Funk Babblings

Sadly, I only managed to make it to one evening of Comfest, and that was dominated by watching two performances: Circus Of Cool and bellydance-enhanced Yogi Poets. I got some good pictures though.

The 2008 Comfest schedule is up.

Looks like the big news is Black 47 and Michelle Shocked.

Got to ride my bike to Comfest. In the rain. It actually felt good. But it seemed to rain hardest when I was riding.

Saw Kate perform her poetry in her very own timeslot. The announcer wasn't clear at first that she was a poet rather than a singer. Eventually she had more than two people in the audience, but I believe it took her Breasts poem to make that happen.

Hung out with chronarchy and singingwren (and later styskel and ceolnamara) at the Three Cranes Grove booth most of the day. (Despite not being at all involved with ADF.) Enjoyed the scattered-microbits of a solstice ritual they did periodically throughout the day, especially the Nature Spirits part. Finally met some people I keep hearing mentioned.

Sun finally came out in the evening. That big ball of fire in the sky, not the band. Well, they did too, but that was after the first Sun went down.

Attempted to go see Marcy Mays perform, discovered she'd been replaced on the schedule with someone quite unlike her. Rather disappointed.

Made up for missing Marcy by checking out Hope Vitellas on a whim, even though I didn't think I knew anything about her. She was really good. Husky-voiced almost-solo-acoustic (she did have a backing electric guitar on most songs). And I realized that I've not only seen her play before, but even have a CD single (of one of the songs she played tonight), but both were with her full band, Camora.

Also saw The Sun (the band this time) play. Five guys in white playing slightly psychedelically-tinged rock. There was definitely a 70s vibe going. I decided I like them better in the studio than live, though I did stay to hear my favorite song of theirs, "Justice".


Tomorrow is lots more music and lots more people to talk to. Better get to bed.

The schedule for Comfest has been posted!

Friday through Sunday, June 23-25, I'll be in Columbus spending almost all my time in Goodale Park. Here are the parts of the schedule that currently have the most interest for me:

Fri noon-1 (Live Arts Stage) drum circle
Fri 2:30-3 (Live Arts Stage) Kate Weilnau (poetry)
Fri 7:50-8:20 (Solar Stage) Marcy Mays (ex-Scrawl)
Fri 10-11 (Bozo Stage) The Sun

Sat noon-1 (Gazebo Stage) Room Nineteen
Sat 1:30-2 (Solar Stage) Michelle Lundy (ex-Dogrocket)
Sat 4-5 (Offramp Stage) The Townsmen
Sat 6-7 (Bozo Stage) Watershed
Sat 6-7 (Jazz Stage) Circus of Cool
Sat 7-8 (Bozo Stage) Willie Phoenix Band

Sun 5-6 (Live Arts Stage) Poetry Slam
Sun 6-7 (Live Arts Stage) drum circle
Sun 6:15-7 (Offramp Stage) Red Dahlia

Obviously there are a couple evenings when I'll have to make a decision about what to do....

Update: I somehow missed Marcy Mays on the Solar Stage when I first looked at the schedule, and was surprised not to see some Scrawl presence. Too bad Manda And The Marbles are still missing; I think they're trying to figure out who their guitarist is. (Watershed and Willie Phoenix are others I'd be surprised to see absent from the schedule, but happily they're there.)

I realized a couple days ago that I'll miss Comfest in Columbus this year because we'll be at Pagan Spirit Gathering. It's not surprising that they conflict; Comfest is always on the last weekend of June (well, unless wedding planners book the park first), and PSG is always the week surrounding the summer solstice. There are enough non-overlapping years that I haven't had to get used to that conflict the way I've had to get used to PSG always conflicting with Father's Day. The trouble is that both events are important to me, but Comfest is more comfortable for me, especially with all the great music going constantly.

It also looks like Karen will finally get to drag me to Pennsic in August -- unless I'm working by then and can't get away. Or sneezing my head off. Should be quite an experience.

With two week-long camping events coming up, I'm starting to think that renting an SUV (gasp!) might be worthwhile. I wonder if there's some pay-for-miles-not-time deal I can make that will take advantage of not actually driving that whole week. What I really need is an expandable car (forget the flying car, I want to keep my foot) so that normally I can happily drive my beautiful and maneuverable little coupe, then when friends come along it becomes a four-door with plenty of legroom in the back, and when I need to haul stuff it expands into a truck.

Anyway, coming up next weekend is Marcon in Columbus. Only a bunch of geeks would spend Memorial Day Weekend cooped up in a hotel for three days, but it still can be fun. Maybe I'll wander over to Goodale Park at some point to try to make up for missing Comfest. And I'll definitely have to head up to Bernie's on Friday night to catch The Secret Sound Of The NSA celebrating their new release.