tried to finish this up last night, but got too wrapped up in the UVA College World Series baseball game...what a heartbreaker! Ah well, they had a great, historic season nonetheless...
thinking back yesterday, I figured out my Top 10 highlights of Bonnaroo '09 that I actually witnessed (as opposed to all the cool things I heard about later and missed)
in no particular order...
--being sidestage for Phish and Bruce Springsteen
--Springsteen doing "Santa Claus is Coming to Town"
--Elvis Costello being joined by Jenny Lewis & band for "What's So Funny 'Bout Peace Love & Understanding"
--Snoop Dogg bringing out Erykah Badu for a cover of Slick Rick's "Lodi Dodi"
--artists including David Byrne (with bicycle), Wilco (the whole band) & Jenny Lewis walking right past me in the radio compound backstage area
--being sidestage for Band of Horses and introducing myself to Chicago radio legends Norm & Marty
--sitting in on a hilarious press conference with Tift Merritt, Alejandro Escovedo, Elvis Perkins, and Triumph the Insult Comic Dog
--the entire Africa Calling lineup on Friday at The Other Tent
--having fun being live on-air Sunday afternoon playing freshly recorded backstage songs
--seeing awesome stuff (The Features & Ted Leo just to name 2) up close either in the Troo Music Lounge (thanks to Elizabeth for capturing the Sons of Bill footage while I was on the air!) or Sonic Stage
more later...
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Bonnaroo Blog '09-5th entry
In the Corner Element, driving back to VA, Monday morning, going back through the memory banks for Friday wanderings/ramblings...(see my Bonnaroo videos here, by the way)
Tift Merritt started off the day in the lightly attended and very muddy This Tent. Nice to hear her rocking out a bit with the full band after her recent solo acoustic show at Music Resource Center in Charlottesville.
saw a few Gomez songs from the bleachers at the Which Stage. cool cover of Zeppelin's "Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp"...they seemed to gear their setlist to their early set time, which meant slower, more meandering jammy stuff...maybe that was just the part of the show we saw.
wandered up to the "Africa Calling"-themed The Other Tent for Toubab Krewe, who added a touch of surf guitar to their eclectic, West African instrumental mix.
caught a little of Kaki King's set at This Tent. Quite a few more folks had gathered over there by this time, which was good to see for one of the best, most unique guitar players around today. And Bonnaroo is certainly a case in point - there are plenty of noodley guitar dudes; the world can certainly use more women who can absolutey shred too, right?
Over to the first-ever artist curated stage with Dirty Projectors playing to a very large crowd at That Tent. You can see why David Byrne loves them so much, and apparently he made a guest appearance later in their set, which we missed after tiring of too much of the lead singer's voice and not enough of his excellent female vocalist bandmates. Definitely a promising band, though, as heard on Brighten The Corners...still waiting to hear the full length release.
back over to The Other Tent for Vieux Farka Toure, who was excellent. When the term Afropop is used, it usually means lilting, light guitar lines, but Vieux definitely upped the rock/funk quotient for sure, as an appreciative crowd danced the afternoon away.
Walking back over to That Tent for St. Vincent, the Silent Disco was jumping with chants of "celebrate good times, come on!" It's always one of the most popular tents at Bonnaroo - the DJ plays a mix that only the folks in the tent with headphones on can hear (there's no outside speaker system), while passersby look on in puzzled amusement...probably should've given this a try this year, and also never got around to taking swings in the backstage batting cage, dang. St. Vincent was good though, proving that even with such a beautiful, pure voice, she can also rock when she wants to.
Grace Potter & The Nocturnals tied the previous day's rainstorm into larger biblical themes by encouraging her crowd to "let it rain" on an epic closing number at This Tent. Grace's new bandmates (she's added a new bass player and 2 guitarists since the UVA Springfest show where she opened for Sara Bareilles earlier this year) sounded great.
It was unfortunately hard to avoid Animal Collective's Which Stage set on the way to our first visit to the largest What Stage for Galactic. I swear we heard NO applause after one of Animal Collective's songs. And believe me, it was a HUGE crowd watching them. And then I thought about how this kind of response is so rare from a usually very appreciative Bonnaroo audience. I felt kind of bad for them because, like the All Points West festival last year in NJ, they were stuck in the hot mid-afternoon sun. Maybe it was just too hot for people to clap (overall, the crowds did seem slightly more subdued this year). Seemed like their style of music and light show would've been better served during a late night spot. But then I remembered their drummer's name is Panda Bear, so I no longer felt so bad for them. Oof. And what's up with (what's the French word for hot?) Phoenix only getting 45 minutes at 1130pm? I'm just noticing that in the schedule here on the drive back home...No wonder we missed them. That's one of my favorite things about Bonnaroo - the set times are usually long enough that you have time to get to a variety of things, and if you want to stay and enjoy one artist, you feel like you've gotten their typical full show, and maybe even their best show, thanks to the surroundings, and not a shortened, "festival set." Heard from a couple folks that Phoenix was good, although I wasn't very impressed by the 3 songs they did on SNL a while back. Let's see next year at this time between Phoenix and Animal Collective who turns into Arcade Fire and who turns into Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.
ok, gotta get some sleep on the ride home...will write more later, promise!
oh, and i'm including the following notes for myself in case I forget to mention in future posts...
