For Truly Curious Lauderdale Kids, Ancient River

Hey dudes! I was just surfing on the internets a bit and trying to catch up with the cool kids. For that reason, I cruised across Gainesville-based psychedelic blues trio Ancient River, which grown Gibbons geeks and Lauderdale scenesters from their mid-20s to early 30s will know includes former Outrights drummer Chad Voight. The band did an interview with Break Through Radio that goes pretty deep into its formation, influences, sound, etc. Most of us have seen at least one of Marco Argiro’s (Voight’s former bandmate in The Outrights) bands, The Killing Floor or The Mood, when he’s toured down here from New York. It would be awesome if Ancient River would come to South Florida to rock the smirks off of our faces.

Ancient River – “Four Letter Word”

ANCIENT RIVER | MySpace Music Videos

Tim and Terry’s with Sweet Bronco and Ancient River

Sweet Bronco and I cruised up to Gainesville a couple of Fridays past to hang out and play a show with Ancient River at Tim & Terry’s/The Purple Store. How much fun did we have? A whole bunch of it.

First things first, we rolled straight into the parking lot of Leonardo’s pizzeria to satisfy my craving for the addictive salad dressing that no other restaurant on the planet is able to duplicate.

We ate some salad and pizza, and then we hopped on over to Tim & Terry’s/The Purple Store to wait for Ancient River to arrive. It was a very funny little scene. All of the college kiddies and Gainesville lifestyle hangers-on were on the front porch playing guitar, chilling and living life at the slow pace that this Southern college town keeps.

We made our way inside and bought some beers, which are sold in the gas station style and at gas station prices, phew! I started off with a Lambic Framboise – yay! – and Sweet Bronco hit the Sam Adams pretty hard. We headed out to one of the tables in the backyard, which was crowded with stylish, young kids discussing the election and other college town topics.

Jaime, Chad and Zach arrived after a while. We caught up with them over some oversized imported beers and then went inside to watch Hunger Circus perform. I don’t have photos of them, but I have video, which isn’t available yet. Sweet Bronco performed a mix of original and cover his songs on guitar and harmonica. As usual, he was delightful and endearing. What else is new?

After Sweet Bronco performed, Ancient River took the stage and rocked us out. We’re huge fans of Ancient River. Ancient River sounds down home, deep, cavernous, grungy, bluesy. I positively lovies listening to them.

Phenomenal drummer Chad Voight, a South Florida boy who went to Gibbons and played in a band called The Outrights back in the day, favored the crowd with a drum solo. The video will be posted below as soon as it uploads.

After the show, Chris Horgan (Sweet Bronco) and Chad posed for a shot.

Then, we joined Warren in helping Ancient River pack up their gear and headed back to Jaime and Zach’s house to crash.

Here’s a pic of all of the boys who made my night go round. Ancient River, Sweet Bronco and Warren.

Thanks guys! We can’t wait until you come to spread your awesomeness all over South Florida. Videos of performances to come. Photo gallery below: