I have seen DMB now in several venues in different states. Never the same venue twice, yet, at least. So in honor of the band's 25th Anniversary here is my Dave Matthews Band story:
I don't remember the first DMB song I ever heard but I remember liking their music immediately. I was in junior high and high school when the albums Under the Table and Dreaming (1994) and Crash (1996) came out. However, I do specifically remember riding in the car with my father (who hates modern music and would rather listen to the 1812 Overture or an opera than any form of rock music but would listen to the radio in his car while he drove if I turned the radio on) when "So Much to Say" came on. I turned it up. I thought maybe he would like DMB because of the combination of instruments they used outside of the standard guitar, drums, and bass: horns, violin, clarinet, flute, piano, etc. The band really had a completely different sound from anything else that was coming out in the '90s. I loved it. So we're in the car and before "So Much to Say" ended and right after the "So much to say, so much to say, so much to say, so much to say ...," my father pipes up, "Well, if he has so much to say, why doesn't he just say it???" Good point, Dad. I'm pretty sure he didn't like DMB either.
Soon I had Crash and later Under the Table and Dreaming. Both were albums that I could listen to all the way through without getting bored or discovering that I only liked one or two songs on the CD. This was before I graduated from high school. I wanted to see the band play live but I grew up in Louisiana. They never do shows there except they occasionally played at Jazz Fest and I have never seen them play there either. I remember learning back then that the band formed in Charlottesville, Virginia. I had no idea where Charlottesville was other than that it was close to DC which might as well have been in another country to me since I was in southeastern Louisiana. Plus most bands came out of Seattle, New York, Austin, New Orleans, San Francisco -- not Charlottesville, Virginia, that's random.
I started seeing a guy who like others made fun of DMB when I told him I liked the band. He made fun of Dave's voice, etc. I didn't stop listening to their music but when you're with someone who is unenthusiastic about something then you accommodate by not doing the things that annoy them like listening to certain kinds of music. I was young then. He was really into music just not DMB so I had to listen to what he wanted to listen to which ended up being the Grateful Dead mostly. I like the Grateful Dead too. He eventually respected the fact that DMB was one of my favorite bands and I continued to collect their music throughout the seven-year relationship.
I spent my first quarter of college at Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, Louisiana which is all the way up in the top of the state almost into Arkansas. I took a Music Appreciation class there which remains one of my favorite college classes ever. The teacher actually taught us about Dave Matthews Band, their sound, and that Dave was from South Africa which influenced the music.
After one quarter in Ruston, Louisiana, we moved back down to Hammond, Louisiana and it was around that time that I got the double disc live Listener Supported album (1999). "Long Black Veil," "True Reflections," and "All Along the Watchtower." Then we moved back to Mandeville and Covington where we grew up after two failed attempts of trying to get away from there. Then Everyday (2001) came out. "Everyday" and "When the World Ends." Got that too.
Finally, in the summer of 2001 we left Louisiana to move to Asheville, North Carolina. I drove my car and he drove the '72 Volkswagen Bus we had. Since we were in separate cars I could listen to DMB while I drove out of Louisiana and I played the Listener Supported album. The "Intro" was the perfect musical start to driving out of Louisiana and into a new beginning that early morning in July.
In Asheville, I discovered Before These Crowded Streets (1998) because that's where "Stay" came from (there's a live version of the song on the Listener Supported album). I would go hiking in the Blue Ridge and that song would play in my head. I would take drives up the Blue Ridge Parkway listening to the DMB collection I had at that point. "Crush" and "#41." The music matching with the rolling landscape.
Right after we moved to Asheville we discovered it scared the heck out of both of us to drive the '72 VW bus in the mountains as we were used to driving it on flat land in Louisiana so we sold it. Then a year and a half later once driving in the mountains was no longer scary, he found another VW bus online that he wanted to buy but we had to drive to Iowa to buy it. On the drive from Asheville to the middle of nowhere, Iowa we came across several cars on the Interstate somewhere in Indiana that had statements painted on their windows about going to see DMB. I remember thinking that I wanted to be going where they were going. That was the closest I had been yet to a DMB concert that was in 2002 or 2003. Then I discovered Busted Stuff (2002). "Grace is Gone" and "Grey Street." Then later Dave's solo album, Some Devil (2003). "Stay or Leave" and "Grey Blue Eyes."