Brett Dennen was good Sunday afternoon
My theory of "camping breeds hardy festival goers," which makes Bonnaroo better than the rest
would've liked to have seen some of the Comedy Tent stuff, but tickets were required and you had to be in line 20 minutes before the performance, so it seemed like too many hoops to go though with so much great music going on.
Tift Merritt started off the day in the lightly attended and very muddy This Tent. Nice to hear her rocking out a bit with the full band after her recent solo acoustic show at Music Resource Center in Charlottesville.
saw a few Gomez songs from the bleachers at the Which Stage. cool cover of Zeppelin's "Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp"...they seemed to gear their setlist to their early set time, which meant slower, more meandering jammy stuff...maybe that was just the part of the show we saw.
wandered up to the "Africa Calling"-themed The Other Tent for Toubab Krewe, who added a touch of surf guitar to their eclectic, West African instrumental mix.
caught a little of Kaki King's set at This Tent. Quite a few more folks had gathered over there by this time, which was good to see for one of the best, most unique guitar players around today. And Bonnaroo is certainly a case in point - there are plenty of noodley guitar dudes; the world can certainly use more women who can absolutey shred too, right?
Over to the first-ever artist curated stage with Dirty Projectors playing to a very large crowd at That Tent. You can see why David Byrne loves them so much, and apparently he made a guest appearance later in their set, which we missed after tiring of too much of the lead singer's voice and not enough of his excellent female vocalist bandmates. Definitely a promising band, though, as heard on Brighten The Corners...still waiting to hear the full length release.
back over to The Other Tent for Vieux Farka Toure, who was excellent. When the term Afropop is used, it usually means lilting, light guitar lines, but Vieux definitely upped the rock/funk quotient for sure, as an appreciative crowd danced the afternoon away.
Walking back over to That Tent for St. Vincent, the Silent Disco was jumping with chants of "celebrate good times, come on!" It's always one of the most popular tents at Bonnaroo - the DJ plays a mix that only the folks in the tent with headphones on can hear (there's no outside speaker system), while passersby look on in puzzled amusement...probably should've given this a try this year, and also never got around to taking swings in the backstage batting cage, dang. St. Vincent was good though, proving that even with such a beautiful, pure voice, she can also rock when she wants to.
Grace Potter & The Nocturnals tied the previous day's rainstorm into larger biblical themes by encouraging her crowd to "let it rain" on an epic closing number at This Tent. Grace's new bandmates (she's added a new bass player and 2 guitarists since the UVA Springfest show where she opened for Sara Bareilles earlier this year) sounded great.
It was unfortunately hard to avoid Animal Collective's Which Stage set on the way to our first visit to the largest What Stage for Galactic. I swear we heard NO applause after one of Animal Collective's songs. And believe me, it was a HUGE crowd watching them. And then I thought about how this kind of response is so rare from a usually very appreciative Bonnaroo audience. I felt kind of bad for them because, like the All Points West festival last year in NJ, they were stuck in the hot mid-afternoon sun. Maybe it was just too hot for people to clap (overall, the crowds did seem slightly more subdued this year). Seemed like their style of music and light show would've been better served during a late night spot. But then I remembered their drummer's name is Panda Bear, so I no longer felt so bad for them. Oof. And what's up with (what's the French word for hot?) Phoenix only getting 45 minutes at 1130pm? I'm just noticing that in the schedule here on the drive back home...No wonder we missed them. That's one of my favorite things about Bonnaroo - the set times are usually long enough that you have time to get to a variety of things, and if you want to stay and enjoy one artist, you feel like you've gotten their typical full show, and maybe even their best show, thanks to the surroundings, and not a shortened, "festival set." Heard from a couple folks that Phoenix was good, although I wasn't very impressed by the 3 songs they did on SNL a while back. Let's see next year at this time between Phoenix and Animal Collective who turns into Arcade Fire and who turns into Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.
ok, gotta get some sleep on the ride home...will write more later, promise!
oh, and i'm including the following notes for myself in case I forget to mention in future posts...
Brett Dennen was good Sunday afternoon
My theory of "camping breeds hardy festival goers," which makes Bonnaroo better than the rest
would've liked to have seen some of the Comedy Tent stuff, but tickets were required and you had to be in line 20 minutes before the performance, so it seemed like too many hoops to go though with so much great music going on.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Bonnaroo Blog '09-4th entry
well, back in the tent closing in on 130am, trying to put yet another stellar Bonnaroo in perspective....
Phish ended about an hour ago, and Elizabeth and I miraculously ended up on the upper sidestage to witness our 1st full Phish concert! As stated in a previous entry, we only caught the first couple songs on Friday night...and if there's one Phish show to catch, I'd imagine it'd be this one - Springsteen guest stars for 3 songs in the middle, a Velvet Underground "Rock and Roll" cover, and oh yeah, there were 75,000 fans going bonkers the whole time...quite a site to witness from any perspective, let along high atop the side of the stage. Oh right, and the setting wasn't any old basketball arena or shed, it was at Bonnaroo! Ok, truth be told, we did ditch out for a bathroom break and a massive slice of pizza around the time they played what's probably my favorite Phish song, "Character Zero," but even that was lucky as we heard the "true" sound mix for most of the song and not the muted, you're-standing-behind-the-speakers mix from sidestage. We were way overdue for dinner as no food was provided backstage, we had to fend for ourselves and time got away from us! And we knew, Phish being Phish, we were gonna be in for an epic night...
