Speaker 1: And welcome everybody. We have entered our number two numarrowdos
of Matt Connorton unleashed and we are live from the
studios of WMNH ninety five point three FM and Glorious Manchester,
New Hampshire. And of course you can stream the show
from anywhere. Go to Matt Connorton dot com slash live
for all of your live streaming options, social media links,
contact info, show archives, et cetera, et cetera. Today is Saturday,
December twentieth, two thousand twenty five, and we have joining
us in studio and I've been looking forward to this
because they're from a venue that comes up a lot
on the show. So let's see. Let me make sure
we got the camera on here. So we've got at
the news table as we like to call it her
in the Newstable area. Mike Hill is here from Charlie Hill.
Hey Mike, good morning, welcome to the program.
Speaker 2: Thank you and thanks for having us.
Speaker 1: And then yes, and speaking of us, so please introduce
these other fine people that you brought with you.
Speaker 3: I brought Lloyd the sound engineer. How you doing, hi, Lloyd, welcome,
brought the boss, my wife Terry okay, Hi, Terry. She said,
I'm Boston, I can say so.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, all right, well very good, very good. So
we were talking off air about this the reason I'm
excited to have you here so Charlie Hill. So, just
for clarification, Charlie Hill is not a band. Charlie Hill
is a venue. And I'm not blowing smoke when I
say this. Of all the obviously, you know, when musicians
come on the show, we talk about various places to
play in the area. Charlie Hill comes up more than
any other venue that we talk about on the show.
I hear about Charlie Hill all the time. Have been
for how long have you been opening? It's been a
couple at least a couple of years, right.
Speaker 2: The first show was in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 1: Twenty fourteen, and oh wow, longer than I realized.
Speaker 2: It's been growing like crazy.
Speaker 1: Oh wow wow.
Speaker 4: It started with annual event the third weekend in August,
a Live Love Laugh Festival, and went from a once
a year, three day weekend event to the doors were
open every Saturday night at seven o'clock.
Speaker 1: Okay, wow, So what's the live LAF I live laugh.
I'm sorry they live Love Laugh, Live Love laugh, what
is that?
Speaker 4: That is a festival Charlie still is in memory of
my daughter, Charlie, who helped me do the first festival
in twenty fourteen, okay, And she loved music. She loved
all the music, all the people, red and yellow, black
and white. She is just all about a safe place
to enjoy music for the musicians and the spectators and
the flow artists and all of it. Yeah, so that's
why we do what we do.
Speaker 1: So that that's how the festival started because of her, yes, okay, Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well the first the first festival was done celebrating the
legalization of medicinal marijuana and educating the public on how
they could become law abiding citizens. We had a doctor
there that did consultations, issued medical cards caregivers and that's
how it was started. And then I lost Charlie ten
days before Christmas that year, and so this is all
done in memory of Charlie. And I think that's one
of the reasons we stand out from other venues is
it's about the bands and the musicians and the people
who love them and support them. Any event we do
always has free camping, probably not recommended this time of year.
Speaker 1: Obviously, unless masochist.
Speaker 4: Yeah, people ask you'd be surprised, really, Oh yeah, die
Hard New England. But all the events we do are
always free. Camping very few events, most most of the
shows are always free. And we don't We're not a bar,
we're not a restaurant. We're there for the bands and
the spectators and and you know that when you walk
in the door, places like a giant, oversized living room
with a really nice stage and incredible sounds. Okay, so
it's like home away from home.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what everyone says.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's not fancy. We got Yeah.
Speaker 2: We decided that making the stage sound.
Speaker 5: Better than front of the house, it's probably better for
the band's experience.
Speaker 1: Oh definitely.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's basically that's what it's about.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's more about having that what you would get
if you went to an arena, you know, yeah, and
actually had you know, expensive production behind you. Instead of
get in and get out, we got to close the doors.
Speaker 2: Right right, you know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we didn't make that much money at the door.
Sorry kid, we already tell him sorry.
Speaker 2: On the way in.
Speaker 5: Yeah, by donation, buddy, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4: I was trying to explain our relationship with between Terry
and Lloyd. I believe we met in nineteen eighty one
at Noble High School? Is that right about nineteen eighty one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, something like that, Okay, okay, so.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we've known each other a long time.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And it started with the outdoor stage and I had
stored people's stuff for free in the back of the
big fifty by one hundred and twenty five foot barn
and we got rained out I think it was twenty sixteen,
and we had to push a bunch of the junk
out of the way at one of the back doors,
and Boyd said, you know, who's stuff is this? When's
the last time we talked to any of these people?
You know, we could put a stage in here and
have a nice indoor place too, mm hmm. And so
we had to be done. Yeah, it sounds like, yeah, yeah,
one step at a time.
Speaker 1: So then when did so that festival though? That so
that's what started it, and then and then from there,
like what was the transition because now is every Saturday?
Speaker 2: Right? Yeah? I guess Saturday?
Speaker 1: Every Saturday.
