Get Ready for a Cosmic Party
Iconic Girdwood Band Returns for Summer Shows
The Cosmic Party kicked off Friday night in Eagle River. Pictured, left to right, are Peter Townsend, Steve Norwood, Tony Restivo, Romero Begay, and, on drums, Benjamin Trocki. Not pictured is songwriter, drummer and lead vocalist Ben "Jammin" Robinson. Read the first of our series on this series of concerts below. (Photo courtesy Soren Wuerth)
Iconic Girdwood Band Returns for Summer Shows
By Soren Wuerth
TNews Editor
I had to look no further for old friends from the Photon community than the car right in front of me on the way to the venue.
They passed the brewery. I passed the brewery. They turned. I turned.
An hour later we were all sweating with other long-lost friends on the dance floor to a "Space Tornado" of a song.
The Cosmic Party (formerly known as The Photonz) are back for local gigs with jam music of such mystical effect, it moves one, almost helplessly, to boogie.
Returning after three years, the iconic Girdwood band is playing four shows of original music that lead singer and songwriter Ben Robinson describes as "psychedelic funk" (writer Jay Stange labelled the sound, in 1998, as "jangly folk rock").
It was the Creekbend concert venue in Hope that called them back this time.
"Steve Thomas reached out to us and gave us a solid guarantee so we could make this happen," Robinson said in an email. "He believed in us and he believed in the crowd that loves and supports us."
The band got its start in Girdwood in 1996 as The Photon Band. Rehearsing original and a wide range of cover songs from bluegrass to disco, the group played live in bars, restaurants and outdoor stages—locations with historic significance for long-time locals, such as Max's, a long-shuttered bar and restaurant on lower Crow Creek Road.
That the songs—about 40 of them—have endured for 30 years (many in the audience sing complete lyrics), is testimony to the band's resounding impact.
On Friday the band played in a darkened, cavernous brewery to an audience of about 125. (The following day they were set to perform at the Hilltop in Anchorage.)
Wearing Hawaiian shirts, the six-member band of Robinson, Peter Townsend, Tony Restivo, Steve Norwood, Romero Begay, and Benjamin Trocki, began their summer set at Odd Man Rush Brewing with a classic original, "Lilly of the Valley". The ballad, about wandering, nature, freedom and loss, spins into something more, well, jangly.
Before long, the songs became even more funky and groovy, the crowd moving, nodding, swaying or boogieing down.
...And that's what we're all supposed to do in the summer, with old friends at the Cosmic Party, "Boogie 'til the break of dawn."
The Cosmic Party plays at the Creekbend in Hope Friday and Saturday, July 24-25, and at the Raw Market in Girdwood on Monday, July 27.
This story has been updated from an earlier version.