Earlier highlights today included-
the fun I had broadcasting from noon-3pm eastern from the radio compound and playing back some of this year's backstage performances from the likes of Alejandro Escovedo, Ani DiFranco, Wilco, The Features, Zee Avi and Andrew Bird (just to name a few). Thanks to Elizabeth and Starr Hill's Mark for joining me on-air, to Brad & Melissa for taking over from 3-4pm, and to Bob back at the studio in VA for getting us on the air from TN!
Elizabeth captured some great video for the Corner Crew of Sons of Bill and Cage the Elephant's raucous (sorry, i know i keep using it, but i love that word!) early day sets. I was on the air and Brad & Melissa's late-morning escort to the off-site showers took longer than expected..."disc jockeys" and "roughing it" aren't phrases that go together very well...lol
Ted Leo was awesome solo at the Sonic Stage. Played a new song and even did a cover of Nick Lowe's "So It Goes!"
Dear & The Headlights delivered a strong set of heartfelt, indie-soul at the Troo Music Lounge. I knew little or nothing about them before I saw 'em...
Strolled over to see Merle Haggard just in time to catch "If You Got the Money, Honey I Got The Time." Classic.
thanks to our Music Allies pal Nick, we got into the pit for about half of Snoop Dogg's set...getting to see him at all was pretty sweet after missing out on a chance to see him during my Missouri days, let alone from that close-up! Sometimes it's not about being backstage at Bonnaroo, it's about tagging along with the right folks at the right time backstage.
also thanks to Nick, caught the last couple of Band of Horses songs from sidestage as well...amazing backdrop with the sun setting off in the distance (for their song "The Funeral" especially). It was around this time I finally introduced myself to a couple of radio legends, Marty and Norm from WXRT in Chicago.
Here's a good summary of tonight, and the festival in general (via yahoo via Associated Press) with most of the highlights put much more succinctly than I could and without my bias...but then that's what makes blogs fun, now doesn't it?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090615/ap_on_en_mu/us_music_bonnaroo_wrap
ok, time for bed...730am will be here way too soon! don't really want to leave that early, but allowing for traffic and stops along the way, we'll definitely need some good rest before heading back to work on Tuesday! fuller updates on previous days will appear soon...check back!
Phish ended about an hour ago, and Elizabeth and I miraculously ended up on the upper sidestage to witness our 1st full Phish concert! As stated in a previous entry, we only caught the first couple songs on Friday night...and if there's one Phish show to catch, I'd imagine it'd be this one - Springsteen guest stars for 3 songs in the middle, a Velvet Underground "Rock and Roll" cover, and oh yeah, there were 75,000 fans going bonkers the whole time...quite a site to witness from any perspective, let along high atop the side of the stage. Oh right, and the setting wasn't any old basketball arena or shed, it was at Bonnaroo! Ok, truth be told, we did ditch out for a bathroom break and a massive slice of pizza around the time they played what's probably my favorite Phish song, "Character Zero," but even that was lucky as we heard the "true" sound mix for most of the song and not the muted, you're-standing-behind-the-speakers mix from sidestage. We were way overdue for dinner as no food was provided backstage, we had to fend for ourselves and time got away from us! And we knew, Phish being Phish, we were gonna be in for an epic night...
Earlier highlights today included-
the fun I had broadcasting from noon-3pm eastern from the radio compound and playing back some of this year's backstage performances from the likes of Alejandro Escovedo, Ani DiFranco, Wilco, The Features, Zee Avi and Andrew Bird (just to name a few). Thanks to Elizabeth and Starr Hill's Mark for joining me on-air, to Brad & Melissa for taking over from 3-4pm, and to Bob back at the studio in VA for getting us on the air from TN!
Elizabeth captured some great video for the Corner Crew of Sons of Bill and Cage the Elephant's raucous (sorry, i know i keep using it, but i love that word!) early day sets. I was on the air and Brad & Melissa's late-morning escort to the off-site showers took longer than expected..."disc jockeys" and "roughing it" aren't phrases that go together very well...lol
Ted Leo was awesome solo at the Sonic Stage. Played a new song and even did a cover of Nick Lowe's "So It Goes!"
Dear & The Headlights delivered a strong set of heartfelt, indie-soul at the Troo Music Lounge. I knew little or nothing about them before I saw 'em...
Strolled over to see Merle Haggard just in time to catch "If You Got the Money, Honey I Got The Time." Classic.
thanks to our Music Allies pal Nick, we got into the pit for about half of Snoop Dogg's set...getting to see him at all was pretty sweet after missing out on a chance to see him during my Missouri days, let alone from that close-up! Sometimes it's not about being backstage at Bonnaroo, it's about tagging along with the right folks at the right time backstage.
also thanks to Nick, caught the last couple of Band of Horses songs from sidestage as well...amazing backdrop with the sun setting off in the distance (for their song "The Funeral" especially). It was around this time I finally introduced myself to a couple of radio legends, Marty and Norm from WXRT in Chicago.
Here's a good summary of tonight, and the festival in general (via yahoo via Associated Press) with most of the highlights put much more succinctly than I could and without my bias...but then that's what makes blogs fun, now doesn't it?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090615/ap_on_en_mu/us_music_bonnaroo_wrap
ok, time for bed...730am will be here way too soon! don't really want to leave that early, but allowing for traffic and stops along the way, we'll definitely need some good rest before heading back to work on Tuesday! fuller updates on previous days will appear soon...check back!
Bonnaroo Blog '09-3rd entry
ok, another quick update here before going on the air again...what a night!
In the Top 10 of things I never thought I'd see in my life but have in the last month
Leonard Cohen at Radio City Music Hall, NYC
"Burning Down the House" performed by a band including David Byrne at Charlottesville Pavillion
Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band performing "Santa Claus is Coming To Town" at Bonnaroo!
it was a request, complete with a life-size Santa sign...3 hours worth of Bruce was hard to top for the best of day 3...
Jenny Lewis (and her band) backing Elvis Costello on "What's So Funny 'Bout Peace, Love & Understanding" was pretty awesome (he came out during her set too)
Triumph the Insult Comic Dog (he's here for The Tonight Show and the Comedy Tent) joined in a mostly hilarious, slightly awkward mid-afternoon press conference with Tift Merritt, Alejandro Escovedo, and Elvis Perkins
Rodrigo Y Gabriela are mind-blowingly fast guitar players
1am crowds for Nine Inch Nails, Ben Harper & Relentless 7 and MGMT were massive...there's no sleeping at Bonnaroo (well, until 3 or 4am anyway)!
and it's been nice to have 2 dry days in a row, although it's still a muddy, muggy mass of humanity here in Tennessee!
ok, more later...check out the pics page too! thanks for listening and reading and looking!
In the Top 10 of things I never thought I'd see in my life but have in the last month
Leonard Cohen at Radio City Music Hall, NYC
"Burning Down the House" performed by a band including David Byrne at Charlottesville Pavillion
Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band performing "Santa Claus is Coming To Town" at Bonnaroo!
it was a request, complete with a life-size Santa sign...3 hours worth of Bruce was hard to top for the best of day 3...
Jenny Lewis (and her band) backing Elvis Costello on "What's So Funny 'Bout Peace, Love & Understanding" was pretty awesome (he came out during her set too)
Triumph the Insult Comic Dog (he's here for The Tonight Show and the Comedy Tent) joined in a mostly hilarious, slightly awkward mid-afternoon press conference with Tift Merritt, Alejandro Escovedo, and Elvis Perkins
Rodrigo Y Gabriela are mind-blowingly fast guitar players
1am crowds for Nine Inch Nails, Ben Harper & Relentless 7 and MGMT were massive...there's no sleeping at Bonnaroo (well, until 3 or 4am anyway)!
and it's been nice to have 2 dry days in a row, although it's still a muddy, muggy mass of humanity here in Tennessee!
ok, more later...check out the pics page too! thanks for listening and reading and looking!
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Bonnaroo Blog '09-2nd entry
2009! Another summer...sound of the funky drummer! OK, so Public Enemy modified the first line of "Fight the Power" last night, but all day I kept thinking about how this year's lineup could very well have been awesome in 1989 as well....Beastie Boys, NIN, Springsteen, David Byrne, Phish, Al Green & Public Enemy! Pretty impressive that all the above are still sounding great so many years later...
bopped around quite a bit for day 2...I'll write more later when we get back, but you can judge from the photos how busy we were trekking from stage to stage. Going with the strategy this year of seeing a little bit by a lot of folks, and definite highlights happened at The Other Tent, with Toubab Krewe, Vieux Farka Toure, Amadou & Mariam, and Femi Kuti & The Positive Force keeping people moving day and night.
bopped around quite a bit for day 2...I'll write more later when we get back, but you can judge from the photos how busy we were trekking from stage to stage. Going with the strategy this year of seeing a little bit by a lot of folks, and definite highlights happened at The Other Tent, with Toubab Krewe, Vieux Farka Toure, Amadou & Mariam, and Femi Kuti & The Positive Force keeping people moving day and night.
Friday, June 12, 2009
Bonnaroo Blog '09-1st entry
Well, here we are again, coming to you from backstage at a very rain-soaked, muddy Bonnaroo! Easily more rain than the other 3 Bonnaroos I've been to combined last night, including a brief tornado warning. We thought we made it through the worst during my half of the drive down, where the road was barely visible for a bit. But the skies opened up again as we assembled the tent in the guest camping area (around 9pm), and we luckily ended up hearing about the tornado warning while we were in the media area, so we waited it out on one of the tour buses provided for those in the media close to the Radio Bonnaroo compound.
Was hoping we could have made it in time to see White Rabbits at 645, or Murs at 715, but no such luck once we got a little bit later start than intended and factoring in a couple stops for lunch and dinner. And with another batch of storms that blew through an hour or so after the initial Tornado Warning (we saw these coming thanks to the Weather Channel on the tour bus), we ended up deciding to stay (sort of) dry and pace ourselves and spent the late evening catching up with some pals from other official Bonnaroo radio stations around the country and record label folks and such. And once the rain let up (a bit), it was back to the tent for a few hours of shut-eye before broadcasting from the radio compound in the morning.
So, no, we didn't see Chairlift or Passion Pit, and it sounded like Delta Spirit ended up playing a few hours later than scheduled after arriving late. And it sure sounded like some kind of techno beat started around 2am fairly close to our campsite, which was interesting since the official schedule had the music ending by 2am on this 1st night. I jokingly speculated we were probably missing a surprise set by the Beastie Boys with Nine Inch Nails, but alas haven't heard anyone buzzing about such a surprise in the radio compound this morning. I have definitely changed from the flip-flops to the rain boots for the rest of the weekend, though, as more storms are predicted for today...
