Once
again I am entrusted with temporary stewardship of the Medicine Show
stage at The Maverick Festival – an annual (now in its eleventh
year) celebration of all things Americana. This year’s event has
much to recommend it in terms of a Commonwealth take on the genre,
with bands from Australia, Canada, Wales and the Independent Republic of Yorkshire alongside such luminary risers as The Cordovas and Southern Avenue,
both of which I caught during drink breaks in the action on my pop-up stage
and of whom I’m sure you’ll be hearing much more quite soon. Of
course the Lingua Franca of the genre is Hillbilly, and it is often
quite the disconcert to hear a Southern Gothic, gibbous moon murder
ballad being back-announced in a broad Sudbury accent. I will later
have a conversation with Alicia Best from A Different Thread about there being nothing more country than singing in your
own accent, or whether there should be a mandatory short written exam before
you are alllowed to adopt the argot of the Louisianans during your
performance - “Describe, in no more than two hundred words, what a
‘bayou’ is, and how you intend to get under it. You have fifteen
minutes”. Later I learn that Alicia is from Manhattan.
The
Medicine Show is a boutique-within-a-boutique part of the festival,
situated betwixt bar and barbecue, and intended as an acoustic sorbet
during band changeovers in the adjacent The Barn stage. Basically I
get a list of artists – all volunteers, for this is no
contractually-obligated add-on for their part – who are going to
show up, plug in, and give it their best ten minutes or until I get
the signal that (say) Danny and The Champions of The World are good
to go. It’s a spectacularly popular diversion amongst both
performers and civilians alike, with the former eager to get up and
indulge in what is for many of us an experience akin to musical
speed-dating, and the latter almost equally as keen to let me know
that “….the vocals could come up a bit”. Oddly enough, it
rarely happens the other way around.
I
do have a couple of trigger warnings. Anyone who asks for “...a bit
more reverb in the monitors” clearly needs keeping an eye on. Anyone who
asks if you’d like to try some delicious tequila from their hip
flask, on the other hand, can have as much or as little reverb as
they darned well like. This year I am not called upon to mic up a
flatfoot stomp box*, however I am presented with a pre-bug mic’d
version with a DI output. If this doesn’t mean anything to you,
relax. This time last year I didn’t know what a -20dB PAD and
ground lift switch did either. I am also reminded that the most
talented artists are also frequently the most personable. This year’s
above and beyond award goes once again to Lachlan Bryan, his band,
and fellow travellers The Weeping Willows, all of whom gave selflessly and
at nothing under magnanimously maximum effort. They also all had
leads, capos, tuners and songs and were ready to go the instant the
start flag fell, even if that did mean passing over a Thai Green
Curry for someone to hold while they played.
But
it’s not all about the performances. Offstage, there is
camaraderie, japerie, cheese, a chance to meet up and let off steam
with your fellow musicians. If you spend most of your time cooped up in a
van, who can blame you if you want to stay up until two in the
morning loudly creating
metaphors
to describe the size of Lenny Kravitz’s genitalia, or replacing the
last letter in words that end with an ‘S’ with the letter ‘T’?
Frankly, I think they’d been hanging out a little too long with the
Yorkshire contingent at that point and some of it had rubbed off.
As it were. Sooner or later though, the
music takes priority again. “He’ll be here at about twelve”
crackles my walkie-talkie. “Should be fine. Oh, and he’s bringing
his three year-old, so you’re on child-minding duties for ten
minutes too”.
*Confonted with a stompbox, banjo, acoustic double bass and vocal accompaniment, I ask a passing sound engineer for any advice. "Make a run for it?" he suggests.
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