Summer lovin' happened so fast..

Part 2

Now where was I… oh yes, Post-Phish McLovins 2010. The next show on the docket was June 26^th at The Main Pub in Manchester, a warm-up for the following week’s performance at the inaugural Nateva Festival. The opening act Buzz Universe came up from New York to play pretty much on faith, the Mclovins chatter drawing them up to try and widen their base a bit. Main Pub is turning into the go-to local venue for the band, Keith runs this fantastic room located a bit west of Hartford and more of a sure-thing attendance wise than other local venues. Most of the old guard showed up, Bill Trzpit, Dave Malloy, and a few new pick-ups that would become summer regulars. Krista and Paris Labbe who caught the Phish-After show the week before, Nolan Dionne who only saw part of the show and Joe Neckbone; an internet regular finally seeing what it’s all about. This was a remarkable show, the band setting up in their now-standard configuration with Jason dead center. Everything the band had been exposed to the past few weeks, the Phish shows included; culminating in a barn-burning performance. The highlight of which was the debut of a Tweezer-Rerprise that shook the building as bottles were literally jumping off the shelves.

Nateva was the next weekend, Bryan and I trundled our way up north, picking Kayla up along the way and we pulled into Oxford, Me. around 11:00. I had to smile as I saw Krista and Paris a few cars ahead up as we were parking. We got into the festival grounds and caught up with the band, spent some time street-teaming and handing out bumper stickers and flyers during the Ryan Montbleau set and trying to draw just a few more moths to the McLovins flame. I managed to touch base with Justin Towle, a Maine fan of the guys who was catching his first show, and McLovins regular Dan Bennet, dancing and smiling every time I saw him. Pam Koslov was also working the festival; lavishing the band with attention and treating them like kings! Their now legendary show drew a crowd of over 2,000, many of them first-timers who couldn’t pass up the chance to see the guys play, and which I feel may have been the summer’s most perfect set, a 45 minute wonder climaxing with Tweezer Reprise; tapping into the zeitgeist of Phish’s summer of Tweeprise. As if that wasn’t a big enough day; the band visited backstage at the Main Stage, met Wayne Coyne of The Flaming Lips, were invited to dance onstage in costume during the beginning of the first set and managed to spend the entire show onstage with the band!

The guys caught a breather for a couple weeks while Jeff and his family visited Israel and their next live show was a return to Main Pub for a steamy summer afternoon Anniversary block party. The guys played after The Brothers McCann, who also played when the Mclovins visited StrangeCreek the beginning of the summer. This was another smoking set; no cobwebs from the nearly 2 week layoff were visible, with tons of the Mclovins family present. Mike McCoy, Bill Clifford, Dan and Eve, Tim and Dan Tyler, Krista and Paris, Kayla, Bryan, Ryan Holowesko and Bill T all showed up and helped to make this a very special show. Keith again was super-supportive of the band, gave them a great slot to play and overall just continues to provide so many opportunities for the band to shine.

Vibes… what can you really say, it was massive and it was awesome, we were 2,000 strong and we marched. We were all there in that moment, one heart one soul…and just wait until next year; we’ve just scratched the surface.

And the summer still isn’t over, there’s a bit more to come……