happy birthday doctor skindiver

longtime friend and four year college roommate of anyone's guess, benjamin daniel walp vandivier, turns - to judge by the hairline - thirty-five today. congratulations, broham. 3rd fastest in history to middle age. no, i kid, i kid.

ben's a fairly skilled pianist and organist and composer, and he's a total sucker for songs with multiple part harmonies, like, for instance, dispatch's "hey hey," which was a staple in the trusty civic's tape deck during car trips. or also this one:

dispatch - general (live at the middle east, cambridge, MA 1999)

we drove down from maine for the show and ben, who's an a.v. nut and had lugged a DAT recorder along with us, sweet-talked the band into letting him plug into the soundboard. the middle east downstairs is more or less a building-length open basement with a stage at one end and for those shows that, for whatever reason, don't draw very well, the quality of the performance can suffer. too reminiscent, perhaps, of a bad basement party at that kid's house from the back of your high school english class. fortunately on this particular night it was jam packed full - extremely hot and incredibly sweaty - and the energy carried over onto the stage. i saw dispatch play quite a few times before they disbanded; this is the show that sticks out. & thanks to ben there exists this pristine recording of the evening, which anyone's guess now happily shares with all of you.

feliz birthday, dude.