Speaker 4: Some a few people came to me in twenty fifteen
and asked me if I was going to do the
really cool event again, like I said I would every year. Well,
I guess you have to go back to Charlie started
going to festivals at harry Chill when she was fourteen,
you know, fibbing to mom about where she was going
to the leak again, and she said, I'll help you
do the festival. Mom, it's the coolest thing ever to
have a festival at my house in our field. But
you're just doing it because you're mad because you got
in trouble from that sheriff. So you have to promise
that you'll do this every year and I'll help you
do it, and you have to put it in writing.
So she made me put it on the T shirts
that year that it was our first annual event. And
even the graphics people, the graphics coop lady that used
to do our race cars and stuff, she's like, Terry.
She goes, you don't put the first annual or something,
And I said, it's a deal I had with Charlie.
So come twenty fifteen, couple of people ask you're going
to do the festival again, and I said, I'll never
have another party again in my life as long as
I live. And then I remember the promise to Charlie
that it was in writing on the shirts, and so
the kids put it together because I didn't have it,
I mean to do anything, and I said, well, open
the field. Of course there was no open doors except
for the office, and then I let them do that
the twenty fifteen showing memory Charlie. And then somebody said, well, Terry,
if it's all about marijuana, you really need to have
something in the end of October where everybody can play
like show and tell with their home grows. So they
put something together the third weekend in October. Typically a
Charlie's Hill event will be on the third weekend of
the month, and other shows that the bands put together
is other weekends of the month. So twenty fifteen we
added the Hallow Harvest, which is an annual event that
we do, and then the next year it just was
more and more and more and more, and as it
it's the way we do things. The way we do it.
We didn't all get together one day and say, hey,
this is what we're gonna do and this is how
we're gonna do it. We pay attention to what the
needs are of the people and what's gonna make everybody
happy and work, you know. I mean, you can't make
everybody happy all the time, no matter how hard you try,
but we definitely try hard.
Speaker 1: Yeah it sounds like it.
Speaker 4: So now here we are, and I guess one of
the things that happened several years ago was we do
a lot of shows in the summer, and then we
don't do a lot of shows in the winter, so
the local guys would come and jam pretty much all
winter except for the random shows that we would have,
and then come summertime we would have six, six or
seven weeks of shows in a row, and then the
local jam guys we, oh, you don't love us anymore
in the summer. So I was like okay. So then
now that's where the open Jam night, the first Saturday
every month came into play. So no matter what time
of year it is, everyone knows the first Saturday of
the month is always open jam. So if anybody wants
the opportunity to come play on the Charlie Hill stage
and enjoy the you know, because Lloyd's a wizard, he's
a madman. Yeah, he's a wizard, so.
Speaker 2: Work.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So once he perfected the front of house, then
he's like, now I gotta get the stage monitors as good,
if not better than the front of house, because if
anybody deserves to have quality sound, it's the bands, right.
So we kind of have a joke at Charlie till
when a new band comes and they get set up
on the stage and then they see the experience on
the stage for them, they poop their pants. So we
actually have a pair of emergency underwear on the stage,
like it was a joke along side and then wouldn't
you know, you come across you know, two dollars that's
on flea market, this pair of emergency understands. So just
kind of fell in with a joke.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we're probably one of the only venues right now
that are I have a set of Servo drive Yeah,
Servo Tech seven. Yeah, they're a subs run by a
Servo motor. Oh really no, yeah, they all way down
to twenty Oh wow, I cut them off at forty
Yeah under the drum rise here and it's just the
drum production microphones.
Speaker 2: That picked that up.
Speaker 5: No getting the stage presence and drums forty and below
is right under your feet.
Speaker 2: Okay, it's like a kick in the foot.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's nice.
Speaker 2: It's more of a feeling than it sounds.
Speaker 1: You know when you started that sentence that I thought
you were going to say, you're you're the only venue
that has emergency underwear for.
Speaker 2: The Yeah, probably that you probably are, probably not.
Speaker 1: As a journalist, I have to ask you going back
to something that Charlie had said to you. What the
thing about getting in trouble with the sheriff? I have
to I have to circle back to that.
Speaker 4: Stories about carry the rebels.
Speaker 2: He's the reader.
Speaker 4: I do not have a criminal record at all, whatsoever. Okay,
no speeding tickets, clean driver's license. Yeah. So in twenty fourteen,
when I decided to do this crazy thing because I
knew it was a lot of people don't break the law.
And the only thing we did to break the law
was we smoked a little weed. So I got pulled
over by the sheriff, York County sheriff in Waterborough. And
I hope he hears this because he wasn't not nice.
Speaker 1: And where where is water Water?
Speaker 4: Water Borough?
Speaker 1: Is that in New.
Speaker 4: Hampshire, York County?
Speaker 2: Means gotcha?
Speaker 1: Okay? Okay.
Speaker 4: A friend of a friend of a friend was actually
a caregiver and had the opportunity to take a ride
all the way up to like you know, almost Augustaye
and go to a caregivers and get that quality bud
that everybody looked for. But I didn't have my medical card,
so like on a down law like it was like
a half.
Speaker 1: Hour just for clarification. You didn't have it on you here.
You didn't have it at all.
Speaker 4: You know, I have a medical marijuana card, gotcha? Okay,
I was a lawbreaker?
