Solshine Reverie 2024: The Escalation

Life moves pretty fast. Fortunes change in the blink of an eye. There is a time to duck and weave but don’t worry grasshopper, Memorial Day in Chillicothe continues to improve. Solshine: Reverie is the culmination of years of inspired practice and the same explosive, corn-fed, festival experience you’ve come to know and love, along with something timeless and always new. This year’s insertion into the volumes of Chillicothe has proven to be an escalation of sorts. Of friendship and quality. Music and art. A focus on detail with some new surprises as well. Did it evolve as planned? Never. Who knows which tall, Mexican woman waits around the corner?  Sit down with a warm Chillicothe coffee with extra Michigan drywall and try to make some sense of it. This is Solshine Reverie 2024: The Escalation. You take a spot in the bunkhouse but you never sleep.

Welcome back festivarians to Three Sisters Park on the banks of the Illinois River and the inaugural Solshine Reverie on May 24-26, 2024. Headliners Goose, John Summit, String Cheese Incident, Disco Biscuits, STS9, Umphry’s McGee, Big Gigantic and Slander led four days of non-stop, high octane, at times unpredictable fun. Illumination Woods, Moonshine Stage, Campfire stage and the Red Barn showcased a tsunami of non-stop, live music that spilled over into countless genres. From Wednesday forward, this party always has always had the same problem…When to sleep?

Baitbucket had to repair the Oldsmobuick at literally every stop on the tour. It was still limping along and the brakes were turning to dust when they passed the sign, Peoria 24 miles. The red blinking lights of the windmills appeared to be bouncing in the morning darkness. They pulled into Three Sisters Park just the time the sun appeared to rise out of the Illinois River. Canadian geese flew over the cornfields, plants only ankle high. A thick dust covered everything until the rains would later come and clean and soften everything back down to an earlier, primordial self.

They arrived from all over the U.S. to help build the Twerk Church. The most elaborate Three Sisters Hobo Kamp to date and a high water mark to be sure. Electricity to the masses with indoor plumbing right around the corner. Oh, it’s a new day here in Chillicothe. Always near the same spot on the forest trail, not far from the main intersection. Daryn and Turtle, the original site ops team, just returned from the Sea of Cortez, where they had been helping to save the embattled vaquita. Zane, the world’s greatest dishwasher stopped by for a few songs before continuing down the dusty trail. Scores of festivarians from all manner of party swung in the Florida room for tea and scones. This forest allows its residents to get filthy whilst pursuing excellence with an elegance and class reserved for only the most bourgeoisie mud holes.

Pedro volunteered to operate the VIP DUI Support Shuttle again this year with trips to all over the state. The goal remains to include all willing participants, using any means at our disposal. No one should be left out when the portal is fully engaged. Sunsquabi, Doom Flamingo, Keller and Future Joy? Splooshness. And yoga, arts and crafts aplenty with a little time set aside to visit the animals at Mi Kulture. They get full credit for bringing the first boatloads of Kamp Happiness refugees to Chillicothe. Haggard and worn, they came with some of the earliest crumpled velvet from the Orient.

Happy Scampshine: What’s in a name? Summer Camp changed its name to Solshine Reverie and the audience trembled at what extreme changes would befall the physical world. In truth it was not much. By losing a couple of stages they were able to beef up the others. Each night the music on three stages ran until four in the morning. In a world of midnight quiet hours, more of this is needed in the festival world. Greetings of “Happy Scamp” could be heard all weekend. Same as it ever was. Give it a name. This is the original summer camp festival experience and the family will continue to show up as long as they have a spot in the woods. Team building, problem solving and a Slumberjack party under the stars. Happy Solshine.

It was Jello Shot’s birthday when she stepped on the ketchup packet at Church Catering, sending the warm goo shooting up her leg. This was a sign. Things were going to get weird. It was also Pedro’s birthday although the orphanage had lost the birth certificate in the fire and no one could be sure. The Artist formerly known as Spyderman made one of his early morning appearances. What’s this? Taking the weekend off? Mental health days are not the same as nappin’ on the job.

There is no going back.

Grown up choices? When did the Fallout Shelter cease making adult cocktails? Where were the Manhattans and Old Fashioned? In this version high and low, nary a mixer could be found. The bottles were passed around as if by hobos in an Arlo Guthrie song. Who amongst them would be train-hopping their way out of Illinois? Straight brown liquor? Oh, there’s a devil in that bottle. Gasoline for the party with no brakes. When did Baitbucket began falling down? He couldn’t remember but there were signs all over his body. Inflamed knee, shoulder and elbow pain. All from Tuesday night? In Ethiopia, it’s both a marathon and a sprint. The medical condition is referred to as “wet brain”.

“Pass the paper bag that holds the bottle
feel the wheels rumblin’ neath the floor”      -City of New Orleans

Lucy and Sketch found some ferns outside of the bunkhouse and recommissioned them to the Illumination Bar where, along with the Christmas Lights, helped set the proper mood. Whomsoever would be looking for them would obviously find them there and at least they weren’t drying in the sun. Kamp Happiness ran power from one of the outlets sticking up in the forest but the cord vanished before they could plug it in. Luckily, Bfly had the Hurtlocker’s construction-grade extension cord left behind at Hulaween. They were all about festival power when they were able to connect to it and yes, Lucy knew she still owed her a new inflatable rainbow.

Betty White showed up wearing the jacket she made from her grandmother’s couch. She’d built a hacienda in staff parking in which it appeared she would remain all weekend. One would just see her in passing, flying by on her way to Slander. “Did he play Tweaker? He’s playing it now?” BFly and Sketch joined the parade of patrons who would return to their vans and Subaru’s anytime it rained, which occurred at regular intervals all weekend.

Pedro had stolen Lucienda’s “Something in the Water’ high-vis and Bagdalini ended up with the purple Coldplay from Hangout. Everyone was looking very official, as per OSHA guidelines and an unofficial inspection revealed extra fire extinguishers and bio-hazard bags.

Soapy was out somewhere in RV parking when she decided to test herself “I can make it home” she lied. She was having ample problem walking and navigating when the rains came. Things were getting sporting and she would need a place to “hole up” while she figured out her next move. If anything happened to her, who would look after the button babies?

After a slow start, the staff got back to business with the Circle K? Hagglin’ Post. It wasn’t any time before the spicy trade and circulating inventory got business booming. Bear’s teeth and video games were among the heady trades of the day. Every once in a while when supplies got low, all trades went for cigarettes strictly. As soon as the cache was refilled, regular trading could continue. These are the some of the variables that cause fluctuation in the modern hippy trading market.

White is black. Black is white.

The Escalation. News Flash! Lucienda had been thrown out for crimes against humanity. Heavy drinking? Harassment? Insider trading? Could it be true? Those were some of her favorite pastimes, but who was doing the accusing? Were there any witnesses? There were so many questions to ask to but this wasn’t the time. Surrounded by high-management security personnel, she felt very small. In the blink of an eye, she was out, shut down like a bad daycare. She held her arm up as they came at her with the scissors. This wasn’t her first rodeo. She knew what was coming before they even said it. “We’ll escort you to your camp so you can gather your belongings.”

No one wants to be the girl who returns to camp with several golf carts worth of security and administrative personnel. It’s a tough look to be the grand marshal of your own parade. Lots had occurred in a short time and she needed to find a place to rest and recoup while she figured her next move. Man, that escalated quickly.

Usually when kicked to the curb, Lucy knew exactly why it was happening and respected it because after all, it likely saved lives, but this time she was in the dark. Could there have been a blackout? Could that have happened this time? Was there a time in the middle of the party when the darkness could have slipped under the door like a haunted fog? Had the sparrows indeed been flying? Could it have been like one of the mornings when she woke up with blood on her shirt, and not her own?

Could it have been a doppelganger? Another beautiful savage going around causing all manner of mischief, besmirching her good name? Possibly. And was it really all that good? She wanted to face her accusers and get to the bottom of it but she wasn’t completely sure she wanted to reopen the can of worms. Who knows what would be unearthed? By now more stories had surely come to light. More bodies found with their teeth still intact. Maybe best to move forward and work from the comfort of the distant future. The Consigliere would agree that some cases were best left unsolved.

The next morning it was time to muster the troops but no one would wake up. This was a bone fide emergency and they were rolling over in their tents with their bracelets squeezed on too tight. The music had already started on the Campfire Stage. The White Ninja suggested entering through the surrounding miles of soybeans that must have stretched all the way to Kansas. Either way, she was coming back. The job wasn’t done. Spaceman Sketch brought her to the front door and let her out as a reborn vendor. She slipped back under the cover of the forest. Reinvented as Jacinta, the Mexican ninja, she was looking for a good time. Future Joy anyone?

Things were finally getting back to “normal”. Lucinda’s paranoia was waning and lespecial’s set was blasting right down the trail into the Twerk Church. Spaceman Spiff was bartending the STS9 set in the Red Barn and when he wasn’t supplying camp with crotch whiskey he was tagging the sheriff’s golf carts and rescuing hippies from the Kroger parking lot. This was his time. It’s good to work with professionals.

The Potato Sisters trotted off to grab a little Umph love at the Moonshine Stage. Baitbucket ran into Danimal from Frick Frack and tried to convince him to help them steal the briefcase of souls. “I knew we should have brought some old lace.” Forest neighbors all worked together to try and figure a way to grab the Jolly Roger that hung from the lights in the forest. For at least the second year, no one could climb the tree and steal the booty. Bruh, do you even ball?

Visit the Solshine Reverie website and like their social media channels on Facebook, Instagram and X. Science, like math doesn’t care if you believe in it or not. Revisit some classics from the wranglers archives at “21: Restricted Access, “22: The Amalgamation and “23: The Illuminated. Things are always saucy in the forest.

Her last year at Chillicothe? Blaspheme. Sorry Pedro, it won’t be our last trip to the woods. This is still one of the best parties around. The crossroads at Shakedown St. is the heartbeat of the festival and it’s still possible to get lost in the protective embrace of the forest. Chillicothe remains one of the cornerstones of the festival circuit. Good times, great friends, heady trades scattered in with moments of blinding brilliance.

They were the last ones left cleaning up camp Monday morning. One would hope this means the cleanup crew ends up with Slumberjack’s Boom Town speaker but it really just means a freezer bag of cigarette butts and a couple extra clothes pins. Bfly was wearing a stranger’s bra and Pedro had packed up anything she could find, regardless of ownership. Welcome to the stress-free load out. It must be Mexican Monday, no further than a cheap hotel in Peoria.

Keep up with the wranglers as Kamp Happiness as we commit to the quick turn around with Mountain Music Festival before edging west to Manchester and then up to Rothbury. Baby steps. Small dog. Sometimes these missteps are just what is needed in order to take several large steps forward. Plan A is still in effect. Believe what you want. The receptionist accused her of being a vagrant when she entered the hotel, even though she had slept there the night before. “The breakfast isn’t even open. Why else would I sneak into the breakfast nook?” Five days in Chillicothe and everyone thinks you’re homeless.