Saturday, May 19, 2001 -
Long’s Park, Lancaster -
Session, Nothing But Oregano, Giant Sequoia, Jellybricks, Negative Space
Saturday, May 19, 2001
Long’s Park, Lancaster
Session, Nothing But Oregano, Giant Sequoia, Jellybricks, Negative Space
We arrived at Long's Park at 20 of 10 and then got our boxed lunches and
strode toward the picnic benches, but then decided to sit at one closer
to the lake and fountains. We crossed another street and found a bench
on which to enjoy our lunch (minus the chicken. Don’t shake your finger at
us though, we just don’t like BBQ chicken. We ate chicken fingers the next night, so we do like chicken.
As we sat enjoying the box of food, we watched the wildlife. The
squirrels decided to get friendly, or shall we say daring. One kept frolicking
around the bench and standing up on his hind legs looking at the seat of the
bench. Melanie did her baby talk hellos to it while Shannon cowered on the
other side of the bench. Is everyone getting an image in their heads now?
Melanie decided to name the squirrel Scamper. When Scamper
visited Shannon’s side of the bench, she jumped up and Scamper
made a half-hearted jump, touched Shannon’s cardboard box, and
landed back on the grass in an instant. Shannon decided she was finished
eating at that point, grabbed her box and started to walk away. Melanie just
sat there and struggled to open her lemonade, calling for Shannon to wait for her.
Several yards away Shannon stopped, still watching Scamper and telling
Melanie to pull on the tab provided to break the seal. Since her hands were wet,
it was hard to pull, so Melanie just picked at the rim of the bottle to peel off the seal.
It worked! She said her good-byes to Scamper and joined Shannon.
We headed for the trash can across the street and when we tossed our boxes in,
it pulled the sides of the bag down off the can rim. Oops! We went back to the
amphitheater lawn area to sit. As we made our way over, we passed by a hot air
balloon that was in the process of being set up. Shannon spotted Raggedy Ann
at a tent by the stage. Then we saw a frosty wobbling around. It wasn’t Raggedy
Ann it was Wendy! When we walked by, we avoided eye contact. Since we had
agreed that the lemonade tasted funny…almost a watered down taste, Shannon
tossed it out before sitting. Melanie drank about half before throwing hers out too.
As we sat Indian style on the grass chatting with one another, a boy with a big
red backpack (the kind with wheels and a handle) came up in front of us and bent
over a bit. He said hello and asked our names and our grades. He did some
sort of non-hand shake thing with Shannon and then asked Shannon if she would
go out with him. Unsure of how to respond, Shannon managed to say that she
didn't even know him and then she proceeded to mumble to herself.
Not long after that incident, the hot air balloon was up. Four ropes restricted
the height of the balloon. Wondering why the people just didn’t let go of the ropes,
we soon discovered that this was supposed to be a ride. You get in, go up,
go down, and get out. We just hoped that you didn’t have to pay for such a thing.
Before the first band (Session) came on stage to perform, WHTM handed us
bags with a flier for the circus and 3, what we later realized were, clown noses.
How exciting. Then two people from FM 97 came up on stage to intro the band.
When they said that Session was coming out, the several sporadic attendees
applauded and no one came out on stage. Baffled, the air personalities came back to
waste some time till Session was ready. The guy invited the frosty over to hug the girl.
They were desperate for something to say or do up there. When Session was ready,
they were re-introduced and we all clapped again. The FM 97 girl told us when she
walked by that she thinks that the Session guys were eating when they were first introduced.
Session, which began at 11:30, was a 6 piece jam band from Lancaster. They
consist of front man, Hank Ricci (lead vocals and guitar), Colin Smith (lead guitar),
Joe Stengel (bass), Tom Chaffin (drums), Shane Firestone (kungas), and Ben McClure
(trombone). During this time we noticed a younger guy who had been hanging
out for a while. He was about as far away from the stage as we were, but he was
standing and not looking at the band. He just stood there not bopping and not looking.
Oh, well. His choice. Session was the first jam band we had ever seen and they
sounded decent to our unaccustomed ears. After Session finished around 12:30,
we went for a walk through the field. We crossed a road covered in sitting traffic
and discovered some swings. After swinging in front of the still cars for a bit,
Melanie asked Shannon how much longer we should spend there. Shannon
decided on 7.3 minutes. Melanie changed that to 7.33 so we would be leaving in
7 minutes and 20 seconds. When the time came, we hopped off and squeezed
between the cars filled with people waiting for their chicken. When we reached the
stage area, the music was about to begin. Good job to Shannon for her time of 7.3.
Next up was Nothing But Oregano, who began their set at 1:00. Before they came
out, FM 97 announced that the person with the most yellow FM 97 frisbees
collected by 2:00 would win *NSYNC tickets. I bet these guys were disappointed
they couldn’t go out to collect some frisbees to win lol. This group of four guys,
who did not sound like *NSYNC, were into their music. The bassist, Clayton Mars,
with his white cowboy hat and red Skippy peanut butter tee, played a bass covered in
black furry material. While they played, the asker-outer was collecting frisbees
(hee hee). Then a bouquet of blue and white balloons, half of which were
popped, drifted across the stage. It got caught on the main mic until the front
man brushed it away to stage right where it came to rest. That gave the crowd a
giggle. As Nothing But Oregano continued to perform, some Negative Space
boys began to show. Focusing back on the stage, the Oregano front man
snatched up a pair of scissors from by the drums. He ran about crazily,
snipping them open and closed. By 1:45, they finished and Mark and Todd from
Negative Space came by for quick hellos.
