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A couple months ago, I premiered "You Are Here" by the South Carolina band Lunch Money. It was one of the many fine tracks on the Many Hands: Family Music for Haiti benefit disk released on Bill Childs' Spare the Rock Records.
And then about a week afterward, I received an odd e-mail -- a remix of the song by one Bil Hooper (known here as Grody), who described the result as "re-imagined as a cross between Neutral Milk Hotel and the Sundays." Yeah, he had that about right. I said it sounded pretty cool, and Hooper apologized for the low sound quality of the remix since he only had the actual mp3, not the individual tracks.
"You know, Molly [Ledford, Lunch Money songwriter extraordinaire] might be willing to share the original tracks with you," I said (essentially).
Which is how Bill world-premiered the remix below on his show this morning and why, with Bill and Molly's permission, you can stream it here. I still think it's pretty cool.
When I was given the opportunity to share with you a track from Many Hands: Family Music for Haiti, the hardest part was picking the track. There are lots of great songs on the compilation put together by Dog on Fleas and Bill Childs to benefit a variety of Haiti efforts, limiting myself to just one was hard work. (But in a good way.)
I picked this track from Lunch Money because in a couple ways it exemplifies the album as a whole -- 1) the benefit compilation itself is the first I can think of that consists primarily of family musicians performing (as opposed to adult artists performing kids' tracks), and 2) its theme of connecting with people elsewhere in the world fits well within the album's underlying intention to connect this part of the world with another part of the world -- nearby geographically, but far away in other ways.
Also, 3) it's just a really fun and sweet track.
Many Hands: Family Music from Haiti is officially released next week, Aug. 10. (You can preorder the album at Amazon, among other places.) Until then, courtesy of Dean and Bill and Lunch Money, stream this track.
[Ed: But only for a limited time. The album's out today...]
Oh, sure, you can go check out Molly Ledford: Songs, the new song blog from Lunch Money songwriter extraordinaire Molly Ledford. 'Cuz, yeah, there are lots of cool songs there. But my favorite unreleased track from Molly thus far isn't even on the blog. It's called "Tap Dancer" -- you can watch and listen to it below. Molly notes that it won't be on the upcoming Lunch Money disk Original Friend but that "it will be on something eventually."
I really dig the bluesy turn the bridge takes. And I think more kids songs should use the word "Arabesque." I should use the word "Arabesque."
I thought I'd wrap up my coverage with a few final thoughts and suggestions for improvement about the AKL stage, plus add a few pictures.
1. The revised stage configuration of this year's AKL stage was an improvement. Less sound bleeding from the Xbox 360 stage next door meant that the AKL artists were never drowned out. Yay! And maybe it was just my imagination (or possibly the cooler weather), but the new layout seemed blessed with more shade.
2. It's still too loud between sets. Lord knows we're big fans of Romeo and his BBoy City crew (quite possibly Miss Mary Mack's favorite part of the festival this year), but they're forced to crank the volume to a point that it drives all the families away from the stage. Perhaps next year they can swap the dance stage and the pottery/kefia tents so that it's pretty close to the stage and the volume can be reduced.
3. There are probably points where the sound on the AKL stage during sets can be reduced -- I could hear 23 Skidoo's set close to half a mile away as we were crossing Lady Bird Lake.
4. Moving on to the weather -- I will gladly take a chance of (or actual) rain in return for cooler weather. I'm so glad that the festival's been gradually pushed back into October and am happy to see it further pushed back to the second week of October (Oct. 8-10, 2010) next year.
5. The guest sets have been really cool, and I'd love to see them used even more to drive families to see bands they wouldn't have seen otherwise. That was the case for me with K'Naan on Friday. I also got a chance to meet Ben Sollee backstage briefly on Sunday before heading back to Arizona, and based on this clip of Sollee covering "Wild World" later that day, I have a feeling that if I'd seen him at the AKL stage playing his cello, I'd have been sure to see him later that day on a bigger stage. (Though it should be noted, I did see him playing with Abigail Washburn the year before.)
