As the weather tries on spring for size, white wine is appearing in my glass more often than red. Specifically, that racy little white grape that's helping to put Vermont wines on the map.
A few weeks ago at the Woodstock Farmers Market, I saw a bottle of La Crescent I hadn't tried before, from Montcalm Vineyards in Benson. I don't know where I've been, as many others have been sipping on this while I've imbibed beloved versions from Lincoln Peak and Shelburne Vineyard. At $14.99, it's comparable in price, so I took home one of the tall, slender bottles.
Once I realized the man behind it is Ray Knutsen, the bottle gained some backstory. Knutsen is an elder of the Vermont wine scene, planting the first vines at his Champlain Valley Vineyards in 1978 when cold-hardy La Crescent was just a glimmer in some oenologist's eye.
I didn't wait for a spicy dish to pop open his La Crescent — the only excuse it took was a sunny weekend afternoon, and a friend to join me. This wine was juicy and alive. Pale gold in the glass, it has intense and heady aromas, reminiscent of lying underneath blooming honeysuckle bushes and apple trees.
On the first sip, all of that flowery promise turned to summer fruit, with off-dry, juicy waves of ripe peaches, pineapples and melons floating on that floral undercurrent, and a crisp acidity keeping the entire thing lively. At a lowish 10.5 percent alcohol, it could be called a sessionable wine, if such a term existed. (Thanks to the beer drinkers for that.)
The wine's sweetness marks it as an able escort to Pla Goong from Tiny Thai or any other spicy fish or poultry dish — it's a fine subsitute for Riesling. Me, I just drink it on its own.
America's most popular — and richest — artist died in California on Friday at age 54. But unless you're an aficionado of kitsch, you may not have been familiar with Thomas Kinkade. He made many, many millions by painting pictures that deftly catered to mass tastes but caused outbreaks of aesthetic hives in those who look to art for something more than syrupy sweetness, corny theatrics and unnatural scenes of rural bliss.
The Middlebury College Museum of Art presented a sampling of Kinkade's work in 2009, with curators proceeding from the premise that his popularity warranted thoughtful appraisal. The nonjudgmental approach did help illuminate the reasons why the self-styled "painter of light" was so successful in market terms. But Kinkade, who actually functioned more as a corporation than as an individual creator, was a terrible painter in the ways that matter most. The organizers of the Middlebury show surely knew that, and their unwillingness to say it seemed disingenuous.
Image courtesy of Middlebury College Museum of Art for Seven Days' review of "Making Sense of Thomas Kinkade."
An anecdote in "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs," the monologue about Apple by Mike Daisey, took on a new resonance on Saturday night. It's the part in which Daisey is in China, planning out his visit to a Foxconn factory in Shenzhen where electronics are built for Apple and other electronics companies. Daisey tells his translator that he's not a businessman — he just plans to pose as one to get into the factory. The translator, Cathy, asks him if he's going to lie. Daisey reples, "Yes, Cathy. I'm going to lie to lots of people."
When Daisey spoke that line at the Flynn Center during his performance, it seemed to hang in the air a little. Not as long as the painfully drawn-out pauses when Ira Glass was eviscerating him on "This American Life," but long enough to let it sink in. I heard a couple audience members chuckle under their breath.
Saturday night marked Daisey's second "Agony and Ecstasy" performance since "This American Life" busted him for inventing and embellishing some details about his trip to Apple's Chinese factories in his ostensibly nonfiction monologue. It was his first in a couple of weeks, since the scandal began to cool down and Daisey had a chance to rethink and rework parts of the monologue.
Sure enough, there were some differences: The guards at the factory gates didn't have guns. Daisey didn't meet a 12-year-old worker. He did not claim that someone saw his iPad turn on and called it "a kind of magic." Daisey did still say that his taxicab came to a stop at a highway exit that ended in midair.
Somewhat surprisingly, Daisey did not address the controversy directly in his monologue. It wasn't until after the show, during a Q&A with Flynn Center executive director John Killacky and UVM Lane Series director Natalie Neuert, that the scandal actually came up — and even then, no one simply said, "Mike got in trouble a few weeks back because he said untrue things on 'This American Life' and Ira Glass really didn't take kindly to it."
It felt a little odd — Daisey frequently breaks the fourth wall and addresses the audience directly in his monologue, so, all things considered, I was expecting a prologue or some other mention of the brouhaha. It never came. Maybe that's all right. Daisey did take out the objectionable pieces of the monologue, so what more should we expect him to do?
