A Road Story; or, Satori in Wisconsin
Seven seven eighty-four. Thirty-five years on and it still rates as the momentous experience in my life. Certainly it never crossed my mind as we piled into Boisson’s Chevette to head for the Ticketron outlet that I’d still remember that day; it was a pretty astounding twenty-four hours, and I’ve probably been trying to figure out what exactly happened ever since.
In classic fashion, we (Mike, Kent, and myself) left without tickets, camping gear, sustenance, and, as it turned out, a bowl. At least we had money enough for lawn seats and doses. We made a quick stop to see if our friend Ben wanted to come along (which he did, leaving a note on the fridge: “Mom-- went to see the Dead. Be back later”), and then we were off to Southlake Mall for the tickets. Later on I would discover how easy we’d had it, walking in the day of the show and getting four tickets for $40 or so, but at that time it was just another errand. As I recall we stopped off at Hegewisch Records too, but we didn’t have enough cash for even the cheapest paraphernalia (why no papers? you ask; I have no idea). I recall the sun shining in a bright blue sky, tunes on the deck, and the summer air blowing through the windows as we made our way out of Indiana, around Chicago, through Illinois and into Wisconsin: a thoroughly uneventful trip to Alpine Valley. Along the way, we tried to work around our lack of an implement using the car’s cigarette lighter as a modified chillum with a decided lack of success. No matter though, it would all work out.
Arrival at the venue proved mind-boggling. From the instant we drove into the lot I felt a very real sense of dropping through a trap door into an alternate or parallel world, truly terra incognita. I mean, I’d seen a few longhairs and stereotypical potheads, but never this kind of display-- it was like stumbling onto some hidden alien hideout, with a mix of bikers and frat boys, Renn Faire extras and Computer Lab weirdoes, fools and fakirs, cowboys, grits, and hippies straight out of Central Casting. I distinctly remember gawking at one freak merrily bopping along the lane between parking areas and his extremely amused reaction to my open-mouthed staring: he shook his head with a grinning laugh and wagged his finger at me as he sing-song-ed “You don’t know what’s going to happen!” He had my number.
We finally parked and in the first bit of weirdness discovered that we were right next to friends of mine from Earlham College: Kevin, Marti, and oddly enough Matt, with whom I had done the “New Wave and Punk” radio program my freshman year. I think Blind Bob was with them too. A completely unplanned happening and a total surprise! Introductions all around, cold Wiedeman’s handed out, and attempts at orientation made. We had parked in the front lot, fairly close to the theater’s entrance, and it was a pretty lively scene; lots of vending and general hustle and bustle going on. I turned around and Mike handed me two hits of Red Saucer bought from a passer-by (“fresh dipped, three days outta’ Berkeley, man!”), some for K and B and we were set-- down the hatch and here we go!
The first waves started as I sat on the front bumper of my friends’ car, watching the continual flow of people headed to the show. I became aware of a non-stop susurrus as all the beautiful hippie women drifted by and then a slight echo or ebbing and flowing of white noise from the sounds of voices calling greetings or advertising wares; I felt illogical movements throughout my body like I was inflating and respiring in a rhythm that was picked up and repeated by everyone and everything I looked at. I found myself unable to speak and quick check of my traveling companions found them equally stymied in that capacity. My older/wiser college friends laughed their asses off as I tried to explain in some sort of lobotomized, molasses-covered mime language to a wandering sticker-saleswoman that, in fact, I had no money and would be unable to purchase her wares. She was considerably less amused.
The flow of people toward the gates had increased and it became almost synchronized, like some sort of huge Busby Berkeley number, or a Fleischer Brothers cartoon in vivid pulsing colors. I looked in the direction of the gates and was amazed to see a dome-like dark purple glow emanating from just beyond the fence, as if some huge extra-terrestrial craft had descended, pulling the earth towards its base, and now, as my more mobile friends assured me, it was time for us to enter that dome. A crush of bodies as we got nearer, a rush of babel and laughter and flashes and flickers of faces and feet, a whirring tempest of flesh and sweat and teeth, and still the inhalation and exhalation of all creation keeping pace with mine, increasing until they were indistinguishable and then suddenly we were through the turnstiles and onto the cool humid grass sloping down towards the stage.
There’s a definite feeling that’s unique to the lawn at Alpine. It’s hard to pin down with just words, but my memory of it is always the rustling paper buzz of cicadas, the stillness of the air as it darkens with twilight, heavy with midsummer moisture, and a permeating vapor of organics, the bubbling smells of mushrooms and bark and leaves. That great stretch of lawn, dotted with blankets and, yes, even picnic baskets and coolers, conversation volumes bouncing between raucous jubilation and whispering anticipation, and again the distant sound of little bells and bare feet whisking through the grass. There are fireflies in my memory but they probably didn’t come out until later. Lots of people didn’t like the venue for various reasons but I’ve got nothing but great memories of the place and the various shows I saw there. It really is a special place.
