Sharon Van Etten Talks Phish Big Cypress Experience
By Andy Kahn Jun 4, 2015 • 9:34 am PDT
Sharon Van Etten spoke with The Guardian recently about her experiences with music festivals. The guitarist signed to Jagjaguwar who released the sublime 2014 album Are We There talked to the British outlet about her memories of her first music festival which happened to be Phish’s Big Cypress Festival that took place over New Year’s Eve 1999 in the Florida Everglades. From the sounds of it, Van Etten’s trip was one to remember.
[Photo by Laura Crosta]
I didn’t grow up with festival culture. But my siblings were really into Phish. So they grew up going to all their festivals and one year as a gift they gave me a ticket. I’m one of five children and I was really the one who wasn’t that into it. I like going to shows and concerts and stuff, but I’m pretty shy so festivals scare me. It’s stressful. But they convinced me to go to this Phish festival in 1999 and it was during New Year’s. It was at Big Cypress in Florida, where all drugs are legal because it’s a reservation kind of a deal. It was a shitshow.
It was crazy and I was just trying to keep it together. I’m walking around with my siblings, taking notes of all the characters that I’m seeing around me and I realise they call it Big Cypress because there’s only one tree on the whole reservation. One tree that has ice blocks under it, shaped like stairs, where all the – I’m sorry – dirty hippies were sitting on and sweating all over. It was so disgusting.
By the end of the first day all the toilets are full to the top, I’m walking around in direct sunlight and all of a sudden I realised I was swelling – I had these shoelaces tied round my wrists because I was cool or whatever. So I asked my brother and my sister: “That’s weird, right? That’s not normal?”
I started freaking out and they ran me back to where we were camping – because of course we were camping for three days – and they’re pouring cold water on me. And I was sat there thinking that I was dying and all of a sudden Phish start playing and my brothers and sisters leave me. So I was sitting in a camping chair, and I guess I had some heat exhaustion and Phish are playing and I’m surrounded by all these really tripped out people on a campsite and I literally thought I was going to die. That was my first festival experience.
Head over to The Guardian to read the rest of Van Etten’s discussion about music festivals. Van Etten will be performing this weekend at the Governors Ball Music Festival in New York, check out the Governors Ball entry in the newly redesigned JamBase Festival Guide.
Next Tuesday, Van Etten will release a new EP I Don’t Want To Let You Down via Jagjaguwar. Check out the EP’s title track and “Just Like Blood” below:
[Photo by Laura Crosta]
I didn’t grow up with festival culture. But my siblings were really into Phish. So they grew up going to all their festivals and one year as a gift they gave me a ticket. I’m one of five children and I was really the one who wasn’t that into it. I like going to shows and concerts and stuff, but I’m pretty shy so festivals scare me. It’s stressful. But they convinced me to go to this Phish festival in 1999 and it was during New Year’s. It was at Big Cypress in Florida, where all drugs are legal because it’s a reservation kind of a deal. It was a shitshow.
It was crazy and I was just trying to keep it together. I’m walking around with my siblings, taking notes of all the characters that I’m seeing around me and I realise they call it Big Cypress because there’s only one tree on the whole reservation. One tree that has ice blocks under it, shaped like stairs, where all the – I’m sorry – dirty hippies were sitting on and sweating all over. It was so disgusting.
By the end of the first day all the toilets are full to the top, I’m walking around in direct sunlight and all of a sudden I realised I was swelling – I had these shoelaces tied round my wrists because I was cool or whatever. So I asked my brother and my sister: “That’s weird, right? That’s not normal?”
I started freaking out and they ran me back to where we were camping – because of course we were camping for three days – and they’re pouring cold water on me. And I was sat there thinking that I was dying and all of a sudden Phish start playing and my brothers and sisters leave me. So I was sitting in a camping chair, and I guess I had some heat exhaustion and Phish are playing and I’m surrounded by all these really tripped out people on a campsite and I literally thought I was going to die. That was my first festival experience.
Head over to The Guardian to read the rest of Van Etten’s discussion about music festivals. Van Etten will be performing this weekend at the Governors Ball Music Festival in New York, check out the Governors Ball entry in the newly redesigned JamBase Festival Guide.
Next Tuesday, Van Etten will release a new EP I Don’t Want To Let You Down via Jagjaguwar. Check out the EP’s title track and “Just Like Blood” below:
