Back from Sundance!

So, first question everyone asks.... No, I didn't run into any celebs there. We were there in the 2nd half of the event and I figure most of them are there in the first part.

I spent the last 4 days at the Sundance Film Festival promoting the screening of Chris Valenti's film "800 CDs". We had a fantastic time!

We had a condo built for 4, but this week holding 11 (count 'em!) 11 people. I got a nice chunk of floor space in a room with Jon Zucker and Mark Latham and his wife, Maria.

I found it pretty easy adapting to the cold temps. It was 8 degrees when we arrived. Saturday was nice at a balmy 30 degrees. Even Rob Anthony, from Wisconsin, proclaimed, "Damn, they get a lot of snow here!"

The altitude presented a few more problems. Queasiness and lack of energy the first day. Better after that. The big problem for all us singers was the lack of oxygen at 10,000 feet up! We all had to adjust our styles a bit to get things going, but it worked out pretty well.

Thursday night we played at Cisero's on Main St. Place was jumping! We were smack in the middle of two bands there for an ASCAP showcase. Our group of 8 performers did about 90 minutes and we got great comments all around.

Friday we did some street promotion for the next show. We had sponsors that paid to be in our gift bags. Just try walking down Main St with a box full of freebies. We didn't get more than halfway before everything was gone. They were great for getting our names out there and trading business cards.

Friday night's show was an early slot (3-9pm) at the Sidecar. 6 hours was a long time, so we all got a lot of stage time. For the first time, I had a couple slow dance to LCW! Even when the punchlines hit, they laughed while they danced. I offered to play it at their wedding.

After the gig, I went with Chris Valenti and a couple others to see "Fears Of The Dark", a collection of animated vignettes from French producers. A couple of them were really good. The others forgot about things like plot and characterization. Minor details. ;)

The opening short was called The Apology Line. It was recorded phone calls of people apologizing for things anonomously. I was left both disturbed and bored at the same time. The visuals had little to do with the audio. It was the cliche "artsy indie flick".

Saturday morning I caught another movie with Chris, Michael Finnerty and his girlfriend T, and a few others. It was CSNY: Deja Vu. A documentary on last year's Crosby Stills Nash and Young's Freedom of Speech Tour. I was never a huge fan of the group, but this was a good film. It was mostly about their mission to educate the audience about the politics of our current war and world political situation. Just as they did during Vietnam.

I've never been the type of artist to push political agendas, but to each their own. They did some good stuff, and some stuff that was over the top. I was astounded to see some of the audience members in the film get angry because they group approached politics on stage. Huh? They weren't exactly going to see Kiss, ya know?

All in all, a really good film and a great look at how an artist see their own work and influence.

After the film, I had a mission. Being an Olympic fan, I really wanted to see Olympic Park there in Park City. Salt Lake was the site of the 2002 Winter Olympics. Everyone had separate plans for the afternoon, but my friend Megan opted to join me on the trek. We hopped on a bus expecting to be there in about 20 minutes. We didn't really keep track of time, but after sitting there A LONG time, I asked the driver how soon we'd be there. He said 2 minutes. After another 10, he looked back at us and realized he'd forgotten to tell these two tourists where to get off.

So we hopped off the bus and caught the next one going back the opposite direction. He said he'd drop us off right across the street. He did. Then the sign told us the park was just another 1.6 miles... Uphill. So we stopped in the visitor's center to ask if they had a shuttle. They did, but we had to got back across the street and deep into a shopping mall to catch it. We were told it would be there in about half an hour. We got there in plenty of time and waited 45 minutes, never seeing a shuttle show up.

So after over 3 hours of riding around and trying to get there, we never did. Gave up and hopped a bus back to the condo. I was really hoping to try out the luge track for $5. Even more I'd have liked to taken a ride on the real bobsled run. But that was $200 a head. Probably not happening. :)

So, after that adventure, we had to get to the next show starting at 8pm that night. Best of the gigs by far. We brought a lot of people in to add to the regular crowd. Closing night of the fest and people were ready to party! We did 5 hours of mixing originals with covers. Different combinations of players. I even slipped in a version of "Keep Your Hands To Yourself" by the Georgia Satellites. The crowd was great and we sold the last few copies of 800 CDs we had on hand, plus a bunch of our regular CDs. Jon Zucker and Amy Raasch were unfortunately out due to catching cold, but the rest of us tore the place down. Chris and I closed the show with a rousing version of Booty Call. :)

Then a plane ride home and 13 solid hours of sleep. :) If you ever have a chance to go, definitely do. :)

Phil Johnson
www.RoadsideAttraction.com