My buddy and I decided a couple of years ago to go see Phil Lesh & Friends perform up in Albany, NY, and also up in Buffalo, NY. We had friends living in each city and we had the car, all we needed was some money for gas, food, and beer. I got picked up from work in the late afternoon and we proceeded straight up to Albany.
Three of our friends happened to be in school at the University of Albany and were living off-campus and offered to put us up. When we got there, we dropped our bags and filled up our cups with beer from their mini keg refrigerator. This is probably the best and worst thing that anyone can have in their house. We played massive amounts of beer pong and cups while we killed time until our last friend got home from work. After he got back, we hit up the town. Albany in the winter time, like the rest of the school year, is nuts. People party all night long here and never seem to want to stop.
We had to wake up early to get on the road up to Buffalo, but it was freezing and we didn’t want to leave the comfort of the warm sheets. But we prepped ourselves, got some breakfast and then hit the open, snowy road. The ride from Albany to Buffalo was anything but interesting since there is nothing on the road except other cars and trees. We pulled ourselves off the road to hit up a bathroom and realized that most people on the road that day were headed to the same destination as we were. Dozens of hippies were brushing their teeth in the McDonalds bathroom and cleaning whatever they could while they were stopped.
We arrived at our friends place at around 3pm, quickly showered and proceeded to get ready for the evening. However, since we were in Buffalo, we needed to get authentic Buffalo wings. Our friend brought us to a place called Duff’s where the Buffalo wing was supposedly born, but they all say that. The wings were great but at Duff’s, they had their own house beer, Duff Beer. We tried to get cans to go, but they don’t exist, yet. If I were you, I would definitely give the wings a try; they were really hot and mighty spicy. We then called a cab and headed downtown to the concert hall where we saw the mayhem that is Buffalo.
The show was amazing but the real fun happened after the show when we hit up the college bars near our friend’s house. I would recommend “packing” well. With cheap drinks and it being constantly cold, the people around here love staying warm, so help them out. When we got back, it was so cold that sleeping was a hard task to complete, but when we finally did, it was short-lived.
We awoke to the sheer blanketing that only Mother Nature can produce, finding that our car was lost under the sea of white. After we finally dug it out, we had to get back to Albany for the show there and then home to New York to get to work the next day. The ride back to Albany was one filled with cold bones and hurting heads; not a way to drive around. The show in Albany was a little less key but the fact that it was in a giant gymnasium made it wonderful. There were no assigned seats, only random people floating around dancing and singing. We had unfortunately parked in one of the worst neighborhoods around the venue (The Washington Street Armory) and almost had our car broken into. We caught someone who was trying to crack open the door, but when we asked what he was doing, he ran off faster than I have ever seen anyone ever run. So try not to park near the Armory while in Albany.
We left the show so drained that I felt like I was just beat up by a team of people, leaving pints of blood and sweat in each city. But, Phil Lesh shows are very unique in the fact that they revitalize the Grateful Dead era of non-stop touring and all night parties. If you can, hit up a show of any Dead members because they will last and be unforgettable. I had a wonderful time, but I would not recommend driving hungover and tired throughout the mid-regions of Upstate New York in the dead of winter; it hurts mentally and physically and it’s a trip. What a long and strange trip it had been.