June 2004

If one considers how Grateful St. Louis is for The Kind, The Shwag and Jake's Leg, there's no doubt that this city certainly knows how to honor its Dead. Truckin' into town are two of the ultimate Dead cover bands. Straight out of the kennel comes RatDog. Led by former Grateful guitarist Bob Weir, the band plays a repertoire of Bob's solo material, Dead favorites and, of course, select tracks from RatDog's premier 10 track CD, Evening Mood.

Sad but true.....Phish is on hiatus after touring for 15 years and as of now they have no plan to unite anytime soon. Fortunately, some of the Phishies are still making music - and plenty of it. Anastasio just finished recording a new album with Oysterhead, a new band comprised of Primus bassist Les Claypool and Police drummer Stewart Copeland. However, this solo show will display the talents of bassist Tony Markellis and drummer Russ Lawton alongside Trey.

I just have to agree with the other commentaries on the Trey Anastasio concert at Alpine Valley! Trey and the band were outstanding! I also read that Trey commented that Alpine Valley is "really the best place to play in the world." Whether Trey said that or not - it is true!

I hope everyone will make it out to East Troy sometime - Alpine Valley is a great place for a concert - especially when it is Trey Anastasio..

Truly amazing, that is all that really needs to be said about these two! I recently attended the two Phil shows at Red Rocks, and the reuniting show with Bobby in Oklahoma. They left me speechless and wanting more. Of course, being in school, for me all good things come to an end. However, I know that Phil will still be playing that bass until the last breath he takes, and for that I am forever grateful.

Time to stifle your shrieks and open your minds, dear readers, for you will find that this is a story outside of the parameters of Judaism.  A story not about desecrating The Body, but one of adorning it, rewarding it.  It is about a little needle and a whole lot of Bacitracin.  You've read the title; you know what I'm talking about.I was not raised in a home particularly concerned with religion.  Channukah was just like any other week and cheeseburgers weren't outlawed due to kashrut but for cholesterol content.

We went to Van Morrison at the wiltern which is kind of a stuffy, lied center sort of place.  no one was dancing, but we HAD to...people were upset behind us for standing up at a rock-n-roll concert...so we tried the aisle...the ushers told us we couldn't dance there...so ro' went to the manager to find out where we could dance, she said dance in your seat, maybe you'll start a trend.