Today's lineup is pretty crazy. There's so much good stuff going on at all times, I'm not sure I'll be able to see a full set from anyone. Instead I'm going with the strategy of seeing as much as I can (mud and weather conditions permitting, of course). Let's see...David Byrne's curated stage (the 1st artist-chosen lineup in 'Roo history) begins at noon, with Katzenjammer, followed by Dirty Projectors, St. Vincent, Santigold and Ani DiFranco. Later in the evening on that same That Tent stage, Phoenix and Girl Talk will do their thing...Gomez and Tift Merritt should be early afternoon highlights, with Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Grizzly Bear and Santigold all playing at around the same time in the late afternoon. Then it's Al Green, TV on the Radio, Lucinda Williams and Ani all on different stages at roughly the same time in the early evening. Beastie Boys and David Byrne set times overlap on the 2 biggest stages, and then Phish is the big headliner on the What Stage from 11pm-2am. Public Enemy goes on at This Tent at 1230am, and we'll try to mud-dance from Paul Oakenfold over to Girl Talk between 215 and 4am (might have to get a nap in at some point today to make it that long!)
Listen for a few reports from me on the air this afternoon, and we're hopeful of having some interview and performance clips to play for you this weekend, live and direct from backstage at Bonnaroo '09!
p.s., just said hey to James and Sam from Charlottesville's own Sons of Bill as they wandered through the radio compound. Looking forward to seeing their noon set on Sunday at the Troo Music Lounge, one of several upgraded "side stages" that definitely add an intimate feel to what already is a great, gigantic weekend of live music here in rural Tennessee!
Cheers!
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Bonnaroo Blog 7
early morning Wednesday 6/18
OK, so it's taken a couple days to recover enough to even semi-coherently wrap up this blog...next time, I'll work through any Sunday downtime instead of watching VH1 Classic on the tour bus, because the trip back Monday is a lost cause - you're either sleeping or driving (hopefully not both at the same time :). And then you get home, and all you want to do is shower and sleep some more. And then Tuesday rolls around and you have all the real work you've been missing to catch up on...but let us go back to Sunday for a few moments, shall we...
The day started off with more blogging in the morning...wanted to make sure I got it done before my Corner on-air shift starting at about 11am. Almost did, and blogged the rest while I was on the air from Radio Bonnaroo. Had fun recapping the events up to that point with Tad & Elizabeth occasionally joining me on the air. During one break, I noticed Ben Gibbard from Death Cab for Cutie stroll by right outside the "window" of my studio, with baseball glove and hat and 3 other similarly clad men in tow. They just talked a while amongst themselves and never even threw a pitch or swung in the backstage batting cages! Maybe they had just come from playing catch in the artist backstage area, and the interview finished up in the radio area, who knows.
By the time the on-air stuff and the blogging were done, we had missed Serena Ryder at 1:30 in This Tent. Cool, Canadian singer who had a great covers cd that I believe came out last year. We would miss her again on the Sonic Stage at 5:15...d'oh!
There was a big crowd assembled at the Sonic Stage for Broken Social Scene, and deservedly so. They would close out the lineup at The Other Tent at 730pm that night...knew we wouldn't make it over there for that due to Plant/Krauss, so it was nice to catch them, esp. in a smaller setting.
It was on to Sherry's backstage area, affectionately known as The Boneyard, so we could get a closer glimpse of Matt Cameron from Pearl Jam, drumming with his jazz trio side project, Harrybu McGage at the back of the Sonic Stage. Mission accomplished, and we even got photos from the front too as the crowd thinned out waiting in the BSS autograph line...I felt like a stalker dork though, since I had chosen to wear one of my old school Pearl Jam shirts. Didn't expect to get so close to one of the members of the band!
Caught a bit of Robert Randolph's Revival (a bit more rock/funk than the pop/soul of the Family Band??) at That Tent. When they started into an instrumental version of Michael Jackson's "Rock With You," we moved along to Jakob Dylan & The Gold Mountain Rebels at This Tent, where we heard the strains of "Three Marlenas" as we walked up. Saying something along the lines of, "we like to play songs we know," Jakob seemed hesitant to try out his own solo stuff in favor of older Wallflowers songs, but that was fine by the crowd, including Superfan Beatle Bob standing in front of us sidestage. Orchestra Baobab was also playing at around the same time, and what a spot-on performance from these Senegalese legends. Oh, and we caught Susan Tedeschi with an acoustic guitar and a flute player on the Sonic Stage and got some good video of her covering Ray LaMontagne's "Shelter." But my tolerance for the flute is pretty minimal, so it was time to move on...
As the anticipation for Plant/Krauss builds, we rest in the media area for a while, missing Aimee Mann and Solomon Burke in the process. Another fact of Bonnaroo...despite your best intentions, there will be times when you just can't head back out into the fray. The lure of tour bus AC and free Subway sandwiches for dinner is too strong...and, as I think I mentioned in the car on the drive down, one of the nicest things about Bonnaroo is seeing colleagues from around the country and catching up on their cities and stations and lives. The AAA (that's Adult Album Alternative) radio community, even though each station has its own unique way of appealing to their city/audience, is a pretty small, cool and fun universe with a lot of like-minded, easy-going folks.
