I saw the Dave Matthews Band open for Phish at the Santa Monica Civic.
I do what Chip tells me. He’d told me I had to come see Phish at the Variety Arts Center and I’d watched them blow up. The DMB was his new band.
I didn’t know that the Santa Monica Civic had a false floor, that it was suspended in such a way that when they started playing “Ants Marching” and the college-aged audience dressed in the same exact clothing as the band members themselves erupted and started moving up and down that the floor would too. I’d never heard the number before, I haven’t forgotten it since.
During the break, before the headliner took the stage, I went with Chip to a side room, just east of the auditorium itself, that resembled nothing so much as an elementary school classroom, to hang out. It was there that I met Boyd, Carter and LeRoi. Maybe LeRoi, I can’t remember exactly, it was fifteen years ago…
This was before Dave became not only a TV star, but a cultural icon, before his humor became widely known. They were just another band. Who kept getting bigger and bigger, whose fanbase kept growing. I followed them to the Palladium, all the way to Staples and the Hollywood Bowl. And got to know their manager, Coran Capshaw, along the way. Not incredibly well. Which is probably why he wanted to have lunch on Tuesday. To talk in an environment different from backstage.
On the way to the Peninsula, I heard “Where Are You Going” on No Shoes Radio, Kenny Chesney testified not only about Dave, but the band’s drummer. I told Coran and Chip this when we sat down. Coran told me Kenny had a place on St. John too. They were buddies.
It was that kind of conversation. Catching up, filling in the little details. Telling me about the status of the band. How they’d mixed it up, how they were playing better than ever before, with Tim Reynolds on the road with them and two replacements for LeRoi.
LeRoi Moore — Reflections On His Passing
August 25, 2008
