Rock Star /ra:k sta:r/ noun : A celebrity within a particular sphere. Thus, you are the rock star of your own life. First, WOW! Our team was floored, inspired and touched during our follow-up conversations with each of the nominators who spoke with us about his/her special nominee for Rock Star for a Day. Just listening to your stories, pride, heart and soul, and love for your nominee, we feel we have already won Burning Man! Thank you to all who nominated an incredible someone for consideration. You all made the decision so tough! After much deliberating and toiling over our fantastic set of nominees, we made our selection. The 2015 Rock Star for a Day is Dani “Rat Lady” Moore Dani Moore has been the ring leader and endless spokesperson for Mobility Camp. Following her inheritance of the camp from a past Burner, Dani has helped spread word and expand knowledge about Mobility Camp’s goals and mission to build awareness and improved alternative abled access at Burning Man. Dani is an incredible, living example of Burning Man’s radical inclusion principle. She is an inspiration and crates a lasting impact on our culture, maternally calling for inclusive accessibility and consciousness by us all. Thursday, Sept 1, 12pm – 4pm The Rock Star for a Day Event If you’d like to participate and thank Dani for her contributions, join us and the wonderful Charlie the Unicorn crew for the Rock Star for a Day event on playa or donate an item from Dani’s Wish List for her camp! It’s easy to check your local Craigslist for crutches, knee scooters and wheelchairs. Bring a pair along to donate anytime! What is Mobility Camp? Radical inclusion! Promotes accessibility awareness to theme camps, artists and art cars. Gift medical equipment to Burners who are are alternatively abled. Whether a person has sprained her ankle at Burn, in need of temporary crutches, or has permanent disabilities and needs information to properly prepare his wheelchair for the playa, Dani “Rat Lady” Moore and the team she leads are there to help. Creates an additional Survival Guide to assist alter-abled attendees prepare for the unique yet common issues traversing throughout Black Rock City. Our team is impressed with Dani’s caring nature while she educates about accessibility at Burning Man. Dani offers workshops on playa...
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Nomination Deadline Extended to June 15th! This year BRC Animal Control and I have teamed up as Rock Star Enterprises in search of the playa “Rock Star for a Day.” We are excited to launch our very own playa-fueled Rock Star Tour for one very special Burner nominated by her/his friends or fans. Who do you know who is the ultimate rock star of their own life and in their greater community? Someone who goes above and beyond, who sacrifices their time, energy, funds, and love for the sake of the greater cause and expects nothing in return. Someone who deserves the ultimate thank you. This year, the opportunity to lavish this person while at BRC has arrived. The Rock Star Tour will include: a full afternoon and evening filled with Black Rock City’s finest experiences, camps, art cars and more – it is Burning Man, after all! all of the most unique, dusty experiences that the playa has to offer. Help us celebrate the Rock Star in all of us as we knight one special person as BRC Rock Star for a Day, occurring Thursday, September 3rd! Nominate your Rock Star! This is our special call out for nominations on who the Rock Star should be. Who deserves a day of plush pampering for all the hard work they’ve contributed to our community? Submit your nomination by June 15th!! Offer your Rock Star service or experience! Are you a camp or Burner who would like to give their special gifts of thanks to the chosen Rock Star in this whirlwind tour-de-la-playa. What can you offer the Rock Star and his/her entourage? Can you offer a insider look or themed visit with your special posse? An extraordinary meal at the table in your Kingdom, fanned by BRC groupies? A Rock Star massage or special healing treatment? A Rock Star wardrobe for all the parties and events they attend that day? A Rock Star art car to transport our Rock Star and his/her posse? Let us know what you would like to offer, big, small, funny or meaningful. We want you to be part of our Rock Star experience and will feature you in our Rock Star activity agenda. Submit your Rock Star gift or service by June 15th! We will send out...
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We all love them and that damnable UNIMOG of a music machine, but how did all that begin? I caught up with PK of Space Cowboys for the story. (RSL)When and how’d Space Cowboys come into being? What was the initial vision and how has it changed and grown over the years? (PK)The Space Cowboys started wrangling the cosmos around 1997. I don’t remember exactly. It was a long, long time ago, in a galaxy far away. The Space Cowboys were one of the first large-scale sound camps at Burning Man. It started of as a group of friends who wanted to go to the desert, build and run essentially a free night-club in the true wild west. Initially the Cowboys had a large camp on one of the “corners” of Black Rock City, and ran a sound system and barter bar everynight. Big changes happened in 2000 when after meeting the fine lads of SpaceLounge, the crew’s focus shifted. As the two camps merged SpaceLounge continued to build the physical public camp that rocked every night and the Cowboys began work on a novel & radical idea at the time: a mobile sound-system. In 2001 the UNIMOG debutted on the playa, and well the playa has never really been the same since. Ever since it’s founding the Space Cowboys have focused their on playa efforts into one evening, the Black Rock Hoedown, one of the finest events BRC has ever seen (we are a bit biased). Held every year on the Friday before the burn, with the advent of the UNIMOG the location has changed each year to a different amazing artwork on the open playa. (RSL)Do you have sound camp veterans in your camp and what camps did they come from? <PK)The Space Cowboys ARE the veterans (funny, sad & true). [RSL interjection: I believe it’s funny, RAD & true!] The majority of us have been doing this for a decade. The old-timers amongst us are either original Cowboys or SpaceLoungers. (RSL)What music stylins’ should people expect to hear from your boom bass? (PK)Peeps should expect nothing but the finest in Breaks & House from the Cowboys. Our roster of residents is as deep as it is...
