The reunion of The Beatles (George Harrison not shown), who were expelled from the mouth of uninvited guest and GQ Denney patron Shiva the Destroyer, was a highlight of Bacchanal 2008.
SATAN, SHIVA JOIN FORCES AT BACCHANAL“Cosmic pissing contest” averted, harmony and drugs prevailBy Ariel Mutha-Tafoya,
Fantasy Sports Network(Editor's Note — The Bacchanal 2008 attendees were too overwhelmed by the magnitude of the event to speak coherently about it for more than a week. The Fantasy Sports Network
apologizes for the delay in publishing this account, but stands by it as a true and accurate description of the event.)
Despite a few tense moments between the Prince of Darkenss and the Destroyer of Worlds, Satan and Shiva managed to share a stage harmoniously at the fifth annual Bacchanalia to the Future, the two-day festival in Nashville’s Centennial Park that coincides with the Beelzebubbas-Bakers finale each season.
Needless to say, the crowd estimated at 85,000 was much relieved that no sparks or fireballs flew between the two cosmic figures, in spite of the claims of each. In fact, Satan, the Grand Marshal and official headliner, and Shiva, a late (and forced) entry onto the performers’ list, co-existed more peacefully together than some performers in years past, such as Ike and Tina Turner or John Ashcroft and Lindsay Lohan.
Even more relieved was festival organizer GQ Denney, who incurred the wrath of Old Scratch by bumping him from last year’s schedule over safety concerns. “We couldn’t exactly say no to Shiva, especially since he returned GQ from New Mexico,” said Bakers PR maven Faith Popcorn. “But neither could we afford for Satan to get PO’ed again. I knew it was going to be okay when I heard the two of them start singing 'Peace Train’ together.”
For the first time, the Bacchanal was extended to two days to accommodate the enormous crowd — and to raise additional money for the rebuilding of the Cherry Bomb Café. Bacchanal-goers could purchase their choice of single-day tickets, two-day passes, combination concert-football game tickets, or an “All Excess” pass that allowed them to attend a VIP reception with Satan on Saturday evening.
Even after the Bakers-'Bubbas game kicked off at noon on Sunday, the crowd in Centennial Park was in excess of 80,000, police said. Among those who remained in the park were Denney and Beelzebubbas’ owner Boyd X. Biggs, along with 'Bubbas’ players Carson Palmer, Adrian Peterson, Laurence Maroney, Patrick Crayton and Leon Washington, who, according to Biggs, were being “rewarded with some R&R” for an outstanding season.
“Taking it to two days was a brilliant marketing strategy,” said Pete Boggs of
Forbes magazine, who covered the event. “The organizers have finally learned to maximize the potential of their various audience segments.” Boggs also was impressed with a new line of “ingestibles” offered by Cherry Bomb Foods, which included “Mama Castaneda’s cream of mushroom soup,” GQ Denney’s “Four Corners Chili,” and giant “Sod Baker Brownies.” For the first time, this year’s Bacchanal also offered valet services, as well as hastily erected “luxury suites” atop the nearby Athlon Building.
On Saturday, after co-Grand Marshal Sara Evans performed the traditional nude rising of Venus from the Centennial Park bandshell, Satan transported her in a chariot pulled by a three-headed dog to the Parthenon’s south side. Music Row media and hangers-on swarmed the couple, some asking Evans to confirm allegations by her estranged husband that she was carrying Satan’s child. An obviously miffed Haven Hamilton, who has served as emcee every year, quieted the furor by leading the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance. Then Arcade Fire (with Satan providing the fire offstage, slightly injuring two revelers) kicked off the concert marathon, joined by a reanimated Bob Marley for an eclectic Quebecois-Jamaican fusion of “Lively Up Yourself.”
The afternoon featured an astonishing array of musicianship, headlined by Steely Dan and Denney’s Dead Southern Rockers Tour. The Dan, joined on bass by the late Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, began their hour-long set with a ringing version of “Boddhisatva” — which Donald Fagen introduced by saying, “We’re just messin’ with our friend Satan’s head a little.” They concluded with “Daddy Don’t Live in That New York City No More,” which Walter Becker described as a tribute to Denney and the Cherry Bomb. Denney himself was seen weeping openly as the band sang the line, “Daddy can’t get no fine cigar, but we know you’re smokin’ wherever you are.”
Later, on the Dionysus Stage, a parade of Southern rockers, reanimated at Denney’s Hohenwald complex before it was destroyed, provided one of the first day’s highlights. The three-hour, almost nonstop performance began with Barefoot Jerry and ended with Lynyrd Skynyrd. In one of the Bacchanal’s most memorable bits of stagecraft, a military drone aircraft, operated by remote control, crashed into Lake Watauga just after the guitar crescendo in “Free Bird” began. Other highlights of the DSR set included a performance by Dr. John, who was named as an honorary Dead Southern Rocker, and a 27-minute version of “Whippin’ Post” by a reunited Allman Brothers Band. During that number, three enemy fighters captured by Biggs’ Taliban Safari in Pakistan were flailed with whips while tied to an iron fence surrounding a statue honoring Confederate dead.
But the afternoon clearly belonged to Satan, who took the Beelzebub stage just after 4 p.m. sporting white knee-high boots and an outrageous Afro hairstyle as he launched into “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Again),” which has become an informal anthem of the Bacchanal. Showing off his virtuosity, Satan switched outfits and musical gears seamlessly to provide scorching vocals on The Who’s “Love, Reign Over Me”; accompanied Sara Evans on several of her hits; electrified the crowd with the blues standard “Back Door Man”; then crooned “The Tennessee Waltz,” accompanied by the Blind Boys of Alabama. Through a previously arranged one-day truce with the Bakers and BeelzeBubbas, Midtown Mojo owner/racketeer Mojo D was allowed to play accompanying dobro as Satan enthralled the crowd with a haunting bluegrass version of “House of the Rising Sun.”
