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Kool and the gang...not so Kool


AdamH

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Last night's Bluesfest festivities were a mixed bag to say the least. I was all set to hear "get down on it" but needless to say Kool and the Gang was horrible. Ok, horrible is a strong word so I'll be PC about it and say it was geared to a different audience than I would have thought (audience of deaf people maybe?). I thing the first sign we were in danger was the pre-recorded "Warm up" intro that had cutsof their greatest hits and a goofy narration. It was downhill from there. If I had to say one good thing about them, it's that they have a good choreographer

On the upside, I caught the first half of Spearhead and was lovin' it. High energy positive hip hop with a santana-inspired guitarist and kickass rhythm section. I left halfway and checked out Zen Guerilla on the Birdman stage. Anybody else see them? I ended up there for the rest of the night because those guys were giving me heavy heavy doses of black sabbath stylings and I couldn't get enough of it. The transition from happpy hippy spearhead to massive feedback and spinal tap cliches (with lyrics like "fall in to my electric ocean" how can you go wrong?) was almost too much to handle.

Anyway, both bands were great.

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I only managed to catch the first half of Kool and the Gang's encore "celebrate"

after about 30 seconds of that, I figured Spearhead was probably the place to be.

Not to totally dis Kool. They definitely have they're place. Most likely at a mansion party in 1977 where everyone could "celebrate" disco with giant salad bowls of cocaine, and pretend it was all ok.

Spearhead was great. I really enjoyed the show. I would say Santana would be the last player to come to mind when thinking of the guitarist, but whatever. They were all excellent players. The guitarist really surprised me at the end of the night by pulling out some blazing country licks. All in all. I thought they were great. I'd go see them again every time, but I'd probably never listen to their music outside of being at a live performance.

good times indeed.

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Though I was pretty excited for Kool & the Gang, after about six minutes I left to go check out Hawksley Workman, who kicked my ass. I popped back to Kool in time for Jungle Boogie and Ladies Night, but to be honest, I preferred waiting at the Black Sheep stage for Spearhead to start to watching more Gang.

Spearhead was amazing. I haven't jumped up and down like that since the last Spearhead show at Babylon.

Speaking of Babylon, see y'all tonight.

Oh, Pablo, Celebrate came out in '79.

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We were all set to go to Kool and the Gang. We showed up at booche and sally's for sally's weeklong B-day extravaganza and talked about staying there to play Mario Party 4 on the Gamecube.

What a fun game. Taking peoples stars is fun, but losing 'em ain't so fun. I sure got a kick out of listening to the Greasemonkey explain all of the mini-games in detail. What a riot!

We listened to some acoustic Warren from Bonnaroo, and a variety of mp3's off of booche's PC, including the always popular Freeker/Huxtable setblender version of Maggie's Farm.

I would have liked to have caught Spearhead but we were addicted to Mario Party 4.

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Guest Low Roller

Kool and the Gang ROCKED! Rarely have I had the opportunity to see such masters on stage controlling the crowd with their energetic and unyeilding performance. Every song was played with such passion and exhuberance that I couldn't help but groove to the music. Best show yet at Bluesfest.

I also think that the lawnchairs are a good idea, that O.J. is innocent, and that Dubbya Bush is an exemplary statesman.

See y'all tonight for Allman's. [big Grin]

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Guest Low Roller

Well, it's not that they were terrible, it's just that they had the cheese turned up to 11. The two lead singers were playing that stupid "my side of the crowd can be louder than your side of the crowd" game for what seemed like an eternity. I remember hearing from the crowd "Turn down the suck! Turn up the good!!"

The sax player did some nice solos, and Kool, the bass player, was sounding good. They pioneered the disco-funk genre, so I'll cut them some slack, admit I was mildly entertained, and leave it at that.

I'm glad that they opened for Spearhead.

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Sally had old-timing friends from Kingston (who now live in Vancouver) show up last night. They werent about to go out for Bluesfest............

Anyways, K&tG sucked?

Thats too bad, really, it is.

You would think any band together for 35 years had their act together. I was sure it would have been a good set.

Oh well.................... [Roll Eyes]

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