And how many people in the audience — people who don't religiously listen to public radio or read the rants of professional media critics — had no idea there even was a shitstorm brewing over the past couple of weeks?
One defense Daisey has offered is that his work comes across differently in the context of journalism. This turned out to be true. The excerpt of "Agony and Ecstasy" featured on "This American Life" was a small part of Daisey's monologue. If you listen to his story about visiting China, it does sound like "journalism." But in the 90-minute-plus theatrical monologue, it's a slice of a larger work with multiple storylines — some more journalistic than others — that intertwine throughout the show.
Exaggeration happens in other parts of the piece, too — unless American business execs really do talk like Chewbacca and tech journalists really do derive sexual pleasure from Apple keynotes. (Maybe those aren't too farfetched.) But these moments of exaggeration and embellishment happen in the context of comedy, where they're excusable and perhaps necessary. But not when you're tugging your audience's heartstrings.
Those other parts of the show also endear Daisey to the audience — at least to those of us who attend as geeks and not necessarily as theater lovers. Who hasn't freaked over an Apple event that effectively relegates one of our devices to the annals of history? Or rushed out to buy a new-and-improved thing even when we're not quite sure what the improvement is? Daisey's work has been praised for exposing the conditions in overseas factories, but this part of the show seems equally important. The cycle of upgrades, trade-ins and new releases is our reality — and it's hard to see past it when you're in it. The tech blogs don't address it, not when there's a mockup of a new iPhone to speculate over.
Daisey's monologue is art, and memoir. It may not be journalism, yet it exposes truths in its own way.
I'd been thinking a lot about the Daisey affair in the time between my interview with him and Saturday night's show. I had a weird epiphany late last week that this controversy proved Daisey's thesis, in a sense. More than anything, he wants us to think about where our laptops and tablets and smartphones come from — because we never do. That's why people were so angry at Daisey for his offenses to the truth. He went there, to the factories. We put our trust in him to be the guy who knew, who saw the places where our devices came from. And it turned out to be a little bit false. But if we did know the origins of our devices, we wouldn't have been troubled about Daisey's "truthiness" — because we wouldn't need him to tell us what's going on.
It feels strange to talk about this in Vermont. We like to think of ourselves as mindful. We take pride in knowing where our food comes from. That's the way things should be. But why stop at food? Most of us spend more time using various electronic devices than we do eating. Why can't we extend the know-the-source mentality to everything else?
Even in an ideal world, it's hard to imagine our laptops and phones being made locally. (Localvore computing?) We'll probably never meet the person who built our computer, the way we meet the farmer who grew our vegetables. Maybe that's OK. But no matter what you think of Daisey, he's right that we should know more than "Made in China."
A final note: Two days before this performance, a new report confirmed that Foxconn, which operates the factories for Apple and most other electronics manufacturers in Asia, should improve working conditions in its factories. In response, Foxconn and Apple pledged to raise wages and reduce workers' hours. But Daisey and others have pointed out we've been down this road before: Apple promises to fix what it had insisted wasn't a problem, then the story drops out of the news cycle and nothing substantive actually happens.
No matter what Daisey said or didn't say, it's true that our devices are made under conditions that would not be acceptable in the United States and other developed countries. That's finally getting more coverage — in part, ironically, because of Daisey's lies.
Will things change this time? Or will everyone forget again?
Photo courtesy of Joan Marcus from a Daisey performance at the Public Theater in New York.
438 South Prospect Street, Burlington, 656-4664
This week, my feature in Seven Days focuses on Vermont Kosher, the new kitchen that provides food for observant Jewish students around the University of Vermont. Sunday through Thursday, students and community members alike can grab a Middle Eastern-style kosher meal at Redstone Unlimited Dining. I was so impressed with chef Rachel Jacob's food, I wanted to see what else was available at the newly renovated cafeteria, formerly Simpson Dining Hall.
For an old fart like me, the LEED-certified space seemed impressively techie at first. Nonstudent diners enter and pay $10.35 at the door. From there, they head to the FÖD (Food on Demand) ordering system, a line of touch-screen computers at which diners choose what they'd like to eat. They can then elect to be sent a text message when the food is ready, or just keep tabs of their order number on one of the dining hall's TV screens.
I chose the latter, which did not keep up. When my food was up, the numbers on the screen were still two hundred behind those actually being served. The waits were also surprisingly long. Cooks labored over several of the same dish at a time, before moving on to the next one. If your selection is toward the end of the rotation, you might be standing in line for a while.