The VIP bleachers are suprisingly half full when we arrive a bit early for Alison Krauss and Robert Plant. I had seen Alison with Union Station on this same What Stage a couple of years ago. This show ended up being one of the highlights of the fest for me, with plenty of selections from their Raising Sand cd, obviously, a couple Zep covers ("Black Dog" and "Battle of Evermore"), a couple selections from their recent history (a rendition of Plant's "In the Mood" was spectacular, and the O Brother Where Art Thou? song "Down in the River to Pray" was chill-inducing). Plant seemed especially exicted to be not only at a festival like Bonnaroo ("it feels pretty good up here!"), but in a state like Tennessee, where so much of the music he had been recently discovering had come from (thanks to his backing band, led by T Bone Burnett, pointing out to him that "there's some great white American music too"). Another highlight was shown on the big screen a couple times during the set - probably the oldest person we saw at Bonnaroo, which got a rise out of the crowd, because despite her short stature and age (70s?), she was right down in the pit, smiling and clapping along. As the crowd thinned out a bit towards the end, Tad & I went down much closer to watch the encore while Elizabeth went over to the Which Stage to catch the end of Death Cab for Cutie's set. Only got a one-song encore though, and it was kind of an odd choice - some old rave-up by the Nervous Fishermen, or something. An odd note on which to end a set that featured such good singing, playing and song choices throughout (even T Bone got to do a song).
The strains of Death Cab's "I Will Possess Your Heart" wafted through the air as we made our way out of the What Stage area and onto to That Tent for Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi's Soul Stew Revival. Really good set from them - always amazing to hear Susan sing, and I had never seen Derek Trucks before - his plucking style of slide guitar playing without a pick is awesome to witness...not sure if they planned on playing a long set anyway or if it was due to the crowd response, but they were still playing when we got off the Ferris Wheel at around 930 (they were only scheduled til 830). Took a picture from the highest point at Bonnaroo (literally, anyway :) atop the Ferris Wheel and then caught a bit of Widespread Panic at the What Stage, after which it was back to the tent to start packing up for the long ride home...6am will come especially early tomorrow!
Oh, and we did get a call from the tour bus area that the Celtics/Lakers game was close late in the 4th so we took a quick break from cleaning up to witness the Lakers barely hang on in Game 5.
And we did actually manage to hit the road by a little after 7, with the Cracker Barrel about an hour away being our incentive for getting a move-on. Surprised any of us were able to stay awake after that several-course feast, but Tad did an excellent job driving the first half and I took the 2nd half, while Jaclyn helped split the drive with Amy from The Tide Radio in Williamsburg. She was heading the same way as us, so we figured we'd help out so she wouldn't have to drive the whole way herself.
So, another Bonnaroo in the books, and some final thoughts (or things I may have forgotten to mention) have crossed my mind the last couple days...
--that was my FIRST time seeing Pearl Jam for free...I know, I know, whoop-de-doo, but when someone like me who goes to free shows quite often, and has PAID to see a certain band (who hardly ever does free tickets) 13 times, and then finally after all these years gets to go gratis, that was pretty darn cool. So those folks who won PJ tix for VA Beach from the Corner should feel especially lucky, I guess is what I'm saying...free PJ tix are hard to come by! And I guess being in the fan club and buying tix through them to get better seats and avoid service fees has something to do with it too, for me anyway.
--the SuperJam this year was a bit odd, in that it was kind of a jam, but wasn't really that Super (Les Claypool and Gogol Bordello). I guess no matter who they got, it would be hard to top ?uestlove, Ben Harper and John Paul Jones doing Zeppelin songs last year :) But it reminded me of something I've noticed at the other 2 Bonnaroos I've gone to...I don't know if scheduling is too tight and bands have to get in and get out or what, but I was trying to think of any "spontaneous" collaborations or special guests I saw...Eddie Vedder came out with Jack Johnson for one song...Kirk Hammitt came out with My Morning Jacket for one song...there had to have been others, but it just seems like, if I was that great of a musician in that setting, I would want to SuperJam with as many people as I could! I guess it's probably understandably a pride thing, too, with each artist wanting to prove their "Bonnaroo-worthiness" on their own, without help from an "all-star." Just throwing that out there...
--I only needed my earplugs once the whole weekend (for Metallica)...such great soundsystems regardless of the size of the stage! Of course the one time I remember to bring them, I hardly need them :)
--the My Morning Jacket stories we heard the next morning after their almost-4 hour set were pretty sweet...when I'm back in Illinois this weekend withOUT pneumonia, I guess that will have to suffice for not staying through the rainstorm for that long :)
--and other regrets...i've had a few...too few to mention ;) but i will anyway :) not seeing the Raconteurs, Serena Ryder, Solomon Burke, Zappa plays Zappa, The Coup or going into the New Orleans area (wonder how much money they raised for Katrina relief with their $5 "cover charge" for the Somethin' Else tent?) But we did see Jack White backstage for a couple seconds after his Radio Bonnaroo interview/performance, and we saw Solomon Burke's velvet throne up close in the Boneyard thanks to Sherry, so again, it's all timing and pacing yourself and the yin and the yang of Bonnaroo...