We finally sat down in a spot about halfway down the slope and now the first really big wave arrived. The angle of the hill seemed to increase dramatically, and the cheerfully echoing tintinnabulation morphed into the ceaseless brass clangor of a thousand temple gongs. Everything outside of a ten-foot radius began to smear slightly as friends and neighbors passed in and out of sight. The initial strangeness of the other attendees began to manifest in the occasional extra eyeball or an odd lizard-like tail. It was getting more and more difficult to keep standing and I distinctly remember a bug-eyed Ben crawling across the grass toward me asking the eternal acid question: “what... is... going... on?” I hadn’t really thought about that, and now it seemed like a fairly important thing to figure out. I glanced around and discovered we were surrounded by nothing but bikers and this fully and truly freaked-out my Sex Pistols t-shirt-wearing self so I had to lie down with my eyes closed to ride out what I was sure would be an inevitable stomping. The “Great A-Horr” as Keyz put it, I think. So, I rode it out. Full on, full-blown mind-manifesting trip through the internal galaxy, visiting a dozen past and future selves, discovering that they were actually the beings sitting next to me, the eternal connection to the infernal and divine all right there with me inside a glowing purple sphere spinning somewhere out on the very farthest shores of my own personal Big Bang. Eventually the maelstrom of psychic winds began to ease a bit and I felt considerably more relaxed, my spine unknotting itself a bit, fingers and toes uncurling. Breathing for what seemed like the first time in ages.
I opened my eyes and announced that I was now ready for the show to start. Near universal guffaws informed me that I’d missed the whole first set, and so, fairly unfazed by this I set off in search of the bathroom. That trek was wild and wooly (and a great tale in its own right) but was successfully completed and somehow I managed to make my way back to my friends to compare notes. Still not a lot of verbal skills among us but all seemed well and we relaxed, drew deep breaths, and plummeted into set two as the twilight turned to darkness.
Nothing particularly special on paper, the second set contained music I was familiar enough with as well as unfamiliar variations that opened door after door, revealing unimagined vistas and possibilities. Some pieces imprinted deeply and became part and parcel of how I understand myself, like the darkness and betrayal of ‘Cold Rain and Snow’ or the regrets and redemption of ‘Brokedown Palace.’ Other sequences simply tore away at my expectations for musical performance, vigorously demonstrating the deep value of opening oneself to what was happening at every moment, letting go and being fully ex stasis.
The combination of the blotters, the music (and christ on a crutch! can you ever forget how that sound system could move every tone through your whole body, vibrating the spaces between your cells), and the very real manifestation of the crowd’s energy all catalyzed in the great, green alembic of Alpine Valley. It seemed that we had truly left life behind in the gravel of the parking lot, that there would be no returning, so best now release your grip and to dive into the heart of the cauldron. I remember that Candace’s lights carved the pillars and trusses and roof of the pavilion into twisting Aztec temple walls filled with mystic flowers and then gaunt, electric caryatids of Gothic saints, then a full illuminated medieval bestiary of day-glo dragons and falcons, and a sudden molten eruption like Rodin’s Gates of Hell before flickering back into ordinary steel and wood as the music drove us further and further out of bounds.
At one point, it sounded as if the gears of the universe were being forcibly stopped, a deep, dangerous grinding and screeching that shook away what was left of the ground below us, gargantuan cable tethers thrumming with the strain. Then shuddering stars shot beams of light catching bits and pieces of the people surging around me, writhing and melting against each other, turning into literal waves washing back and forth, up and down the hill, crashing against the white hot engine on stage, rushing back again and again, a bubbling witches’ brew into which I dis-incorporated and then reformed over and over until with one last massive exhalation it all became Alpine Valley again-- still vibrating to be sure, the grass seething with garter snakes of energy, rippling quicksilver just escaping from the periphery of my vision-- but actually back on earth; speechless, agog, poleaxed by the enormity of the trip-- mama, mama, many worlds I’ve come since I first left home.
We slowly slogged and stumbled up the hill, still seeming impossibly steep, and eventually got back to the lot and our car. The air filled with the smell of gunpowder, beer, and cooking food, the high- pressure sodium lights giving everything an odd sheen. Fireworks arced and exploded randomly everywhere as we cooled off with beer and little watermelon. Kevin gave me a fraternal shoulder punch and asked: So whatcha’ think? All I could summon was a shaky “Wow.” I compared notes with Kent, but mostly we were kinda’ speechless still. The facility staff didn’t seem to have any intention of making anyone leave, and things carried on into the night as the lights were turned off and the hooting continued. It took a little doing but we managed to convince Mike that he should not attempt the drive home and we made do with what crashing space we could find in the car, waking with the dawn to figure out which way to go.
I had experienced all the parts of that day at separate times, or in partial combination, but none of it, nothing at all had prepared me for seeing the Elephant. Haven’t quite figured out what he told me, but I’m working on it.
