The Chameleon

Yeah after a little digging I cam up with this. Looks like it could be a reality... check the link: Superball 9

I think if any of us was busted with 3oz of weed in texas this would be a bit different.

I hope it is on. I just booked a hotel. But I am not sure what that music today page proves. It says nothing about Watkins Specifically. It could be for anyshow upcoming in the second leg of the tour.

Lawns are where the party is at for a Buffett show anyways!

I am totally excited! Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Refer Band return to the Molson Amphitheater Sat. July 16th. Jimmy puts on the best vibe I've seen at a show since the Grateful Dead. Lots of margarita's and lot crazies. tickets go on sale Thursday (for live nation pre-sale), Firday for AMEX front of the line and Saturday general public.

Many of you may not know who Melvin Sparks was. To me he is/was one of my main inspirations on the guitar. A very underated Jazz guitarist and father of the Acid Jazz movement who in later years crossed over into the Jam world with Karl Denison and the Greyboy Allstars. A true Giant.. Here is some bio info... Guitarist Melvin Sparks, a soul-jazz legend and acid-jazz pioneer, died yesterday at his Mt. Vernon, New York, home from heart failure. He would have turned 65 next week. Reports indicate he died from complications associated with diabetes. Sparks made his name in the late '60s and early '70s as a soulful guitarist—or “gittar" player, as he called himself—accompanying Jack McDuff, Lonnie Smith, Lou Donaldson, Charles Earland, Jimmy McGriff and countless other soul-jazz stars. “But for the last two decades," wrote Sparks' friend Annabel Lukins on Jambands.com, “it was the jam-band scene that cherished him as a hidden treasure. As the Acid Jazz style he helped pioneer enjoyed a revival in the '90s, its new generation reached out to Sparks with heartfelt reverence and the guitarist found appreciative new fans in the audiences of Galactic, The Greyboy Allstars, Karl Denson's Tiny Univers, Derek Trucks and Robert Walter's 20th Congress." After becoming an essential part of New York's then thriving soul-jazz scene of the late 1960s, the guitarist began recording his own records, including Sparks (1970), Spark Plug (1971) and Akilah (1973) for Prestige (the home of soulful jazz that later became famed as “acid jazz"), Texas Twister (Eastbound, 1974), Melvin Sparks '75 (Westbound, 1975) and Sparkling (Muse, 1981). At the height of the Acid Jazz craze in the mid '90s, listeners rediscovered Sparks' rapid-fire soulful boogaloo-styled guitar at the heart of most all of their favorite pieces, reviving the guitarist's career. Sparks waxed the groove-laden I'm A Gittar Player (Cannonball, 1997) and four discs for the Savant label including What You Hear Is What You Get (2003) and This Is It! (2005). Melvin Sparks-Hassan was born March 22, 1946, in Houston, Texas. His mother ran a café popular with area musicians and Melvin recalled folks like Don Wilkerson, Billy Harper, Cal Green and Stix Hooper hanging out there. Melvin began to play guitar at age 11 and credits Cal Green, guitarist with Hank Ballard and the Midnighters for many years, providing a good deal of his inspiration. While still in school, Melvin played in a combo with Hammond B-3 great Leon Spencer, Jr., who would go onto record often with the guitarist later in New York. Melvin left school in 1963 to play professionally. His first major gig was with the Upsetters, the famous R&B show band. He spent three years with this band, backing everyone from Little Willie John to Little Richard and Sam Cooke. He left the band in 1967 to join Brother Jack McDuff. After leaving McDuff, Melvin spent a year with organist Lonnie Smith then formed a working trio with another organist, Reuben Wilson. Sparks can be heard on Wilson's brilliant 1970 album Blue Mode, the 1973 The Cisco Kid and 1998's Down With It. The guitarist also waxed organist Charles Earland's hit album Black Talk! (1969), featuring the wildly popular “More Today Than Yesterday." Earland and Sparks performed and recorded frequently together throughout the years, right up until the organist's 1999 death. During the 1970s, Sparks got his highest-profile gig to that point backing saxophonist Lou Donaldson on the funk-jazz classics “Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky," “Hot Dog," “Donkey Walk" and “The Caterpillar." Melvin Sparks' very first album, titled with his appropriately apt surname and an exclamation point only, yielded a radio hit with his cover of Sly & the Family Stone's “Thank You (Falettin' Me Be Mice Elf Again)" but was later rediscovered for the dance-floor covers of The Coasters' “Charlie Brown" and Eric Burdon and War's “Spill the Wine." Two of my very favorite Melvin Sparks performances of all time include Rusty Bryant's “Soul Liberation," from the great Ohio tenor player's 1970 Prestige album Soul Liberation (included on the Legends of Acid Jazz—Rusty Bryant CD), and the guitarist's own “Conjunction Mars," from the 1971 album Spark Plug (included on the Legends of Acid Jazz—Melvin Sparks CD). These two songs alone are worth hearing over and over again to hear the inspired contagiousness Sparks could generate. He was a tremendously focused player, never losing sight of a solo's need to engage or its power to enrapture a listener, body and soul. Melvin Sparks' contribution to the funky sound of jazz is immeasurable. So many recordings went from soulful to memorable with the addition of Melvin Sparks' guitar, a signature sound and a fluid rustle that gave groove to everything he touched—from all the major organists to saxists Houston Person, Hank Crawford, Plas Johnson and Red Holloway and vocalists Jimmy Scott, Etta Jones, Leon Thomas, Dakota Staton and Arthur Prysock. Melvin Sparks, who had a large extended family, reunited with drummer Alvin Queen (who recorded with the guitarist in the mid-1980s) and organist Leon Spencer, who had long since before moved back to Houston, in New York City last October to play a successful week at the Jazz Standard. Hopefully someone recorded the event for posterity. “I just love to see people have a good time," Melvin Sparks once said. “They don't have to dance if they don't want to as long as they leave happy and long as it helps them get through whatever it is they're trying to get through." Melvin Sparks helped many of us get through.

