Murph, Your video is timely! I have a new Masterbuilt Smoker and 2 shoulders going in at 6 AM for a family celebration tomorrow night. Plenty of morton's salt, pepper, vinegar and Texas Pete on hand. NO CATSUP! I find that if you play music the pork says tender! Low and slow

Well, what a weekend! Truly a high-speed weekend for the Madeira! Rip and Spanky would have been proud. The travel was killer (we left Fayetteville, NC at 9 am yesterday morning, and I arrived back home in Michigan at 11:30 pm), and I've had a total of 15-16 hours of sleep in the last four nights - but it was completely worth it! Friday night and Saturday afternoon were an awesome surf party, which we will never forget! What a pleasure to finally get to meet Crispy and be a part of his celebration of surf/instro music - we were truly honored that he invited us. And how wonderful to see SO MANY old friends again (Moon Dawg, Carol, Fady, the Mystery Men, the Surge, the Ninth Wave, Bob Surf King), and make quite a few new ones (Aqualads, Noel, Cousin Mary, Mike Morphbalio, Kill, Baby, Kill, the Monterreys, the Atom Bumz, and probably others I am forgetting right now - forgive me if I did)! That familiar feeling of close camraderie was in full force - it's really amazing to me that whether it's SoCal with the SG101 convention, Europe with the Surfer Joe festival, or the East Coast with the Instro Summit, that feeling is exactly the same each and every time and permeates all those events - passion, love, respect and support! The surroundings may be different, but the atmosphere is identical. Our scene may be small, but it's just the best!

After an 11+ hour drive, we arrived to Chapel Hill at 7:30 pm or so on Friday, checked into our hotel, got some grub, and made our way to The Cave just in time for the Aqualads set. (REALLY bummed out that we missed Klller Filler, and the Mystery Men, especially once I found out that Chad, formerly of the Squares, has joined them as a permanent third guitarist at that show - I'm still bumming about that!) But Aqualads lived up to my HUGE expecations - wow, they blew me away! (I'm going to have a lot more to say about these guys in another thread - we had a wonderful bonding experience this past weekend, and having seen them twice in two days I'm now of the opinion that they are not only a truly world-class band, but in fact one of the very best in the world!) Hung out with the Mystery Men afterwards, and they're such fun young men that the time just flew! Returned to check out our bros Destination: Earth! who delivered the RAWK! Then we went on, and I must say I thought we played much better than we had any right to! It was a good night. Though, I guess it was difficult NOT to have a good night with such positive and incredible vibes from the audience! I imagine this is what rock stars in huge bands get to feel every night - and I'm so grateful that we get to ever feel it, it's the most amazing feeling. Kill, Baby, Kill! went on after ours and delivered a fantastic, super-high-energy performance that I thoroughly enjoyed! They're tight, they're enthusiastic, they're talented, and I have no doubt we'll be seeing a LOT more of them! They ended their set with a bang - literally! A big explosion, the band threw their guitars down, and walked off as an urgent sample kept looping. I couldn't believe Noah threw his beloved Hallmark down on the hard floor! He told me later that the adrenaline got the better of him, and he was regretting it as soon as he did it! But at least it was a throw-down with some finnesse and technique intended to prevent much if any damage to the guitar!

We ended up hanging out and chatting with everybody until about 2:30 am (which, given that I had 3.5 hrs of sleep the night before, should have been much harder than it actually was!). Mike AKA Morphbalio brought in his incredible new Johnny Marr Jag, and was kind enough to let me play it. At first I was put off by the hefty neck, but got used to it very quickly and was thoroughly impressed with the guitar. Still dislike the 24" scale, but it's definitely the best Jag I ever had a chance to play (not that there have been that many).

We got to sleep around 3 am, and I woke up at 9:30 am, feeling surprisingly good. We left the hotel at Noon, and headed to The Station to get some food and check out the informal surf jam. Had no intentions to play, but Crispy encouraged bands to play, so we performed the three songs we had to cut out of the previous night's set due to the time constraints (Tangaroa, Undercurrents, Intruder). It was interesting, as we were playing on the DiPinto guitars that the company's sales rep made available. They felt quite good, actually! (He talked to us afterwards a bit about a sponsorship. Hmmmmm.....) It was a joy to see everybody playing, in particular to catch the Surge's three songs as we weren't going to see them play that night, but also to see the Monterreys (with a very cool version of Malaguena), the Ninth Wave, the Atom Bumz, and all the others. Lots of fun! Unfortunately, I was outside talking to my wife on the phone when Aqualads got up there, but all of a sudden I heard a super-obscure '60s Australian track "Storm Warning" by the (Australian) Nocturnes - I was blown away! I didn't know they were playing, and couldn't believe somebody was actually playing that. So, I ended the conversation and went inside to see them doing it, followed by their own incrediblel "Atlanticus". Wow!

