Total Blog

HOLY FUCKING SHIT. NICE TOTAL, PEOPLE.
Sorry about taking the profanity gloves off you know, hopefully that's not alienating the all-agers and parents. I honestly only mean it for the emphasis, and not offensively. Here's the deal though: what a freakin' blast of a weekend. From Dan Deacon and the Best Westerns to Iron Lung, Gay Witch Abortion, Sedan to I don't know, Harkonen, we got slayed by great tunes, hugged by great friends and blew our cash on a pretty good pile of records we're only just getting into. Here are my (Josh Vanek's) in no way all-inclusive just-fest highlights:

1) Meeting Brain Tumors at the Thursday barbecue while Bryan Ramirez played noise rock and I had a cold Eddy Out from TF sponsors Kettlehouse. Nicest, shittiestly blown out and blasting band of Total Fest.
2) King Elephant. First band of the fest and they cranked out forlorn, high energy punk full-on. Love the way Booster drums.
3) Listening to the Best Westerns while I worked the door. Didn't see what was going on on stage, but I loved the way they sounded. I like this song in particular. Is that a tuba?
4) Picking up Dan Deacon from the airport, bringing him to the Good Food Store (Total Fest sponsor) and having a cup of Black Coffee (Total Fest sponsor also) and talking some shop. Dan organized Whartscape for years, knows what it's all about, and has been doing his thing seriously DIY-style for years. He just released a great new record called America too.
5) 5 unique copies of the Bugs' first LP Goin Places with hand-drawn covers, purchased at the Record Swap. Eventually selling 'em in the Wantage distro.
6) Lecherous Gaze. 
7) the 5 minutes of Swamp Wolf I saw. Jeezus.
8) Gay Witch Abortion. Dude, I felt like Bill Clinton was president again. And that the Cows might show up with blow up doll masks on, and a dented reveille trumpet.
9) Abe Coley at the Record Swap.
10) The fact that the Havoc distro was at the VFW and they had the Heratys and Mauser LPs, and a Direct Control 7".
11) The fact that the Iron Lung Records catalog traveled with Iron Lung, and that they had the Total Control LP and No Statik 7".
11) Harkonen. Jeez-luh-wheez, what a rad show.
12) Dreamdecay at the VFW.

This is a pretty un-inclusive list frankly, but you know, it's a start. Need also to make a serious nod to Josh Harteis and Paul Hanbarger, the new Total Fest head dudes. They did a good job, and made the transition all too seamlessly. Also, KBGA is our radio station. Let that be on the record. Without a station on which you can hear two straight hours of Total Fest bands, content, stories and interviews, Total Fest ain't what it is. They helped us get Torche and Dan out this year, and KBGA is a powerhouse of community-involved and oriented radio station, run entirely by UM students and volunteers. I wish KBGA.org had a show archive page, because between Tom Helgerson, Tom Daily, Dave Martens, Reggie Herbert, Niki, Julie, Dawn, Dane, Chris Justice, Kevin Sherwood and Hana Montana, you pretty much got your bases covered for all the great music you need in a week. Lots of the specialty DJs are using Mixcloud, so if you hear somebody you like on the stream, dig around on the internet and you might find something like this. Oh, and while we're giving mega-shouts, let's thank Biga Pizza, whose hosting of the Total Feast allows us to keep on our mission of doing Total Fest all-ages. It's a real big solid they do for us, and it's noticed. Pushing publish now, knowing it's way too short a re-cap. Like I said, one dude's only.