05/23/09 Star ’69 (Dead tribute) & others @ private party, Queens, NY

Baller BBQ V: One More Saturday Night featured local Dead tribute band Star '69 and a bunch of my friends jamming in the backyard. Good times as always.

09/07/08 Stumblebum Brass Band @ private party, Queens, NY

I stumbled on the Stumblebum Brass Band in a subway station and I eventually got around to checking them out when they came to Maguire's Pub conveniently located within walking distance of my job. That night we ended up barhopping with the trio. Sometime before or after or next barhopping adventure at The Magician (after a thwarted loft party), I finally got the Stumblebums (or the brass two thirds anyways) to come rage a Baller BBQ. This was the 4th edition, subtitled Hello Goodbye, hello to my new roommate and goodbye to my friend who was about to move to Israel.

06/21/08 Consider the Source/Sampson & The Folkadelics/Lachi @ private party, Queens, NY

I had been throwing progressively larger parties in my backyard for a couple years at this point. My buddy dubbed one Baller BBQ and the moniker stuck.

We had also had live music before but only loose jam sessions; this time we stepped up our game with 3 bands and a PA system.

We've had several since, each one better than the last, but this one took us to the next level and it will always be recalled as such.

To start with, in a move that flabbergasts me to this day, I managed to book the local virtuoso Middle Eastern jam metal trio Consider the Source to headline, proof eternal that MySpace was once good for something.

The party started off as usual - the regular stalwarts arriving first and tens of stragglers filtering in at a steady clip towards sundown. The bands all brought the heat, peaking with Consider the Source jamming an ambient metal improvisation while my friend spun fire betwixt the impressed guests.

Until that evening, I had oft wondered exactly how raucous a celebration I needed to concoct in order to arouse the ire of the neighbors to alert the authorities. I no longer have that query.

My friend was playing drums with a legally blind Nigerian pop singer at the time and she addressed the police from the microphone inquiring of a Semitic inclination to their noise concerns - "Did you say we have to turn it down because this is a Jewish neighborhood?" - misinterpreting "residential".

Volume reduced, drunken escapades persisted well into the summer night, a tradition set in stone.