Cornerstone 2012

I returned from the Cornerstone festival after a two day drive. I have to admit that it was nice to be in my own bed in air conditioned comfort and a private washroom only steps away. This post is all about the special moments I had at Cornerstone. This list isn’t in any particular order, just reminiscences.

Great moments:

• Meeting up with old friends from Lauren Mann and the Fairly Odd Folk and Kiros.
• Late night talks with Mike from Lauren Mann and the Fairly Odd Folk, who crashed in my tent trailer for a few nights instead of sharing a tent with his band mates
• Cooling off with an ice coffee from the on site Chelsea Cafe
• Making new friends: Dave the hitchhiker from Florida, Chris from The Scurvies, Dave and all the band members from The Skies Revolt, David of CKCU 93.1 FM Ottawa, Richard a professor of  philosophy and apologetics at Southern Evangelical Seminary, all of the members of Those Know-It-Alls & Their Mighty Causes, and so many others whose names I can’t recall.
• The in depth conversations with Neph and Matt of Photoside Cafe and the band members of La De Les
• All of the bands that put up with my inane interview questions and answered with such alacrity: Squad Five-O, La De Les, The Kings Kids, Ilia, Photoside Cafe, Kiros, The Scurvies, and Ravenhill
• Enjoying my twice a day freezie from the Rotary club booth
• Listening to Mike Sales and Leanor Ortega Till’s seminars on Scum of the Earth Church
• The incredible bargains to be found on CD’s at the radrockers.com booth
• The First Baptist Church of Busnhell, Illinois who offered free internet access and a wonderfully air-conditioned building to relax in. Allowing me to use their phone. Best of all, homemade ice cream!
• The Free Ramen tent. A great place to find a comfy chair, shade, company, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and, of course, ramen noodles. All for free.  Thanks to the friendly bunch who set this up!
• The ladies at the Cornerstone office who prayed for the return of my lost wallet. Praise report: it was found!
• Finally being able to meet in person, artists and industry people I’ve only been in contact with by phone or email: Michael Pritzl of The Violet Burning, Dave Prindle of The Skies Revolt, Josh of  Ravenhill, Doug Van Pelt of HM magazine
• Movie viewing and intelligent discussion of such at the Imaginarium
• Best of all, the amazing concerts by tremendously talented bands

Things I’m not missing:

• Porta-potties. I know they were clean and didn’t stink, but using one during a heat wave is near the bottom of my fun thing to do list
• Trying to find shade under the blazing sun
• Clouds of dust from the dry roads
• Having to pre-pay for gas at American gas stations who don’t know how to handle Canadian credit cards
• Temperatures so warm that you don’t want to eat a thing
• The 15 hour drive to get to Cornerstone
• Having only 2 – 5 hours of sleep per night because there are so many things to do.

The only negative aspect of Cornerstone is wanting (or needing) to be in three places at the same time. Now for a list of the things I never had time to do:

• Falling asleep in the tent trailer instead of seeing Norma Jean perform
• Not being able to watch the series of Batman movies that ranged from the era of the campy TV show to The Dark Knight
• Missing The Skies Revolt second show
• Not seeing The Burial perform with an operating microphone
• The burning of the Viking ship (email me if you want more details of why this took place)