feedback forms are up

Just a short FYI.

The feedback forms are up. So if you forgot to fill one out be sure to make up for it now :) They can be found in� text and PDF format. Details see the FRFF website (just scroll down).

And for early planning:� Next year's festival will be 21 - 24 July 2005.

everyone make sure to vote for the mammals!!!!

(and russell, WA9, as always.)

too late. I submitted my form there - Beth Amsel, Kris Delmhorst, Jim's Big Ego, WA9, Russell, and The Kennedys.

I had Peter Mulvey, Christina Abbott, Melissa Ferrick, Susan Werner, and I can't remember.

arrrrgh, i forgot to include susie. i was too busy giving some lovin' to other chicagoans (and...erm...non-chicagoans).

1. andrew bird
2. we're about 9
3. peter mulvey
4. russell wolff
5. ruthie foster
6. anna fermin's trigger gospel

and i asked for richard, girlyman, crooked still, young mark, snake oil medicine show, and erin back.

here's my voting:

Want to see again:
Girlyman
Richard Shindell
Eliza Gilkyson
Ellis Paul
Crooked Still
John Gorka (wasted vote - he always returns. my bad)

want to see:
Susan Werner (of course!)
Carrie Newcomer
Sarah Harmer
Lori McKenna
CM Thompson
Jess Klein

My voting went as follows:

MUST TO RETURN:
Girlyman
Erin McKeown
Richard Shindell
Vance Gilbert
Lowen & Navarro
Brave Combo

WANT TO SEE:
Russell Wolff
We're About 9
The Mammals
Peter Mulvey
Christopher Williams
Jim's Big Ego

But... the kennedys were there...

only unofficially. they weren't even allowed to mention on their website that they'd be there, because their appearance wasn't "official."

oh really?

Weird.
I just assumed since they were onstage and all.

they were onstage because people like the nields kept bringing them onstage. check the schedule or the list of performers on the site. they're not listed. that's why we got them to play the dome.

yeah, no, I did.

Just saying, that's why I just assumed they were on the lineup.
:)

I think I put We're About 9, Christopher Williams, Peter Mulvey, Susan Werner, The Mammals, and...I don't exactly remember.

I didn't put Dar down, cause that would be like wasting a vote, cause I'm pretty sure that she will return to FRFF in the near future.

Aside from the usual suspects, there are some more high-profile people I'd like to see as headliners..

* Damien Rice (drool)
* Belle & Sebastian
* Nickel Creek
* Ben Gibbard (one can dream)
* Elliott Smith (oh, wait, nevermind..)
* Great Big Sea
* Steve Earle
* Elvis Costello
* Ben Folds
* Jack Johnson / Jason Mraz / John Mayer / etc (who are probably doing more for N�Folk's popularity than everyone else combined, despite what I think of them)

Others that would be neat that I haven't seen there..

* The Decemberists
* Sondre Lerche
* Nellie McKay
* M. Ward
* Guster
* Magnetic Fields
* Andrew Bird
* Leo Kottke
* Martin Sexton
* Redbird

No matter who they choose, for gods sake, pick some new people next year. I'm sick of the same lineup every year.

No matter who they choose, for gods sake, pick some new people next year. I'm sick of the same lineup every year.

Well, I suppose.. but there are some people, like vance, who it just wouldn't be falcon ridge without.

Amen to the guster, andrew bird and Elliott smith votes, though.
(as well as costello.. but... like tom waits, it'd never happen.)

i actually think they had a good lineup this year.� Josh, weren't you telling me that there were a lot of people on the ticket that you hadn't heard of? ;)

Yeah I really liked the Brave Combo, Inner Visions, Snake Oil, Crooked Still and Girlyman. Nice energetic danceable fun music that was different from the usual folk fair.

People I wanted to see that weren't there (on my survey)
-Dar Williams
-Great Big Sea
-The Prodigals
-Deirdre Flint
-We're Aboot 9
-Stuart Davis

Others I'd like to see
-Nellie Mckay
-NickelCreek
-Susan Werner
-Dave Matheson
-Trout Fishing in America
-Rufus Wainwright
-Belle and Sebastian

belle and sebastien! belle and sebastien! but would they play? It would be enough to get me back if they did!

ew ew ew any of those annoying john mayer/jack johnson/jason mraz/jason johnson jackson joey-joe-joe-junior shabbadu guys would turn frff into a big annoying teenybopper/frat boy fest. they're doing well enough that they don't need frff. in fact, i think they might not even *want* it, because who wants to be pigeonholed as a "folk" act when they can keep being "popular rawk starz who get all the twinkie groupies"?

