white nøise

Another edition of the massive music festival has come and gone, but this one bearing the significance of being the 20th Anniversary of Lollapalooza. D and I saw the very first edition back in 1991 and it still stands as one of the best days of live music we’ve seen. Back then, Lolla was a single day, single stage, touring festival and the lineup consisted of (the brand new) Nine Inch Nails, Rollins Band, Violent Femmes, Butthole Surfers, Ice-T, Living Color (in their hey’), Siouxsie and the Banshees, and Jane’s Addiction. For the past seven years, Lolla has been grounded in Chicago, initially as two days, then as three. We’ve been to 4 of those 7 now, and it just keeps getting bigger. Just how big? Lolla sold out this year, with 90,000 attendees per day.

We returned to this event with D’s brother, Mike, and nephew, Justin. After their first Lolla last year, they couldn’t wait to get back. We met up downtown before noon, got checked in, and had a pre-concert beverage (or two) before heading out.

The first day started with rushing in to catch the set by Young The Giant. It was a warm sunny afternoon and jumping around to “My Body” was a great start for the festival.

From there it was a brisk hustle down to the other end of the park to catch The Naked and Famous. With their shimmering, poppy synths they sound quite a lot like Passion Pit, only the lead singer is a woman, which gives them just a hint of Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs vibe. Their set at Lolla sounded great, even if it was a little low on stage energy.

Following Naked and Famous was one of our most anticipated acts of the day (or the whole weekend), Foster the People. We’ve been fans of Foster since last Fall, when D first heard “Pumped Up Kicks” and knew it’d make a great Halloween party song. Since then they’ve really blown up, hitting lots of festivals this year, even if they’re not necessary a mainstream name yet. Since we were already at this stage for Naked and Famous, we moved up even closer after their set ended and wound up just a few people back from the front. Lead singer, Mark Foster, came out in a long sleeve dress shirt and black trousers – way overdressed for the hot summer day. A couple songs in his entire shirt was drenched.

The band sounded great, they had great energy, and the crowd was phenomenal. There was more crowd surfing during this set than probably any other act we saw over the weekend, and definitely more than at any of the headliners. It reminded of Matt and Kim’s set from last year and Dan Deacon the year before. With Foster, Lolla 2011 had officially hit cruising altitude.

After Foster, we grabbed a bite to eat, more drinks, and chilled out (literally) in the Dell Lounge tent. A worker there snapped our pic on a tablet and emailed it to us.

After resting up a bit, it was time to hit the DJ stage. This year Perry’s was set up under a huge tent. It was a interesting setup – something I’ve seen from other festivals – as it allows for hanging light over the crowd and projecting things on the tent above them. I guess it was a little more immersive than the open outdoor stage they’ve used in the past, but mostly you were just more immersed in people. And heat.

We caught the last few minutes of The Bloody Beetroots’ set. The tent was completely packed. Too packed to dance, but it didn’t keep the mass of bodies from trying.

Next up, was who I most wanted to catch at Perry’s, Skrillex. Somehow, even more people pushed into the text. D had enough before the set even started and bailed to listen from outside the tent. Justin has left for other stages earlier, so it was just Mike and I. As the awesome waves of dub got under way, it seemed like an endurance challenge just to stay in there. The day was already warm enough, and with all these people stacked in the tent, the temps inside soared. Lights swirled, lasers wooshed. Exhausted fans would appear from somewhere deeper in the scrum and squirm their way out. Around 20 minutes into the set, a girl behind me vomited – missing me but got the guy next to me. Mike and I decided listening outside the tent would be fine indeed.

Before leaving Skrillex rocked us with a mix of the Ludacris hit “Move Bitch”. Oh yeah!

We decided we weren’t ready for another dance crowd, so instead of watching Crystal Castles (who were darn good in the rain a couple year’s ago), we grabbed a shady spot under a tree to watch OK Go. They did a decent set, but without their clever videos, they didn’t overwhelm me. One unique highlight was when they performed “Return” with only hand bells.

And of course, their biggest hit was fun to see live.

Digging on the mellower vibe for the rest of the night, we decided to skip the huge headliners, Muse and Coldplay, and instead finish the night with a much more intimate set by Ratatat. They are an electronic duo; one mostly plays synths part with a guitar, while the other switches from guitar to various synths and drum controllers. Their music is instrumental and downtempo, and I very much like gaming and coding to it. Their stage show features all kinds of visuals and very strange videos, and there are never spot lights on them. Incidentally, this makes recording their show quite difficult as they grove along in relative darkness.

It was a great end to our first day. We were tired, but not exhausted, and would be ready to hit Day 2.

