December 24, 2007

Like most other secular Semitic folk, the neurotic Jews that run Hidden Track typically associate the Christmas holiday with Chinese food, blockbuster movies, casino trips with the Asians and beach-dominated Caribbean vacations. Sadly we’re not publishing this post with the sand ‘neath our feet, so we’re loading up the molester-white van and taking you all to Jamaica, to a musical resort that Dave Chappelle tells me is “right near ‘da beach.” Boooyeeee.

Mid-December brought the respective and crossover fanbases of Umphrey’s McGee and the Disco Biscuits down to the Greater Antilles for an all-inclusive Caribbean Holidaze music vacation. Fans shuttled back and forth between the Hedonism III and Breezes resorts, the former of which featured early afternoon and evening sets from the two aforementioned bands, plus the stellar Benevento/Russo Duo, Keller Williams, Mad Professor, Tom Hamilton and the Beatles-Floyd supergroup known as Brain-Damaged Eggmen.

Our friend Dave Vann knows his way around an f-Stop, and he agreed to snap some photographic evidence of bands melting faces and fans raging their tits off. So read on after the jump for a full photo gallery from Caribbean Holidaze, featuring pictures and YouTube videos of all the live acts, the gorgeous scenery and a climate many of us long for at this very moment. And since we weren’t there ourselves, feel free to leave a first-hand report or observation in the comments…

We’ve been pretty harsh on STS9 in the past, so on the day before Christmas, it’s only fair we recognize a cool thing they’re doing for their fans. STS9 is teaming up with iClips to offer free webcasts of their upcoming shows at The Tabernacle in Atlanta on December 28-31.

Fans that weren’t able to score tickets to the nearly sold out run will be able to surround their screens with heady crystals while watching a five-camera feed from the shows. We’d usually throw in a joke about feeding Phipps’ daughter here, but we’ll move on since these guys are also donating $12,000 from this year’s NYE shows to Rock Against Cancer. Good stuff.

Now let’s start the abbreviated holiday week off right with some linkage:

• Levon Helm, Bruce Hornsby and Bela Fleck head the MerleFest lineup
• Mike Gordon, Luther Dickinson and others look back on 2007 for the third installment of Jambands.com’s Auld Lang Syne
• Take Live Nation’s 50 Moments That Revolutionized Music quiz
• Stereogum previews studio albums due for release next year
• Despite a slew of reunions, the concert industry slumps into 2008
• VH-1 teams with CBS to offer Classic 60 Minutes
• Tom Waits returns in August to cities he hasn’t played in decades
• Are The Paradise’s days as Boston’s top rock club numbered?
• Ickmusic remembers Joe Strummer five years after his death

Finally, read on after the jump for a very special Christmas Eve video treat…