After the Rupp Arena show, I decided that I couldn't avoid going on tour any longer. This was also my first journey to Wisconsin and it turned out to be the best show of the run. From Theme to Rocky Top, there wasn't a single song that lacked energy or flow. The band was hot all night long. The band totally wore me out! I had to sit from ALF to Weekapaug because I raged it so hard earlier. I learned a lot about how to pace one's self during a multi-show run.
Many people have already discussed the musical highlights, but I was also blown away by the crowd. Huge, raucous and probably the most musically educated group of people outside of my music school that I had met up to that point. This was the first time I started meeting large numbers of wonderful people who wanted to talk about music instead of how to get wasted. Go figure.
This was the biggest Shakedown I had ever seen. Remember, this was back in the day before Alpine turned into a police state. Things were wide open. After the experience of 8-9-97, I knew Alpine was THE midwestern venue for me and summer tour was a permanent fixture of my life.