automatic for the people

The officer flickered on his lights as I saw pulses of blue shock my retinas from the passenger side. Cops on motorcycles are interesting. There were two of them.

Awesome.

Their collective gazes were chilling as the officer number one motioned for Katie to roll down the window. He gave the standard chin down, crinkled forehead look with eyes wide open and looking forward. I thought about shutting my eyes and acting like I was asleep because I feel like its always better if there is only one person to talk to the officer. The window couldn’t have taken any longer to roll down and officer friendly was stone cold waiting for it to get…all…the...way… down before he would speak.

“Just what do you think you are doing ma’am?” His forehead was still crinkled. I sat in the passenger seat of the Dodge minivan we were renting—the rig was in the shop getting the radiator fixed.

“Well, we are staff for the music festival this weekend and were told that if there was a large line at the entrance we should just put our flashers on and get around the line on the shoulder.” We were entering the Langerado Music Festival in South Florida. Us being staff was something of a white lie. Another Crocs Tour was set up for the weekend and they hooked us up with passes and employee credentials to enter the festival grounds.

“Well, you were told wrong!” His voice was definitely getting louder. I must have appeared as though I was fixated on the ashtray in the dashboard because I didn’t really lift with my head. At one point I acted like I was fumbling with the radio but immediately stopped.

“I apologize, we must have been misinformed.” Katie was staying strong.

“The only time you get out of that traffic lane is if an officer of the law tells you to do so.” The only place I have heard ‘officer of the law’ thrown around was during episodes of the People’s Court when they introduce the magistrate. Maybe, just maybe I read it once in a business law textbook. This guy was full of himself. Next time I need some help, I will make sure to contact an officer of the law.

“Thanks.” A perfect response by Katie. She then veered the vehicle back in to line and we proceeded on business as usual. We got some cheers for having circumvented what potentially could have been some sort of violation. Had I been driving, I guarantee I would be holding the carbon copy of a piece of paper telling me I now needed to appear in court in Florida.

Brother.

The line moved quickly and soon we got to the staff parking. Now mildly nerveous about the legitimacy of the directions we received, we asked some more questions but got overly positive answers. In the end our parking spot was situated backstage behind the main stage at Langerado 2008.

Things were looking good.

Three days prior I was sitting in a restaurant that had to have been a Taco Bell at some time in its life cycle. Instead of eating minced cat food tacos, however, I was eating a crawfish po’boy sandwich. A delicious one at that.

Yep. Louisiana.

At that point, I was on hour 12 of sitting passenger side which at times can numb your skull to the point of oblivion. The break was much needed and the sandwich was tasting great. I had a strawberry Fanta to wash it all down. I was unaware of the fact that strawberry Fanta even existed at fountain dispensers, so I suppose that’s another reason to love the state of Louisiana.

Minutes before devouring the crawfish sandwich we had received a phone call from a fellow Crocs employee telling us that if we wanted passes for the Langerado festival we could probably get some—perhaps one of the large benefits of working for a company that sponsors such events. Our event was in Jacksonville that weekend, 5 hours to the north of the festival, so we could probably pull it off making it down there afterwards. I immediately phoned my mother, and being the saint that she is, she looked up the musical lineup for the weekend.

R.E.M. was headlining on Saturday night.

Yep. I had to be there.

And so there we were about a week later parked in the minivan behind the main stage. Mildly shell-shocked with an Olympic hard-on, I was ready to give this weekend all I had. A girl whizzed up on a golf-cart and asked us if we needed a ride anywhere. I thought maybe she thought Katie was Jewel or something, so I went along with it. 3.5 minutes later we were situated within spitting distance of Ben Folds for his 5:30 performance at the Sunset Stage. Having purchased an arsenal of whisky before entering the festival grounds, I happily took down a couple of victory slugs. Things were looking alright.

The festival crowd around me was decked out in every variety of tie-dye apparel and the smell of marijuana littered the early evening air. As my head was on a swivel admiring the size of the crowd around me, two girls offered me some Skittles from a bag that looked like it was purchased at Costco. I love Costco. My teeth became furry as I continued to eat Skittles and enjoyed some of Folds’ set. He ran through a couple favorites from the old days, so I was appeased.

More whisky slugs.

As I walked away from the Folds performance, Thievery Corporation was playing at the main stage in the distance. Lebanese Blonde, as made famous by Zach Braff and his creation of Garden State, was blaring through the PA. Feeling the effects of Jim Beam surge through my body, I shook out a couple of Elvis moves and called it familiar.

Night fell on the festival grounds. I devoured a gyro at the concession area for free. Just minutes prior I spotted a fifty dollar bill on the ground. Nudging the total stranger next to me I asked him “real or fake?” He hit the deck immediately like it was a pot of gold and yelled out it was in fact a real fifty-dollar bill. He was visibly pleased with his new find and offered to buy my gyro for me. I have this weird thing about picking up money I find. I won’t ever do it. I can’t really explain why. I am not doing it for humanity or the children of the third world. I just can’t pick it up.

It’s probably idiotic, yes.

Hours later waiting for R.E.M. to take to the stage, I continued to drink whisky from the water bottle. Jim Beam tucked within my pocket at a music festival has become gospel. I tuned in to the fifty different conversations going on around me— where people were from, what songs would be played, the first time they saw R.E.M. in ’85, how many times they have seen the band live. You get the point. My mind drifted.

It was my eleventh birthday. I received a bubble mailer from my Uncle David with what was likely a present inside. Nothing can really describe that feeling you get when something comes in the mail and in big, bold capital letters your name is etched across the front it. Because I was 11, multiply that feeling by 5,000. As I ferociously ripped open the contents of the package, a present was in fact revealed— a copy of R.E.M’s “Automatic for the People.” It was hands-down the first album I ever fell in love with. It had it’s own spot in my music shoe box, along with other albums— Queen’s Greatest Hits, Bon Jovi’s “Keep the Faith,” and TLC’s “Ohhhhh on the TLC Tip.” Jesus. I would end up going through three copies of that R.E.M. CD over the years.

In the years following that album and what became a growing penchant for R.E.M, I got in the habit of packing up the minivan for a good ‘ol American road trip with Dad whenever they would tour. I can remember a few notable trips.

Chicago. 1998. Blake came along. The show was sold out at what was the New World Music Theatre in Tinley Park. Somehow Blake and I had convinced a young couple on the night of the show that they should let us use their ticket stubs to gain access to the orchestra pit at the outdoor amphitheatre. Blake was probably flexing, so they complied. I cant tell you much about the concert because all I seem to remember is the smell of Blake’s feet when we were riding home the following day. There’s a good chance he hadn’t changed his socks or washed his feet in about 30 days. The green cloud coming from his feet was stabbing my Dad’s and my nostrils. I think both of us could have vomited at any point during the ride. The severity of the smell has caused us to refer to “Blake’s feet” many times in later years.

Toronto. 1999. R.E.M. was playing a show in the middle of the city off of Dundas Street. We had nothing booked and decided to just leave on Thursday after Dad was done with work. The 10-hour drive was nothing to shake a stick at. I still remember the pizza parlor we stopped at for what was probably the largest pizza pie I have ever seen/consumed. Dad emptied about 3 cubic feet of crushed red pepper on to his half of the pie. We showed up in Toronto at about 2am and ended up sleeping in the van that night. R.E.M. took to the streets the following afternoon and we were of course front and center. The blasts from the speaker stacks shook my sternum as they played for a couple hours.

Almost ten years later I was back for more.

The stage lights went down and R.E.M. burst on to the stage with energy that suggested maybe it was 1985. I jumped to my feet and felt the whisky creep down my chest with a warm vengeance. Three songs in to the occasion a little girl sitting on top of her Dad’s shoulders handed me a sign that read “i heart you REM.” The word heart was replaced with an actual heart. She was all of six years old. Unsure of exactly what was going on, I still took the sign from the little hand that extended from 3 feet above me and smiled.

Michael Stipe was in prime form on stage. He was visibly enjoying himself. The rest of the band was following suit. Michael took to being a bit of a ham even as he fashioned a t-shirt with “OBAMA” screen-printed across the front of it and taking every opportunity to assure it was shown on the jumbotron.

The little girl and her Dad were holding up the signs. I followed suit. So did some of the others in the vicinity that were lucky enough to be handed one. The smile that poured off of her face as we collectively cheered on the band warmed me even more than the whisky did. Twenty minutes later I couldn’t feel my arm because I was still holding the damn thing up. The little girl would occasionally look back and I would be sure to fashion the sign accordingly. Someone in the R.E.M. camp must have noticed the now half dozen pieces of paper being held up by complete strangers bearing childish phrases and drawings. A roadie came down and gave the little girl a stack of paper. Apparently they were the sheets that Michael had been reading song lyrics off of as the show went on.

You would have thought that smile was painted on her face. At show’s end it was still there. I shook her hand and thanked her for letting me join in on her little party. She wrapped the evening up with an extra layer of enjoyment.

The rest of the night dipped and turned at 100 miles per hour in to the wee bits of the morning. There were parties to be had and plenty of random people to happen upon. The last official recorded time for the evening was 3:58 am from the timestamp on a cell phone call. As I tried to situate myself for a slumber in the reclined driver’s seat of the rented minivan, there was a calm that fell over the festival grounds. I didn’t want to let the night come to a close.

Day one at Langerado. And that was only half the story.