I really didn't have too much of a problem with this review. It's not as if the guy came out and wrote "Everyone must believe what I say," or "This review is dogmatic and supported by all the attendees of Summercamp." The man gave his honest opinion of his festival experience. Sure, he neglected to mention a couple of bands in his review, but hell, I was there and I neglected to SEE a few of the bands that I wanted to see, much less write about them less than 48 hours after the festival.
A lot of people are criticizing the idea that Summercamp '09 marks the passing of the torch from moe. to Umphrey's McGee. While structuring an article entirely around this idea may be err on the side of laziness, it was not some wild idea that he conjured in his head. There is some validity to that argument.
As of now, Summercamp is moe.'s festival, but for the 4 sets of theirs that I caught, they sure as hell didn't play like it. Some people have raved about moe.'s playing throughout the weekend, deeming it "epic," "nasty," or any other of the overused words in the jamband vernacular. The words that I came up with during moe.'s sets, especially Sat 2nd set, were boring, stagnant, uninventive, uninteresting, uninspired, complacent, self-indulgent, noodling, directionless, and old. I hated saying these words. I've spent more than enough time defending moe. and what they can do, but lately, all I can rely on is what they have done and what they used to do. Looking at the stage this past weekend, it seemed like a band of five guys that could care less about each other, much less the music that another member was playing at a given moment. Sure, there were highlights in the painstakingly long Timmy Tucker>Lazarus>George>Timmy Tucker, but I had to wade through an hour and fifteen minutes of flavorless, aimless vamping. After that set, I left thinking that moe. should no longer have a period after their name, but rather an elipsis.
I just don't understand how they can allow themselves to be outplayed and outshown by such a wide margin by the other headlining band. Yes, Umphrey's and moe. play a very distinct and very different brand of music and employ different modes of improvisation, but c'mon. There's got to be some kind of competitive spirit, or at least a sense of indebtedness to the fans to perform well, and at least ACT like you enjoy being at a festival where 15,000+ paid good money to come and see you.
Maybe it is time for them to pass the torch. They still have moe.down and from all accounts from some of my hardcore moe.rons, they always bring their A game to that festival. The state of Illinois is spoken for in the jam community. It may be a few years down the road before UM can generate the kind of attendance to support their own festival, but it should happen. This weekend, they played like a band hungry for the future, hungry to please, and hungry to create music.
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