Saturday, August 12, 2006
Lollapalloza
Last Saturday I saw one day of Lollapalloza, a music festival in Grant Park. I wish I had bought tickets for the entire weekend instead of just Saturday, because the lineup was spectacular. I saw (in chronological order):
The Go! Team. That was fun. Basically minorities hopping around like a demented cheerleading squad. And shouting Go! Team! with audience sing-a-longs.
Wolfmother. We had a great spot that was pretty close to the stage. Just so much energy. That was probably the most rowdy, rocking out crowd of all of them. There was sort of a mini mosh pit thing going in part of the crowd for a bit. We had to leave their set early, though to get to Gnarls Barkley.
Gnarls Barkley. I like Gnarles Barkely a lot, but I actually felt like they were not a band for which you gain that much more appreciation from seeing them live. Gnarls Barkely is a duo of a rapper turned singer and a very well known DJ named Danger Mouse, who is known for his creative mashups--remixing works together (for example, The Grey Album, a mixture of rapper Jay-Z's Black Album and the Beatles White Album). I feel like a large portion of why they are so good is due to the fact that Danger Mouse has an ear for mixing interestingly, and a nerdy guy at a turn table is not something you need to see to appreciate. But the crowd was insanely huge. We missed Sonic Youth because that happened at the same time. We also left their set a little early to get to the Dresden Dolls.
The Dresden Dolls. Now this is a band that is much much better live than listening to their albums (although I like their albums too). It's a very theatrical act, and their movements facial gesturing adds a lot, supposedly cabaret influenced. If I ever get a chance, I really would like to see the Dolls again. We had to miss most of it to stake out a place for the Flaming Lips.
The Flaming Lips. OH MY GOD! That was spectacular--by far the hilight of the day. I can't even totally describe the experience. On one side of the stage, there were people dressed in Santa suits dancing, and on the other side there were girls in purple dresses and alien masks. In the background, people were dressed as superheros and there was a huge blow up santa, astronauts, and aliens. There were balloons dropped from stage in massive amounts that fell against the Chicago skyline, and it was absurdly gorgeous. Wayne Coyne (the lead singer) dove into the crowd in a giant spacebubble and (since we had a decent spot staked out) came pretty close to us. And it was really audience involving with sing-a-longs. The entire effect was totally magical.
The New Pornographers. They were very good, but they couldn't beat the Flaming Lips. Thievery Corporation was going on simultaneously, so the crowd wasn't as packed as it could have been. Hanna and I joined one of those dancing chains of people and worked our way almost to the front. Oh those Canadians.
Kayne West. I think we stayed for about fifteen minutes tops. We did a little dancing, but we were all pretty tired and not really into rap. We didn't get close enough to really see the stage at all, just the screen, and it didn't seem worth it.
Overall, quite the experience
The Go! Team. That was fun. Basically minorities hopping around like a demented cheerleading squad. And shouting Go! Team! with audience sing-a-longs.
Wolfmother. We had a great spot that was pretty close to the stage. Just so much energy. That was probably the most rowdy, rocking out crowd of all of them. There was sort of a mini mosh pit thing going in part of the crowd for a bit. We had to leave their set early, though to get to Gnarls Barkley.
Gnarls Barkley. I like Gnarles Barkely a lot, but I actually felt like they were not a band for which you gain that much more appreciation from seeing them live. Gnarls Barkely is a duo of a rapper turned singer and a very well known DJ named Danger Mouse, who is known for his creative mashups--remixing works together (for example, The Grey Album, a mixture of rapper Jay-Z's Black Album and the Beatles White Album). I feel like a large portion of why they are so good is due to the fact that Danger Mouse has an ear for mixing interestingly, and a nerdy guy at a turn table is not something you need to see to appreciate. But the crowd was insanely huge. We missed Sonic Youth because that happened at the same time. We also left their set a little early to get to the Dresden Dolls.
The Dresden Dolls. Now this is a band that is much much better live than listening to their albums (although I like their albums too). It's a very theatrical act, and their movements facial gesturing adds a lot, supposedly cabaret influenced. If I ever get a chance, I really would like to see the Dolls again. We had to miss most of it to stake out a place for the Flaming Lips.
The Flaming Lips. OH MY GOD! That was spectacular--by far the hilight of the day. I can't even totally describe the experience. On one side of the stage, there were people dressed in Santa suits dancing, and on the other side there were girls in purple dresses and alien masks. In the background, people were dressed as superheros and there was a huge blow up santa, astronauts, and aliens. There were balloons dropped from stage in massive amounts that fell against the Chicago skyline, and it was absurdly gorgeous. Wayne Coyne (the lead singer) dove into the crowd in a giant spacebubble and (since we had a decent spot staked out) came pretty close to us. And it was really audience involving with sing-a-longs. The entire effect was totally magical.
The New Pornographers. They were very good, but they couldn't beat the Flaming Lips. Thievery Corporation was going on simultaneously, so the crowd wasn't as packed as it could have been. Hanna and I joined one of those dancing chains of people and worked our way almost to the front. Oh those Canadians.
Kayne West. I think we stayed for about fifteen minutes tops. We did a little dancing, but we were all pretty tired and not really into rap. We didn't get close enough to really see the stage at all, just the screen, and it didn't seem worth it.
Overall, quite the experience
