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String Cheese Incident |
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Dixie Classic Fairgrounds
Winston-Salem, NC
08.04.00 |
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review
Boulder, Colorado's newest super band, String Cheese Incident, headlined the first night of the first ever three-day Jomeokee Music Festival in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The line-up for the rest of the weekend included The Original P—P-Funk for all practical purposes—on Saturday and the southern boy's favorite, Widespread Panic, on Sunday. Originally, the festival was to take place at the Jomeokee Park campground in nearby Pinnacle, but was relocated because of logistical problems. The Dixie Fairgrounds ended up being the perfect venue. A large stage was constructed near one end of the infield of an unused racetrack, leaving room for vendors at the other end and on both sides. Festival-goers were permitted to camp a mere 500 yards from the venue in a large field adjoining a small forest.
Formed in the mountains of Colorado in 1993, the Cheese began as a bluegrass-rock-jazz fusion band, but over time has become known for its own brand of funk, and its touching, truthful ballads about life on the road. The band features Michael Kang on electric & acoustic mandolin, and fiddle; Keith Mosely on bass; Bill Nershi on flat-pick guitar; Michael Travis on drums, congas, djembe, talking drum, and percussion; and Kyle Hollingsworth on piano, organ, Fender Rhodes electric piano, and accordion. Knowing this, and seeing the wide range of instrumentation the Cheese brings to its music, the group's name begins to make sense: String, for their acoustic roots; Cheese, for their "cheesy" originals; and Incident, for those deep-funk parts of their shows defying definition.
Both sets of this show highlighted all aspects of their name. The first set began with the cheesy "Outside Inside," followed by the bluegrass-drenched "100 Year Flood," which effortlessly transformed into an Incident—the instrumental favorite, "Rhum n Zouc." Later in the set, "Latinismo" reflected on the band's recent trip to Costa Rica. Another highlight was "Sweet Melinda," an old Peter Rowan chestnut, which segued into an Incident original, "Shine," to close the set. Halfway through the set, the band's spokesman, Bill Nershi, asked who was seeing the band for the first time, and, as usual, a huge hoorah came from the exuberant crowd. This routine is a constant reminder for the band that its grass-roots following is always growing.
Highlights from the second set came in the form of the long, jammed-out "Rhythm of the Road," followed by a new song, "Joyful Sound," which provided the crowd with a catchy chorus and a grooving bass line. The set ended with Nershi's song "Smile," which is about his girlfriend and the difficulties of being on the road. After a short huddle near the monitor board, S.C.I. returned to the stage. The encore started with a bluegrass favorite, "Mountain Girls," and moved on to an inspired cover of Stevie Wonder's "Superstition." The dichotomy of the song selection in the encore simply shows what String Cheese Incident is all about: diversity and adventure.
by Innis Nelson
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