Halloween weekend, 2006, marked my first return to Las Vegas since the breakup of Phish. The draw this time was the second annual Vegoose Festival, a new music festival for those who are too old to camp and/or love an excuse to visit Vegas. The acts included a handful of my favorite smaller acts--Built to Spill, Gomez, Guster, and G. Love among them--as well as big-name acts The Black Crowes, Tom Petty, and Widespread Panic. The fact that Trey and Mike from Phish and Phil Lesh from the Grateful Dead were playing multiple shows throughout the weekend didn't hurt, either.

But mostly, Vegoose served primarily as a reason to see many of my friends and family scattered across the country. My brother, the person who most shaped my passion for music, arrived from his home in another corner of Nevada (Tahoe). My bride Bethy drove in Amy's Prius from Southern California after visiting our friends Jill, Amy, and Laura, living in San Diego, Huntington Beach, and Newport Beach, respectively. Adam flew in from Chicago (for work!), the Hadls, at left, drove from L.A., and Aaron and Stephanie were among the NYC contingent.

After putting in a half day on the job--and winning an office costume party for "Best Character" (I dressed as the obsessive baseball fan from one of my kid's books), I headed to Vegas solo. The plan, I learned when I landed, was to meet at Mandalay Bay at midnight. I couldn't have known then that my friends had arranged in advance to use the gathering to commemorate my turning 30. Mostly that's because my birthday was still 3 weeks away, but it was still much appreciated. Even Dan, whose actual birthday was that night, was there to celebrate.

Laura (somehow) took the two photos below...

Adam and I played War, the most ridiculous game I've ever seen at a casino. The dealer gets a card, you get a card. If your card is higher, you win. If not, you lose. No skill, no strategy. Yet amazingly, the dealer didn't know how to play--she had to call a pit boss over to ask if an ace beat an eight. She also misdealt and forfeited an easy win, something I've never seen happen before. A drunk at our table repeated "Steady As She Goes" to himself, referencing The Raconteurs' song. (We didn't realize this until the following day when they played it.) I somehow lost $100 playing War and decided to go home.

Back at the hotel--the lovely Alexis Park--we drank a bit, played guitar, and listened to tunes. Below, the always-entertaining Doug acts out some of the late-evening's moments. Jordan unwittingly cued The Grateful Dead's "Ship of Fools," which included a fitting birthday message:

Saw your first ship sink and drown, from rockin of the boat,
And all that could not sink or swim was just left there to float.
I won't leave you drifting down, but whoa it makes me wild,
With thirty years upon my head to have you call me child.

I finally crashed at 7:30 a.m., after being up for close to 30 hours; there's just something about the Las Vegas energy.

I couldn't motivate for the early shows, instead stumbling into a midday lunch at Lucky's. There I ran into Laura and her stunning O.C. crew sitting at a booth next to Jack White and his bandmates. I hate bothering celebrities by taking their pictures--while they're eating, at least--so I instead took a mental image of musical gods with very messy hair...

After the meal, I headed over to the festival and saw Jack's new group, The Raconteurs, rip it up.

The Raconteurs are one of Laura's favorite bands, and she was determined enough to get close and take photos. The awesome shot at right is hers.

As for the attire on this glorious Saturday afternoon in Las Vegas...

Strangers at the festival came up to shake my hand. Some took pictures and asked what I did to get so lucky in love. Others heard that it was my birthday and wished me well. The fact that my name is, in fact, not Lloyd, and my birthday was not for several weeks, I got the sense that I was living some other man's fantasy--some man named Lloyd. One gentleman shyly told me that his name was Lloyd, and he left with a similar picture of a half-dozen knockouts professing their love for him. "That's one to show your friends when they ask how Vegas went," I told him with a smile.

Based on our position in the fairgrounds--in front of the "Joker's Wild" stage--and because I had been told that Damian Marley was the Bob kin keeping it real, I stayed to see Damian's set.

Damian "Gong Jr." Marley played some of his Dad's legendary songs, but it never felt like we were seeing a nostalgia act. His set was energized and uplifting, danceable and full of positive messages. We grooved along to one of the best reggae sets I've ever witnessed in the hot summer sun.

I had seen Ziggy Marley a few times and always left lamenting Bob's untimely death. But after sticking around for the full Damian experience (missing the Keller Incident), I can say with full confidence that he does, in fact, keep his father's spirit alive.

Our official guides for the weekend were Hanz Vonz Svensonschnak and his friend, Choctopuss. Hanz is seen at left drinking heavily and at right partying to Marley.

Like much else in Vegas, it's hard to explain. But they were the greatest monsters I've ever known.

As the sun began to set on Vegas, the oppressive heat disappeared--and the crazies came out in full force.
Not that we weren't part of them, of course.

