No music for
almost 3 months and now 2 shows in 2 days. Crazy. But this is the one I have
been waiting for. The return of live music to Nectar’s. Inside. Around other
humans. Here we go. 9 pm Dead Set, June 20th, Nectar’s, Burlington,
VT.
I had a reason to
walk by Nectar’s about once a week since this all started. At first, the old
posters advertising shows were still up. Then everything came down and the
windows were covered up so you couldn’t see what was going on inside.
Eventually, a sign went up advertising the online store. And within the last
few weeks, another sign went up in the window. It read, Jah is my Shepard. I shall not want. The paper came down earlier
in the week and I saw a lot of the pictures and art stacked against the wall.
Met my friends across the street behind the
Democracy statue because, pandemic or not, we still live in Burlington. A table
with masks and hand sanitizer is in the little vestibule now. I walk in and the
inside is totally naked. The left wall that had the old staging area for window
food? Gone. The pics of the Stones, Jerry and Belushi. Gone. The entire wall
striped down to the original brick. The booths and most of the tables are were
removed. Closer to the kitchen, the
benches along the wall and pool tables were removed. A few tables were in the
area, but that was it.
The bar area had
the majority of the tables, spaced out, all the way to the back. No hanging out
at the bar. All the art was off the wall along with that large mirror. They had
ropes up in front of the stage. They even removed the No Drinks tape that was
on the stage (and Page’s keyboard at the NYE Bus Set in 2013). There is a mural
on the wall behind the stage now. We don’t know if that was new or just hidden
behind the curtain. The only thing still on the walls is this:
You could dance in
your general space around your table and it looked like most people were
following the rules. One clown came over near our area and sat on that enormous
subwoofer that is right by the bathrooms. He was definitely closer than 6 feet
to myself. Rather than dance, he likes to stomp. Winner all around. But the
outstanding Nectar’s staff came over and told him to go back to his area. I
only witnessed all this because it was right in front of me.
Sugar Magnolia>Scarlet Begonias>Fire on the Mountain,
Estimated Prophet>Crazy Fingers, Catfish John, Sunshine Daydream
I thought it was outstanding. I hoped they would go into
Scarlet when they opened with Sugar Mag. Nice long drawn out flow into Fire. The
Estimated had a lot of wah wah, even in these troubled times. I danced my ass
off and only took it easy during Catfish John. The ceiling fans were on high
and they had the garage window open. The garage door window was not open Friday
night when I walked up there.
Masks were optional at your table. The servers and staff
always had theirs on. I did as well. Pulled it down to drink and then back up.
Wasn’t a huge inconvenience. Singing can really spread the virus. But I believe
in science and now the data says wear a mask.
But I did feel safe with the mask on and was really able to forget about
the world for 2 hours.
So there it is.
Live music is back, at least for now. There is a minimum number of tickets one
must buy for the shows and the cost is almost double because of limited
capacity. But it is what we have and I feel very blessed to live in a place
where they are allowing small gatherings. We just had an outbreak in Winooski
over the last 2 weeks so this could all close down again.
Dave Kemp
BA American Studies
PhD Rock and Roll
