Bob Lefsetz: "Jam band music is the new heavy metal."

[MarcO]

My favorite e-newsletter has arrived at the subject of jambands:

We lived for "Whipping Post". The version that took up the entire fourth side of "Fillmore East". It was a ritual. At the end of a long day the band from Georgia and a little smoke would calm us down.

The previous spring, only insiders, the cognoscenti, were aware of "Idlewild South". Suddenly, the double live album was wafting out of seemingly every dorm room. The Brothers had taken over.

And then came the Dead. The following fall the Allmans had a companion. Jack Straw from Wichita visited our college campus as part of a three disc Grateful Dead set entitled "Europe '72". This was enough to turn a dedicated early listener like me, who preferred "St. Stephen/The Eleven" from the original (and still best!) "Live/Dead" album, off. But I marveled how suddenly everybody was talking about seeing the Grateful Dead. Yes, the biggest band on campus was now the Grateful Dead.

Did you ever see the Dead? They'd play for four hours. One would be utterly horrible. Two would be mediocre. And one would be TRANSCENDENT! You had to settle in for the ride, you had to commit, you had to DEDICATE YOURSELF! The gig wasn't broken down into bite-sized chunks you could consume in an hour and then go home. It was about exploration, and setting your mind free.

Creative work both drains you and fires you up. You're spent, but you're on edge. The only thing that can soothe you is music. Which is how I found myself listening to Sirius two Sunday nights ago, after 11 P.M., after I finished my KLSX radio show. I started at the Spectrum, channel 18, which most closely aligns with my tastes. But whatever they were playing didn't ring my bell so I pushed the button on the Alpine to take me one station down, to Jam On.

How Sirius could get this so right and XM so wrong is illustrative of a giant hole in XM's thinking. Satellite radio is all about filling niches. Making sure there's a station for EVERYBODY! But trying to placate an unidentifiable middle, which already had options, XM canceled MusicLab and replaced it with dreck like Big Tracks, eighties music that was already available ELSEWHERE!

Not that MusicLab was really a jam band channel. It was a curious hybrid, of progressive rock and jamsters. Placating no one entirely, but at least some of the people some of the time. But now it was gone. And fans of this music had nowhere to go. Except to Sirius. Which at least knows there's a jam band SCENE!

Yes, there's a scene. The two prime exponents are Phish and the Dave Matthews Band. Phish were the Grateful Dead without all the mistakes. Phish was NEVER off. Unfortunately, their material wasn't even as good as that of the Dead's, which was notoriously spotty. But the playing was transcendent, and when they did covers! Whew, even the STONES don't play "Loving Cup" anymore! As for Dave... He's purveying a quieter sound, one that sneaks up on you. It's less acid and more marijuana. You start mellow, and then he LIFTS you. And sure, Dave was helped by hit records, but even without them Dave could sell out everywhere, because he's offering just that good an EXPERIENCE! Not based on choreography, or backdrops, but sheer music.

But Phish broke up. And now Bonnaroo, which was BUILT on the concept of jam bands, is broadening its spectrum. Giving the illusion that jam band music is passe, that its peak is behind us, but nothing could be further from the truth. Jam band music is the new heavy metal, the music ignored by the major labels that is a GUARANTEED DRAW on the road.

The great thing about the jam bands is they don't CARE about the mainstream. It's irrelevant to them. Rather than raining down from the sky, they seep up through the earth. And someone stumbles on the beautiful flower they've sprouted and tells ALL his buddies. Suddenly, you've got a coterie of devotees. Who will see every reasonably-priced gig. And drag along his friends. Who'll spread the word on the Internet. Who'll need live tapes of those shows he DIDN'T attend. Who is committed. Who is a FAN! THIS is the audience Jam On appeals to.

Everything's casual in the music world today. There's no internal fire, none of the passion that can move mountains. "American Idol" is TV fodder. The jukebox hits are evanescent wonders purveyed by lowest common denominator executives who have contempt for the audience. But the jam band world is populated by BELIEVERS! It's all about RESPECT for the audience. Ticket prices are low. The acts give back. Hell, the musicians and fans are in it TOGETHER!

And maybe if you're a college student, or a tribal member, you can penetrate the scene, know who's hip, but the rest of us rely on outlets like Jam On, to clue us in.

So I'm accelerating onto the Santa Monica Freeway and this SOUND starts to come out of my speakers. It's not verse chorus verse kind of stuff. I can tell they're BUILDING towards something. Like a group of Native Americans sitting around the fire plotting. The band is JUST getting down to business.

I'm hooked. There's this strange staccato beat. That's got me tapping the accelerator. I'm in the fast lane. I'm going sixty five, seventy, seventy five, eighty. It's like I'm riding a magnetic rail. Straight towards Santa Monica. And what's keeping me attached to the road is the music.

Which never ends.

I park in front of my house, retrieve the Sunday papers, and when I'm back in my car, this song is STILL playing. And now I'm hoping it will continue all the way to Sherman Oaks, to Felice's house.

Now I'm on the 405. And the band is like a levitating spaceship, the one from "Close Encounters". God, I may not even be attached to the road anymore, I feel like I'm hovering too.

I pass Sunset and now I start to get worried. Maybe this song will NEVER end. I want to hear where it goes. Am I going to have to stay parked in front of Felice's house, riding it out?

But just after Mulholland, not long before I arrive at Felice's abode, the Disco Biscuits' "Basis For A Day" finally ends.

I wrote the title down. I tried to find it P2P. Eventually I got a version. But this wasn't the one.

Turns out the take I heard was from the NEW album. The double live album "The Wind At Four To Fly". And it was 29 minutes and 28 seconds long. And it was distributed by my pals at SCI Fidelity, the String Cheese Incident's record label.

The String Cheese Incident never made a major label deal. They're the Ani DiFranco of the jam band world. Doing everything themselves. Thus, they've never lost their hipness, their cool. In a world where everything's overhyped and oversold, the String Cheese Incident is an oasis. They don't CARE what you think about their music, it's just for THEM and their FANS!

I mean I'd heard of the Disco Biscuits. But with a name like that, how good can they be?

I e-mailed everybody I knew at SCI. Mike Luba said I'd have a package the next day. Which wasn't quite soon enough.

When I put the disc in my computer, it wasn't quite the same experience. But when I took the second copy of the album into my car, it was just like driving Sunday night. And listening on my iPod, over and over again while I was reading on my bed, I realized this was just like college. The music wasn't coming at me, wasn't beating me up, it was WITH ME!

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[Basher]

Great read - thanks for posting.

[zero]

But just after Mulholland, not long before I arrive at Felice's abode, the Disco Biscuits' "Basis For A Day" finally ends.

Classic line... finally ends

I mean I'd heard of the Disco Biscuits. But with a name like that, how good can they be?

Yeah, String Cheese Incident is a far preferable name.

[mattm]

yes

[SmoothedShredder]

Great read! I loved this part

... now I start to get worried. Maybe this song will NEVER end.