Speaker 1: You criminal?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4: He pulls me over. You know, you'd be past each
other in the opposite direction and then all of a sudden,
the blues come on. He whips it around. I'm like, well,
he's obviously not pulling me over, so I'm not breaking
the law. Yeah, and oh yeah, slides in right behind me.
I'm like okay. So he comes up, put the window down.
This is in February. I have a great big tahoe.
I have wood equipment, like the haul firewood out of
the forest. Yeah, and then I have all my janitor
buckets in the back seat, so got a lot of
work equipment in there. And uh, and there's snow off
in the woods and he comes up and he goes, uh,
I pulled you or for going thirty nine and into
thirty five, and I'm looking at the thirty five mile
an hour sign. I'm not even in the thirty five
mile and hours long, so I just knew he was
not Most police officers are righteous dudes, okay and women,
but I knew this was not one of them right off,
because I'm not even in thirty five. So he pulled
me over for going thirty nine to thirty five. I
knew I was going anyway.
Speaker 1: Even if you were in a thirty five and it couldn't.
Speaker 4: Get a warning, a verbal warning for thirty nine and
thirty five. But I distinctly smell your room of marijuana
emanating from your vehicle, and I'm like the other day
and I yeah, right, So I'm usually pretty respectful that
you know, my dad's thirty five years retired Air Force
ye sergeant.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I'm.
Speaker 4: Pretty respectful to authority. But I'm like, really, I just
looked right at the copp Like, really, I'm forty six
years old. I'm thinking I don't have a speeding ticket
or nothing, and he's gonna bust my chops because my
vehicle smells like marijuana. So oz Bratt, I go, oh, well,
I love my twenty two year old daughter borrow it sometimes,
you know, And he's like, I'm gonna have to do
a seven twenty nine search of your vehicle. So I
knew he was gonna toss my truck through everything, over
the snow banking in the woods. So I just reached
in the console because he was right. I smoked the
first time when I was twelve. It was the stinkiest
grass that I ever had in my life. Yeah, it was
emanating from my vehicle, the aroma. So I just hand
him the bag weed and then he goes, oh, what
am I supposed to do with us? Now, I'm gonna
have to fill up paperwork and do a report and everything.
And I said, well, I guess you should have thought
of that or you busted my jaws. So I was embarrassed,
right bottom line, I always thought it should be legalized. Yes,
Indians smoked it in their peace pipes before we started
making alcohol. So I'm in a state where you could
have a medical card not get in trouble for it.
I were getting in trouble for it, So I was embarrassed.
They didn't have my medical card. Now, if I knew
then at the time, and this is for anybody who
doesn't live in Maine or whatever. If you have a
medical marijuana card, you're protected by the hippolaws. So if
a law enforcement officer asks you do you have your
medical marijuana card and you say yes, that's the end
of the conversation. Do you not have to show or
produce that medical marijuana card because it's against hippolize and
violates your hippowrite if they demand to see it. So,
but you should never lie, to lie to a law
enforcement officer. So but anyway, so that's I decided to
have the festival because there's so many other people like
me who don't break the law except they smoke weed
or eat it or drink it or whatever. Right, because
it's used medically, you know, in a lot of ways too.
And so that's why we did that first festival.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, or about.
Speaker 4: A lot of things. So it's also home of Cannabis
Charlie Silo is also home of Cannabis Church of New England.
Speaker 1: Okay, what that's come up on the show before too,
but refresh my memory. What is that Cannabis Church of
New England.
Speaker 4: The church doors are open every Saturday seven o'clock.
Speaker 3: No matter what, we celebrate and you can weed, you
can celebrate music. It's all about the musicians. The state
is built. We built the venue for the musicians mostly. Yeah,
we have we have so much power on the floor
and the kick on drum riser. Yeah, we can plug
amps and foot pedals and everything. We don't have to
worry about running chords. Stage is on its own one
hundred amp service so that it's isolated. Nothing on a
stage is unshielded or ungrounded. Yea. All our amps have
a sister ramp under them, so if we have a
problem during the show, Lloyd's slides under, switches to the
new amp.
Speaker 2: We're good to go.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 3: It's all designed for the musicians to get the best
experience they can get.
Speaker 2: On a stage.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I love seeing the new kids come. Yeah, first timers
when they come off of that stage, they're just high
on on the feeling of it, right. And we get
a lot of bands while that's say, well, we've never
played this song out before, so we're going to try
it here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I hear a lot of first first It's
very cool.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's probably one of my favorite. Really, you know,
we're gonna try it.
Speaker 2: Hell it you guys want to know the song? Sure? Absolutely? Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5: They never asked the sound guy if they got time
for one more because I'm like all night.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, we don't.
Speaker 5: Walk to the band coming up after you. They might
want to go home tonight, right.
Speaker 3: We don't have to shut down at one o'clock. We're
not beholding Tenny loss. We don't serve food, we don't.
Speaker 2: Our Saturday night. Yeah yeah, okay, we're all yeah, I
don't want to go out.
Speaker 1: We have a.
Speaker 4: Few neighbors who don't appreciate out of state license plates
parked on the one side of the road safely.
Speaker 1: Oh really, such things.
Speaker 4: And so it came up in a meeting, I believe
it was last summer. Every once in a while, group
of you know, four or five of them will get
together and go to the Selectmens meeting and really and
raise their complaints. And I try to be concerned, and
you know, I mean I do because they might actually
have a legitimate thing, you know what I mean. So yeah,
so I try to blow them off, you know, the
first couple of times, and then when they get all
really hot and bothered that I'll go to the selectmans
meeting and we'll discuss it.
Speaker 1: And but what are they what are they complaining? You said,
out of state? We should clarify to where where where
is Charlie So exactly Lebanon, Maine, Lebanon, Maine.
Speaker 4: More Center Road, Lebanon, Maine, not Lebanon, New Hampshire right there.
Speaker 1: Holy crap, so so so in Lebanon, Maine. So you've
got neighbors effectively who they don't like out of state plates.
They get what they.
Speaker 3: They counted one hundred and sixty cars parked along the
side of the road. Yeah, for the New England death
metal bonanza.
Speaker 2: Yeahs. And they were all.
Speaker 4: Island and Texas and Pennsylvania, New York and New Jersey.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I refused to disclose the exact number of people that
may have came to visit us that weekend.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's okay that the voters approved to have a
ridiculous amount of uh recreational marijuana retail businesses up down
the road, you know. But we're not going to discuss
the ridiculousness of the known as the lawless town of Lebanon,
because approximately twenty years ago. You can't make this up onney, Okay,
I'm just saying they accidentally voted out their local police departments.
Speaker 2: Wording is everything, especially Yeah, and.
Speaker 4: They still twenty years zalor they still can't get like
if they put up a new ordinance or something for
the for them to vote for the town to vote on. Yeah,
they still can't get the wording right. Real like they
actually legalized oh gosh, this a whole other thing. But
they put the fourth to the voters whether or not.
Because if you get approve to get approved by the
state of meane to have a recknot medical, we're talking
the recreational thing now, So you have to have town approval,
and if you don't have town approval, the state won't
give you state approval. So in the town of Lebanon,
which is one of the reasons I bought the property
in Lebanon twenty plus years ago, is there's no zoning.
So you can use your acreage which residentially, agriculturally, commercially,
or a combination of the three. We have no comprehensive plan.
We have no zoning because we have no comprehensive plan,
we don't have a town charter. Okay, so it's ridiculous.
So they want to make up new rules about no
campingness and no freaking parking on the side of the
road and no loud music ever anytime, and you know whatever.
But but they have no zoning, so they can't even
make up these rooks like oh, well, do you vote
to let the recreational pot stores be on only two
o two and not you know, off of two oh two,
And it's like, you can't do that because we have
no zoning. They did it anyway, like they voted on it, yes,
we'll let it happen, and then they didn't write it
correctly so they couldn't enforce it, so they had to
vote on it again. And then the people voted no
because it was just a three ring circus, you know,
it was ridiculousness. They figured that out. So they vote no.
So then they have the third vote, they vote no again,
and then this particular select man okay, who love me?
You know you love me, Chuck okay, and you hate
to love me and you love to hate me. Okay,
So anyway with this.
Speaker 1: Passion one way or another.
Speaker 2: So he's like, oh, well, going to authorize.
Speaker 4: It anyway, and he's like, okay, so we authorises all
the recreational stores on the side of two O two,
so they're there, you know, and of course anybody in
the town of Elebanon can have it because we have
no zoning. Yeah, and it's just ridiculous. Yeah, it's insane.
So that's all cool, all right, But having one hundred
and sixty cars parked safely on only one side of
the road and not near intersections and not blocking driveways,
and every time they call the police, you know, like
a little boy that cried wolf, they waste the sheriff's
time when he should be out. You know, he's got
to drive all the way out to Lebanon, to the
very edge of York County. It's got to cover all
of York County to come out and say, oh yeah,
once again, the cars are all part safely on the
side of the road and there's no problems. Yeah, you
know what I mean from their perspective, I've been doing
this over ten years and we've had no problems. Yeah,
you know what I mean, what if we heard out
of their mouth, geez, we wish all the other venues
and mud runs and whatever else goes on in you
York County, you know, had it together enough because you
guys give us no trouble. You take care of yourself
and we have no problem except for the Cairns of
the neighborhood.
Speaker 1: So why does it why does the sheriff have to
come to that? Is that because there's still no there's
no police, no local police. That's incredible.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they had a lot of tiny town police department
and the budget was X amount of dollars and the
police department requested in considerable increase in the budget. Yeah,
so they put it on the next year's vote. You know,
do we approve this higher, way higher budget than the
one last year? And they didn't say or resort to
last year's budget. They like left that part out of it.
True story, man, So then you voted all the people
that like campaigned against the new budget. They don't need
no more money, we don't need no more cruises, you know.
And uh. And then they voted on it. It's like,
don't we voted budget no, no, and no. And then
they're like, what they didn't mean to vote out their
police department. They didn't, Okay, but they did. And then
and then once once after that, it was like so
much of your tax money goes to the state police
and goes to the sheriff's apartment. So from a taxpayer's perspective,
I already have to pay for two policing agencies. Why
do I want to pay for a third one? You
know when all they do is go around and pick
on the local and question you all, that's the whole
other thing. So it puts a bigger straight on the
state Police and the sheriff's department. It's not fair, and
it's spent a three ring circus because you know, like
at one point in time, it was the Sheriff's department
this month and then the State Police the next month,
so their alternated, like rival football team, community commit this
crime every other month. You know, it was insane. You
get all this nonsense going on on the thirtieth and
the thirty first of the month, and then the next
patience he takes over and they have no idea what
the other agency was dealing with two days years ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's incredible.
Speaker 4: You want to know, Okay, So I'm sorry response to Arlie,
this is very interesting.
Speaker 5: I haven't learned that people who don't want to be
told what to do can't tell people what to do
right right.
Speaker 2: See, if you if you.
Speaker 5: Set up a town so that nobody can tell me
what to do with my property and nobody can interfere
with my stuff. Well, when you don't like what your
neighbor's doing, guess what You've got no laws.
Speaker 2: All you got is what the state guidelines are.
Speaker 5: When the state says it's legal to park the cars
on one side of the road, well guess what, I
don't care if they drove here from Taiwan.
Speaker 4: Okay, appropriate, All right, I'm sorry, but I'm gonna quote
Chuck Russell, Chairman Chuck Russell of the Select Oh yeah,
because this is what he said recently this summer. The
problem is she knows the rules.
Speaker 2: That's a fact.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we did use it. We did use it to
our advantage. At the New England Death Metals Show this year,
we had mortician came out of retirement to play kidding
and we knew it would take him. The neighbors would
start complaining exactly at one o'clock, so we noticed and
take the sheriff half hour at least to get there.
So we let mortician run and then when the sheriff
did come, we turned down front of house and ran
it off, just the monitors out. Yeah, everybody got a
good dose of death metal nice right before bed.
Speaker 2: Nice.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I understand this. In twenty fourteen, before I
did this very edgy, controversial celebrating legalization of medicinal marijuana thing. Yes,
I did my homework first. I don't like to do homework.
I don't like to study, but I can if I
want to.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So I researched every statute, every law, every rule that
anybody could possibly apply my three day camping weekend event.
Speaker 1: Smart.
Speaker 4: So when they came at me, I was like, well, actually, officer,
the statute says blah blah blah blah blah, and they
don't know what to say because they don't know what
it says. Yeah, so I know the rules, and and
that is the thing is when they try to like
throw something at me, I'm like, well, the rule is this,
and I will go right to the edge of the
rule and stay on the legal side of it. But
I was standing there with my tippytoes and going and
here I am on the edge of the rolls. And
because this is the United States of America, it's a
free country and freedom of speech. And so back to
the meeting. I was telling you about one of the
ladies down the road. He goes, well, I see the
burner in their building out there. This is there some
sort of kind of church, says Cannabis Church of New England.
And are they actually church? Do they pay taxes? And
so that was it. So when we named it Cannabis
Church in New England, many many, many many years ago,
I looked into registering the church with the state of Maine.
You pay five dollars to reserve the name, and then
you get yourself a nonprofit EI N number, right, so
you give meet a nonprofit. Well, my experience, what I've
learned about nonprofits is kind of hide a lot of
money behind nonprofits. So I didn't want everybody going, oh,
it was making all kinds of money over there. That's
why she saw. I was like, no, mall set pay
the five dollars, register the name. That's the end of it.
So when I went to the meeting again at the
end of the summer, I thank the lady and I said,
thank you for reminding me about the church thing. I
now have a federal EI, I have an ei N number,
I'm a registered church. So now I'm not going to
pay property taxes and we're not going to pay sales
tax on anything we buy for the church and thank
you for that, you know what I mean. And so
she's like, oh you know, and yeah, peace and law,
Peace and law read them or religion.
Speaker 1: Fantastic.
Speaker 4: We don't hurt anybody. We have no accidents. Speaking of which,
one of the reasons that Mike's become the face of
Charlie So is because of his greeting magic.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, explain curious riway. Yeah, explain the driveway thing, please.
Speaker 3: Crass parking is an issue, and I like to meet
everybody in the driveway. I have a system to park
bands and and and people for the show. But I
always ask him if they've ever been at the hill before?
Speaker 4: Okay, as soon as they pull on the driveway theyre I.
Speaker 3: Always ask if they're first time is and I tell
them I have some simple rules. The simple rules are,
it's the cannabis church, eat drinks, Smoke all the weed
you want. I encourage it. If you drink, don't drive
out of here with a buzz, either the sheriff of
the deer or going to get you. But the one
thing I cannot and will not have is hard drugs. Yeah,
we can't have that. Kind of stuff going on. I
can't have people O d and into porta parties and right,
that's the end of that.
Speaker 2: I just and and.
Speaker 3: Believe it or not, A lot of people are relieved
when they hear that because they know they don't have
to worry now, right right. And the people who come
a lot, they keep an eye out as well. So yeah,
if there's not a lot that goes on that we
don't see, yeah, you know it. It's we police ourselves.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I get a lot of people with a
lot of eyes that watch.
Speaker 3: Yeah. We got regulars that come all the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, yeah, you must have a lot
of regulars.
Speaker 5: Well it's a church, so yeah. Yeah, we have a
group of locals that come all the time. Yeah, almost
every Saturday night. Yeah, walk of tables. Yeah, they watch
out for us.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah that's good.
Speaker 2: Well that's their place to go to see music.
Speaker 1: Right right, Yeah, so that makes sense.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's kind of our We call it the band cave,
but it's basically a big giant man cave.
Speaker 3: Yeah that's great, Yeah, it's great. We have we have
the secret weapon. That's Lloyd on the soundboard. Yeah, he's
our secret weapon.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know about that. Yeah, we just we
just got a new donation.
Speaker 5: They called me a secret weapon. It's kind of funny.
I really never went to school for any of this crap. Yeah,
I just started building stereos.
Speaker 4: When you took your first speaker apart, Lloyd, uh.
Speaker 2: Probably seven? Wow.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I've been I've always been building cabinets and speakers,
and you know on that end of it, the engineering
end of the building stuff, you know. And uh, I
had a lot of friends in bands and they can
never seem to get the sound right. Yeah. And you know,
again a lot of it's just hands on by a
compressor because what it does.
Speaker 2: You read the book, you wire it in and you
use it. You know.
Speaker 5: I need to go to school to take the tips
from the book right right and apply them.
Speaker 2: Yeah you know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, at seven years old, I had a twenty band
equalizer and a component system.
Speaker 2: Wow no kttle. Oh yeah.
Speaker 5: My parents weren't scared for me to be playing with
you know. Yeah, yeah, I mean electronics. Yeah, you know yeah.
Radio shack, Yeah.
Speaker 2: Radio shack. That was my favorite story.
Speaker 4: It was sound. Build a barricade behind the control booth
and you want to talk to nobody. He don't want
to see nobody really, Yeah, he just wanted to do
the sound. Yeah, it wasn't there a socialized to make
crowd guy very serious about the sound thing. So I
have him here on your show. Yeah, yeah, come a
long way.
Speaker 1: Oh, I'm glad.
Speaker 4: I've actually found out people aren't so bad.
Speaker 1: That's good. That's good. Well, I'm very glad. I'm very glad.
What's the what's the what's the most challenging show that
you've that you've done there, maybe in terms of logistics
or running sound or like.
Speaker 4: I don't I think that that's an unfair question, Matt.
I feel that you've assaulted me with a trick question
because you can't judge one person's show by anothers you
know what I'm saying, because they're all they're all great shows.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'd say forty three bands in three days?
Speaker 4: Was that?
Speaker 1: Was that? The death metal Festival?
Speaker 2: It was? Yeah? One band dropped out.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and they were from all around the country, around
the world.
Speaker 4: That's that's the one. The neighbors get there, undise the
biggest twisted about Yeah, the New England death Metal fun
Time Bonanza.
Speaker 2: They start rolling.
Speaker 1: I love I love the name, by the way, the
New Time Bonanza.
Speaker 4: Just a young guy out of the New York City
area and they all went to you know, they all
went to school. He's incredible, absolutely incredible young man. A
band by the name of Bonginator, and Bonginator showed up
with somebody else. They did a show, then they put
on another show. They put on a couple of shows,
and he did this. He didn't call it that, I
don't think in the beginning, but he did this annual
thing a couple of times somewhere else, and then there
was a last minute glitch with the location and their
local Karen's, and he kind of hit me up and
he's like, hey, Tyry, I got this three day weekend
thing and like we got bounced out of whatever supposed
to do it. What do you think? And I'm like,
all right, bring it, you know what. So, because we're
there for the bands, and you know, we've there's been
a couple of times that weekend events were last minute canceled,
and it was a shame somebody didn't hit us up
because we weren't doing anything that weekend and we would
have happily shared our dirt.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: But yeah, so he's made it bigger and better every year.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 4: And you know it's nothing we like to admit to.
But there was probably like three thousand people there this week,
just this year.
Speaker 2: Wow. Yeah, we can't. We think about the.
Speaker 4: Accounted accounted what was it? One hundred and one hundred
and something tents in the backside and sixty tents on
the front side.
Speaker 3: Just mentioned the vendors tent. I was straight up that
was just oh wow. And not not counting car campers yet.
Speaker 4: He had a guy from Australia to bob log. Yeah, oh,
blob blog was something else. Let me tell you it
was great. He said he'd come from Australia again to
play there. Wow on the outside stage.
Speaker 1: So that must have been the most challenging, right, I mean,
that's a lot to handle that.
Speaker 2: That's the funny thing, you know.
Speaker 5: I used to I started with Terry and I took
off and did a little bit of traveling.
Speaker 2: Yeah, a little bit.
Speaker 4: Wanted to go to the travel and they wanted.
Speaker 2: Me because I have I run the Wall of sown.
Speaker 5: So yeah, you ain't gonna find one of those anywhere anymore, right,
I got one, except oh my guys don't want to
move it anymore.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: But what I'll say is, out of all the festivals
that I've done, the people that came to the Death
Metal Festival were the most polite, the most controlled, I believe,
and the cleanest people I've ever had. I'm serious grateful
dead Festival.
Speaker 2: Ground.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and that PENT agree with on the most respectable
group of people. When you have the biggest head count
at an event and everybody's respectful and we actually have
a lost and found instead of ground scores, you know,
it's kind of an unspoken ruler too little ground score. No,
there's no such ground score. It's called lost and found.
Speaker 5: Yeah, look that I found. Yeah, why don't you put
it the Yeah.
Speaker 4: We lot people leave like five thousand dollars set of cymbals. Okay,
I'll packaged up and then they'll call me. You know,
they'll hit us up five six days later they're like, oh,
I'm jistry. Yeah, your stuff is still right here. And
that's one of the I think that's one of the
reasons Charlie still gets to love is because, yeah, if
you leave it there, it'll still be there.
Speaker 1: Right, That's really cool.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Rarely do we have stuff disappear. Yeah, honestly, God,
do you know what disappears? What super little two dollars trinkets?
And my dogs get fresh dog blankets and I get
them from the Salvation Army. Okay, so I'll go in
and they'll be these beautiful afgans that somebody hand knit
it or crocheted, and they're like three bucks four bucks.
So I buy them and I bring them out to
the venue and throw them on the couches in the chairs,
you know, and the respliners. That's what disappears, man, is
my Afian. Somebody comes in and goes that look just
like old Aunt. I'm as Daffian, doesn't it or dreeamas
own so? And so they take it home and that.
Speaker 1: You know, you.
Speaker 4: Still be there, go figure out.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Lately we've been, uh, we've been getting people that
bring things in and hide them amongst the other stuff, okay,
just to see if it will be there the next
time they come back. Yeah, I've been noticed, and I
find little little things that I didn't know we're here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because even though it's full of.
Speaker 3: Stuff, you know, you're there all the time. You know
what's what and what belongs where. Yeah, and we're reaching
the point where our ceilings probably won't hold very many
more shirts.
Speaker 4: Oh no, gidding, selection a T shirts hanging from the
ceiling from all the bands there.
Speaker 1: That's cool. That's something I've never seen too that.
Speaker 2: That's I meant to do it, like the Boston Garden,
you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's such a great concept. I've never seen that
T shirts hanging in a venue like that. That's a
great idea.
Speaker 4: It's somebody asked, why why you get all the tapestries
Charlie Hill Museum and Events venue, So people like, why
is this a museum that's kind of weird? And as
soon as they walk in the door and they see
like all the stuff, they're like, oh, yeah, damn.
Speaker 1: That's a great idea. That's a really great idea. Yeah.
Speaker 4: But when you have a building that's fifty one and
twenty five feet and it's all moisture, mildew, fire commercial
fireboard and everything, yeah, I'm sorry. Now, Lloyd don't take
his soult to this because he's a painter. He paints.
He doesn't like money taping. He's a professional, very professional
painter to okay on a ceiling that's not perfect like
it sound. He's a perfectionist. Yeah, So I'm looking at
the ceiling, it's like yuck, you know what I mean
seriously because it was a garage. The other end of
the building is a garage. My automotive business was there. Oh okay,
So I mean put all the rock up all the
way down, so it's far from perfect. Yeah yeah, So
how do you take care of all those? You know,
no matter what you do is all is going to
be imperfect. So that's where I started putting up the
tapestries and all the stuff on the ceiling is to
hide the imperfections with other imperfections. And then the t
shirts and it baffles you know, it kind of keeps
the down and.
Speaker 5: Yeah, keeps my face cancelation down. Yeah, that in active crossover.
Speaker 1: So tonight I was going to ask you, what do
you have? What do you have tonight?
Speaker 4: We got we have Every show is great, no show
is better, worse than any show.
Speaker 2: We got some local Boys.
Speaker 1: We got the.
Speaker 4: Local boys at excellent. So we got Down Boys. Down
Boys is one of the newest up and coming bands. Okay,
very very good bunch of people.
Speaker 1: They were here last week. Love them for the show.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and then and then we got uh day to attend,
so we got Data attend and Down Boys tonight and
day to attend, we had the pleasure of going to
the Aura in Portland. They opened for Ace Fraley remember
that show. Yeah, yeah, and so we got to go in,
you know, on the coat tails of Jeff and Data
ten yeah and enjoy the Ace Freely show and check
out the Aura. So that was a great experience. Made
friends with their security crew up there. Yeah, Taylor's security,
I believe it was.
Speaker 1: Yeah, excellent, excellent. So that's so that's tonight. So day
to attending Down Boys, anybody else just the two or two,
just the two, excellent two.
Speaker 2: It's going to be a nice night. I think there's
a surprise.
Speaker 4: Sometimes we just have two bands. It's kind of nice, yeah,
because a lot of them have quite a repert for
our songs. Oh yeah, but when you do one set,
they never get the chance to play all the songs, right,
So when you only have two bands, they'll do like
a set and then they'll take a break and then
they'll go up and do all those other songs they
never have a chance to do, right yeah, yeah, and
then break down and then the other band will go up.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's very cool. That's very cool.
Speaker 3: We don't rush people on and off the stages, no
need to. Yeah, we're not beholding any curfews.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's excellente.
Speaker 3: Janet Mills did send her troopers down during COVID oh no, yeah,
we were doing a metal show. We had around one
hundred and fifty people. Yeah, and she sent a letter
from her desk. Oh and that we were breaking COVID restrictions.