--i have no idea who the headliners could be next year to top this (for me personally)...Radiohead and DMB would be solid picks, but they've both headlined here before...Tad's still rooting for the Jackson 5 reunion...maybe they'll branch out into Green Day or Coldplay territory next year...Beastie Boys have yet to play Bonnaroo, I'm pretty sure...and once Chinese Democracy comes out this year (yeah, right!) and flops, what better place than the middle of Tennessee for that G'n'R reunion tour to start! I'm just sayin'...the Phish reunion would be too big for Bonnaroo and a band like U2 or the Stones doesn't need to play a festival, because the monetary incentives could never be enough. The Led Zep thing could still happen I guess (Plant sure seemed to enjoy himself this year)...ah well, let the speculation begin!
Thanks for reading my mostly off-the-cuff ramblings this past week...hopefully it brought the equally ridiculous and sublime world of being backstage at a major music festival home in a relatable way! The Corner Crew is humbled and honored to have been part of Bonnaroo '08!
OK, so it's taken a couple days to recover enough to even semi-coherently wrap up this blog...next time, I'll work through any Sunday downtime instead of watching VH1 Classic on the tour bus, because the trip back Monday is a lost cause - you're either sleeping or driving (hopefully not both at the same time :). And then you get home, and all you want to do is shower and sleep some more. And then Tuesday rolls around and you have all the real work you've been missing to catch up on...but let us go back to Sunday for a few moments, shall we...
The day started off with more blogging in the morning...wanted to make sure I got it done before my Corner on-air shift starting at about 11am. Almost did, and blogged the rest while I was on the air from Radio Bonnaroo. Had fun recapping the events up to that point with Tad & Elizabeth occasionally joining me on the air. During one break, I noticed Ben Gibbard from Death Cab for Cutie stroll by right outside the "window" of my studio, with baseball glove and hat and 3 other similarly clad men in tow. They just talked a while amongst themselves and never even threw a pitch or swung in the backstage batting cages! Maybe they had just come from playing catch in the artist backstage area, and the interview finished up in the radio area, who knows.
By the time the on-air stuff and the blogging were done, we had missed Serena Ryder at 1:30 in This Tent. Cool, Canadian singer who had a great covers cd that I believe came out last year. We would miss her again on the Sonic Stage at 5:15...d'oh!
There was a big crowd assembled at the Sonic Stage for Broken Social Scene, and deservedly so. They would close out the lineup at The Other Tent at 730pm that night...knew we wouldn't make it over there for that due to Plant/Krauss, so it was nice to catch them, esp. in a smaller setting.
It was on to Sherry's backstage area, affectionately known as The Boneyard, so we could get a closer glimpse of Matt Cameron from Pearl Jam, drumming with his jazz trio side project, Harrybu McGage at the back of the Sonic Stage. Mission accomplished, and we even got photos from the front too as the crowd thinned out waiting in the BSS autograph line...I felt like a stalker dork though, since I had chosen to wear one of my old school Pearl Jam shirts. Didn't expect to get so close to one of the members of the band!
Caught a bit of Robert Randolph's Revival (a bit more rock/funk than the pop/soul of the Family Band??) at That Tent. When they started into an instrumental version of Michael Jackson's "Rock With You," we moved along to Jakob Dylan & The Gold Mountain Rebels at This Tent, where we heard the strains of "Three Marlenas" as we walked up. Saying something along the lines of, "we like to play songs we know," Jakob seemed hesitant to try out his own solo stuff in favor of older Wallflowers songs, but that was fine by the crowd, including Superfan Beatle Bob standing in front of us sidestage. Orchestra Baobab was also playing at around the same time, and what a spot-on performance from these Senegalese legends. Oh, and we caught Susan Tedeschi with an acoustic guitar and a flute player on the Sonic Stage and got some good video of her covering Ray LaMontagne's "Shelter." But my tolerance for the flute is pretty minimal, so it was time to move on...
As the anticipation for Plant/Krauss builds, we rest in the media area for a while, missing Aimee Mann and Solomon Burke in the process. Another fact of Bonnaroo...despite your best intentions, there will be times when you just can't head back out into the fray. The lure of tour bus AC and free Subway sandwiches for dinner is too strong...and, as I think I mentioned in the car on the drive down, one of the nicest things about Bonnaroo is seeing colleagues from around the country and catching up on their cities and stations and lives. The AAA (that's Adult Album Alternative) radio community, even though each station has its own unique way of appealing to their city/audience, is a pretty small, cool and fun universe with a lot of like-minded, easy-going folks.
The VIP bleachers are suprisingly half full when we arrive a bit early for Alison Krauss and Robert Plant. I had seen Alison with Union Station on this same What Stage a couple of years ago. This show ended up being one of the highlights of the fest for me, with plenty of selections from their Raising Sand cd, obviously, a couple Zep covers ("Black Dog" and "Battle of Evermore"), a couple selections from their recent history (a rendition of Plant's "In the Mood" was spectacular, and the O Brother Where Art Thou? song "Down in the River to Pray" was chill-inducing). Plant seemed especially exicted to be not only at a festival like Bonnaroo ("it feels pretty good up here!"), but in a state like Tennessee, where so much of the music he had been recently discovering had come from (thanks to his backing band, led by T Bone Burnett, pointing out to him that "there's some great white American music too"). Another highlight was shown on the big screen a couple times during the set - probably the oldest person we saw at Bonnaroo, which got a rise out of the crowd, because despite her short stature and age (70s?), she was right down in the pit, smiling and clapping along. As the crowd thinned out a bit towards the end, Tad & I went down much closer to watch the encore while Elizabeth went over to the Which Stage to catch the end of Death Cab for Cutie's set. Only got a one-song encore though, and it was kind of an odd choice - some old rave-up by the Nervous Fishermen, or something. An odd note on which to end a set that featured such good singing, playing and song choices throughout (even T Bone got to do a song).
