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Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010

Festival Story Contest (Mile High Music Fest)

Hello Blinders and Flashers!

John Common and Blinding Flashes of Light Mile High Music Festival

You can WIN a pair day passes to the Mile High Music Festival (worth $100) as guests of John Common & Blinding Flashes of Light on Sunday, August 15th. We are playing from 1:15 - 2:00pm on the Cougar Stage (ahem) that day. Also playing that day are: My Morning Jacket, Punch Brothers, Matt Morris, Ozomatli, Drive By Truckers, Dave Matthews Band, and lots of other great bands.

How, you ask?

It's simple... Just share a funny, weird, beautiful or life-changing festival story in the comment section below. Yes. Relate a story about a time YOU have been to a festival and seen something wondrous, incredible, hilarious, sublime or otherwise memorable -- in the comment section of this blog post.

The band will gather around, read the entries, laugh, cry, ponder and then CHOOSE the lucky winner. Bonus points will be awarded for specificity, florid language and overuse of metaphors.

3, 2, 1.. Go! The Winner will be chosen on August 6th at 10AM. So hurry!

Tell you friends to share their stories!

May the best story win!

Posted By John Common at: 12:08 pm 5 Comments

JC&BFoL

August 9th, 2010 10:39 am

All entries were stirring and wonderous. But there could only be one winner... and that was Laurie Maves!

Laurie Maves

August 3rd, 2010 5:25 pm

hmmmm.....metaphores, similies, boys and girlies.
Being a creative gal, but more so with the paint and the brush than with stories...im still DYING TO SEE YOU ALL PERFORM at Mile High Music FEST...DYING!!! so here is my entry:
I'm a live painter, as you know, and what is amazing about painting live is not only the charge of creativity i get from the music, and capturing the live art - its process, its craziness, the jokes, the instruments, the love, the hair, the metaphors flying around stage...all of it one big fat ass job, but one that i LOVE LOVE LOVE, but i love getting to meet the musicians, and have them say hello or comment on the painting, and with all of god's grace, sign the paintings i make and say lovely things about them.
I was at the Monolith music festival last year, painting live! Little did i know on that day - which was sooooo cold and rainy, that i could set up "shop" at an indoor stage.
Well because I tend to be a scrappy little live painter, after surveying the scene, I set up at the larger indoor stage, behind the stage- mostly stage left and low and behold, i found myself set up right where the muscians come and go- in a secured area!!! two stpes from the VIP tent with all the band nosh and goodies...which i ended up schmoozing the lovely security peeps and they gave me full access to the festival "green room" and so there i was- painting bands, having beers with them, meeting national acts, having a holy cow this cant be happening good time! and i worked and i painted and i had a beverage, and i worked and i painted and i met Hoolywood Holt, a fancy DJ from Chicago, and Isis from Thunderheist, and the Starfuckers and the Stars of Track and Field, and Woodhands, and Health and Speak Easy Tiger and others others...it was WAYYYY coolio for me! and i must have painted 12 or 13 paintings that weekend...all on a volunteer basis, and yes i even had to doante a painting as my way into the festival- but it was TOTALLY worth it!
I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!! best of luck at the show and keep being blinding!

John

August 3rd, 2010 3:26 pm

Mark -- good story!
John -- that is a salty story indeed!

John Kinsner

August 3rd, 2010 2:42 pm

Ok, I'm gonna try to set the bar really, really high on this one.

Let's flash back to the Summer of 2002 & I was on tour with Metallica & the Summer Sanitarium Series. There were actually 3 different stages on that tour, and the stages and crews would leap-frog, since the set up & tear down was a multi-day event. Load in was going just fine throughout the morning and we were making great strides to have the stage, sound and venue (the at the time, very new Invesco Field at Mile High) ready to go for soundcheck. Of course, there were a lot of hang-arounds. Kids & parents sporting "And Justice for All" T's accompanied by mullets and Coors Light respectively. There were also, of course, girls all around, not necessarily a good thing, since picking a winner out of this lot was like choosing the lesser of ALL evils, but none-the-less, if your standards aren't too high this could be an ample feeding ground for a savvy Roadie!

It was my first tour with "Wolfie" (name changed for protection), he was a Salty Old Sound Engineer, complete with ratty clothes, old tour T, Steel Toe Boots, Scraggly Face and Smokers Cough. Not exactly God's gift to women, but what he didn't have in looks, he more than made up for in wit. Wolfie and I were getting the Front of House console ready when we looked over to the barricade and saw a couple of girls standing there, waiving to us, clearly trying to get our attention. Without hesitation, he looked to me and said "Watch this Johnny, your education is about to take a BIG step forward" at which point, he dropped everything and approached the ladies.

Wolfie approached the girls at the Barricade with a sly grin, already sizing up the girls, he made his decision on a rather large breasted 30 something gal. Her Corset was rather tight however, so it may have enlarged the physical appearance of her actual breasts, I will probably never know for sure. Wolfie approached the lady and started talking, I was so far away I couldn't be sure what he was saying, but I had an idea of the direction of the conversation. A few words and moments later, I see Wolfie extend his hand, the lady takes it as he helps her over the fence. Wolfie looks the the adjacent security guard and gives him the thumbs up, at which the guard simply smiled and walked the other way. (This is Important)

After the lady successfully jumped the barricade with Wolfie's assistance, they started walking together, I wasn't sure where they were heading until they in tandem entered a Port O' Potty on the field level at Mile High (It's probably important to note here that the Crappers had not actually been used at this time). About 15 minutes goes bye and Wolfie emerges from the John, alone. With a Big Shit eating grin he approached me and said "Did you see that?!! I promised that chick 3 backstage passes for her & her friends if she'd blow me, she's in there waiting for me to bring them to her. This is gonna be funny!"

Without any further hesitation or explanation, Wolfie walked directly to the Security Guard that he had signaled earlier & that had witnessed the fence jump and said "She's in #4". At that point the security guard rallied a small detail of other security guards together and approached the scene of the fellatio related crime, for the rest of my life I will never forget what happened next, Wolfie walked with the security detail to where the woman was hiding, watched them throw open the door, grab the lady amidst her profane screams and gestures and escort her to the front exit. The entire time smiling, laughing and exclaiming "Maybe you shouldn't give such lazy blow-jobs!!"

My education certainly did take a big step that day, I am just not 100% sure on which direction :-)

Mark Matheson

August 3rd, 2010 1:19 pm

A few years ago a friend won tickets to the Aspen/Snowmass Jazz Fest. He couldn't go so he gave them to me. My 16 yr old son and I went to enjoy groups ranging from Los Lonely Boys to Robert Randolph to Don Henley to Kanye West. During the Kanye West set, I wandered past a couple of sets of bleachers in the back of the field. The bleachers were filled with parents who obviously had no interest in Kanye West, but were there just to take their kids. I just had to stop, and call out to them all, "You look SOOO excited to be here! How about a big WHOOPEE for Kanye West?!?!". Needless to say, no one whoopeed, they all looked at me like a cow looking at a new gate (moo?). Totally hilarious, plus a fantastic festival.

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Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010

Festival Story Contest (Mile High Music Fest)

Hello Blinders and Flashers!

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