Voodoo Recap: The drive

So hopefully you've read our previous posts about your trip to New Orleans and Voodoo Fest 2007. Hoosier's pre-trip outlook can be read here and pictures from the trip also up. So now, months later, it's time for my full recap and a few thoughts.

The way I see it the trip can be split into three chapters: The drive, the festival, and the city. Im going to do a post for each.

The drive was a long one, riddled with stupidity and stuttering from the start, which I take full responsibility for. We left my place heading the wrong direction, literally. I had to show Roc the bridge over the Savannah river. Besides being the source of a few good stories, it has traditionally marked the beginning or end of many a long drive. Also, on a nice foggy morning, I love driving up the bridge, as it rises into the nothingness, its the best way to begin a trip, but more on that later. After seeing the bridge, I put us back on course heading south, but not for long.

Only an hour or so later I was taking us on another detour, this time to see a friend in Brunswick. Alex, is one those people whose charm and childlike humility can only be found south of the Mason Dixon, and despite his bushy red beard and extensive tattoo collection, you instantly feel at ease and free to speak as if you've known each-other for several years. Add a few bowls,and you will end up babbling back and forth. I hadn't seen him much since he moved south of Savannah, so why not stop along the way?

So it was about 9, 10 at night now and Alex was busy convincing us how insane we were for planning on driving all the way to New Orleans that night, and I was still locked in a state of denial, saying "No. It won't be to bad. We'll pull over and sleep for a few hours on the side of the road and we'll be fine." Either way, it was time to get back on the road. And after popping our Whataburger cherries, and seeing proof that they like things bigger in Texas, we were back on 95 south. I would now like to say that there was no really good way to do this trip that would accommodate our schoolwork, wallets, and schedule. We had to be in New Orleans by Friday afternoonish and is at-least a 10+ hour drive from Savannah. Rather then waking at the earliest hours of the night and driving direct, I decided to take a more leisurely pace

Soon after, it was time to head west, and that means the Bible Beltway, I-10. For many young, liberal northerners, this would be the time to shit on the local Christians responsible for the billboards reminding us that their is only one white male God, whose politics seem to fall inline with American fascists like Curt Weldon. But these signs really don't bother me, because as fucked as they are, and as evil as the frauds are who promote and profit from spewing this bile, at-least their is a sort of honesty in them. Which is more then you can say for most, if not all, conglomerates who use their sock piles of reserve cash to create giant eye-sores of lies, false-promises, and general phonyism. This why I cant wait to drive across Montana and North Dakota, because I have this idea in my head of an open highway drive, where you can see the horizon in any direction, and no billboards for a hundred miles. Now that I have that out of my system, we'll get back to the trip.

Next stop was Tallahassee, to see another lost friend. Like Alex, Rush has those extra hospitality and easy going genes that don't seem to like cold temperatures. So, we chatted about this, that, and the third over a few beers, and not very slowly or subtly, sleep crept upon all of us. I think we got to his place around 1:45 or 2, and we planned on sleeping until 4. We were still about 6 hours from New Orleans, and about 8 into the trip. After we awoke and thanked our generous host, we were off, again. 6 AM stop at Waffle House (A Waffle House along a major highway, has to be one of the safest places ever. At the right times, its a though looking crowd in there. You'd have to be batshitcrazy to start trouble in a Waffle house.). Two hour nap at the road stop before the Louisiana boarder. Short controlled burst, think of the Halo 3 Battle rifle. Shot people in the head, take cover. Drive a few hundred miles, take a nap.

The coolest part of the drive is certainly driving along the causeways of Alabama/Mississippi/Louisiana. As I said before, theirs something bizarrely powerful about driving on a near transparent structure in the air over water; ... simply its like flying. At least it is to me. And with a low thick fog, you plunge into the clouds and you find yourself in a unfamiliar context. The last miles into New Orleans couldn't be more unnerving , and upsetting. Communities one after another in ruin, deserted, empty. But that is were I will pick up in the next part of this Voodoo 07 Recap.
Next, my time in New Orleans.

Driving tunes: A post for the blog's sake

Since posting has more or less stopped I figured I'd post a something on the lighter side. I just drove back to school in Savannah, GA, and the 11+ hours spent in the car prompted me to write this post. What is the best music to drive to? I tend to listen to albums in their entirety, although I think this puts me in the minority. I know that crafting a good mixtape is an skill unto itself, however I have never really been able to sink my teeth into the process, and have left it in the hands of the artists. But I want to hear what people have to say on the subject. You can recommend single songs, albums, mixs, as well as what type of drive they would be suitable for. Be as specific (song, album, traffic conditions, length of drive, destination) or as broad (artist/genre) as you want. Here are some of my picks, in no particular order:

• Steve Reich - Music for Eighteen Musicians
Steve Reich was one of the leading minimalist composers of the 1970's, and honestly this is the only work of his I have in my music library, or have really been exposed to, but I've wanted to get my hands on some of his other work for a while now and just never got around to I. I like driving to this album (the whole album is a single hour long track) when driving long distances. I tend to listen to Music… 5 or 6 hours into a day of driving. At this point in the drive I want music that is not going to demand my attention to be enjoyed and not put me to sleep. Reich's construction (and deconstruction) of a repeated theme, and all it's permutations, is certainly worthy of a focused headphone listen, but it can also serve as a beautiful backdrop while speeding down I-95.


• Kraftwerk - Electric Café & Daft Punk - Homework
Two of my favorite electronic albums. The Kraftwerk album really gets me into the mind set of being a robot, which helps when driving for a while. The first three songs are very strong, you really feel their presence, but the final three tend to receeded in the spectrum of my wondering, long-drive mind, however they never fall off into background music. Homework is similar in this sense, it starts of bumping and then slows down, then it picks back up, however it never regains the enthusiasm it started with. In addition to being longer then Electric Café, most of its energy comes from fast tempo, pulsing rhythm, and flashy sample modulation, instead of a simpler more open, non-techno soundscape. Moderism vs Post-modernism, in my opinion.


• Tool - Lateralus
This album is fucking amazing. I don't know how I discovered it, probably because of "Schism" but thank God, no thank Satan I did. Imagine King Crimson, taking black acid and listening to Sabbath, a beatutiful mix of heavey metal drums, Velvet feedback drones, and psychadelic conceptualism. The drums alone will keep you awake and driving. I highly recomend buying the physical CD, the album/booklet art makes for a great package.


• The Grateful Dead - American Beauty
You know when people say, "Think of a happy place." For me, this album is that place. Accordingly, American Beauty, and most Dead is better during the day, its a nice complement to the sun. Personally, I enjoy the Dead's studio recordings to the numerous live sets available. It showcases their composition and musical talent, without slipping into self-indulgence or familiarity. "Ripple" to "Brokedown Palace" is phenomenal.

Will there you have it, a taste of my drives to school and back. Like I said these drives are done by myself, so I enjoy being able to select an album and listen to it from front back. I'd love to hear what other people listen to when in similar situations, or any other driving situation.