The strains of Death Cab's "I Will Possess Your Heart" wafted through the air as we made our way out of the What Stage area and onto to That Tent for Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi's Soul Stew Revival. Really good set from them - always amazing to hear Susan sing, and I had never seen Derek Trucks before - his plucking style of slide guitar playing without a pick is awesome to witness...not sure if they planned on playing a long set anyway or if it was due to the crowd response, but they were still playing when we got off the Ferris Wheel at around 930 (they were only scheduled til 830). Took a picture from the highest point at Bonnaroo (literally, anyway :) atop the Ferris Wheel and then caught a bit of Widespread Panic at the What Stage, after which it was back to the tent to start packing up for the long ride home...6am will come especially early tomorrow!
Oh, and we did get a call from the tour bus area that the Celtics/Lakers game was close late in the 4th so we took a quick break from cleaning up to witness the Lakers barely hang on in Game 5.
And we did actually manage to hit the road by a little after 7, with the Cracker Barrel about an hour away being our incentive for getting a move-on. Surprised any of us were able to stay awake after that several-course feast, but Tad did an excellent job driving the first half and I took the 2nd half, while Jaclyn helped split the drive with Amy from The Tide Radio in Williamsburg. She was heading the same way as us, so we figured we'd help out so she wouldn't have to drive the whole way herself.
So, another Bonnaroo in the books, and some final thoughts (or things I may have forgotten to mention) have crossed my mind the last couple days...
--that was my FIRST time seeing Pearl Jam for free...I know, I know, whoop-de-doo, but when someone like me who goes to free shows quite often, and has PAID to see a certain band (who hardly ever does free tickets) 13 times, and then finally after all these years gets to go gratis, that was pretty darn cool. So those folks who won PJ tix for VA Beach from the Corner should feel especially lucky, I guess is what I'm saying...free PJ tix are hard to come by! And I guess being in the fan club and buying tix through them to get better seats and avoid service fees has something to do with it too, for me anyway.
--the SuperJam this year was a bit odd, in that it was kind of a jam, but wasn't really that Super (Les Claypool and Gogol Bordello). I guess no matter who they got, it would be hard to top ?uestlove, Ben Harper and John Paul Jones doing Zeppelin songs last year :) But it reminded me of something I've noticed at the other 2 Bonnaroos I've gone to...I don't know if scheduling is too tight and bands have to get in and get out or what, but I was trying to think of any "spontaneous" collaborations or special guests I saw...Eddie Vedder came out with Jack Johnson for one song...Kirk Hammitt came out with My Morning Jacket for one song...there had to have been others, but it just seems like, if I was that great of a musician in that setting, I would want to SuperJam with as many people as I could! I guess it's probably understandably a pride thing, too, with each artist wanting to prove their "Bonnaroo-worthiness" on their own, without help from an "all-star." Just throwing that out there...
--I only needed my earplugs once the whole weekend (for Metallica)...such great soundsystems regardless of the size of the stage! Of course the one time I remember to bring them, I hardly need them :)
--the My Morning Jacket stories we heard the next morning after their almost-4 hour set were pretty sweet...when I'm back in Illinois this weekend withOUT pneumonia, I guess that will have to suffice for not staying through the rainstorm for that long :)
--and other regrets...i've had a few...too few to mention ;) but i will anyway :) not seeing the Raconteurs, Serena Ryder, Solomon Burke, Zappa plays Zappa, The Coup or going into the New Orleans area (wonder how much money they raised for Katrina relief with their $5 "cover charge" for the Somethin' Else tent?) But we did see Jack White backstage for a couple seconds after his Radio Bonnaroo interview/performance, and we saw Solomon Burke's velvet throne up close in the Boneyard thanks to Sherry, so again, it's all timing and pacing yourself and the yin and the yang of Bonnaroo...
--i have no idea who the headliners could be next year to top this (for me personally)...Radiohead and DMB would be solid picks, but they've both headlined here before...Tad's still rooting for the Jackson 5 reunion...maybe they'll branch out into Green Day or Coldplay territory next year...Beastie Boys have yet to play Bonnaroo, I'm pretty sure...and once Chinese Democracy comes out this year (yeah, right!) and flops, what better place than the middle of Tennessee for that G'n'R reunion tour to start! I'm just sayin'...the Phish reunion would be too big for Bonnaroo and a band like U2 or the Stones doesn't need to play a festival, because the monetary incentives could never be enough. The Led Zep thing could still happen I guess (Plant sure seemed to enjoy himself this year)...ah well, let the speculation begin!
Thanks for reading my mostly off-the-cuff ramblings this past week...hopefully it brought the equally ridiculous and sublime world of being backstage at a major music festival home in a relatable way! The Corner Crew is humbled and honored to have been part of Bonnaroo '08!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
