The second annual Arroyo Seco Music Festival took place on the third longest day of the year, Saturday, June 23rd, bringing in the summer concert season in grand style. The two-day festival was organized by Goldenvoice, the same organization responsible for the most auspicious festival in the country, Coachella. The Arroyo Seco festival was held in a beautiful tree-lined meadow, just outside the Rose Bowl, in the affluent suburbs of Pasadena.

Imagine having to follow Neil Young and your sons after they’ve just slayed your own festival crowd with this string of set closers:

Powderfinger

Welfare Mothers

Cowgirl in the Sand

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

Cortez the Killer

F*!#in' Up

And you, with only an old, small-bodied, nylon-strung Martin with a hole in it.

Steve Gumble, of Telluride Blues & Brews Festival, and Craig Ferguson, of Telluride Bluegrass Festival, have joined together to announce two very special shows from legendary guitarist and songwriter Neil Young in the world-famous mountain town of Telluride, Colorado.  

A side project of The Infamous Stringdusters, The Founding Fathers, Andy Falco and Chris Pandolfi combine their strings, pedals and whatever instrument is within reach to form as impressive of a duo as is out on the road today.  Their set:

Have A Cigar, Sitting on Top of the World, Ravi Shankar Jam>Listen To The Wind Blow>Ravi Shankar Jam, Fork in the Road, While My Guitar Gently Weeps

Sugar Mountain. Sugaree. Sugar Magnolia.

Interlocken, a 4-day music festival, with an emphasis on world class music, locally sourced food and sustainability, is confirmed to take place September 5 – 8 at Oak Ridge Farm at the foot of the Blue Ridge in Central Virginia, a mere 35 miles south of Charlottesville, and approximately 100 miles from both Washington, DC, and Richmond, VA. Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Furthur, Zac Brown, The String Cheese Incident, and The Black Crowes will perform.

Tomorrow, Thursday, December 6, Trey will join Neil Young & Crazy Horse at a special benefit concert at Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City, NJ.Trey, a New Jersey native, will perform a solo acoustic set at the concert. Proceeds from the evening will go to the American Red Cross Hurricane Sandy relief effort.

At age 67, Neil Young is looking classically weathered for a rocker his age, but no more so than any other celebrity who came of age in the 1960's, and definitely not withered in form . The "Godfather Of Grunge" saddles up again with bandmates Billy Talbot (Bass), Ralph Molina (Drums) & Frank "Poncho" Sampedro (Guitar) of Crazy Horse for "The Alchemy Tour", showcasing the band's first original material in nine years from their October 2012 release "Psychedelic Pill".

“Just had that . . . it's weird. Just had that little feeling . . . you ever get that funny little feeling [of] 'vujà dé'? No, not déjà vu. This is vujà dé. This is the strange feeling that, somehow, none of this has ever happened before. And then it’s gone.”

~ George Carlin (RIP George – if anybody deserves some of that RESpecT, you do, too, brother!)

“A life without cause is a life without effect.”

My feet are aching, my throat is hoarse, and my ears are muffled. That can only mean one thing: Outside Lands day one was a success.