We Asked Guster: What’s It Like to Play a Philly Half Marathon?
Guster’s Ryan Miller sings at the post-Rock ’n’ Roll Half Marathon concert in Philadelphia on Sunday morning | Photo: Bruce Buckley
“Do you see a space blanket on me?” Guster’s Ryan Miller says to the crowd assembled in front of the stage on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. “Then, obviously, I did not run the marathon.”
A lot of people had, though. Guster, a melodic alt-rock band from Boston that first broke in the late ’90s, played a concert after the Rock ’n’ Roll Half Marathon in Philadelphia. The race, once called the Philadelphia Distance Run, had about 12,000 participants finish the 13.1-mile course in August-like hot-and-muggy weather. (In response to a question about how many people went to the hospital after the race, organizers said “nothing beyond what we were prepared for.”)
The early-morning (10:30 a.m.), post-race concert was a first for Guster. Frontman Miller said he literally had no idea how the band got the gig. At this point, with his band being a quarter-century old, he didn’t even really prep.
