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Submitted By: Mark Ward
Date: 11/13/2002
On the road again with Groovatron! I'd been travelling to see the band quite a bit with the longest of those journeys being the prior weekend seeing the band in Atlanta at The Brandy House. Unfortunately, the band got screwed by the venue and was only alloted 45 minutes or so for their set due to the fact that they had 3 bands lined up that night and each band thought they were headlining the show. Anyway, Groovatron played a good set that evening but it was just short and since I'd travelled over 700 miles from Chicago that weekend it was a bit disappointing that they didn't get to play longer.
But the following weekend my buddy Dave and I were still resolved to go see the band play back at Uncle Fester's in Bloomington, IN. We'd seen them there over the summer and it was an amazing show. It was Homecoming weekend at Indiana University that weekend so we knew there was likely to be a good crowd on hand for the show. We got to Bloomington a couple hours before the band was to play and went and grabbed a bite at one of my local favorire sandwich shops Dagwoods and then decided to head over to the venue to chat with the band and some early arriving fans.
Uncle Fester's is a great college bar for live music. It has 2 levels with the 2nd level basically looking right over the stage below. Cheap beer and liquor can be found there and since we are used to paying Chicago bar prices we took full advantage of this and began drinking quite a bit once we came in. We chatted with the band for awhile and asked how their Southern Tour went.
"It was good. Starting to get know down there." was Nick's response.
Nick asked if we wanted to hear anything in particular that night and I, of course, gave my usual request for the hilarious Take The Skinheads bowling. Well, time was passing along fast. Some old college friends and acquaintances were coming in to chat and we were pounding pitcher after pitcher of beer as the band took the stage.
Set I:
The band opened with a spirited What You Are and followed that with a sweet Triumphant Inferior that found its way into a jamed out Lay Me Down. The next tune was Down By The River and I wasn't familiar with this one but it was quite good as well. People were starting to come in and the audience was growing at this point when the band really took off in this set.
Mount Money is always a great tune to hear. It was played very solid this evening with some excellent improv jamming between the guitar and percussion sections. Andy was laying down a real kick ass groove in this tune. And Then, BAM! Erotic > Hey You > Erotic > Hey You! WOW THIS FUCKIN SMOKED!
The whole time this jam was going on people began really getting into the groove and dancing hard. Half the time I wasn't sure whether they were jamming Hey You or Erotic as they kept laying grooves down that were so funky it made my head start spinning (or maybe that was from dancing my ass off). I thought the end of this jam would have been a great end to the set but the band decided to play one more, The Ocean, and closed a great warm-up set on that!
Set II:
After a nice herbal enjoyment break, the band retook the stage and opened with the reggae stylings of Hole In The Fishtank and took off. This jam found it's way into Bone Diggin which i am still trying to figure out how that happened but it was so damn cool and after a spirited funk jam in Bone Diggin with Steve doing some really cool shit on the percussion they segued right into The Grateful Dead's Shakedow Street.
I'd never seen Groovatron play this live but they definetely give this Dead classic their own spin. They have a great vocal jam and some solid jamming lead by the excellent saxophone of Tony Mac. This jam wound its way into an old school Groovatron classic Make Like A Tree which was solid but I think the band feels like they have taken this tune about as far as it can go and that's why they seem to play it less often nowadays.
At this point, a dude from Tennessee joined the band on stage for All Along The Watchtower. In all honesty, this was ok but the guy who joined them on stage for this wasn't in sink with the band and it made this kind of akward.
The rest of the set is somewhat of a blur. The venue was packed for the 2nd set with lots of college kids drinking heavily (as was I). Everyone was dancing their asses off and having a good time. The band was feeding off the crowd energy and really taking some of their jams out there to very new levels. Gilara > Fall > Good Morning Little Schoolgirl was a fantastic medely. Take The Skinheads Bowling is always a favorite of mine. It cracks me up! It's just one of those funny, goofy rock n' roll songs. Cissy Strut was probably the best I've ever heard them play it and MacBeth was a perfect set closer for another fantastic night of Groovatron bringing the funk to Uncle Fester's!