For me, it seems that once the fourth of July passes me by, it’s all downhill from then on, in regards to summer. The weekends fly by, and before I know it snow is once again on the ground. This summer however, I still have one thing left to look forward to: the upcoming Wanderlust Festival scheduled at Squaw Valley USA. For anyone blissfully unaware of this festival, Wanderlust is different than many festivals we see breeze through our area, as it combines yoga, music and an environmentally friendly attitude like never before.
As the only yoga phrase I am familiar with has something to do with a dog (see Kari Sindberg’s article on page 60) I decided to wrassle up a few rock stars to talk to about their summer, what Wanderlust meant to them and what we, the people parting with hard-earned dollars, could expect to see that last weekend in July.
I found myself first on the phone with Amanda Palmer. Performance artist, sultry songstress, and ukulele aficionado, Palmer defies a complete definition. Half of the Boston duo The Dresden Dolls, Palmer has been performing solo as of late, releasing her first solo album, ‘Who Killed Amanda Palmer,’ in September of 2008. The album has been followed up with a massive companion book of the same name filled with photos of a ‘deceased’ Palmer accompanied by stories written by Neil Gaiman (‘Coraline,’ ‘Stardust’) who also happens to be her sweetheart. ‘The album is doing what seems natural, which is just constantly spreading virally,’ says Palmer. ‘One of my favorite things about the Web is that I get to see people discovering me every day, it’s like planting a garden and coming to visit it.’ The book is finally being released right around Wanderlust dates, and Palmer says, ‘I might bring a box to just give away; I am just so proud of how they turned out and am chomping at the bit to get them out.’
I am talking with Palmer while she is on an alleged vacation, although while we are talking she is in Seattle prepping for a guest appearance at a Jason Webley show. After that she’s heading to Portland before a layover in Boulder to visit family, jetting to the East Coast for some r&r with Gaiman, coming back to the West Coast for a few gigs and then landing in Tahoe for Wanderlust. ‘My idea of down time is doing last minute gigs on the beach – events that don’t take a huge amount of prep and personnel,’ says Palmer. ‘The great thing about doing a Twitter gig on the beach, is that no one is involved but me – no manager, no promoter, there is no money exchanging hands unless they donate and it goes straight from their wallet into my ukulele case. I used to be a street performer, and that feels like home to me. That feels like that’s how that should be, and I love doing shit like that… to me that feels like more of a vacation me than sitting on a beach chair drinking Mai Tai’s.’
When asked about Wanderlust, Palmer says it will be ‘a positive pit stop for her.’ She says festivals are ‘a very different kind of show, you aren’t preaching to the converted necessarily which keeps you on your toes.’ She says she wanted to be a part of Wanderlust because she ‘knew so many people involved’ and is hoping to do some kind of ‘crazy collaboration’ with many bands, including the Honey Brothers and Kaki King. She also is a huge yoga practitioner, and plans on ‘doing yoga up the ass.’
Palmer is also addicted to Twitter and invites people to start following her for the weekend, saying, ‘I plan on Twittering a lot – spontaneous gatherings, ukulele gigs at 5 a.m.’ She also says since she’ll be there for a couple mornings that instead of an ‘insane party I would like to have the chance to do some quieter things. I would love to do morning meditations, which could really be more like one in the afternoon, like, meditate off your hangover with Amanda Palmer.’
I for one wouldn’t doubt it – Palmer seems like one of the most accessible artists around. In fact, last week she Twittered a meeting for fans to hang out with her at a Portland strip club. Even better are the beach gigs she Twitters where fans dress up and meet her on said beach for an impromptu concert/photo shoot. In other words, visit twitter.com/amandapalmer and get thee signed up for your own personal backstage pass to Palmer’s Wanderlust.
While the natural high achieved while talking with the-force-that-is-Amanda-Palmer wore off, I geared up for my conversation with Dory Honey, aka Andrew Vladeck of the five-piece Honey Brothers. I caught Vladeck sitting in his own personal garden of Eden aka his back yard in Brooklyn.
The Bros – Dory (Vladeck), Kid Honey (Ethan Gold), Carl Honey (DS Posner), Hoyt Honey (Ari Gold) and Honey DuContra (Adrian Grenier) – released a four song EP titled ‘Demonstration’ in June, and while they stay extremely busy with their side projects, are getting together to grace us with their infectious presence at High Camp.
‘It’s hard to turn down an invitation to a party, and (Wanderlust) looks like it combines everything that’s right in the world,’ Vladeck said. ‘It’s at a great location, it looks easy to get to from many places and I think it’s cool that it’s going to have a different climate than other festivals. I’m excited to see how it’s going to work.’ Vladeck says he’s a big yoga sympathizer, and he’s ‘down with downward facing dog,’ and while he says the festival may help renew his connection with yoga, he’s ‘concerned how this will affect our music, maybe we’ll all strike our own pose – I’ll be downward dog, we’ll have warrior pose, tree pose – we’ll figure it out. I mean wait, what was the question?’ Ever the serious journalist, I laugh because I’ve forgotten as well.
Vladeck tells me how the Brothers started as a three-piece ukulele band and how it was a fun stage. He’s ‘playing banjo now and Ari is playing the ukulele. It’s just been so great to play basically rock music and have all these sonic palates to work with.’ Although they have been playing together since 2001, the Honey Brothers have only released one full-length album in 2006 and the aforementioned EP. With such a large gap, the EP really showcases how the group has evolved from their first. ‘Now I think that with our lyrics there is a sense of humor, a sense of a real soul, and then musically it is less in your face,’ Vladeck says. ‘I feel like the jokes in our last album were much more obvious, while now there is still humor and wit, but there is more musicality and this EP shows how we are able to gel, which is so exciting for us.’
As for the honey-themed monikers, ‘everything is so different from when we started. Like most healthy humans we evolve and change, and I feel like we have still retained our old style with our alter egos, yet as we evolve we can face the fact that we are a little less attached,’ Vladeck explains. ‘While it was nice and fun for us to create that, we feel so fraternal: we’ve known each other for a long time, and using the honey names displays the level of connection we have with each other.’
As for performing at Wanderlust, Vladeck alludes to a potential collaboration with Palmer and leaves me with a promising ‘just wait and see what happens.’
Brush up on your Honey Brothers history at thehoneybrothers.com. They hit the Gold Coast Stage at 12:30 p.m. on Sunday and Palmer follows them at 1:15 p.m.
~ Get your complete Wanderlust schedule figured at wanderlustfestival.com.
