Recapping a Weekend of Live Music in Vermont

Music editor Chris Farnsworth is a man about town. From time to time, he collects his weekend adventures in a diary that sheds light on the local music ecosystem. For this installment, he recaps the big “Weird Al” Yankovic show, which took place last Friday evening at the Champlain Valley Exposition’s Midway Lawn in Essex Junction, and hopping around Burlington’s Old North End for Saturday’s Ramble.

Friday: It’s Always Weirdest Before the Dawn

Lately I’ve been thinking about the role of the Fool in the works of William Shakespeare. What? Don’t look at me like that. It can’t all be weed jokes and making fun of jam bands, OK? Sometimes the music editor gets to talk about literature, dammit.

Yes, I’ve been low-key obsessed with the archetypal fools, jesters and all-around chaos agents that populate the worlds of ol’ Billy Shakes (we’re tight like that).

The Polish writer and Shakespearean scholar Jan Kott wrote one of the most influential tomes on the Bard in 1964, titled Shakespeare, Our Contemporary. Kott’s perspective was influenced by living through the Nazi occupation and subsequent Soviet domination of his homeland; as the book’s introduction states, he wrote for readers who “will at some point or other have been woken by the police in the middle of the night.”

When viewed through that lens, Kott’s take on the Fool has added depth.

“The Fool knows that the only true madness is to recognize this world as rational,” Kott wrote.

That quote ran through my mind last Friday at the Essex Junction fairgrounds, where I watched “Weird Al” Yankovic smash a pie into the clownish, white-painted face of Puddles Pity Party, a Pierrot who opened the show.

The scene unfolded as Yankovic, America’s greatest musical-parody artist and satirist, made his way to the stage, where he would open his concert with “Tacky,” his take on the Pharrell Williams smash hit “Happy.”

Prior to arriving at the show, I did my daily doomscroll, reading of war, rising fascism, explosive diarrhea, AI-created music, data centers … You know, all the fun topics of the day. As I finished perusing an article about the crisis in Cuba thanks to the U.S. government’s oil embargo, I realized, with a disoriented jolt, that I was in danger of being late to “Weird Al.” What is my life?, I wondered as I drove toward the fairgrounds.

How the hell was I supposed to enjoy songs like “Party in the CIA” while the current president of the United States was trying to pressure the agency’s director to undermine the results of the 2020 election? How could I laugh at “Dare to Be Stupid” when so many Americans seem to have taken up that challenge?

The answer was, apparently: easily, and often. As I was reminded over the course of a set that covered his entire career, Yankovic has shown time and again that laughing at the absurdity of life is essential to keeping your marbles.

From polka medleys to a drum solo that was just a single hit on the snare, Yankovic took nothing seriously during his performance. He performed in a full fat suit for the Michael Jackson spoof “Fat” and had a janitor play the tuba in “Smells Like Nirvana.” The California native even told the crowd how happy he was “to be back in my hometown of Burlington.”

It was sheer ridiculousness — a decades-spanning parody of American music and society — and hot damn, I needed it

It was sheer ridiculousness — a decades-spanning parody of American music and society — and hot damn, I needed it. I needed to step back from the darkness and appreciate the surreality of modern life. I needed to sing “Like a Surgeon” at the top of my lungs. Yes, even the “hey” in falsetto. Sorry to anyone who heard my voice crack like a 13-year-old boy’s.

And yet, it’s not as though Yankovic is a political figure or that his songs call anyone out or even highlight specific issues. His humor is egalitarian in that anyone and anything can be laughed at, but it’s never vicious.

(However, I did love hearing the recent news that Yankovic turned down more than $1 million to play a controversial Saudi Arabian comedy festival. You can’t corrupt “Weird Al,” jerks of the world!)

As Yankovic came out in full yellow-Tyvek Devo gear and launched into “Dare to Be Stupid” — an anthem to idiocy that I’ve loved since I was still wearing a retainer — it took on a whole new meaning.

“Why don’t you dare to be stupid?” he sang. “It’s so easy to do.”

More than 40 years after launching a career dedicated to taking pop music less seriously, Yankovic reminded me that sometimes you just have to laugh at the world. Like a curly-haired, costume-changing, accordion-playing Feste from Twelfth Night, he and his songs show us the farcical side of modern life.

Michael Perry performing at the Ramble Credit: Owen Leavey

Saturday: Ramble On

Every time I travel to catch music in Montréal, I come away with the same thought: Burlington needs more festivals and block parties.

There’s almost always some spectacularly odd, genre-defying event happening up north, a surefire sign of a robust, thriving music scene. These pop-ups are also a great answer to the modern problem of dwindling venues. As more and more independent clubs shutter their doors, such as Nectar’s and Club Metronome in Burlington, and the average ticket price for concerts has surged more than 40 percent since 2019 (starting at nearly $60, “Weird Al” was not cheap), it’s a smart move to turn neighborhoods into festival grounds for a weekend.

Fortunately, Burlington does have a few events that fit the bill. The South End Art Hop, held in early September, turns much of its neighborhood into a giant gallery. And then there is the Ramble, a community arts and culture festival held over the weekend on the streets of the Old North End.

I might catch some flak for this, but I’ve always felt that the Ramble is a truer depiction of the Queen City’s crusty, quirky, chaotic and weird-as-hell soul than the Art Hop or even the late, lamented Waking Windows festival. There’s nary a whiff of tourism about the Ramble: The Ramble is by Burlingtonians, for Burlingtonians.

“Do you know where the potato workshop is?” a girl on a skateboard asked me on Decatur Street. What a question. I mean, seriously, if you aren’t being asked where the potato workshop is, what are you even doing with your life?

Later, a friend asked if I wanted to go to a meet and greet with candidates for the state legislature, but I was much more interested in a driveway chess tournament. (Unfortunately, I missed that due to stopping to watch some of the worst breakdancing I’ve ever seen in my life. It was glorious.)

As I rode my bike around the Old North End on Saturday afternoon — the wisest way to take in the Ramble — and I checked out garden tours, porch bands, headband crafting workshops, yard sales, lemonade stands, plant swaps and food trucks (shout-out to the arepas from the Caracas Venezuelan food truck), I felt a swell of admiration for my city.

Between sweating my ass off waiting for the Ramble Roller Disco at Pomeroy Park, hearing kids scream in a bouncy house at the ONE World Market, and rocking out with Happy Spangler and MAD at Ratsmission — a former auto garage turned outdoor venue — my Ramble cup was full before dusk.

For all the folks bemoaning the degradation of the Queen City, people perhaps forget that Burlington is so much more than Church Street and disparaging Reddit posts. Long live the block parties, and long live the Queen City’s weirder sides.