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Burning Man’s Rites of Passage theme this year got me pondering in a lyrical, booty beat sense. Late last night, when I couldn’t sleep due to a certain accelerating compression, I got up and nostalgically flipped through the various Rockstar Librarian Burning Man Music Guides of years past. The epic musical playa moments showered over me. First, I thumbed through the 2008 guide, and the page naturally folded open. “Root Society: Thursday, Fort Knox Five, Bassnectar.” My memory’s bass boom hit me, and I was back atop the metal spire, devouring the playa eye candy below. Then, I heard the familiar bass chord before I recognized the song. Upon recognition, I belted out one of my deepest belly laughs to date; tears of delight rolled down my cheeks. Here, among hot, furry bunny booties and chiseled, tribal gods, the dome filled with Dolly! Yes, it was an epic, silly playa moment that wouldn’t have flown anywhere else. Then, Bassnectar killed the decks for the next two hours. I was in dancing bliss. A big, jaw-hurting perma-grin, caused only by natural high, filled my face. Nothing could bring me down, not even my need to defend my small but earned dance space in the air against grumpy newcomers who griped and barked at me to get down. All I could do was dance harder and laugh out my verbal rejection against such bitter angst. “Why are you so mad? Don’t you know where we are? We’re at Burning Man. Burn-ing Maaaaan.” Tell me! Were you there, too? Or should I immediately call and schedule an emergency appointment with my therapist? (UPDATE: Thanks, Backwerds, for hooking me up with Fort Knox Five’s ‘Live on 4 decks at the Belly Up Aspen’ DJ set with said Dolly song @ 37 minutes in! Phew! Therapy delayed a bit longer.) And then *FLASH* I was back, in my dimly lit bedroom, guide in hand. I set it on my bedside and cozied up for what turned into the happiest, dream-like sleep. Though I didn’t remember the details this morning, I’m certain I visioned booty shaking and bass beats. And now I can’t help but reminisce back on the music. So, join me throughout August as...
Read MoreA South African Fifty-five weeks ago Patric entered the Crown Room in Portland, Oregon, sat down at the bar next to me and our mutual friend, Laura, who introduced us mere weeks before, and asked, “You two wouldn’t want to go to Rio for Carnival, would you?” Perhaps in one of my previous iterations of myself I’d have easily brushed off this kind of offer as mere day dreaming, but over the last several years, I’ve accepted these moments as wonderful opportunities awaiting my faith in them. So, I played along and asked, “When do you need an answer?” Over the next days, we discussed pre-flight requirements. Flight. Check. Hotel. Check. Vacation request approval. Check. Travel visa… “You need a visa?” Patric asked. We realized South Africans don’t need a visa to travel to Brazil, but Americans do. After speaking with a plethora of visa agencies, I discovered I couldn’t conceivably receive my visa in time to travel. Dream trip thwarted – for the moment, because now, I had the Brazil bug. I asked myself “How?” and “Why not?” rather than tell myself, “I can’t.” And then one day I just decided, “Travel doesn’t have to be expensive or difficult.” And this was what that beautifully blossomed belief manifested: A Barcelonan Monday night. Burning Man. Playa dust clouds swirled off my sparkly heels as I stepped onto my first art car for the week, with a full suited Cookie Monster at the helm. Just as I gained balance, several foreign, reveling Burners descended the staircase to await their stop. I grabbed the stair rail, ready to climb, but as I did, one of the revelers intently took my hand, looked me squarely in the eyes and in a Spanish accent said, “Wait! You! You need to travel, and you need to fall in love.” “Both sound wonderful,” I reply, “Where are you from?” “Barcelona!” he said. “Oh, I loved Spain! But I never made it to Barcelona,” I respond. We paused for a moment. I embraced the message, thinking our momentary interlude was over, but he continued, “You Americans. You travel to Europe. This is not travel. No. You, my dear, need to go to…” He looked intently into my...
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