At some point while I was living in Asheville a woman I worked with asked me who my favorite band was. After thinking for a moment I said Dave Matthews Band because I always came back to listening to their music. Their songs never really got old for me. When I discovered that they had music I had not yet heard more often than not I liked it. I liked more songs by DMB than I did any other band even at that point. That was around 2004.
In 2005, we moved from Asheville to Chapel Hill. It was there that the guy who really didn't like DMB and I broke up. Soon after I discovered Stand Up (2005). "Louisiana Bayou," "Stolen Away On 55th & 3rd," and "You Might Die Trying." Then I finally completed my undergraduate degree in 2007.
I never really followed the band super closely but when I went looking for some new music to add to my life I would discover a new DMB album and then discover that I liked it. They never fail to disappoint. That is rare. I decided it was finally time that somehow I get to a DMB concert.
In 2008, I learned over the radio that Dave Matthews Band would be playing at the Walnut Creek Amphitheater in Raleigh, NC on my birthday. I was living in Chapel Hill, that venue was right down the road!! Then I learned that one of the local radio stations was giving out free tickets to anyone who could write the best poem about going to the upcoming DMB concert that went to the tune of one of DMB's songs. Ok, so I didn't win but I did submit a poem to the tune of "Proudest Monkey" (Crash). I could not tell you for a second now what I said but I did put in there that the concert was the night of my birthday and that I had never been to a DMB show before. So I think someone at the radio station felt bad for me and gave me two lawn tickets to the concert anyway. Which worked out better because then that meant they didn't have to read my poem over the radio which would have been embarrassing. I found a friend to go with me, we got stuck in traffic and missed the first bit of the concert. But on that September evening in 2008 I finally got to see DMB live for the first time and they closed with "Ants Marching" ... I was hooked ... even more.
In 2009, I moved to Seattle. Soon after arriving there I heard "Funny the Way It Is" play on the radio. I wasn't won over by that song and thought that maybe the band was going to go the way of other bands and lose its touch. Then I heard "You and Me" on the radio which I loved. Then I listened to bits of other songs on the album which I liked and then even "Funny the Way It Is" grew on me. Later I learned that Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King (2009) was a tribute to LeRoi Moore and I had to have that album too. That was the first full DMB album I bought through iTunes.
In 2010, I heard rumors that DMB would be taking a year off from touring that was enough to inspire me to get a ticket to see them play at the The Gorge in George, Washington over Labor Day Weekend. I bought a camping pass too which was for all three nights that the band would play there but only concert tickets for the first night. I dragged a guy I was seeing at the time with me for the weekend. He also was not a fan of DMB which made him no fun to be around for the entire weekend we were there. The first concert night Ben Harper opened up yet another reason I bought the tickets for that night. I like Ben Harper but unfortunately I don't remember him being too good and I had seen him live before in New Orleans which was good so that was a little disappointing. But we had lawn tickets so we were way up from the stage and the Columbia River Gorge was in the background, the sun was setting, and then DMB came on. Perfect! Then the guy I was with passed out at my feet for the rest of the night and people kept on tripping over him as they walked by which was distracting. I was unable to get a ticket to the second concert night as it was sold out so we walked around in a field next to the stage listening to the band play. I could hear "Bartender." Then I got a ticket to the third concert night which I went to by myself. I remember Dave playing "Out of My Hands" (Stand Up) on the piano. Each night was a completely different set of songs and The Gorge is a beautiful venue. I would go there again if I had the chance.
The following summer of 2011 I moved back to Louisiana and on the way I learned that my mother was very sick. Early in 2012 I went to the DMB website to see if there were any new songs out and I came across "Mercy." It was exactly the song that I needed to hear at that time. My mother passed away in 2012 the same year Away From the World came out. The name of the album mirrored how I felt that year.
In 2013 I moved to Woodbridge, Virginia to stay with my cousin for a while. I had wanted to move to DC but I never found a job there so I moved to Charlottesville, Virginia instead where I found multiple part-time jobs one of which was with a restaurant, Petit Pois, located on the Downtown Mall. So there I was working in Charlottesville a couple blocks down from Miller's where Dave Matthews had bar-tended.Then I got Away From the World and discovered "Snow Outside" and "Drunken Soldier."