While I waited, I hit the salad bar next to the kitchen. In a nice touch, there were regular salad fixings on one side, and all the ingredients for a specialty salad on the other. I chose to assemble the latter, combining spinach, mandarin oranges, cranberries and lo mein noodles, all dressed in a surprisingly zingy, herbaceous balsamic vinaigrette.
By then, my selections were ready. And the chicken-pesto panini was totally worth the wait. The chicken was not only moist, it was actually juicy, and dressed in garlicky pesto. Tomato slices and a chewy, salty slab of fresh mozzarella tied it together. I would have been happy with the sandwich even at a "real" restaurant, though I do deduct points for curly fries.
Another potato dish also fell short of impressive. Though I liked the inclusion of a small cup of sour cream on the side, and the cheese was suitably bubbly, the potato skins lacked crispness. The slightly bland chunks of potato also appeared to be covered in something more like Bacos® Bits than real bacon.
In the realm of cured pork products, the penne with spinach, peas and pancetta was more successful, though the cream sauce that dressed it was disappointingly one-note.
The kung pao chicken, one of several Chinese dishes available last night, was quite the opposite. The dish packed a wallop of flavor that included long-lasting, lip-burning spice. I have a friend from Chongqing who cooks a fabulous, from-scratch kung pao. The only major difference between this and hers is that the chicken at Redstone was fried. The carrots and celery were crisp and fresh, and even the little balls of fried chicken were meaty. I dare diners to find a spicier, more flavorful kung pao anywhere in Burlington.
By the time we were done trying the disappointingly healthy-tasting vegan parmigiana and a slice of flatbread with Bolognese sauce, most of the desserts were picked over. There were still the diner-style Jell-O cups at right, but I prefer red and blue to the citrus flavors available.
Instead, I grabbed a chocolate cupcake, topped in Christmas-colored sprinkles. The huge mound of vanilla buttercream on top was as buttery as I might have hoped, but the cupcake itself was dry and burned in places.
There were highs and lows in the offerings at Redstone, but the highs were higher than I might have expected. All the same, if I were studying at UVM, I might take at least a few nights a week to eat kosher.
Alice Eats is a weekly blog feature devoted to reviewing restaurants where diners can get a meal for two for less than $35. Got a restaurant you'd love to see featured? Send it to alice@sevendaysvt.com.
Burlington's music scene got some national love today when online tastemaker Stereogum included the 802 in its "Area Codes" feature, an ongoing series profiling various lesser known music scenes around the country. The piece has some nice quotes about the Queen City from local music mavens Alex Crothers of Higher Ground and Nick Mavodones from Angioplasty Media. (Mavodones also works at HG, BTW.)
Although the 802 area code encompasses the entirety of the state, the Stereogum piece is particularly Burlington-centric. Aside from passing mentions of Brattleboro and Bennington, music made outside of the state's biggest little city is pretty much ignored. That's somewhat understandable, especially considering it's a short piece coming from a writer with an outside perspective. Some small acknowledgement of the great tunes coming down from the mountains woulda been nice. But that's a minor quibble.
The piece does a admirable job of dispelling the myth that Burlington is still a jam band haven. (It ain't. And if you think it is, you should try getting out more often since 2001.) Mavodones in particular notes the city's burgeoning indie, experimental and hip-hop scenes. And the inclusion of some videos from the likes of indie space rockers Parmaga, Death's punk progeny Rough Francis and indie folk sweetheart Maryse Smith, as well as links to download tunes from Villanelles, the Vacant Lots and Lawrence Welks and Our Bear to Cross, among others, is some cool exposure. But to really capture BTV music — an admittedly tall order in a scant 500 words — it might have been wise for Stereogum to cast its gaze a little wider than the Angio/NNA Tapes crew and their associated acts. Not that those bands and labels don't deserve the love — they certainly do. But the piece feels a little clique-y and narrow in focus. Still, it's always nice to see the spotlight shone on our humble little corner of the world.
Here's a link to the entire story. And here's a new video from a great non-Burlington Vermont band, Wooden Dinosaur.
This week in movies you missed: Just for Thanksgiving, a family dramedy that tried to be American Beauty and fell on its face.
What You Missed
The Burnetts are one of those adorably dysfunctional families you only see in the movies. Mom (Hope Davis) is a control freak who organizes charity functions when she isn't having secret role-playing sex with neighbor Chi McBride.