6. The fact that the AKL stage hosted both K'Naan and Ben Sollee, both Mr. Leebot and Secret Agent 23 Skidoo, speaks to the fact that the stage can handle a fair amount of diversity, which is somewhat reflective of the ACL Festival as a whole. There's obviously only so much diversity you can have when you've got just 8-10 acts playing a set or two, but I encourage Tor to continue mixing it up as much as possible.
7. Can these festivals really be done with families? Well, it's definitely hard work, but if you're willing to sacrifice some of your own needs (sorry, Karen O, maybe next time), you can definitely see a lot. I'm conflicted because I have to balance my own musical tastes with that of my kids with my need to cover the festival (and the AKL stage in particular) on the press pass with the fact that my family lives in Austin and I want to see them, too. Sometimes I felt like I did none of those things well. But the AKL stage is situated about as well as it can be to serve as a base station for families exploring the festival. (And, hey, there's always babysitters.)
8. Finally, thanks to everyone at C3, particularly Tor, for making the AKL stage (and the press area) run so smoothly. Hope everyone reading got a good sense of the weekend of fun... Pictures after the jump...
And now it's a full 48 hours later after Saturday's Day 2 mudfest, and I still haven't posted my thoughts. So let's get moving, eh?
We did get an earlier start on Saturday morning, and found a parking spot fairly quickly, but even so, we pretty much only caught the last 2 songs of Mr. Leebot's AKL debut. Lee was energetic, trying to get the rained-upon crowd moving.
Did I forget to mention it was raining? That it rained for, oh, most of Saturday? That I would still prefer my music festivals rainy and cool than hot and dry? Well, I would.
Mr. Leebot - "Robot Dance"
As I noted to Lee later that weekend, although it was raining for his set, nobody was flinging mud at him a la Green Day circa Woodstock '94.
Then it was time to get lunch, so we moved out to the Food Court (mmmm... cones from Hudson's on the Bend) and, desirous to get out of the rain, after we ate we went to the Wildflower Center stage, which besides having a really good set of artists has a solid roof. We enjoyed 30 minutes of a (not literally) roof-raising set from the Gospel group the Soul Stirrers (Sam Cooke's old band), then made our way back to the AKL stage.
Walking back to the AKL stage from behind the stage, you would have been forgiven if you thought that it was a guest artist set. The music from Quinn Sullivan did not sound like it should be coming from someone who could have gotten in free with a paying adult. Not kids music, but pretty amazing. Packed crowd, and when Sullivan said, "This was cool -- I hope I get to do this next year," I'm sure I'm not the only one who thought, "Yeah, on one of the other, bigger stages."
Then we stuck around for Secret Agent 23 Skidoo, who I was eager to see. Skidoo brought a full compliment for the show including his daughter Saki, performing on stage and not fazed in the least by the crowd out there. Good set, though I'm wondering if maybe the bass was a bit loud -- as we left after the set early so that my wife and the kids could go home early with the Official Brother of Zooglobble, we could hear "Gotta Be Me"... from about a third of a mile away.
Secret Agent 23 Skidoo - "I Like Fruit"
Secret Agent 23 Skidoo - "Sleepover"
After I came back across the bridge after dropping off my family with my brother, I was hoping to see more, but Lunch Money's set had started late, and between that and the rain, traipsing off throughout the rest of the festival seemed more of a pain than was worthwhile considering I had to leave shortly for another engagement.
Lunch Money worked harder than probably any other band at working through the "this is what you do in this song to be interactive" motions. Here they solicited foods that did the kids wrong, right, and had never been tried. You sort of take for granted that people know how to act at concerts, but those are learned traits, and it's just as important to learn the rock show rules of the road than the children's theatre rules of the road.
Lunch Money - "Ate Too Much of My Favorite Food"
If I have one regret from the Lunch Money sets it's that I didn't hear them play many of their quieter songs. Having said that, live, the band rocks harder than on record. Watch out Rush, the band's looking to claim your power trio crown.
Sad to have missed Milkshake's second set (though I did hear a song as I dashed back at one point to collect our stuff) and Ralph's World first set. Not to worry, though, Ralph was playing Sunday....
Saturday, October 2, 2010 at 7:40AM 
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