On Sunday, the revelers at the second annual Mile High Music Festival were granted a temporary reprieve from the heat.  The sky was cloudy, and lo!  The grounds were clean!  The night before, as I waded through a sea of discarded plastic beer cups, it occurred to me that perhaps a better way to save the planet would have been to sell freely refillable beer cups, in the hopes that folks would use the same cup all day, rather than burning through five or six.  Now I’m all in favor of just about any recycling program you could think of, but refillable beer

Twiin Productions--the event producers of the WEST BEACH MUSIC & ARTS FESTIVAL, one of America’s only beach festivals--has confirmed several additions to its music line-up. BEN HARPER AND RELENTLESS7, SLIGHTLY STOOPID, DONAVON FRANKENREITER, THE BRAVERY and BASSNECTAR are the new additions to the three-day event--Friday, September 18, Saturday, September 19 and Sunday, September 20, 2009 in Santa Barbara, CA.

As I went off to bed Friday night, the weather turned very chilly and was beginning to settle in my head, foreshadowing a good  head cold.  And later in the night, our fellow campers had a fire pit going, whose some for some reason just that night seemed to sweep underneath our tent fly and fill my sinuses. I woke up achy and feeling like crap. As I stumbled toward my morning coffee, the sky was cloudy and threatened to rain. I talked with one of the recycling people and he said that though rain wasn't forecast, it wouldn't get warm, just up to the late 60s by dinner time.

After last night's rain, it dawned sunny and warm with a few clouds. The humidity was greatly reduced, too, promising to be a great day for music.

I had long been hearing about both the beauty of Nelson Ledges Quarry Park, a place that I had been meaning to go for years, and the great new band that Klyph Black had formed called Rumor Has It.  So it was with great anticipation that I wander over on Saturday afternoon of Gratefulfest weekend to see the band, at the main stage located just steps from a huge lake, and within the shady shadows cast by the trees that are all over this beautiful festival location.

I started off my musical day with two exceptional bands that weren’t on the program. Enchanted Ape and Mountain Standard Time played acoustic sets in the VIP Chill Tent. Enchanted Ape had a guest guitarist join them, a performer who had played with frontman Chris Obrien years before and who added some really nice vocal backups. The regular guitarist will come in Friday just before Enchanted Ape’s slot that day. Chris also added a tenor sax player to this acoustic set.

SONIC YOUTH, THE JESUS LIZARD,BUILT TO SPILL, THE GOSSIP, DEERHUNTER, BLACK LIPS, THE THERMALS, PELA, THE PAINS OF BEING PURE AT HEART, EARTH, MOONDOGGIES, SPINNERETTE, THE DUTCHESS AND THE DUKE, MIKA MIKO, THE BLAKES, SLEEPY EYES OF DEATH, GIRLS, HEY MARSEILLES, THE MALDIVES, TRUCKASAURUS, AKIMBO, PAST LIVES, FUTURE OF THE LEFT, MICACHU & THE SHAPES, JAPANDROIDS, THE LONELY FOREST, FENCES, STARFUCKER, FAUX PUNK, NEW FACES, D.BLACK, HOTELS, FATAL LUCCIAUNO,PICA BEATS, SPACEMAN, FLEXIONS, THE LIVE!, AWESOME COLOR, WILD ORCHID CHILDREN, SGT MAJOR III, AUDACITY, BOW + ARROW, SOL, SING SING

In a precedent-setting move for American music festivals, ALL POINTS WEST MUSIC & ARTS FESTIVAL organizers have just confirmed the U.S. festival debut of JAY-Z.  The hip-hop superstar and pop culture icon will take over the headlining slot for the opening night (Friday, July 31) of the critically acclaimed annual event. 

The seventh annual 10,000 Lakes Festival opened yesterday to a large crowd that seemed small. This was partly due to the fact that the Main Stage had two acts running against the Saloon Stage (called the Vitamin Water Syn Saloon Stage this year). The Field Stage and Barn Stages were dark until 11:30 pm. This meant that the focus of last night’s audience was on the Main Stage acts: Gomez and Widespread Panic. Unfortunately, this drew some of the crowd away from the acts up the hill at the Saloon.

The group that has for more than 13 years brought you Quixote’s True Blue, Sancho’s Broken Arrow, Cervantes’ Masterpiece Ballroom, Dulcinea’s 100th Monkey and Owsley’s Golden Road, is making their foray into the festival business with Dancin’ In The Streets, which is set for Aug. 7, 8 and 9.