Written by Lou McCoy
Summerdance 2019 was a weekend I won’t soon forget. We arrived Friday at Nelson Ledges Quarry Park to some beautiful weather. Start Making Sense kicked off the night with some Talking Heads covers. My Fiancé and I set up camp in “The War Zone,” a heavily wooded area in the back of the park where all the weird stuff goes down. A great aspect of Nelson Ledges is all of the campsites are in woods camping where the temperature feels 10 degrees cooler. I soon greeted friends from Ohio and we set up their canopy in hasty anticipation for the big event. We ran down to the stage to see the headliner we had all driven to this beautiful slice of heaven for. Lotus played a beautiful “Spiraling of Light” and encored with a “Hammerstrike.” After Lotus we stopped by Camp Weirdo and enjoyed some grimy electronic music and then turned in for the night.
Image taken at one of the renegade sets, a DJ at Camp Weirdo.
We awoke Saturday and enjoyed some biscuits and mushroom gravy from one of the ledges vendors. I recommend the biscuits and mushroom gravy to anyone who attends this event as they were extremely tasty. We then went back to the camp site and enjoyed catching up with friends before jumping off the ledges into Nelson’s beautiful fresh water quarry. There were lots of wacky floats to be seen on the quarry all weekend. A notable daytime performance was Cut Chemist a former member of Jurassic 5. This guy spins and mixes in ways I haven’t seen in today’s DJs. After Cut Chemist we enjoyed the NYC based trio Moon Hooch. These guys brought a vegan diet fueled funk with their bassy saxophone music. Moon Hooch brings a vibe unlike any other. The Moon Hooch stage tech Tony was doing Tai Chi for the crowd during their entire set which gave it an extremely trippy vibe. It was as if we were about to summon something. Well, what we summoned was another great night of Lotus. Lotus’s first set had a ripping “Neon Tubes.” Lotus came with a housey “Belleweather” second set, completely improv. This is a set I have never seen these boys bust out. After Lotus we enjoyed watching Camp Propane spin fire on the beach. Following the fire performance, we ventured to Camp Weirdo and watched another renegade set by Eerie Waters.
Lotus playing an improv House set.
On our final day of music we took a nice hike around the Ledges and then went to morning yoga on the beach which prepared us for our adventure. We then spent time relaxing and catching up with friends at our campsite. We enjoyed another set of Moon Hooch as well that day which prepared us for more music. Lotus played during a thunderstorm, it was beautiful. We enjoyed a “Nematode” as well as a flowery “Umbilical Moonrise” closer. After the show we bought an entire Disco Pizza and we enjoyed it by our campfire. Summerdance 2019 exceeded my expectations, one thing’s for sure about the dance…I will absolutely be back.
