We parked our car on McGee Street and headed for the gate. It was early evening, two hours before sunset, and we were ready to relax and take things easy. At the entrance we traded in our two-day passes for a pair of wristbands and sauntered into the 100 x 80 yard outdoor arena behind Grinders restaurant and bar.
My first action upon entering the Crossroads Music Festival on September 8, 2007, was to scan the audience, mentally calculating how many were in attendance. It didn't take long to figure. The place looked empty with only about 75 people (not including workers) mulling around the stage and various tents.
"This is what happens when Kansas City hosts a downtown music festival," I thought to myself. "Hardly anyone shows. The turnout is meager. All of those people who complain that there is nothing to do in K.C. are at home chopping celery or roasting pork loin or watching reruns of Guiding Light."
As we entered the venue, Truckstop Honeymoon was setting up and checking their instruments. We hung around the main stage to hear their upbeat concoction of bluegrass, rockabilly, and punk.
Hurricane Katrina forced this married duo out of New Orleans for an extended road trip until, finally, they settled in Lawrence, Kansas, when, according to their website, "the road weary family parked their rig as far from any large body of water as they could get."
Katie Euliss pulled at the mammoth strings of a towering upright bass while her husband, Mike West, alternated between banjo and acoustic guitar. The couple sang in unison: "She’s queen of the lanes / She got good aim / She never throws a gutter ball / She’s my dollar store diva / and I’ll never leave her / She’s my rockabilly debutante," during "Rockabilly Debutante," the first track off their latest release on Squirrel Records.
 Truckstop Honeymoon |
We stayed put at the main stage and waited for the next act, the ever-so-fabulous Eleni Mandell (http://www.elenimandell.com/), who traveled from Los Angeles to perform. Honestly, I was not familiar with Mandell’s music, but the friends who accompanied me to the Crossroads Fest were primarily there because of her, and I soon found out why.
With every word I fell more and more in love with Mandell until, by the end of her set, I was forking over all the cash in my wallet to buy two of her albums, which she graciously autographed.
As Mandell performed, the glow of the sunset mingled with the stage lights, creating a dreamlike ambience that corresponded perfectly with the couch cushion revelries of her music.
"Moon glow / Lamp low / All I need is a rainbow," she sang as the natural world seemed to advance according to the mood of her music. In my love-struck mind I felt as if she was granting permission for the sun to set, the breeze to circulate, and the rate of my pitter-pattering heart to increase.
If you’re not a fool, go and see her the next time she comes to town. She visits Kansas City quite often, usually performing at Davey’s Uptown on Main Street.
After seeing Truckstop Honeymoon and Eleni Mandell perform, we spent our time meandering between the three stages. We saw Ghosty (http://www.myspace.com/ghostymusic) at the Gorilla Theater. Ghosty is a group from Lawrence, Kansas, whose music was characterized by sluggish, droning melodies that evolved into feedback terror.
 Eleni Mandell |
Then, after dining on expensive, cardboard-quality pizza from Grinders, we headed back to the Gorilla Theater to see American Catastrophe.
American Catastrophe (http://www.myspace.com/amcat) is part of the reason why I am terrified of rural life. They played a bold blend of intense, moody Americana. I kept picturing a meth-crazed farmer lurching towards me with maniac eyes and a razor sharp hatchet with my name engraved on it.
By the time American Catastrophe finished their set we were becoming heavy-eyed and hard of hearing, so we trampled towards the car, but were delayed when Lucero (http://luceromusic.com/), from Memphis, Tennessee, broke into the first song of their set.
Because they attracted such a crowd, I felt obligated to see what all the hype was about. I guess I didn't get it. Lucero seemed like a bunch of phony, Social Distortion wannabes with a self-absorbed style. Their website claims: "To call Lucero Memphis' answer to Bruce Springsteen is not a stretch." I guess it depends on how you define "stretch." I mean, are we talking rubber bands or giving birth to quintuplets?
On Sunday we returned to the festival to see three more Kansas City favorites perform. First, we checked out Mike Dillon's Go-Go Jungle (http://www.myspace.com/mikedillonsgogojungle), a percussion-oriented trio that mixed high speed, kamikaze rhythm blasts with laid-back vibraphone improvisation.
During a single arrangement they transitioned from breezy, patio-party jingles to disorienting, outlaw-inspired Congo beats that resembled a high-speed car chase.
After getting our fill of mind-twisting beats, we meandered over to the Brick where the Gaslights (http://www.thegaslights.com/) were sound-checking. The Gaslights are a pretty straightforward group; they play whiskey-soaked, country-western songs that are saturated with heavily distorted guitar solos, much like Kansas City's beloved alt-country rockers, Pendergast, who also performed at the Crossroads Fest.
The highlight of the day, and perhaps the entire weekend, was the performance by In the Pines (http://www.inthepinesmusic.com/). At ten o'clock on Sunday it seemed that no one was going to show up at the Gorilla Theater to hear the sextet perform; yet, as In the Pines began their first song of the evening, the tiny Gorilla Theater was packed shoulder-to-shoulder and knee-to-knee with supporters.
With four vocalists, a violin, and a viola added to the standard fare of guitar/bass/drums, In the Pines has a unique sound that is reminiscent of junky flashbacks, recovery, and the beauty of decay in a dingy, basement apartment of a neon city. There was a feeling of peace and rejuvenation in their music, which created beautiful contrast with the sorrowful, moody, scarred frequencies they produced.
Unfortunately, during the two day festival I was only able to see about one-third of the fifty musical acts who performed.
The festival was organized by Spice of Life Productions (http://spiceoflifeproductions.com); and, according to their website, the purpose of the festival was "for people of all ages to experience a taste of Kansas City's cultural diversity."
However, I must question all of this talk about diversity. Perhaps I missed something, but – excluding The Scamps and a few others – all I saw were rock 'n' roll bands and country-western groups. I had expected to see at least some representation of genres such as hip-hop, R&B, punk, goth, soul, funk, ska, electronic, industrial, world, and so on. To my knowledge, none of these genres were adequately represented.
After talking with several people who did not attend, I began to get a better idea of why the crowd was so sparse. Many people did not feel like paying $30 (plus $5 per beer and $4 per slice of pizza) to see bands that play in Kansas City on a weekly or monthly basis in venues that charge $5 at the door and offer $1 drink specials.
Shaun Hamontree of American Catastrophe said it best, perhaps, when he commented that the organizers should have booked at least one band that people were willing to pay $30 to see, making the event a worthwhile investment even for the frugal-minded music enthusiast.
So while I was disappointed about the support that the event received, I began to understand the simple economics of the situation: the promoters did not provide locals with a weekend festival that was worth $30. Simply stated, supply outweighed demand at the third annual Crossroads Music Fest.
Copyright 2007 Metropolitan Community College