How great to hear from an out-of-town fan! (I had no idea such a thing existed...)

ChazFest yesterday was a resounding success. There were scattered showers until about 2:30-3 pm, not enough to turn the grounds to mud, just enough to keep things cool. The "Truck Farm" venue is a large and rather pastoral spread in the middle of a very urban city block, completely invisible from the street, which once functioned as a working vegetable farm.

Veteran observers agreed that this year's event drew the largest crowd yet ~ but it was still comfortable, not oppressively overcrowded. It will probaly continue to grow in popularity, and eventually become unmanageably overpopulated. Maybe we'll look back at 2012 as the last nice homey ChazFest...

I did not see anyone shooting video, but who knows? There may be some footage available in the near future. Tiny little digital cameras, and even some cellphones, can record video these days...

The second VMC CD, "From the Straits of St. Claude," has been produced and a few free copies distributed to band members. The "CD Release" event is still two weeks off, however, on Saturday May 19 at the Saturn Bar. All of which means that Alex may or may not wait a couple of weeks before shipping the new CDs. His website does NOT offer the new album just yet, so perhaps there'll be a brief wait. Shoot him a message via "contact us" on his website to ask you can pre-order; I'm sure he's interested in all prospective paying customers.

The stories about Alex's tenure as "Captain Sandy" at Tokyo Disneyland about ten years ago are indeed true ~ most of 'em, anyway, I suppose.