I was so stoked yesterday that I got a postcard from all the members of Cracker from their recent Cracker - Camper Van Beethoven Campout in Pioneertown, CA. I couldn't make it this year - well, I could've broken the bank to do it but there are many demands on that money! I went last year, one of about 3 people who flew transatlantic to see the inaugural event. It was amazing, to see live Cracker, Camper Van Beethoven, Monks Of Doom, Victor Krummenacher, Greg Lisher, Johnny Hickman and Chris LeRoy, (I was sadly in jetlag sleep during Jonathan Segel's set), LP, Roger Clyne..., and to meet up with the band, their families, friends and fans. It's such a friendly collective. Cracker and Camper are David Lowery's two bands. They've been amongst my favourite bands for 15 years. They've led me to many other great bands and artists through musical connections, e.g. Monks Of Doom, Sparklehorse, FSK, Goldfrapp, Clyde Wrenn, Susanna Hoffs, The Hickmen, Spot 1019, Box O' Laffs... In about 1996 I joined a Cracker mailing list and started talking to other weirdos like myself who like thse semi-obscure bands. A bit later I started tinkering with web design purely in order to publish a discography I was putting together of music related to CVB and Cracker, as the existing online ones frustrated me with their incompleteness. That initial site evolved into CrackerWEB, which, once CVB reformed, evolved into The Van (http://www.the-van.com). It's probably had 250000 hits since its creation. It's because of this site that I've got to know the band, and many great people who are fans. And it led me to become a web designer for a living too!I was already a music obsessive before all that, trawling record shops since I was 16, with an earlier stint when I was 10, when ska/punk went mainstream and I loved The Jam, Madness, Bad Manners, Blondie, Gary Numan etc. I still listen to that stuff now, though some of my mid-teen obsessions remain mainly on the shelf nowadays: Dire Straits, Bruce Hornsby, Huey Lewis, Chris Rea, Queen, It Bites, Rush, Genesis, Fleetwood Mac... I guess we all have dodgy phases, and the alternative at that time was basically Stock, Aitken & Waterman, so can you forgive me?!