moe. will take the stage at the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, NY on February 7 and 8 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the famed Wetlands Preserve, a venue that was central to the jamband scene from its opening 1989 to its closing in 2001. A number of special guests with ties to the club will join them for festivities, including The Ringers (featuring Jimmy Herring), Chris Barron, John Medeski, Scott Murawski, Reid Genauer, Aaron Maxwell, Peter Prince, Jen Durkin and Fuzz. We caught up with moe.’s Rob Derhak—who played a number of gigs at the New York City venue during its heyday—to talk about the anniversary shows, some of his favorite Wetlands memories, and more
What are your first memories of playing the Wetlands?
We played a few gigs, but the first big one I remember was when we opened up for the Dude of Life, and I didn’t know what that meant. Then when I got there, some of the guys from Phish were his backing band and he was like a lyricist for Phish and it ended up being this huge insane blowout. All these people who had never heard of us got exposed to our band. It was like this huge boost for us. I think we had played there maybe three times, as our own act or maybe we were on a bill with like three other bands. So basically our friends. And all of a sudden we had this following in New York City after that, it was great. That was the earliest thing I can remember. It was like you were at a house party every time you were there. It wasn’t like playing a gig. You were in and out of the crowd. The stage is basically right where the crowd is, you’re so low so you are really part of the experience. It’s cool.
Sounds like it was a little bit different to play the Wetlands than it was to play other venues?
Well it was. I mean first thing you noticed was the sort of bad hippie paintings, and the bus. That VW bus. It was like all of a sudden you were in this place where you knew you weren’t going to be dealing with metal heads who didn’t want to be there. It was like this crowd that was meant for our music.
What are some of your other memories from the Wetlands?
There was a lot of people just coming in and out all the time. We had a New Year’s show there one year where—I don’t remember what the capacity of the place was—but for some reason, I don’t know how we worked this, but we ended up almost doubling the amount of people that were supposed to be in that building at the time. We just kept stuffing people in. People would leave and, I don’t know man, it was a pretty funky party. (Laughs) It’s hard to remember most of the stuff that happened there.
You guys have a bunch of guests coming to play with you for these 25th anniversary shows, which is very much in the spirit of the Wetlands? Were there a lot of collaborations when moe. was playing there?
Yeah that’s what it was really about. Most of the time we ended up playing shows with our friends’ bands, bands that we played with in other places, like Ominous Seapods and Yolk. You would always have somebody jamming with you or you would jam with somebody else. I think that’s when we started doing the “hostile takeover” thing, where someone would come on stage from the other band and start taking over our instruments and stuff. I think that’s where the whole idea kind of came from.
Some of these guys that are coming to play with us up at Port Chester, we’ve never actually gotten jam with them. Some of them we have, we’ve played with in the past. I don’t even remember how many different bands we’ve played with there, but I know we’ve done stuff with Jimmy Herring and the Conehead Buddha horns and all that. But Chris Barron, we’ve never really done anything with the Spin Docs. Maybe we opened for them once when I lived in Buffalo. But a lot of these other bands, it’s going to be a first time for us. They were all integral parts of the Wetlands though, so its going be pretty cool.
For sure, I mean John Medeski is going to be there. Jen Durkin from Deep Banana Blackout, Aaron Maxwell from God Street Wine, Reid Genauer, Scott Murawski.
Like we’ve never played with Aaron before. Well, he’s never sat in with us so that’s going be cool. I’m not sure, I know we’ve done shows with Jen but I don’t remember if she’s ever done anything with us. I think some of our guys have played with her. And obviously we’ve done stuff with John Medeski a few times. He’s phenomenal. It’ll be great. Never did anything with Scott. Reid I’ve done a million things with. So some guys, right away we’ll know what to do and other guys, it’ll be fun to learn where and what their style is. It’ll be cool.
Have you guys thought up any interesting ways to pay tribute to the Wetlands over the course of these two shows?
Oh yeah, but it’s all surprise stuff (Laughs). You have to leave something. You have to let everyone let that stuff unfold. No secrets (laughs).
Our own Dr. Dean Budnick directed a documentary about the Wetlands, Wetlands Preserved. Have you, per chance, seen the film?
Yeah, I’ve seen it. It’s good man. There’s that whole funny story about Rodney that kills me every time. I don’t know, man. Somehow I got involved in the Rodney story and I wasn’t even there that’s the funny part. That’s a great movie though. My son watched it. He’s 15 now and he was just impressed by the sort of legendry status that the film gives the venue. He thought it was cool.
Anything else you want to say about these shows?
We did a benefit a while ago at—I think it was the Roseland, or maybe we played at Irving Plaza—I can’t remember. It was with a Butch Trucks, Sam Bush, Trey Anastasio and stuff. We got together with all those guys and rehearsed and came up with all this great stuff and the whole show was just so much fun and it was just such a different thing. I’m hoping that we can bring something like that to this; where it’s not necessarily going to be a moe. show. It’s going to be us with all these special guests playing some of our music, some of their music, and some covers. Really make it special for me and for the Wetlands. And then, obviously, because of the amount of influence the Grateful Dead had on the venue, I think we are going to try to pull some of that stuff into the whole mix and do something. It’ll be good.
