There are certain points in the year our band finds easily marked by festivals… March is South by Southwest, April is CincyPunk Fest, September is MidPoint Music Festival, October is CMJ, and August—well August is Dayton's Ladyfest… Ladyfest is a multi-day celebration of women in performing arts, and it's one of those neat ideas that many cities chose to host in festival form throughout the year. We played Dayton's Ladyfest last year and it was a major blast—we've been looking forward to this year's incarnation since…
I met the boys +1 (Mike's dad, Mark, joined us as Merch Guy Extraordinaire) in Dayton for load-in (I'd been visiting family in Cleveland). Dayton's Ladyfest is held in a DIY art venue called C{Space—it's a large, colorful, L-shaped spot. The festival organizers had moved some things around this year and we loaded our gear directly into the vault. From there we high-fived some friends of ours from Chicago-by-way-of-Dayton Hospital Garden, explored the prospect of a bright future made possible by vegan twinkies (there was a booth!) with some good folks who drove from Cincinnati for the event, and watched a giant spider spin a web in the open doorway leading the the back lot where all the smokers were hanging…
We had some sound problems that complicated our line check and put Mike in a prematurely sweaty and slightly anxious state. Thankfully the problems were resolved, and with Mike just a little wetter than usual, we got going. During our set I found myself adjusting to the view from our stage, which had been moved from its location last year. Rather than looking out from the vertex of the L upon the front doors, we were facing the second stage perpendicular to the entryway. While the stage this year seemed higher and larger than last, and jumping on and off it with gear was kind of fun, I do think I preferred the location of the stage from Ladyfest Dayton 2008. From there I probably started contemplating something entirely inappropriate to think about on stage, like what it would take to turn my home office into a sweet room for a (future?) pet baby bunny, or how large an AU really is in comparison to my height (as a graphic), or how great it was going to be to get a vegan twinkie after our set… Every so often my mind wanders off while we are onstage—something I generally try not to let happen, but I accept that sometimes it does. Whatever it was, I was brought back from Reverie Land with the help of some particularly loud and enthusiastic "wooooooo!s" from the Cincinnatians. We had a great time playing just as we did in 2008. Sadly (for me), the vegan twinkies had all been sold by the end of our set, so I'll just have to wait for next August to get my "Golden Sponge Cake with Creamy Filling" on.
Bribot prepares for battle.
Mike curses the phantoms.—Margaret
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