The Dude Of Life Unveils Remarkable New Band Space Armadillo In Asheville

The Dude of Life brought his stellar new band to the charming Asheville Music Hall in the gorgeous mountains of western North Carolina on a warm summer evening Sunday, June 18. Space Armadillo are a fearlessly fun fist-pumping five-headed monster cranking out musical glee, roaming joyfully with emotional resonance and a massive sound like Godzilla destroying Tokyo. The man behind the lyrics of such aquatic favorites as “Suzy Greenberg,” “Dinner and a Movie,” “Slave to the Traffic Light” and “Run Like an Antelope” named the band in tribute to his high school group Space Antelope, which featured a young Trey Anastasio by his side. Their songwriting brotherhood endures to this day, and more recent Dude compositions continue to appear on Phish setlists, including an encore of the heartfelt and touching “Show of Life” at their latest New Year’s Eve concert.

Space Armadillo consists of Steve Pollak (the Dude) on guitar and lead vocals, Andy Greenberg from Runaway Gin – A Tribute to Phish on lead guitar and backing vocals, Ross Bogan from Doom Flamingo and Lureto on keyboards and backing vocals, Ben Mossman from Little Bird on bass and Stuart White from The Motown Throwdown on drums. Though just their third performance as a unit, the captivating two-hour show consisted entirely of superb originals (including some old classics), and their debut album is currently in the works. Local Phish tribute act Lumpy Heads opened the festivities, tearing through the beloved songbook with vigorous virtuosity and perfectly setting the stage for the extragalactic excursions to follow.

The show opened with the chunky changes of “Crimes of the Mind,” the title track from Pollak’s 1994 album that boasts Phish as his band throughout the record. Armadillos are known as “pocket dinosaurs,” and likewise the band is both versatile and monstrous, burrowing through your brain with a joyous sense of rock ‘n’ roll celebration that quickly twists into dark nightmare funk. Spirited vocals led a headfirst plunge to a huge jam, with Greenberg’s lead guitar lines blazing an adventurous trail into a mindmelting psychedelic groove. The enchanting earworm ballad “Automatic Pilot” came next, followed by the grand explosion of “Dr. Gabel” which was written with Anastasio and wisely expounds, “I dug down deep to get things off my chest / It’s been a struggle as you might have guessed / No need to harp on things we can’t undo / Try to see it all from a brand new point of view.”

The tragic tale of Charlie Hustle was recounted in a colossal rendition of “Pete Rose,” with the line “It takes a little bit of sinning to make one great” leading into a majestic and immense jam with cascading waves of guitar notes flying across the room. A serene keyboard introduced the intimate ballad “King of Nothing” which reveals “I am the king of nothing / The emperor of emptiness / And I don’t have a castle / And I don’t have a crown.” Next up was the debut of the driving rocker “Spirits Nesting,” followed by the country swing and bouncy beat of “Can’t Always Listen,” with glorious keyboard and guitar solos soaring over the sizzling rhythm section. “You can’t always listen to what people say / If you wish to wind up where you hope to be someday” crooned the Dude.

“We’re Space Armadillo from outer space” they proclaimed, as the delicate melodicism of “In Case You Didn’t Know” led into a wildly unhinged deviation on “Sanity,” replete with otherworldly effects and an unrelenting rhythm. The penultimate song of their set was the sweet and eternally endearing “Show of Life,” whose beautiful sentiment opened the door to a mighty and jubilant jam with the crowd loudly singing along.

The set wrapped up with “The Dancing Plague of 1518,” which featured an unstoppable infectious pulse threatening to reignite the euphoria of France’s mass dance mania: “They could not stop, they could not slow down!” The encore of “Fluffhead” led not to familiar travels but instead dove deeply into haunting and mysterious musical explorations before the thrilling and triumphant return to the chorus with Pollak leaping up and down in delight. Covering a vast range of sounds and moods from intensely thunderous to blissfully ecstatic, Space Armadillo is a powerful animal whose voyage is just beginning.

Setlist

Set: Crimes of the Mind, Automatic Pilot, Dr. Gabel, Pete Rose, King of Nothing, Spirits Nesting, Can’t Always Listen, In Case You Didn’t Know, Sanity, Show of Life, The Dancing Plague of 1518

Encore: Fluffhead