August 1 - The month started out with rumors burning up the pages of web boards about George McConnell quiting Widespread Panic after the 07/30 show at the Fox Theater in St. Louis. By mid-afternoon many were tuned in as JB, John Keane, and Todd performed at the WFPK Studios in Louisville.
The hearsay fires kept burning as hundreds logged into Panicstream.com near showtime at The Palace in Lousiville to catch the live text-feeds of the setlist.
Many felt a sense of assurance that the gossip was just trivial conversation when someone texted a message saying that George's rig was setup at stage right.
As soon as the show began, a flood of people texted in that the earlier information given was incorrect. George's equipment was not there and only Sam Holt and John Keane took the stage that evening. This fueled the fire to explosive proportions and led fans to flock to Widespread Panic's official website and Myspace pages looking for further details.
By the end of the evening many had conceded to the revelation that George was most likely GONE.
August 2 - The second day in August brought out new rumors the Jimmy Herring would be the replacement guitarist for George. Panic's myspace website had a legion of posters leaving 'Farwell' messages to George and 'Welcome' messages to Jimmy. Even a Thank You George Myspace page was created in honor of Panic's ex-guitarist.
It was just after Noon that the Official Anouncement was made at the Widespread Panic website telling fans that George ..."moved on to further adventures".
Later in the evening more rumors popped up at Panicstream.com that said Jimmy Herring was at the The Palace in Louisville during soundcheck.
Most of the chatter from the messageboards were debate on whether or not Jimmy, Sam Holt or some other guitarist would be best suited for Panic.
August 3 - WSP made the official announcement after 5pm that Jimmy Herring would, in fact, be the new guitarist for the band starting with the Fall '06 tour. Most of the news zines printed articles with the same information found at WSP's website.
Then came speculation that Herring was in line to be the new guitarist before they actually hired George. There was also a lot of gossip about an argument that may have occurred on the WSP tour bus between Jojo and George with Dave trying to deflect the fight. Many Fans were hoping that Dave Schools would publish in his blog the events that had taken place since August 1 but nothing came.
August 4 - This day saw many fans still looking for answers. The Widespread Panic Myspace site had made things even more official by removing George's name off the list of 'Band Members' and removed his picture from the site.
A RELIX article reported that Jimmy Herring "revealed" that he was asked to join WSP after Michael Houser passed. The conspiracy theorists claimed that was just a guise created by Panic's PR people.
The band played at the Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia with John Keane and Sam Holt, once again on guitars.
Vic Chestnut made an appearance during Sleeping Man.
More conspiracy zealots noticed that George had been placed in each official WSP photograph, suspiciously, to one end as to be easily removed at a later date.
Makes you wonder!
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