It was especially nice to catch up with Laura Inglis, who came to Vegas with her friend Joni, reprising their visit in 2003. (Amazingly, we met both Joni and the Hamaoui sisters on that trip--a true testament to the value of traveling to see Phish.) Laura and Beth were college roommates for three years--four, unofficially--and five years after college we still see each other semi-regularly. Cool girls, all of them.

As cool as I felt being "Lloyd" in a sea of beautiful woman and friends, I do admit that it felt a bit strange when left alone with Jordan and Adam, above. Not that they don't love me and vice versa--they were my Best Man after all.

But when I noticed that Adam was wearing his Fire Island sweatshirt, I got a little nervous. (It's from the straight part, I swear.) Still, I couldn't choose two more incredible men to be surrounded by during this wonderful weekend. I had a nice conversation with the folks from HeadCount, the get-out-the-vote movement founded by my old friend Andy Bernstein. The volunteers below were dressed in political costumes for Halloween, and I thanked them for their participation in advance of the critical midterm elections the following week. Below right, Beth shops at Taylor's Little Hippie stand. With her beautiful wares and warm service, it's no wonder her booth was packed all weekend long.

I witnessed some simply stunning Halloween costumes throughout the weekend. At left, one of my favorites--two ghostbusters, the Stay-Puff Marshmallow Man, and Dana (a.k.a Zool, or the Gatekeeper) gather in a group.

Moments after I took this picture, the inebriated ghostbuster on his knees (most likely Peter Venkman) began urinating on the ground, directly in the middle of the concert grounds and very much in public.

With the spout of urine shooting out from the midsection of his ghost-busting uniform, it was only too obvious to scream "Don't cross the streams!"

Next up on my musical lineup was the Black Crowes, one of my favorite bands from the 1990s. During my freshman year, they released Amorica, a 54-minute masterpiece, and I was convinced they were the greatest band around--pure rock and roll, southern-style. I once waited all night in the cold of a Boston winter to see them up close at the Orpheum. I even traveled to see them around the northeast, culminating with a night in New Haven when I went backstage and met Chris Robinson. But their 1996 follow-up, Three Snakes and a Charm, left me so disappointed that I basically dropped them from my listening repertoire. Ten years later, I was finally seeing them on stage again.

Maybe it's that the Crowes played most of their pre-1996 material--including the many gems from their first two albums, Shake Your Money Maker and The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion--or maybe it was the mood I was in, but the band was absolutely fantastic. Heck, maybe they just really were as good as I remembered--and they hadn't let a decade slow them down.

When I met Chris Robinson in the back room of the dirty and now-demolished New Haven Coliseum, he was sickly thin and pale as a ghost. It looked to me like he had a drug problem. But as I watched him kick, wail, flail, and sermonize the gospel of classic southern rock on stage, he had as much energy as I'd seen from him. It was inspiring for me--and awing for my friends who'd never seen it before.

Whatever Chris Robinson has gone through since I last saw the Crowes, from the lowlights of their post-Amorica albums to the lineup changes of his band (and new bands) to the public outing of the Kate Hudson-Owen Wilson affair, he seemed to have made it through stronger and resilient.

And those songs, they proved as timeless as ever.

Saturday's final festival show belonged to Tom Petty, and his set was exactly as I expected. After manufacturing pop hits for more than a quarter century, he had more than enough to entertain the large crowd song after song, As Adam astutely pointed out, each of his songs felt "like an old friend."

Interpreting "Runnin' Down a Dream" literally, Beth, Amy, and others actually run to his song at left. One guy decided to get in on the action. As he ran into my camera's frame, he took a spill and went down hard. A moment later, he popped up off the ground and continued running ahead. It's dark, but that I happened to capture the event midway through a 26-second clip amused me to no end.

In a weekend full of hilarious moments, this one may have been my favorite.

After the first night of the festival was over, we headed almost directly to the Orleans Arena for the Phil Lesh & Trey Anastasio show. With John Medeski on the keyboard, this gig had the word "epic" written on the ticket. (I wrote it, but you get the idea.) And when the show kicked off with a spooky Ghost, the tone was set. Unfortunately, that tone wasn't "Awesome Phish songs throughout the night" but rather "Dark and scary jams that take you to another dimension." There were times when it worked, and times when it didn't. There were some wonderful moments--St. Stephan and said Ghost, for example--but the show was a bit too moody for my tastes. The only other Phish song during the night, 46 Days, had even less direction than when Phish use to play it. According to zzyzx's blog, Mike Gordon was at the show too and said it was "too noodly for him."

At 2 a.m., the time became 1 a.m., and the show didn't end until about 4 a.m.--which was really 5 a.m. And at some point much, much later in the night I was being held with a limo driver as collateral. It was just that kind of night.