Dad (Dermot Mulroney) barely seems to notice anything besides the rack on a secretary in his office (Christina Hendricks, playing her "Mad Men" role without any of the interesting parts, or really anything to do besides standing around showing off her physical endowments). Teenage son Eric (Max Thieriot) has teamed up with a group of religious zealots and is really into shooting guns, much to his parents' dismay. Teen daughter Kelly (Britt Robertson) wears too much eyeliner and has random hookups.
Then, in the time-honored way of movie contrivances, Mom gets bumped on the head and returns home an amnesiac.
She has reverted to the time just after her marriage, before she had kids, when she still hated her ice-queen mother (Jane Seymour), loved her husband and enjoyed fun. A celebration of life ensues!
Except not really. Mainly, a lot of disconnected subplots ensue and play themselves out till someone remembers to tack on an action sequence and a family-affirming finale.
Why You Missed It
The Family Tree played two theaters and earned a whopping $6000 or so before heading to DVD purgatory.
Should You Keep Missing It?
I don't have a whole lot to say about The Family Tree. This effort from director Vivi Friedman is a horribly misguided effort to recapture the magic of American Beauty, The Royal Tenenbaums, "Six Feet Under," and other family-dysfunction fare that combines serious drama with black humor. It tries so frantically to be "edgy" that it never stops to develop its characters into people we could conceivably care about. It's a waste of the excellent Hope Davis and a bunch of other recognizable actors.
But, while the film bored me, it gave me a conundrum to chew on (and that's what we all like to do while recovering from chewing on too much stuffing and pie, right?). Before The Family Tree, I watched The Descendants, the George Clooney family drama that's already being touted as a Best Picture frontrunner. Critics are loving it, but I was distinctly underwhelmed.
Basically, I agree with Noel Murray that director Alexander Payne went for obvious, crowd-pleasing plot and character elements when he could have done something way more interesting. Or maybe I got enough of long close-ups of Clooney getting in touch with his emotions in Up in the Air. Or maybe the theme just didn't resonate with me. Overall, The Descendants reminded me of Little Miss Sunshine, so, if you love that, take my mild disapproval as a recommendation.
But on to the idea. What's wrong with a movie being "crowd pleasing"? And how does a movie please the crowd? Critics apply the term negatively to movies with broad appeal that they didn't especially like -- such as, in my case, The Help and The Descendants.
Some would say we're just being a bunch of snobs. But I've enjoyed films with "crowd-pleasing" elements in the past -- Moneyball, for instance. What I seek in a realistic movie drama is some element of traction or friction; some unpredictability; some sense that I'm learning new things about people and their ways of living. The Descendants taught me about Hawaii, which was cool, but it did not teach me anything new about how humans interact, because it relied on comic and dramatic clichés. Well, that was my impression.
Now, let's come back around to The Family Tree. It, too, relies on time-honored clichés and offers no amazing new insights into family life. It, too, offers the familiar message that we need to appreciate our near-and-dear ones before they're dead, and forgive them their foibles.
But the evidence suggests that The Family Tree is not a crowd-pleasing movie. No crowds showed up for it. It sank like a stone.
So, what's the difference between a movie that just wants to be crowd pleasing and a movie that succeeds? Star power, for one thing. Genuine filmmaking skill, for another.
Unlike Friedman and her scriptwriter, who let their story wander all over the place (what the hell was that subplot with Selma Blair as an unhinged teacher sleeping with a disabled female student?), Payne keeps The Descendants firmly focused on Clooney's character and his reactions to a family tragedy. His daughters seem interesting initially, but they end up being just props to get their dad from one emotional place to another.
By keeping the focus on an actor with whom the audience finds it easy to identify, Payne provokes a strong response. It's the same factor that helped The Blind Side become huge, I think. Audiences respond to Clooney and Sandra Bullock — not just as actors playing roles, but as people.
Granted, the problems with The Family Tree go a lot deeper than lack of focus and lack of George Clooney. While The Descendants offers us some novel, clearly authentic elements, like the details of Hawaiian land ownership, and even its clichés are handled with taste and integrity, The Family Tree doesn't seem to be happening in the real world. When it broaches a big topic like race and tries to be daring and un-PC, the results are embarrassing.
Both movies make pretty obvious attempts to shock us (in The Descendants, for instance, when the teen daughter cusses out her comatose mother), but Payne moves beyond that to redeeming sentiments that don't feel tacked on. So enjoy your awards, The Descendants. You've pleased the crowd, and it's harder than it looks.
