Over at Collectors Weekly, BB pal Ben Marks interviews Widespread Panic bassist Dave Schools, but not about his music. Turns out, Schools is an avid collector of Hot Wheels, Wacky Packs, and vinyl records.
In Richmond, Virginia, where I grew up, we had the world's largest nighttime parade. It was part of the National Tobacco Festival. It's odd in the year 2014 to think about a festival that celebrates cigarettes, but that was Richmond's economy at the time. My mom wrangled the parade's Grand Marshall, who was usually Peter Graves or one of the other cast members from "Mission Impossible," someone like that, so she got to attend the drag race at the Richmond Dragway.
I got to go, too — for a little kid, it was a profound and visceral experience. There was one dragster called the Earthquake that literally shook the ground. They'd pour ammonia on the track, they'd spin their wheels, and it would generate a huge cloud of smoke. And then, bam, off they'd go down the quarter-mile track before popping the parachute. It was like, wow! So I don't think I had a choice about Hot Wheels. I was corrupted very young.
"Good, Clean Fun: This Rock Star Parties Hard (with Hot Wheels and Wacky Packs)"