In the summer of 2014 I was preparing to move again this time to Maine. One afternoon I took off from another job to have lunch with a friend at Petit Pois where we worked on the Downtown Mall. After lunch I told her I would walk with her up to Mudhouse, a coffee shop on the Mall, where she needed to meet up with someone. On the way, we just happened to walk past Dave Matthews standing on the Downtown Mall with a group of guys not far from Miller's. I could not believe it, of course. I finished walking my friend to Mudhouse and then turned around to walk back past Dave Matthews and the other guys. Despite being incredibly nervous, somehow I managed to stop and tell him that I was a huge fan of the Band "like since the 90s" all while looking at the ground. Dave shook my hand and said "Thank You." Then I made a hasty exit as I had no idea what else to say. One of the best moments of my life! No really it was.
Later that month I managed to drag a friend to the DMB concert in Bristow, Virginia. It was her first DMB show:
[Update 8/2020: There used to be links below to see some video snippets from the July 2014 show in Bristow but they have been deleted as Google Plus no longer exists]. The show was broken up with an acoustic set first during the evening, an intermission, and then an electric set after dark. Both Two Step and Ants Marching are from the acoustic set.
Two Step (from Crash - 1996)
Cover of Peter Gabriel's Sledgehammer
Drunken Soldier (also from Away From the World)
Then I left for Maine and my first year of law school which brings me to summer 2015. I drove from Portland to a show in Hartford, CT where I saw the Band debut a new song: "Virginia in the Rain." They had Branford Marsalis as a guest on stage during that show which was especially amazing to me since I am from the New Orleans area and the Marsalis family is a famous Jazz family from New Orleans. They did "Jimi Thing," "Sexy Mother------" and an unbelievable brass section breakdown. That was in early June.
Later that month a friend of mine from New Orleans told me she was going to come visit me in Portland over the 4th of July weekend. I told her she would be going to a DMB show with me on the 4th. We drove from Portland to Saratoga Springs, New York to make it to Night 2 at the Saratoga Springs Performing Arts Center. That show goes down in history as the best one I have ever seen. I think there is a video of the show posted on YouTube somewhere.
When my friend and I arrived at SPAC on the evening of July 4, 2015 we did not have tickets to the show. We walked from the car to the entrance of the venue where there was a large immovable crowd waiting to enter. We were on the complete opposite side of the crowd from the ticket booth. We slowly made our way through and when we got to the ticket lady she told us two seats had opened up in the Pit. Each ticket was around $100 which is why I have always only had lawn tickets but we were presented with an opportunity and we took it. Then we moved at the current speed of glacial melt through the front entrance of SPAC with the rest of the crowd. By that time, Dave was on stage doing a solo cover of "A Whiter Shade of Pale." Beautiful. We made it to our seats where we could see the band with our own eyes and not just on large screens. That night they had Bela Fleck as a guest artist (again, amazing). The Lovely Ladies sang that night too.
They did a cover of "Friend of the Devil," Grateful Dead tribute. I remember "Minarets" which sounded incredible in that venue. I remember "Why I am" which they started so suddenly that the opening notes scared the heck out of me. Dave danced on stage that night. I had never seen that before. They closed with "Halloween" which was the most full energy version of that song I have ever seen or heard and they had closed with "Halloween" at the Bristow show I mentioned above, no comparison. I mean it was the kind of show that you did not want to end, in fact, they came back on stage twice. Even DMB did not want it to end!
Now this summer is Dave Matthews Band's 25th Anniversary and I don't know which show I will get to but it will be another venue I have never been to yet. Maybe one in New Jersey as all the venues in New York near to Brooklyn are sold out. So far I've covered Raleigh, NC; George, WA; Bristow, VA; Hartford, CT; and Saratoga Springs, NY. Wherever I see them this year, it will be the highlight of my summer. DMB's music continues to uplift and inspire me somehow right at the moments when I most need it. Their music has added something to who I am as I have essentially grown up with their music. That is a pretty incredible influence. So maybe Dave Matthews Band won't be your favorite band but maybe one day you'll listen to a live version of "Ants Marching" or live versions of any of the other songs I have mentioned here and you'll feel a slight twinge of positive energy. Maybe you'll want to go to a DMB show just once and see what it's all about.
Link to DMB's website: http://davematthewsband.com/
[All pictures and video were taken with my cell phone hence the lackluster quality and possible user error.]
