Venue-Alpine Valley Music Theatre, East Troy, WI

Date-8/17/79

The last time I saw Jaco was on Joni Mitchell’s Shadows and Light tour.  It was at the Alpine Valley Music Theatre in East Troy Wisconsin.  They played on the 16th and 17th, and I saw both shows.  The Theatre is an outdoor venue, but the stage and seats are covered with a roof, so shows are rain or shine.  The Theatre is built into valley, with the seats built into the hillside, and the stage down at the bottom.  On this particular night the weather was very ominous.  Shortly before show time there was a torrential downpour.  By the time the show began there were huge cracks of thunder, and the sky behind the stage was lit almost constantly by streaks of lightning.  The rain was running down the hill, onto the concrete where the seats were and down to the stage.  As the show was preceding the water began to rise at our feet.  It eventually got to the bottom of the seats, with our legs below the knees completely submerged.   The sound from the thunder and storm was drowning out the subtleties of Joni’s music.  Entire songs were completely inaudible.  When Jaco came out to do his solo it was a relief as he really cranked up the volume.  It was the first thing in the show many of us were able to hear at all.  Whether by serendipity or intent, he seemed to choreograph his solo with the storm.  At times he would jump in the air and hit the ground just as a huge thunderbolt struck, giving quite an awesome impression.  I read Joni say that he did the flip off the amp every night other than the one they filmed for Shadows and Light.  He didn't do it during the rainstorm show either.  At the conclusion of the following song there was a flash of lightening, and all power was gone.  Joni came to the edge of the stage and tried to relay that there was nothing they could do, but it was difficult to know exactly what was going on in the dark, no amplification, and the noise of the storm. 

On a good night the parking at Alpine was horrible.  Imagine 8,000 cars in a dirt field, no roads marked, driving into one another’s path, trying to get out of the gridlock.  Now imagine that dirt field under a couple of feet of water, a huge mud puddle.  Over half the cars were stuck in the mud, people everywhere trying to push them out, getting drenched in the continuing deluge.  Those that weren’t stuck were locked in by those that were.  It took literally 4 hours to get out of the parking lot. 

All in all it was a very memorable show and night