Verdict: If you like this kind of "wacky" family movie, there's really no reason to rent The Family Tree when you could have Crazy, Stupid, Love.
On the plus side, proof that Davis doesn't deserve to be consigned to roles like the matronly aunt she played in Real Steel. She deserves an Oscar-bait showcase of her own. And would someone please give Hendricks a role that involves more than being a sassy spitfire in low-cut tops?
Other New DVD Releases You May Have Missed
Uh, not a lot. You can now rent The Devil's Double and Sarah's Key, which both played recently at Merrill's Roxy (and Rick Kisonak panned 'em both!).
Or you can wait for next week, which is a big one, with Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams, Another Earth and Miranda July's The Future. Only one of them played in Vermont for more than a week.
Each week I review a brand-new DVD release picked for me by Seth Jarvis, buyer for Burlington's Waterfront Video, where you can obtain these fine films. (In central Vermont, try Downstairs Video.)
You know what, dudes? It's pretty wild that my 914th Phish show just happened to fall on September 14. Crazy, right? And practically in in my back yard, no less!
OK, I'm lying. The band's flood-relief benefit extravaganza at the Champlain Valley Expo in Essex last night was, in fact, my first time. I know, I know. Having grown up in Vermont during the supposed peak of the band's powers, it's kind of amazing that I never chanced in to a show at some point along the way. What can I say? I've never been much of a fan. And as an aside, most other VT stereotypes have never really fit me, either. I don't ski or snowboard, I don't smoke weed, I've never owned a Subaru and I prefer Gifford's to Ben & Jerry's. But I digress.
As the music editor for Seven Days, I've gone on record on numerous occasions as someone who doesn't care for the the band's music. I've taken generally good humored shots at them in my column. I once begged them to turn the entire city of Burlington into a gigantic festival because we needed the cash influx. In fact, declaring my distaste for seaphood was the first line ("I don't like Phish") of one of my first 7D CD reviews, Page McConnell's 2007 self-titled solo album. And that was before I was even a full-time staffer here at Vermont's Independent Voice. So, yes, Phish and I have a bit of a checkered past. And so it was with some trepidation that I went to last night's festivities.
Well, guess what? It was a lot of fun.
(Before we move on, if I could chat privately with the hardcore Fi-hadist nitwits for a second. Dudes, what follows will be a mostly positive review of my experience at the show last night. However, I'm a music critic. I don't believe anyone, even a sacred sea cow, is above criticism. I'm gonna write a few things you probably won't agree with or like. So let me save you some time and trouble:
- Yes, this is the worst piece of journalism in history. And I am the worst journalist ever.
- You're right, I probably should be/will be/have been fired for this.
- It's true. I am so jealous that your band is bigger than my li'l hipster indie bands. By the way, have you heard the new Vampire Grizzly Beach album? Really skinnies up my jeans.)
Aaaand we're back! So, yeah, Phish. Good times.
We arrived at the fairgrounds a little before 7 p.m., very surprised at the lack of traffic heading to the concert. I think we probably missed the biggest crush. An accidentally veteran move, I guess.
Strolling the fabled parking-lot scene, I was struck by the fact that, well, there really wasn't much of a fabled parking-lot scene. In fact, I was a little insulted to be offered hard drugs only once. I expected more, guys. (And for the record, no, I didn't partake. You don't do drugs, drugs do you, man.)
The queue to get in by the main expo entrance was, predictably, something of a clusterfuck. The nebulous line formed seemingly at random, sucking in stray fans like a black hole picking off wayward stars and planets with sheer gravitational force. I'm pretty sure some people are still waiting to get in.
Fortunately, as we were waiting, security announced there was another entrance on the far side of the stage with no line. The stampede was on, especially when the crowd inside cheered the entrance of Gov. Shumlin, which spurred fans from a gallop to an all-out sprint. Thousands charged from the west gate to the east. I've never seen so many hippies running without police being involved. It was majestic.
Inside the gates, the scene was surprisingly low key. Fans milled about anxiously, waiting for the band to take the stage. When they finally did, the crowd, both inside the arena and outside on the concourse, exploded with palpable glee. It was electric. One young-ish guy near me was practically orgasmic. As the opening strains filled the night air, he dropped to his knees and exclaimed, nearly in tears, "Ohmigod, I loooooove this band!" I found myself envying him, in a weird way. I can't think of anything that would inspire that degree of uncontrollable giddiness within me. It must be kind of nice.
My companions and I made our way to the beer tent for a few songs. It was sparsely populated but offered a decent view of the stage and good sound. The mood here was decidedly mellower, as most folks simply stood bobbing their heads or chatting with friends, with maybe a stray wiggle dancer here and there. It was pleasant, but I came for the spectacle.
I headed to the entrance under the grandstand to make my way into the heart of the lion's den. Jackpot. Thousands upon thousands of fans gyrated in unison. The energy here was undeniable as Phish tore through a number of classics. You couldn't help but groove along, if only for self-preservation. In fact, I believe I may have stumbled upon the origin of the noodle dance. It's the only way to move from point A to point B: to contort your body, almost Matrix-style, in an effort to dodge wayward knees and akimbo elbows. Neccessity is the mother of invention.
But what about the band?
Honestly, the Phab Phour were tight and polished and visibly excited, seeming to draw as much energy from the crowd as the crowd did from the band. Trey Anastasio's lines were often virtuosic. Page's keys rippled and rumbled along while Jon Fishman and Mike Gordon carved out space underneath. Even someone as jam-phobic as myself has to concede they are a technically impressive group. And speaking of jams, they were generally succinct and purposeful. Many jam bands confuse jamming with extended masturbatory soloing. Phish showed impressive restraint and focus, using flights of fancy to augment their songs, rather than letting the songs serve as a template for musical wankery.
My biggest critique would be that, after a while, it all kinda started to sound the same. Though they've penned some memorable tunes, Phish are not great songwriters and seem to rely on the same arranging tricks too often. The result is a blur of bouncy jam fare in which one tune becomes almost indistinguishable from the next. I'm sure aficionados willdisagree and point to subtleties throughout the set that I probably missed. But after a couple of hours, I started feeling as though I'd heard it all before.
But for me, the point of going to the show was less about appreciating Phish's music — I've been trying for almost two decades, folks — than it was simply trying to understand the phenomenon. Last night was probably not representative of the Phish enigma on the whole. Still, it provided a glimpse into why so many people feel so strongly about the band and the experience. Even for a curmudgeony music hack, it was hard not to get caught up in the vibe (I can't believe I just wrote that).
Maybe it was the stunning orange moon above the stage. Maybe it was the crisp fall air. Or the ridiculously cool light show. Or the scads of pretty girls dancing as far as the eye could see. Whatever it was, I left feeling as though I finally understood what the big effing deal is. Am I going to quit my job and go on tour next summer? Doubtful. Will I be scouring eBay for live bootlegs from 1994? Hell, no. Will I stop taking (playful!) jabs at hippies in my column? Are you serious?
But I'll say this. Vermont is lucky to have Phish. And Phish fans, pathetic message-board trolls notwithstanding, are lucky to have something to which they can cling so dearly. I'd estimate the majority of the crowd last night comprised longtime fans who practically grew up with the band. To be able to share those life experiences and memories with a community of likeminded enthusiasts is extremely special. Enjoy it, pholks. I did.
On September 12, I wrote a blog post titled "Here For Phish? How About You Lend a Phreaking Hand?" In retrospect, I realize that it was ill-timed and ill-conceived. A number of readers felt the post impugned the good work already being done by flood volunteers, took for granted Phish's contribution to the relief efforts, and was offensive to a legion of music fans.
This was not my intent. I simply meant to draw attention to a need facing our state in the wake of a natural disaster and, at the same time, poke a little fun at the caricature of the Phish fan that has formed over the years. And, yes, I realize there is more than one kind of Phish fan.
I, like my fellow Vermonters, appreciate the work that is being done around the state to help get people back on their feet after Tropical Storm Irene. Phish is being incredibly generous by donating their time and talent. The money that is raised from their benefit show on September 14 will go a long way toward helping the state heal. I didn't intend to minimize their contribution, or those of concertgoers from in and out of state.
Judging from the negative reactions to the blog post, I clearly didn't achieve what I set out to with the piece: to entertain and inform. As some have already pointed out, this piece was a "phail." I acknowledge that, and I'm sorry.
Editors' note: Opinions expressed on our staff blog do not necessarily reflect the views of editors or staff at Seven Days. Many of us are longtime Phish fans, and all of us appreciate what the band, and its fans, are doing for our state.