A half-hour later, Giant Sequoia took the stage. There were only three of these guys
(noticing a downward trend here?), but they still entertained the attendees.
This front man (John Pompeo) looked like Adam Sandler. Check out our pix
and tell us if you agree. We decided to grab a frisbee and toss it around next
to the stage while they performed. As we attempted to throw and catch, Josh
(Negative Spacer) came through the field burdened by a jam-packed backpack.
He asked Melanie if we had seen any of the others and Melanie sent him to the other
side of the amphitheater by the FM 97 van, where she had seen Sean last.
(They were probably in back of the amphitheater.) We then noticed a bunch of
young teenagers by the area we had been sitting. Upset, we ran back over with
Melanie’s bag and Shannon’s purse to claim a spot in front of them before they
took over the whole area. We did the head nod thing to the last few songs before
Giant Sequoia finished at 3:00.
By this point we noticed the young teen males were acting rowdy and the females
were showing more skin than we cared to see. The guys were on the opposite
side of the amphitheater wrestling and some girls by us blew a few bubbles.
We had brought bubbles too that we had used at the Bruce Bond Late Afternoon
Show Picnic in the Parking Lot.
Next up were the Jellybricks, who were a first for us to see, like all the previous
bands. We had heard more about these four guys beforehand. Beginning at
3:25, we realized the teens were not there to see the Jellybricks and were not
all that polite in their vocalizations when they were introduced. Vocalizing her
love for the Jellybricks and their rock and roll, an older woman who was enjoying
her KFC with her husband shouted encouragement to them. Mid-performance,
a man carrying a little boy hung about the side stage. After the guys finished their
song, this man with the boy walked across the stage with the FM 97 girl and her dog.
The man took over a mic and announced to the entire park that a child had lost his parents.
The little boy was so upset, he wouldn’t tell the man his name. Aww. Continuing their
set on the breezy, sunny afternoon, we bopped as we sat on our bums till 4:10. Also
having fun during the Jellybricks were two young boys on roller blades. They stirred
up the dirt and jumped over the cords laying on the cement. The Jellybrickers said
that they had been turned down from the Vans Warped Tour because they did not have
enough experience playing in front of skaters and thought that maybe this
would count for something.
Unsure of how well behaved the teens adorned in fake tattoos (being drawn on with
markers) behind us would act, we stood up and tried to make sure we were not
associated with them. At 4:40 Negative Space went on and made quite an entrance.
The man we had seen before carrying the little boy came out carrying Josh,
announcing that he had lost his band. The teens crowded up front gave off lots
of energy…but we did not want to be a part of that energy. We sat on the
one ramp located at either side of the stage and took pictures. When one
girl decided to toss her water around, Melanie moved to the other side of Shannon.
One girl tossed a red shirt to Josh with “JP” on the back in black marker.
Josh then hid as he changed into it. Good thing it was red, otherwise Todd
and Josh wouldn’t have still matched. (Josh had been wearing the red Phillies tee
from our interview at MMC.) Further into the set, a girl with her black dog on a leash
(good job on the leash) came to sit where Melanie had been sitting. She stood later,
placing her dog on the stage. Josh gave her dog a quick pet. The stage was so big and
Sean looked so far away as he was doing his drummer thang. Stu was so far away on the
opposite side of the stage with Mark. Of course Josh couldn’t stand still, and raced all over
the stage. Todd was right in front of us on stage right. Kimmi, their merch and photo gal
(who does more we’re sure) made her way around us and the posse of teens to get photos
with her professional and spiffy looking camera.
The guys finished up at 5:30 and we sat in the grass chatting with each other. Mark
saw us and we could tell he was making his way over to us. Suddenly Mark did
some crazy hop, skip, and jump and landed right next to us in a crouching position.
We got our usual, “Thanks for coming,” from him. Our response was, “Thanks for playing.”
lol. Yeah, we still haven’t come up with a more exciting response. But thanks for making a
point of coming over :) There was also this huge chunk of…mud?…that we thought came
from Mark’s shoe. It was the size of a baseball squished into and oval. So it just popped
out of no where after Mark arrived. Yeah, cause that happens…ANYWAY… Todd then
made a trip to visit us. We talked about how Shannon’s and Todd’s glasses
are kinda alike, but Todd’s only serve a fashion purpose. I said my sunglasses
were prescription and we found out that Sean’s are too. We talked until Todd
was admonished for not helping out and he scurried off.
Deciding to whip out the green Green’s frisbee, we started to try to play again.
After one of many horrible throws by Melanie, Sean plucked it up and started to play with us.
He’s such the frisbee expert! We felt bad he had to put up with such bad frisbee-ers like us.
Todd then joined the fun, or shall we say embarrassment. He was a good frisbee player too!
The four of us played until they had to go. We continued for a bit longer then went home
(but not without stopping at the Park City Mall).