Shortly afterwards, Crispy's Link Wray tribute band Phatlynx followed, and man, they were FANTASTIC!! They had the sound and the feel DOWN. Crispy is a phenomenal guitarist, I was just blown away. It was way too cool for words, and I loved every minute of it, especially that they played Link's "Mustang", my favorite track by him. It was great to see the "I'm Branded" solo contest, and see Carol win it, too, playing her GORGEOUS Ventures model Jazzmaster! Finally, the Rumble record breaking performance was just too much fun!! I'm so glad to have been part of that. The sound made by 20 guitarists playing at once was something to behold. Crispy is a natural-born leader, and was conducting us all like he was born to do it, too.

It was after 4 pm by that point, so we had to take off for Fayetteville, where we were playing that night with Aqualads. We got hit by some unbelievable storms on that trip, maybe the most intense storms I'd ever been in. It was like being in a car wash at points! Wow. But we made it to our hotel safely. It was disappointing that we weren't going to see night 2 of the Instro Summit, but we were looking forward to seeing Aqualads again - and were most certainly NOT disappointed. I'll write about our Saturday night in another thread.

Anyway, it was an unforgettable Friday and Saturday, and thanks again to Crispy for making it all happen. You ROCK, my friend!! As somebody already said, you've definitely created something very special there. Thank you!!

Ivan
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Last edited: May 07, 2012 19:04:30

I just read Ivan's great posting of his Summit experience. Glad you enjoyed it, and I'm humbled that a man of your talent would appreciate the guitar licks of a 4th rate hack like myself. As for the Madeira, allow me to quote my own Facebook page:

Have you ever seen a band where EVERY SINGLE FRIGGIN' NOTE WAS ABSOLUTELY GODDAMN AWESOME? I did tonight.

You fellers set the bar real high this weekend, and bygod, everybody went for it. Somedays, I am one lucky sonovagun, and this weekend I got three of them days! Hoo Hah!

--Crispy

To echo what's already been said, Friday night's show was a blast. It was fun to finally see Destination: Earth, and Kill, Baby, Kill!, to see how Man or Astroman?'s influence lives on. The Mystery Men? and Aqualads impressed me mightily, and the Madeira blew the roof off. MC Crispy gave it all a fun hillbilly DIY vibe, but he also kept the band sets starting and ending right on time! I scooped up CDs by Killer Filler, Mystery Men?, and Aqualads (3!). Best, it was very cool to hang with Ivan, his bandmates, Eddie K., Mike and Sandy, and to meet surfsters I hadn't met yet. Next year I'll try upping the dose to 2 or 3 nights!

I just want to thank Crispy and Killer Filler. All the work to pull this off, the constant support for the other bands, and you still had time to slay us with your mad musicanship. All hail the Kings of Wray!

This is Noel. Reverb's at maximum an' I'm givin' 'er all she's got.

Congrats Crispy!

Site dude - S3 Agent #202
Need help with the site? SG101 FAQ - Send me a private message - Email me

"It starts... when it begins" -- Ralf Kilauea

Here! Here! To Crispy! ...and equal props to the bands from near and far that brought it big time.

What a great weekend of Instro & Surf in NC. I feel so lucky to have this sensational event so dang close to home; spoiled really.

Fady

El Mirage @ ReverbNation

Dare I mention a BI-ANNUAL INSTRO SUMMIT ?!

(ducking for cover)

Seriously though, having to wait a another year is going to be tuff.

METEOR IV on reverbnation

tobyroan wrote:

Instro people are the nicest bunch of folks around. It sounds like an awful cliche, but it's almost like a weird, reverb-y family.

This is true. If there are any exceptions, I haven't met them so far. And, Toby, it was nice to meet you.

This is Noel. Reverb's at maximum an' I'm givin' 'er all she's got.

thanks for the plug for the convention Mom,

as for the people in the surf scene,
I'd agree with that, for about 98% of the people I know.
There are a couple I dont like, but I'm sure they feel the same way about me.

Jeff(bigtikidude)

Last edited: May 09, 2012 15:26:59