Dave Matthews Lets His Spirit Loose for Rothbury Set

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Dave Matthews' between-song banter devolved almost as quickly as the mental capacity of those campers experimenting with mind-altering substances in Rothbury's Sherwood Forest. At the onset of the nearly three-hour performance he talked about the weather in mundane terms ("What a beautiful day"), but less than 30 minutes later he was riffing about laying in a hammock and trying to "touch the moon with [his] tongue." Surprisingly, as his stage presence grew more unhinged, the group's musical explorations tightened. A galloping "Tripping Billies" mixed mirth ("Eat, drink and be merry...") and morbidity ("...for tomorrow we die."); "So Damn Lucky" built to a dizzying, horn-fueled climax; a true-to-its-source take on Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" proved a smart selection, as violinist Boyd Tinsley sawed at his instrument as if he was trying to start a fire.

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Song Stories

“He Will Break Your Heart”

Jerry Butler | 1960

A lightly swinging Latin-influenced, almost cha-cha groove and close harmonies decorated Jerry Butler's early soul hit "He Will Break Your Heart," delivering a stately warning that his rival would never love his girl like he did. The melody came to Butler as he was driving on the highway from Atlantic City, New Jersey, to Philadelphia with Curtis Mayfield, and as Butler told Rolling Stone, "I just sang the melody and Curtis put the chords to it." The song's premise, Butler added, "was something that I'd lived ...The lyric was an experience rather than a revelation. Whereas music is usually a revelation."

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