Guest post from Alan Densmore of Missing Memoirs

Ah, Sasquatch; the birthplace of my festival experience. Breathtaking views of the Columbia Gorge coupled with four days of amazing music and some great crowd dynamics (read: antics). The sights and smells of the Northwest’s premier music festival remind me of giant campground, all-night parties and sunset shows from bands with a ton of Facebook “likes”. But this year looks to be special for me. On Monday night, when I will surely be exhausted from four days of sun, dancing, rocking, rolling down the giant hill, walking up the giant hill, 1AM shows, and dealing with the Apes on Tape crew, I will get to see Tenacious D.

“The D”‘s new album just dropped and I had a few listens on the way up to the California mountains and Lake Tahoe. On the first few run-throughs, I was having a hard time determining how I felt about Rize of the Fenix. The bar set by the first album was certainly high because of the iconic nature those tracks have reached within the 20-something generation. The Pick of Destiny makes way more sense as a musical sound track for a film quickly headed for cult classic status. The critics will probably tear this one up just like the last album, but I really don’t care what they have to say, and The D doesn’t either… The title track is a four part self-deprecating comedy epic ranging from acoustic ballad to 80’s metal in the same song and is the self described “one hit” of the album. But the song the really did it for me was “The Ballad of Hollywood Jack and The Rage Kage.” In their typical mythical biographical style, they describe Jack Black’s rise to fame and the insanity of Kage. Complete with flute solos, this song is an instant classic in the D catalogue. I could go on about the in’s and out’s of the album but what I am looking forward to even more is a chance to see the D with Dave Grohl (I have no idea if this is gonna happen, but since he played last year and given the size of the stage I’m banking that he’s gonna be there) fully electrified and unleashing some satanic magic on the last night of my favorite weekend of the year.