Near the end of his two-hour show, the Dark Lord took requests from the audience that ranged from the predictable (“Sympathy for the Devil” and “The Devil’s Right Hand”) to the unexpected (Nirvana’s “Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge Upon Seattle”) to the transcendent (Marvin Gaye’s “Mercy, Mercy Me”). Joined by Marley, Satan concluded his set as thousands in the crowd sang along to the chorus of “No Woman, No Cry.”
Even when he wasn’t performing, Satan owned the show. First, he bit the head off Ozzy Ozbourne after the “Oz man” had run through a medley from his Black Sabbath days, prompting the crowd to chant “Satan! Satan! Satan!” for a full 10 minutes before the next performer, Kevin Bacon, was able to take the stage.
Later, in a much ballyhooed reprise of the musical showdown in “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” Satan possessed the body of Alison Krauss, who outperformed Charlie Daniels in a fiddling contest. After declaring himself/Krauss the winner, Satan invited those with VIP reception tickets to join him for a “celebrity roast” of Daniels in the basement of the Parthenon, where the born-again singer was placed on a spit and slowly cooked throughout the evening. “It’s a good thing the Bush administration says the Geneva Convention doesn’t apply to America,” Satan quipped during the roasting. “We couldn’t have pulled this off in Canada or Mexico.”
Satan returned on Sunday morning to kick off Day 2 with a reanimated James Brown, whose feet literally were on fire as he danced. Then, in what Cashville411.com described as the "most sublime moment" of the entire event, Satan performed “Satisfied Mind” with a reanimated Porter Waggoner with Jack White on lead gutiar. Then he turned things over to Cartman, whose South Park-based band, Faith Plus One, performed their hit, “The Body of Christ.”
Shortly after Satan left the stage, all hell, as it were, almost broke loose.
As the Dionysus stage crew was setting up for Courtney Love, an emerald bird began circling overhead. Then, without warning, Shiva the Destroyer appeared onstage in the form of an elephant and furiously launched into “Devil in a Blue Dress” — an obvious jab at the grand marshal.
As soon as he finished the first song, Shiva grew to 20-feet tall and then devoured Haven Hamilton in a single gulp. Seconds later, he opened his mouth again, and all four Beatles appeared onstage long enough to perform “Twist and Shout” and “Helter Skelter.” Then Shiva swallowed the Beatles and, still in his Ganesh manifestation, sang “I Am the Walrus” as a row of miniature elephants sang “goo-goo-goo-joob” as backup. Finally, Shiva regurgitated Hamilton and, with the voices of all four Beatles emanating from him, led the crowd in the anthemic “All You Need Is Love.”
“I wasn’t quite sure what we had just seen,” said Beelzebubbas Media Relations Director Wiley Peyote. “I figured it was just the medicinal hallucinogens that the doctors had been prescribing for everyone until all these other people told me they had seen the Beatles, too.”
Not to be upstaged, an obviously irritated Satan took the Beelzebub stage at the Parthenon amid a shower of lightning bolts. As Lucifer began performing Elton John’s “The Bitch Is Back,” the statue of Athena came to life and appeared onstage, where Satan sexually assaulted her before tossing her into a rapidly formed mosh pit below.
At that point, witnesses said, the Bakers’ Faith Popcorn walked up and said something into Satan’s ear. Satan then called for Shiva to share the single stage and perform with him. Then, witnesses said, Popcorn appeared to turn into an emerald bird and flew to the top of the Parthenon.
“It looked like we were heading for some kind of cosmic pissing contest,” a fully human Popcorn said later. “I was a little concerned for the safety of our guests, even though they looked like they were down with it.”
Shiva accepted Satan’s invitation, and the two played together during a lively, hour-long Americana set that included “Great Balls of Fire,” “Long Black Veil,” “Mystery Train,” and “Love Is All Around,” the theme from The Mary Tyler Moore Show. They concluded with “The Night They Drove Ole’ Dixie Down,” said to be one of Satan’s favorites, and the crowd became rapturous as Shiva transformed his appearance into that of Levon Helm and sang, “Virgil Cain is one of my names.”
As darkness began to fall late Sunday afternoon, a miraculously resurrected Haven Hamilton called all the performers still on hand to the stage — including Jack White, James Brown, Li’l Kim, Iggy Pop, Husker Du, Glen Campbell, Kanye West, Van Morrison, Ryan Adams, Flaco Jiminez, Stevie Nicks, Sara Evans, P. Diddy, Jack Black and Gretchen Wilson — along with Denney and Biggs to lead the crowd in the traditional closing of the Bacchanal, “Will the Circle Be Unbroken?”
Three days later, attendees (some of whom had come from as far away as India and Australia) were still marveling at the event. “I thought I had seen everything,” said East Nashville Black Dogs Coach Jim McMahon, who was on hand Saturday and early Sunday to man the Friends of the Cherry Bomb booth just down from the Guinness Book of Records-setting outdoor vomitorium. “But that whole rape of Athena thing was the damnedest [expletive] I ever saw. I’m buying the All-Excess pass next year, fo sho’.”
Furious George, the French impresario who witnessed his first Bacchanal as a guest of Denney, said, “Soon enough those — how do you say? — fucktards Bush and Cheney will be gone. This event is an example of what the world still loves about America. Vive le debaucherie!”
