HowWasTheShow Party at the Turf Club - best 39th birthday of all!

Did you miss the party Saturday night? HowWasTheShow and friends had a fabulous time. The music was awesome. The crowd was gorgeous. The drinks were tasty. And we even got a link from the online edition of the Pioneer Press ("The Ross Who Knew Too Much" link -- Read Ross Raihala's review here.)

Mark Wheat had joked on 89.3 "The Current" Friday night it would be interesting to see just how many reviews of our own show would end up on our website. That still remains to be seen, though I can tell you nearly everyone who has written for the site over the past three years was there Saturday to help celebrate.

Dan Schultz of Mordac.org was on hand to capture all the action, both onstage and off. (See Dan's photos here or click on any of the photos.)

Good thing the Clown Lounge was open for overflow seating as over 300 people crowded into the Turf Club for music and fun. I got an email from one.org thanking us for the local exposure we were able to give them. (Apparently they got quite a few signatures as well.)

When Pete Hofmann featuring Chris Pericelli of Little Man on guitar opened up the evening just after nine p.m. a sizable audience was already in the club, and it just continued to swell. (BTW, if you missed Pete's interview on the Current last week, listen to that here.) JoAnna James sold a lot of CD's to new fans. I played a couple songs with JoAnna's band and Jessy Greene on fiddle. (See all the action in the photo link.) My two songs went surprisingly well, despite a lack of rehearsal, though due to my exuberance I did break one of JoAnna's strings on "My Girlfriend Likes to Drink Too Much." (Sorry JoAnna!)

Two surprise musical guests were Kari Tauring and Maren Amdal (The Huldre), who along with Matt Spillum on bodhran provided a curiously unexpected interlude of rhythmic cow calls from ancient Sweden and Norway. Where else but at the Turf Club at a HowWasTheShow party could you expect to see this kind of eclectic performance during prime time on a Saturday night?

Chris Koza put on another inspiring performance. Vicious Vicious brought the dance. (I can't wait to hear their new album -- make sure you go see them at their CD Release Party June 17th at the Entry.) And when Romantica (Ben Kyle from Romantica is pictured to the left) finally took the stage around one a.m. I was actually glad we were behind schedule so we had music right up until bar close at 2. This was one party no one wanted to leave. Except of course to go to the afterparty. . .

Thank you to everyone who came, who played, who partied, who drank too much, and made this quite probably the best 39th birthday of all!