Xavier Rudd: an Australian jammer with the power to evoke a spiritual experience.

This was a game of psilocybin roulette: I wasn’t sure how much of the magic mushroom chocolate bar to take. The friend who gave it to me never specified how much power, or lack of power, it contained. “Use at your own risk,” she warned. “Let me know how it is. You can be my guinea pig.” The only thing certain was that I wanted to be a little shifted when I saw Xavier Rudd live at Humphreys on a recent Friday night, but not shit-my-pants tripping. I didn’t need booze, or even weed. I just wanted an old-fashioned mushroom trip, so that I could best connect with the one-man band’s didgeridoo croonings, nature’s sounds, and the nearby boat-filled waters of Shelter Island.

A little outside the Shelter Cove Marina, I broke apart three squares from the chocolate bar and chewed ‘em up. Would that be enough? If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be able to come back out for more. There was a no re-entry rule that inhibited me from any extra servings. Walking towards the venue, I began to worry that I hadn’t eaten enough, but trudged forth anyway. I guess I don’t need to be fucked up to enjoy Xavier Rudd. The Australian jammer has the power to evoke a spiritual experience with his music alone. Still, I thought mushrooms would most certainly help the cause.

An hour later, as I stood near the front, and watched Rudd’s opening act Bobby Alu strum a beachy-sounding ukulele, I still felt nothing from the mushroom bar. Well, I guess it wasn’t meant to be. The bar was a dud. Oh well. Pizza sounds good. Let’s do that. At the concession stand, I ordered an $8 slice of pizza and a pineapple juice. “Did you know pineapple juice has bromelain in it?” asked an older male attendant. “It’s good for arthritis, but not as good as Oxycontin!” I took my juice and pizza and walked on. “What a wildcat,” I murmured to myself. That’s when the phrase “what a wildcat” began to echo in my brain. What a wildcat. What a wildcat. What a wildcat. Things were happening. The pizza grease must have activated the mushrooms. The grip was quickly getting tighter. It was only a matter of time before I would either be having the time of my life or hiding in fear and crying in the bushes.

Passing through hippies, dudes in Patagonia jackets, and dreamcatcher ladies, I found my spot in the crowd. Like a fool, I posted myself near a walkway as people came and went, bumping my shoulders as they passed by. I didn’t know any better at that point. Stay cool. Don’t throw up. Don’t shit in the trashcan. Nobody needs jail. Not tonight. Xavier Rudd is about to come melt your face off.

As Rudd took the stage, a voice from the side asked, “Have you been to this place before?” It seemed I’d manifested some sort of angel in white to babysit me.

“Are you talking me to me? Yeah, a few times. They have the San Diego Music Awards here.”

I felt nauseous. I was going to yack all over this poor woman, who said she had just moved here from Nashville. Welcome to San Diego! “I’m sorry if I’m a little weird right now,” I said. “I’m tripping pretty hard.” When she found that out, the Nashville gal must have mistaken me for good company. Not that I was bad company, but I wasn’t exactly present. She let her hair down and started moving to Rudd’s repetitive drum thumps. She stayed by my side for the rest of the night. I was too connected to the music to watch what was going on around me, but I could, without a doubt, feel it.

Following Rudd’s encore, the Nashville angel and I found her friend sitting on a chair near the back. I was on the comedown, but still wanted to explore my surroundings a bit. After we left Humphreys, the three of us walked on the grass near the water. I eventually parted ways with them and continued my barefoot exploration on the bay rocks. There was nowhere I needed to be. I allowed the child within me to play under the moonlit sky, there across the waters from a lit-up Downtown. My brain was still in flames.

Later, my friend who’d given me the mushroom bar asked how everything went. “I’m not even sure if tonight really happened,” I said.