Concert report (and Xingu update).

Last night I attended the second "Pyramid Party" - the first was in April - somewhere south of Cairo, Georgia, in an isolated field distinguished by the unique "Pyramid House." In it dwelled Chelsea Luker, Xingu's saxophonist/flute/vocalist and nothing short of lovable, and her boyfriend Rob Sipsky, frontman for Mars Retrieval Unit, and formerly of Glass. Both are moving to Portland, Oregon (Chelsea will be transferred there for her day job). As I wrote in the "A great band ..." post below, the other members of Xingu do not want to follow Chelsea to Portland. Rob told me that Xingu will take a break, and try to continue without her while they search for a replacement. In my opinion that's a very tall order.
Back to the house: I would estimate each side is 20 feet at the base, and the pyramid being about 20 feet high. The lower floor has the living room/kitchen, a small bedroom, and bathroom/laundry room/closet. The loft, accessible via a ladder, is the main bedroom, with glow-in-the-dark stars (made vivid by a black light) affixed to the ceiling/walls all the way to the apex. Partygoers toured the house and availed themselves of the bathroom and air conditioning.
I told Chelsea: "You must have a deep well of patience - I couldn't stand having a lot of people troop through my house!"

As for the music: Xingu did not perform, but I wasn't disappointed since Chelsea (as well as Tony, Xingu's keyboardist) played in a half-hour jam with musicians from the other bands that was phenomenal. Yes, half an hour of continuous music. I was a bit late and missed the first band (The Ums), but got there in time for MRU, and Chris Hall's fine drumming. Other groups included a duo called Polyester Jockstrap or something to that effect, and a Phish tribute band called Shaftey.
The last band to play was well worth the wait. Chris had been raving about Soular System and wanted me to hear them. I'm glad I did; their specialty is old school funk/soul served with a truckload of gusto. The lead vocalist kept things at a rolling boil and kept the crowd of about 50 on its feet. This band is also blessed with a three-man horn section.
Team JRC did its usual excellent job with the sound and lights - John Clark, Alan Slaughter, Ian Fritzsche, and Chris taking turns at the audio board, and Jason Jones on lights. Prior to Polyester whatever's set, Chris and John were desperately trying to find the source of an annoying hum. Chris was swapping cables and jiggling connectors, and John was punching buttons, trying to stop the hum. Finally Chris, in order to access a cable, lifted the lamp that sat atop the board - and then the humming ceased! The lamp had a transformer in its base that caused the hum.

I got acquainted with a few of the concertgoers. I brought my sketchbook along, which contains the original art for my webcomic. Those who saw it were impressed and read it thoroughly. Two of those were musicians who expressed interest in my doing artwork for them. Of course, I told them all about Whole Wheat Radio.
In the Pyramid I met Ian Weir, an artist/musician who played for me and a couple others. His instrument was a wooden box with slots cut into one side forming tabs; the tabs are struck with mallets to produce the sound. It was well played.
The concert was outdoors but the weather, apart from being warm and somewhat humid, was cooperative; it cooled down before midnight and the stars and full moon, along with a mist over the field (a combination of fog from a nearby pond, fog from the stage, and smoke from cigarettes, fireworks and chronic) made things quite ethereal. A table with plenty of free food was set up near the Pyramid, along with two kegs. I only had some sodas and cheese.

A woman young enough to be my daughter approached me midway through the evening, . She wore a button which read: "I'm NORML."
"You're eccentric, aren't you?" she asked.
"I guess."
She smiled and shook my hand. "Good to meet you. I like eccentric people, artistic people."
All I could say was "So do I."