Oh okay, we should see some desists, right, and we didn't.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we just went on with it, right right.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that was That was one of those nights where
we felt really bad for the state police because they
never never come yeah in the wintertime, you know. Yeah,
and they're like said, Terry, were really sorry, but we
came here first because we knew that you would be
the most understanding.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Gena Mills gave us a whole list of businesses that
we have to go pull licenses from. We all know
that you don't care about your temporary events, campground camping
license in February, right, But yeah, they had to go
pull a bunch of restaurants and bars and taverns because
they were still leaving their doors open when it was
ordered that it was sad. You know, I felt bad
for that whole situation. Oh yeah, yeah, but sometimes, as
Jeff Day with tend, you get a fight, you're right
to a party.
Speaker 2: The Beastie Boys were prophets.
Speaker 1: Well we are so before we run out of time?
So where should people go online to keep up with
everything that's happening at Charlie Sell because you got I mean,
do you ever is there ever a Saturday that you
don't have a show? Do you ever take a Saturday off?
Or is there a show?
Speaker 2: Rare? Is it fifty damn rare?
Speaker 1: Really?
Speaker 4: Doors are open every Saturday at seven o'clock, no matter what. Okay,
once in a while we give Lloyd to Saturday off
and show up and it's acoustic only. Oh okay, yeah
he's a alkoholic. Yeah yeah, So first Saturday of the
month is always open GM night. Okay, how do you
get a chance to play at Charlie Cell? Show up
at open GM? Everybody gets their own twenty minutes. So
you got three guys in a band? All right?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 4: Got three guys in a band? Each person?
Speaker 1: The Hey, that's not the sheriff Colin is it?
Speaker 4: It could bes been on your show too. Oh yeah, yeah,
Alys Valen yea, yeah, yeah, he's calling.
Speaker 1: Out to a bunch of times. Yeah, ignore you're talking now,
he's probably listening.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I love you, buddy.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So three person band shows up, Each gets their twenty minutes,
they share their twenty minutes with each other, and they
just got themselves the forty five minutes set.
Speaker 1: Okay on the stage.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you have to play there to schedule a show there,
prove that your lyrics aren't, you know, vulgar and yep, inappropriate,
and and then that's how you can put together a show,
because the bands put the shows together.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh that's fantastic.
Speaker 2: Charlie's killed me. The event's venue.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I guess, I guess you want to say this.
We're not a business. We're not a bar, We're not
a restaurant. You gotta bring your own beverages. You're responsible
for your own alcohol consumption. We got couches and chairs.
You know, you can sleep in your car when the
weather's appropriate. We do, we do. We do take donations cash.
We also take Venmo PayPal. I just did recently. This
is the all only to stuff to me. Charlie made
me do the the Facebook or I wouldn't know a
thing about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, that's what I was gonna ask.
Speaker 4: Terry's, Terry's Church, t E R I s C H
U R C H Terry's Church and terryer my paypals
and all that.
Speaker 1: Stuff, and that's on that's on Facebook.
Speaker 4: That's the best Facebook. And you can two O seven
four three two five one six three. That's my personal
phone number. If you call, it will not answer the phone.
You have to send me a text message. Okay, okay,
thinking not on Facebook. Those are the digits, okay, but
Facebook is definitely the way to message to see.
Speaker 5: A band, and they want to see the schedule, they
probably want to go to what Charlie shi page.
Speaker 4: They got to go to the Charlie shillpage.
Speaker 1: It's all right, I answer that.
Speaker 4: On the Facebook.
Speaker 2: The Book of Face right right, Yes, you'll have to
use the Facebook if you come.
Speaker 4: Check out the show tonight.
Speaker 1: Well very good. Well we're running out of time, but
I want to thank all three of you for coming.
Of course, Mike, Terry, you for having us, absolutely having
thanks for having us. This has been wonderful because, like
I said, the venue comes up on the show more
than the name of any other venue. So it's wonderful
to and to learn all about Charlie Sill, the history
of it and everything.
Speaker 2: We're looking forward to having you and Gen down for
a show.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, count on it. Count on it.
Speaker 2: You'd love to have you guys down.
Speaker 4: All about the music, all about the bands, peace and love,
and I think, uh, real quick man, everybody's giving you
stuff Christmas. Yeah, okay, so I brought you Eastery for Christmas.
Speaker 1: Wow? All right, well, thank you very good. Here, I'm
gonna I'm gonna for people watching online. I'm gonna hold
it up there you go. Well, thank you very much.
Speaker 4: Never got for Christmas? Did you?
Speaker 1: No, can't say.
Speaker 4: I want to make sure I got you saw me
you didn't already.
Speaker 1: That's perfect, Thank you, I appreciate it. I appreciate it
very much. And we're gonna close out the segment with
a Day to Attend song. I think that's appropriate since
they're playing tonight, my personal favorite not coming back. And
for those of you listening live stick around in the
third hour. Tombstones in Their Eyes is going to be
joining us via Microsoft Teams. They're on the West Coast.
Really looking forward to them. But again, thank you all
three of you for coming. This has been absolutely wonderful.
Check out Charlie Hill and here it is. This is
not coming back by day to attend