Last Tuesday, Vermont's phavorite jam band, Phish, announced that they would play a special benefit concert for victims of Tropical Storm Irene. Unsurprisingly, the quartet's announcement created tremors of excitement around Vermont and across the whole of Phish phandom. No sooner had word gotten out about the phoursome's show then dedicated Phish phollowers the country over grabbed some hula hoops, a couple djembe drums, a few pallets of Cheetos and their best water bongs, hopped in their vanagons and hightailed it to Vermont.
They came phrom all over — New Jersey, Connecticut, New Jersey, Colorado, New Jersey — in the hope of nabbing one of the hottest tickets in town. The devoted called in sick to work so they could camp out on the sidewalk, despite the fact that the FlynnCenter box office asked them not to queue until Saturday when the tickets went on sale. When the box office opened at 10 a.m., the weary waiters rubbed the weed smoke phrom their eyes, threw off their drug rugs and stepped up to take their place in history — the show, after all, will be Phish's phirst in its home state since 2004's epic concert in Coventry, a big, sloppy mess if ever there was one.
By late Saturday, the show's 10,000 tickets were sold out. All the die-hards walked away from the box office with a $75 ticket in hand (all the proceeds go to the band's Waterwheel Foundation and the Vermont Community Foundation, which will dole out the money to appropriate phlood relief efforts). But here's what I want to know — what are all the out-of-state phans doing until Wednesday's show at the Champlain Valley Exposition, besides making daisy chains, crafting hemp dog leashes, swapping bootlegs and hosting sing-alongs in City Hall Park? Here's what they should be doing — volunteering.
I submit that if you're coming to Vermont just phor the show, you need to phind yourself some gloves and a mask and pitch in. More than 700 residences were destroyed or significantly damaged when Irene rolled through. Sorry to harsh your mellow, but hundreds of people are homeless and without work and could really use a helping hand.
Phans might say that they're already helping out by purchasing a ticket and dropping some cash on limited edition merch. I dig that, Moonbeam Sunflower. But before the money starts rolling in, there's work that needs doing. And if you could phigure out a way to get your patchworked, Birkenstocked self all the way here, you can sure as hell phigure out a way to provide some assistance.
Not sure what you can do? Phair enough. Here are some ideas:
— You could phill your camper van with personal hygiene products, phirst aid items, cleaning and school supplies and food and take it to South Royalton. For a full list of this community's needs, click here.
— How about taking down some walls and pulling up some flooring for the Kadrik family in Waterbury?
— Perhaps you could help muck out the Hancock Town Hall basement.
— Maybe you could help phix the phence at Turner Farm on Route 100 in the Mad River Valley.
There are many more projects that you could help with. Your best bet to phind volunteer opportunities is VTResponse. If you are willing and able, they will gladly set you up with something to do. Not able to swing a hammer, carry a bucket or throw things in a dumpster? Consider writing a check the American Red Cross of Vermont and the New Hampshire Valley, the United Way of Chittenden County, the Vermont Foodbank or any number of towns accepting financial donations. Remember to earmark your contribution for flood relief.
Vermont has been good to you, no? We gave you Phish and Ben & Jerry's and phlannel and weed. That's right — we invented phlannel. And weed. We might have even invented patchouli, white-people dreadlocks and barefoot dancing. So consider giving back. Then when you go back to New Jersey, you can tell all your phriends how you helped save Vermont. So heady, brah.
It's hard to not cast a cynical eye on the tsunami of ink the Burlington Free Press has unleashed in trying to obtain police and university documents related to the case of the Essex couple who went missing on June 8. On the one hand, as a fellow journalist, I can sympathize with reporters' and editors' ire over being repeatedly shut down in their public records requests. On the other hand, the daily drumbeat playing out on the front pages of the Free Press seems like little more than a way of generating headlines in a criminal investigation that, for now, is mostly unfolding behind closed doors.
Ever since the June 8 disappearance of William and Lorraine Currier of Essex (pictured) the Free Press has run at least seven stories about the legal wrangling over the paper's denied records requests for search warrants, police affidavits and UVM emails belonging to William Currier, an animal-care technician employed by a university subcontractor. Both the Chittenden County State's Attorney's Office and UVM officials have repeatedly denied those requests.
Based on the number of Free Press writers who have penned stories on this subject (four), as well as the urgent tone of their headlines — "Ruling pending on release of Currier case search warrant" (June 23); "Warrants, emails challenged in Currier case" (June 23); "Prosecutor challenges judge's ruling to release warrants to media in case of missing Essex couple (June 25); "Supreme Court keeps Essex search documents secret" (June 27); "Court rules to temporarily seal warrants in case of missing Essex couple," (June 28); "Judge: Prosecutor's case for sealing search warrants in missing couple case weak" (June 30) — one could led to believe that Vermont's courthouses are under siege by an army of Gannett lawyers filing repeated motions and memoranda in the name of the Fourth Estate.
