The Crossroads Guitar Festival is like a guitar jam convention of the rawest kind, operating on specified fandom comparable to Comic-Con. The fest would also be much easier to dress up for: 5 o'clock shadow, casual short sleeves, cringe-y solo face. Founded by Eric Clapton, a legendary guitar tickler himself, the Crossroads Guitar Fest started in 2004, with subsequent festivals in 2007 and 2010, featuring enduring gods of blues and blues-rock from the past century. The concert was created to benefit the Crossroads Centre for drug rehabilitation in Antigua, which Clapton also founded. I would've drawn attention to the irony of supporting rehab with guitars, but there's no smashing on these stages.
The latest Crossroads fest, aka "Ten-Minute Version of Every Song Fest" aka "Dad Fest," took place on June 26, 2010 in Chicago with a formidable lineup of seasoned guitar riff-raffs, including Buddy Guy, B.B. King, John Mayer, Robert Cray, Steve Winwood, ZZ Top, Vince Gill, Jeff Beck and of course Clapton himself. Four of the festival's eleven hours can be seen on the 2-disc Crossroads Guitar Fest 2010 DVD, which includes Clapton's "I Shot the Sheriff" performance and his collaboration with Winwood on the Traffic hit, "Dear Mr. Fantasy." The DVD comes out on November 9th.
Although this year's concert was supposed to be Crossroads' last, Clapton told the audience there just might have to be another one. In the event of Crossroads 2013, get those lighters out and fireproof that thumb. With guitar heroes like these, a lighter salute iPhone app just won't do… unless of course you're sitting indoors watching the DVD.