CAPE COD FAIRGROUNDS – Glenn Corriveau stood by the main stage of the Naukabout Festival and waited for the band, David Wax Museum, to start. He scanned the crowd. (See slide show below)
“It’s a kid-friendly festival,” he said. “Hippies and kids.”
Corriveau, the manager at the Daily Brew in Cautamet, comes to the festival at the Barnstable County Fairgrounds every year. He called the attraction “folk rock songwriter’s music. I’ve gotten turned on by a lot of music here,” he said. “I’ve ended up buying it.” (See also, 2-Minute Video, David Wax Museum)
Jeff Conley started the Naukabout festival
In a world of top 40 or yet another cover of that Journey song, the six-year-old Naukabout music festival was a unique little gem on Saturday at the Barnstable County Fairgrounds. The weather wasn’t great early in the day but by evening of the noon to 10 P.M. festival, the weather was spectacular.
“We probably had 1,000 people”, said Jeff Conley, who started the event as a way to promote his family’s clothing company, which has since evolved into a beer company, Naukabout Beer. But Conley had a second motive, besides promoting the family product. He is a musician who writes original songs.
The festival, said Conley, who now lives in San Francisco, features approximately one third each of local musicians, regional musicians, and national acts. He talked to Cape Cod Wave just after he had played a set on one of the three stages at the Naukabout Festival.
Conley had wanted to open for big regional and national acts. “I thought, if they’re not going to let me open for them, I’m going to make them headline for me.”
Thus, the Naukabout music festival.
“I love it,” said Jack Phaneuf, 70, of Bridgewater, who said he was at Woodstock in 1969. “This is very nice and family friendly,” he said. At that moment, two children ran by.
Cam Roberts, 15, of Lakeville, was trying to explain why he liked the Naukabout Festival better than other music festivals he’d been to when he pointed and said, “Because I never saw anything like that.”
Just then, the members of the David Wax Museum band, walked off the stage at the beginning of a song and strolled right into the crowd.
Lead singer David Wax later explained to Cape Cod Wave that the song, “Carpenter Bird,” is based on an old Mexican folk song and they performed it “like wandering minstrels.”
“Everyone sings a verse,” he said, “They are linked verses.”
At the festival, there were a few vendors, including “lovin’ cup” Lemonade, run by Cody Peterson and Erin Peterson of Marstons Mills. “I was a big Phish fan. I used to go to lots of shows,” said Erin. “Back in the day, I used to sell cider out of the trunk of my Volkswagen in a parking lot. It evolved into what it is today.”
At the festival in various places, there were girls spinning hula hoops.
— Brian Tarcy
Unfortunately I missed The David Wax Museum because of the kickass music of Danielle Miraglia in the beer tent. It was a shame that the 2 acts were going on at once. But I must say that the 2 stages at the top of the field got my vote this year with exception of BTB band which I thought was the best festival band there which not too many people saw because they started them before any entrance to the festival was permitted. All in all a wonderful day filled with amazing spirit!!!