Ronee and I drove 8 hours to Bushnell, IL for Cornerstone Festival. I think it’s like the 7th time I have been there, not sure. It’s been a lot of years since I was last there. Maybe 2001 or 2?
We stopped in St. Louis (about half way) on the way up to eat at Sweetie Pie’s, a place we had seen featured on the Food Network. It was southern food (mac and cheese, meat loaf, fried chicken, etc.). By the time we got there I was starving. I thought the food was very good. A little too salty though, which isn’t very surprising.
We arrived at the fest in the evening just in time to catch Louis from Gasoline Heart performing solo. He did a great job and even got the crowd to come up on stage and sing for him. Louis is always hilarious. We were fortunate to have him and roadie Tim stay with us a night or two before and share breakfast. Love that guy. Dave Bazan (aka Pedro The Lion) played after Louis but I was too busy talking to old friends (JD Herrin, Wiitala Brothers, etc.) to pay attention.
Later on we finally caught up with our buddies from Canada, Joel and Eric. They went with us to see The Satire (great job Matt, Bryan Gray, JD Herrin and gang!) and then Stavesacre. Mark is one of my oldest friends. We have known each other since we were 16 years old – so, over 20 years now. It was really great to see them play again. One of my all time favorite bands and one of the best times I have ever seen them that I can recall. Good fun also seeing Sam, Ryan, Jeff, Dirk, etc. Those guys are awesome.
The next day we slept in. Then we got some breakfast. I ordered a “California” omelette that should have been peppers, cheese and avocado. It did not have any avocado, but it did have bacon. Ha. It was delicious anyway. Then we took a swim at the hotel pool. Then we took a nap. By the time we finally got in to the festival it was 6pm. And if you’ve been there you know that’s a pretty good time of day to start the “day”. We hooked up with our Canadian pals and headed down to main stage to catch mewithoutYou (love their new record, love them, great show!) and a few songs of Shiny Toy Guns (liked them, but it started raining)
As we were wandering about we ran into my old friend Samuel Durling from Sweden. I love that guy! I was so excited to see him! (See photo, that’s him in the middle) He gave me a bunch of great metal he’s putting out. Fantastic packaging. If you need a graphic designer, you should hire him. He does great work!
At some point I snuck by to see The Wednesdays. Those guys were great, as always. You should check them out if they are in your town. I managed to say hi to Jamie (vocals, guitar) real quick as well and he schooled me on the skateboarding history of Alabama.
Later that night we caught the midnight reunion show of The Crucified. My band in high school played with them at their first show ever in April of 1986. The first show of my other band Blenderhead was also with The Crucified. I can’t believe how great they sounded all this time later. How did Mark remember all those lyrics? I don’t think I could ever do that. More bro time with the old school people, Streeters, etc. Good times!
Saturday morning we checked out of our hotel and headed into the fest to meet up with Samuel for lunch. Great time and conversation. He had us practically booking tickets to visit him. Some talk of an island off the coast there that has “over 100 medieval churches” – WHAT?!? Really want to go there! Good talk. Good coffee time. Never enough time to hang with Samuel, though!
After that we headed over for another set of Louis from Gasoline Heart. Louis told an inflammatory story about me. He thinks he’s funny. Well, he is. I actually manned their merch table while Tim went and got the van. I did not sell anything. Note to bands – get a good looking girl to sell your merch, not old dudes like me. More time walking around running into old schools like Kemper (Stand True) and Dunn (NIV/Facedown Records).
As evening rolled around we caught War Of Ages (who were great) and finally Living Sacrifice who rocked as usual. Don’t let Bruce’s peaceful and calm demeanor fool you. He is pissed off! I can’t wait for the new record “In Your Face, Devil!” Keep an eye out for that!
It did rain Friday night and most of Saturday which (as a tradition, of course) the entire fest site was converted into a giant mud bath. All part of the experience. We did throw out both of our sneakers (sorry, Joel…I know you wanted to take them back to Canada with you) as they were old anyway and saturated with mud.
All in all we had a blast (even if the 8 hour night drive in mostly rain was brutal) and enjoyed hanging with friends and seeing a few bands. It was 9 years ago on July 4th that Ronee and I met at the festival. So it was fun to be there and to remember that time together!