damien rice, on the other hand, would be awesome. and nickel creek--how on earth is it that they've never played frff?

nellie would rule at frff, but i get the feeling she'd probably meet the same fate as dan bern and adam brodsky.

and andrew and magnetic fields. *melt* we're not cool enough to have any magnetic fields connections (i've met them, but it was more the "here's how many cds you've sold" and "doors don't open for another hour" kind of thing :P ), but neal and i are working really hard at getting andrew to frff next year.

his manager is definitely into the idea, but i can see andrew saying, "um, a whole weekend surrounded by all those weird folk music people? no, thanks, i'll just hang out in my barn and feed my chickens." and i can see anne saunders saying, "andrew bird? no clue who he is. give me another year of greg brown and john gorka and the storycrafters any day." :)

and redbird. please. or at least peter and kris, because i never saw either of them at frff.

"andrew bird? no clue who he is. give me another year of greg brown and john gorka and the storycrafters any day."

ick. I don't mind the Boringcrafters being there, but keep them on the family stage where they belong, and don't pollute the workshops with their tedious crap.

ugh. i died a thousand deaths during their workshop sets in 2000. i think they should have their own festival, far far away. possibly with tim mason.

hrm. IMO Redbird� would work better in a small venue than at a big festival. That's why I didn't vote for LFNY either. Same thing. (And they have played at FRFF before).

Some people I'd love to see at next year's festival are Equation. They'll be celebrating their 10th anniversary in 2005 and be touring extensively in the U.S. next year anyway. That's the one and only possibility of spicing up FRFF with some damn fine british alt-folk-rock extravaganza ;-)

Oh and I *heart* Kathryn Roberts

There are 27 mainstage slots, not counting song swaps and other special events.

I think they should write the top 13 who were there and were voted to return on slips of paper and pull 6 of them out of a hat.

then write the top 13 who weren't there, plus the 7 who were there two years before but NOT picked then, and pick 14 of them.

Then take each of the three most wanted from the past 5 years (so 15 artists - maybe less, since some small numebr of them have already made it into the festival) and pick 5 of them.

Then choose two big acts that people haven't really thought of that can be that year's "one-offs."

popular repeat performers still have an advantage in that they're almost always in one of the hats (and if they aren't invited back in consecutive years, there's a very good chance they'll be back the following year), but new performers now have a HUGE advantage in that there's a chance they'll actually get to play, especially the New Artist Showcase people who seem to always come back one year and then seem to disappear.

There are 27 mainstage slots, not counting song swaps and other special events.

I think they should write the top 13 who were there and were voted to return on slips of paper and pull 6 of them out of a hat.

then write the top 13 who weren't there, plus the 7 who were there two years before but NOT picked then, and pick 14 of them.

Then take each of the three most wanted from the past 5 years (so 15 artists - maybe less, since some small numebr of them have already made it into the festival) and pick 5 of them.

And then divide by pi, carry the 1, multiply by the number of Jesus look-alikes, factor to the power of Fruheads, and you wind up with . . .

�. . . .Pete Best?

Wait, that can't be right. Let me check my calculations again.

Try this:

you can't take three from two, two is less than three, so you look at the four in the tens place. now that's really four tens so you make it three tens, regroup, and change a ten to ten ones and you add them to the two and you take away three, that's nine, is that clear? now instead of four in the tens place, you've got three, 'cause you added one, that is to say ten to the two, but you can't take seven from three, so you look in the hundreds place. from the three, you then use one to make ten ones and you know why four plus minus one plus ten is fourteen minus one? 'cause addition is commutative, right. and so you have 13 tens and you take away seven and that leaves five.... well, six, actually, but the idea is the important thing. now go back to the hundreds place, you're left with two and you take away one from two and that leaves.... everybody get one? not bad for the first day.

er, sorry. (that was from memory - anyone with google want to check my work? :)

hooray for new math!

When I learned math, it was just called math. I'd never heard of "new math" until I was reading Peanuts cartoons and they started talking about it. So I started getting all worried that I'd have to learn another kind of math. But no one ever tried to teach it to me.

And then, in high school, I figured out another way of doing math - just started doing things in my head by regrouping an all. I mentioned it to someone, and they said "oh, that's old math." Huh???

It turns out that they taught us all "new math" but didn't call it that, and we were none the wiser.

When Beatlemania Now was playing yesterday, the sign for the concert series read "Simply the Best Music" and the word Best was right over "Ringo's" head.