R.IP. in LSD Sorry to hear him go in such a sad way. Car Crash. So sensless. My life would not have been the same without him and Albert Hoffman. Interesting to note that Hoffman lived past 100 and Owsley died at 76 and could have lived longer. SO much for LSD shortening your life span.

ICe cube's cousin. What did he die of anyways?

ASWESOME! I saw Huey Lewis at Casino Windsor last year and it killed! His band is amazing and his guitarist is on a high level, almost Trey like if you can beleive it. Highly recomended. BTW Private Eyes is a Hall and Oates tune.

[color:blue]So turns out me and my buddy both got lucky and got our requests filled for Bethel Woods. Unfortunently we don't need all these tickets. So I have a 3 tickets (lawns) for each night in Bethel for a total of 9 tickets. All 9 is $450 (Face, no shipping cost) or I will sell sets of thre for $52 eac which is face plus charges. If interested message me.

I have 3 tickets for each night in Bethel (9 in total)(all lawns) for sale. all I ask is face value. If interested message me.

SO I a super thrilled to get tickets to this sure to be barn burner of a 3 show engagement. So who else got tickets? Also were are you staying? I was able to get a hotel in Port Jervis, but it is almost 1hr away. Everything else is booked or farther away. Anyone get lucky with hotels or have the inside track on were to stay? See you there!

I can't agree with your friend. Hi svoice and musician ship is still first class. I want to go to the show but fear tickets will be $120+ Massey is a small venue for a superstar like him.

I was at Levon's Ramble for this NYE. Would love to go back to that part of NY state for Phish in Bethel, but having been in that part of the statev recently I can tell you hotels are super scarse. It is mostly small bed & breakfasts and small towns of which are by this time sold out. The biggest problem with those dates is no place to stay for the 40-60,000 that will show up. Yikes!

Seger is a legend and I am gonna get tickets. Even if it is just to watch all the drunken Q107 Dad's bro it up in their glory. I just really hope tickets are not through the roof. I wanna see Seger but I do not want to drop a $100 on a ticket if I can help it.

This show is tonight! and it should be wicked. I have been added tot he bill to DJ prior and after the show. I will be playing elctronica (dubstep, drum & bass, trip hop etc.) rather than my usual vintage disco and funk. I am interested to see this new venue too.

That would be super-magnefique-fantastic and ooh-la-la. It's been a long time since they've played Moreal

The line up is OK, but I am not sure it's soo good it's going to get me to drive 16hrs and deal with 90,000 people again. I've done it 3 times before but I find Bonnaroo is just too big for it's britches and the sheer mass of peopel is making it a negative concert experience. I'm going to wait for the possible Phish Watkins Glen and catch Buffalo Springfield somewhere else. Everone else ont his line up I've seen at some time. Here's hopong Rothbury happens this year.

I totally agree. I am glad that a band that actually plays music rather than presses play (I'm looking at you Bieber, Gaga, Drake, Usher) won something, but I find the music pretty average and unmemorable. I just don't find there's any rteal groove or cool textures or anything I can grtab on to as a listener. My 2 cents. I feel the same way reharding Broken Social Scene and Alexis on Fire too.

Can't wait ot see heady human grilled cheeses' on the lot.

Shocked that the Dead have allowed thier music and likeness to be used int his film. They are notorious for not allowing that. They must have really liked the project. Looks great.

Johnny Rabb is a midblowing drummer hands down. Simply insane. Search his name on youtube to see. Here's a link: Love to see these guys.

Hope he is OK Buffett is one of a kind.

Never had any search issues at Bonnaroo the 3 times I have been there. and yes the U2 thing is a bummer, at least it's not Kanye.

Insane!