At least, that what I assumed when I queried managing editor Mike Townsend about the Free Press' ongoing court battle with Chittenden County State's Attorney T.J. Donovan. Thus far, Donovan has refused to release any of the documents, at the behest of Essex Police Chief Brad LaRose, and has asked the Vermont Supreme Court to uphold his decision.
"The Free Press has not engaged in a court battle or enlisted the services of an attorney," answered associate editor Mike Kilian in an email to Seven Days.
"Not engaged in a court battle?" That's an interesting, if disingenuous, take on things, considering the print headline on the June 25 front-page Free Press story: "Court battle brews in missing couple case."
To be fair, the Free Press hasn't actually made its case in court — just the court of public opinion. However, that's likely to change soon, as the Vermont Supreme Court has asked both sides to file court papers about the records request by July 6.
"Three judges' rulings to date have concluded that the State's Attorney's Office has failed to make the case that release of the search warrants would impede the investigation," Kilian noted, "and our hope would be that the Supreme Court concurs."
Is this a bonafide violation of Vermont's open-records law — a cause the Free Press has been championing for months, as evidenced by its daily chronicle of open-records provisions and the legal exemptions thereto — or a tempest in a teapot?
Obviously, Donovan believes the latter. While he said he understands the need for transparency and the media's right to access public records, that right is "not absolute."
"For me, part of the critical question here with search warrants is the timing of when they’re [made] public," Donovan said. "Are they public after charges are filed? That’s fine. I don’t have a problem with that. But during the pendency of an investigation, where perhaps there is an alleged perpetrator out there who could gain an advantage by having access to this information, I don’t think there are strong public policy reasons for releasing that information."
University officials have essentially staked out similar legal ground, according to Enrique Corredera, UVM's director of communications.
"We have regularly demonstrated our commitment to openness and transparency, especially when responding to public records acts requests," said Corredera. "But in this case, the request involved records previously provided to police as part of an ongoing investigation involving potential criminal activity. Our position is that we simply cannot take any action that could potentially interfere with an ongoing police investigation."
In the meantime, one might also assume that the Freeps' reporters are onto an especially juicy lead that justifies compromising the integrity of an ongoing criminal investigation: Are the Essex Police covering something up? Have their detectives botched the investigation? Is the family frustrated by the pace of new developments?
"That would be speculation," Kilian wrote back. "All I'll say is that the free flow of information assists the public in gauging the effectiveness of their elected and appointed officials.
"The Currier disappearance has generated considerable public interest and concern," he added. "The Essex police have shed very little light on the case. We believe release of the search warrants has the potential to build public understanding of what might have occurred in a high-profile case." Not to mention the potential for more headlines.
But Essex Chief LaRose begged to differ on who's shedding light versus heat. Pointing out that he and other Essex officers are fielding media inquiries "every day" on the Currier case, "I think we’ve been very open with all the media in sharing what we can," LaRose argued. "We’re putting out as much information as we can without compromising the investigation."
Could the release of the warrant returns — that is, what police turned up in their search of the Curriers' home — actually compromise the investigation?
"I'd say stronger than 'could,'" LaRose said. "I can't say definitely, but there's a strong possibility."
Some information included in the police affidavits would be known only to family members, police or a potential perpetrator, LaRose noted. Moreover, he's asked the family not to be public about certain details, in the greater interest of finding the couple more quickly.
"We asked the family to try to help us out here and not make it any more public than we have to," LaRose explained, without mentioning specifics. "We can’t say it’s protected information that only the police know, but it does help us to narrow the scope of things."
Early on, LaRose said, the family had questions about why detectives couldn’t share more information with them. "But when we explained it to them, they understood it right out of the chute why we do things like that and were appreciative of it," LaRose said. "It's very difficult for them, but they understand that we’re doing everything we can do to figure out where Bill and Lorraine are. And, they’re 100 percent behind our efforts."
When asked if the family has designated someone who might answer a reporter's questions on this legal brouhaha, LaRose added, "They don't want to speak to the media."
Finally, LaRose seemed at a loss to understand why the Free Press was putting on the full court press for information that will be made public in due time. As he put it, "Jeez, we’re all in this together, the public and police, trying to get justice served here in the best way possible."