Fly the Freak Flag at Half Mast:
The Pain of Losing Two of Our Best

Most of us have our family, and then we have our “family”. That extended group of people with whom we’ve forged strong bonds through work, passion projects, hobbies, or (in our case) touring extensively to follow great live music. When you get out of town and stop worrying about your job or the dishes in the sink, you can really focus on the moment you’re in and the people you’re with. The struggles and the victories on the road bring you closer together and then the concert itself ties to you a thing bigger than yourself. Some of us have experienced times where we're on the outs with our “real” family and we lean into our tour family even more. Not only do they lift us up and strengthen our love for live music, but they also hold us to task. Like a real family. Our tour family has called out our faults in just the way relatives would. And we wouldn’t have it any other way.

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Two of the most colorful and well-known names among the folks who follow Widespread Panic are Chris Covington and Chris Wren. In an unbelievably cruel twist of fate, we lost both of these legends within a week of each other this month. Their light burned too brightly to be diminished so quickly, so let’s take a moment to talk about them, shall we?

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Chris Covington had a role as a father figure on tour and many even referred to him as “Paw”. His huge smile and charming nature made him a collector of people. He’d roam the lot at shows while slinging his latest shirt creations and could barely make it five feet before someone recognized him and came up asking for a selfie with him. He loved those damn selfies and seeing how many likes he’d get. It’s okay, Covy, we all enjoy getting likes, even if we don’t admit it. If anyone knew how to pull off a feat, it was Covy. A friend described a typical Covy caper: “Covy could find tickets to a sold-out show in his sleep. The closest we ever came to getting shut out was probably Red Rocks 2023. My arm was tired from holding my finger in the air. About five songs in, Covy pulls up with three hard copy tickets in hand. Minds blown, we asked where on earth he got them?!? He said, ‘the box office’. He was a very good problem solver.” Hahahahaha. Bet he could not wait to deliver that line deadpan. Classic. 

 

Chris Wren was known for his humor, his meme curation, and most of all for the love he had for his family. Wren met his wife, the glorious Breanna “Breezy” Wren, through their love of Widespread. Together, they were raising a most special and beautiful family with three of the cutest girls you ever did see. Though Wren was known for the memes he posted, you could see his real love of life through his family pics, shots of his latest wild mushroom find, and his early morning sunrise photos (always captioned “Murnin”). He might have had the appearance of a big, tough guy, but he’d surprise you with moments like that. A friend of Wren said "We celebrated birthdays, holidays, victories, and defeats just like any other family but we chose each other and it makes it all the more earth shattering to lose them. I, too, have not had good relationships with those I am blood related to and the Widespread Panic community, especially those two, made me feel at home and welcomed with open arms like the brother that Wren was to me and the crazy fun uncle Covy was. There's nothing more precious."

 

We’ve traveled and had adventures like these a lot, but most of us have never gone to war. We've never dug a foxhole with some guy beside us nicknamed “Cleveland”. But we get it. These times of being away from home and your creature comforts, these times when challenges arise that we’d never expect, these are the days that shape us. These are the unconquerable problems that turn into entertaining anecdotes. And they unite us. These inside jokes, these regionalized stories, they intertwine us with threads that can never be broken. Even if we lose touch with certain people, those bonds still create the most amazing tapestries in our memory. We look around at this rowdy crowd and think “These are the moments, and these are the people I’ll think of when I’m old and missing the past.” We can still hear Wren and Covy's voices so clearly. We can hear their laughter. We can just see them boogieing beside us. We can still feel that connection. 

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We often describe feeling connected in the midst of a great show. That’s not a hippie daydream, there’s real science behind it. The Grateful Dead community has received the most research on this topic. One scholar argues that “the Deadhead concert experience revolves around four religious phenomena which are community, cultus (ritual behavior), creed (beliefs about the meaning of human life) and code (rules for everyday behavior that reflect creed)…More generally, Deadheads may be devoted to the Grateful Dead in much more intense and meaningful ways than the average person is connected to a musician, because the Deadhead concert experience is about more than music.” This connection ties us not just to the band and the music, but also to our community that shares this passion with us. There’s actually a term for that feeling of being a part of something bigger: self-other merging. “…mechanisms for this social bonding effect: self-other merging as a consequence of inter-personal synchrony, and the release of endorphins during exertive rhythmic activities including musical interaction.” So, what the hell does that mean (as both of the Chrises would say)? Imagine when you and your friends listen to music or dance together. Two things happen when you do this. First, when you move or dance at the same time as your friends, it creates a special feeling like you are all connected, like moving together makes you feel closer to each other. They call this "self-other merging." Second, when you do energetic activities like dancing or playing music, your body releases endorphins. These chemicals make you feel happy and good. So, when you do things like listening to music together, it's not just fun, it also makes you feel more connected to your friends because of the way you move together and because of these happy chemicals in your body. As the great and powerful Lemmy of Motörhead said, “Touring is too much fun to stop.”

 

All this touring means that you meet some people who are on the other side of the country from you, but no less “close”. Since the dawn of man, we’ve not let distance or time lessen our bonds or our grief. Ancient poetry, collected in the Highlands of Scotland laments “Every moment hath woes of its own. Why seek we our grief from afar? Or give our tears to those of other times?” The downside of being known all over the country, and beyond, is that when these two captains of tour left us, they left so very many people mourning them. Now that Wren and Covy are gone, we’ll never see a funny meme or a Shakedown vendor without thinking of them. We’ll never celebrate New Year’s without remembering the losses this month. We’ll never catch a glimpse of a glorious beard in the crowd and not think it’s one of them, just for a moment. 

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So, what do we do now? We come together. We lift each other up. We forgot about petty slights. We share memories of Covy and Wren and other truly great souls whom we’ve lost. And we do what we can to support those most affected by all of this. There is a GoFundMe for Wren’s sweet family, and you can help out there. There may be a fundraiser to come for Covy’s expenses, as well. 

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We’ve proven our resilience and our strength on the road, time and again. Whether it’s changing a flat tire on the way, finding a lost friend, or even getting help in an emergency, we’ve toughed out some rough situations before. None of that compares to losing these two brothers in funk, but it’s time to “find out just how tall I am, by jumpin’ in the middle of a river” (to quote our favorite poets…) Whether you knew Covy and Wren or not, you’ve probably had similar losses. Cheers to you and those you’ve loved and lost. 

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“Skäl, very cold beer. Cheers, to your friends so near.

High, your dreams so clear. Raise another glass to the dreams so near…”