I woke on Day 3 of Lolla still thinking of that impressive Green Day show. I knew it wouldn’t be topped today, but their were still some great acts in store. For the first time in this installment of Lolla we got some rain in the morning. Not too hard, but enough to decide to miss a couple early acts and have a couple drinks at the hotel instead. By about 2:00 it had cleared up and we headed in.

We took more time today to check out the pretty large section of vendors (a part of Lolla since the start). The guys picked up a couple tee-shirts and I found a cool guitar strap repurposed out of a seatbelt from a FedEx truck. We also hit the Adidas shoebox diner and got a couple silly photos taken.

For the day’s first act we returned to the DJ area, Perry’s, to catch some NERVO. The sisters from Australia were laying down some nice beats while the gray skies were clearing up. It wasn’t the frenzy of Steve Porter, but it was a good warmup for the day.

The next band we caught was Hockey , a new act from Portland with a couple catchy singles. They played on a small side stage and it was nice to walk up and be close, but not in a crush of people like so many of the other acts.

After just a few songs we made our way back to the other end of the park. As we passed Perry’s again, Perry himself was in the middle of a DJ set. After listening for a few a moving on, we made it just in time to catch the last couple songs from X Japan at a distance. I wish we’d caught a little more of their set, because they really threw down in their long awaited first performance in the States.

Next up, along with some lounging, was a chill set by Erykah Badu. After that I was tempted to fight the crowd to see some of MGMT’s set, but opted to grab dinner instead. I’d need the energy for the next act.

Just as evening approached, Cypress Hill took the stage. Their set reminded me a lot of Snoop’s show the year before: energetic, nostalgic, and well, smokey. A string of 90′s hits like “(Rock) Superstar”, “Dr. Greenthumb” and, of course, “Insane in the Brian” had the diverse crowd pulsing hard while band members took turns hitting their 7 foot bong.

Our closer for the festival was Arcade Fire. Even though I think opposing headliner, Soundgarden, drew a big crowd, there was an absolute sea of people already crushing in for them. We decided to sit this set out from a distance and enjoy a nice patch of grass. At times I wished I was up in the frenzy, but taking in the whole scene from a distance was an appropriate way to close out the awesome weekend. Arcade powered through hit after hit, and with the crowd singing throughout, I realized just how popular they had become in the past couple of years since their first Lolla appearance.

As their set finished and we walked under the inflatable, and real, stars overhead the crowd continued singing the chorus to “Wake Up”. A continued into the downtown streets.

After a great start to Lolla, we launched into Day 2. After some coffee and a morning walk around downtown we headed into the park around 1:30. To start the day D and Mike checked out the Prius tent and got some other swag, while Justin and I headed to Perry’s (the DJ stage).

Whether you’re a fan of techno or not, Perry’s is always worth at least one visit. Steve Porter rose to internet fame when he remixed the Slap Chop infomercial into an auto-tuned rap. Turns out he’s an all around fun DJ. He had the crowd jumping at Perry’s for a solid hour with great beats and crazy video mashups on the screen behind him. I was going to catch The XX’s set, but we were having such a blast at Perry’s it didn’t seem right to leave for a much more mellow show.

One thing you must always be on the lookout for is crowd surfers. Although they were most frequent during the big shows, I learned the hard way that even at Perry’s you’re not safe.

After dancing our butts off, we grabbed some food and drink. Once again, with Chef Graham Elliot as food director, Lolla had the best food I’ve ever seen at a festival. Throughout the weekend I enjoyed some awesome BBQ, classic deep dish pizza, and of course Elliot’s lobster corn dogs.

The rest of the day was about rocking out, so we started with AFI. They were (predictably) screamy, and very loud, but the few songs I knew sounded very good.

After about 4-5 songs in, it was time to switch over to claim a close spot at the main South stage for the evening’s last two acts. D and I grabbed a decent spot right on the rail to the left of the stage. You really can’t beat a rail vantage point – even if you’re off to the side there’s no one to look over and people aren’t constantly trying to push past you. First up was Social Distortion. They played all the staples and sounded good, but it was a notch less intense than the club show I saw them at last Fall. Some of the songs seemed arranged a little slower (e.g. “Ball and Chain” really crawled) and others just didn’t seem to have the usual SocialD fire. Or maybe the momentum was just slowed with the bits of between song banter (which I actually enjoyed). But even with a little less spunk, Mike Ness and company still put out a solid set of old school punk rock.

So it was a good historical segue into the new(er) school of punk(pop) rock, with Green Day’s headlining performance coming next. I really didn’t like Green Day through the 90s, and I didn’t particularly care for them in most of the 00s either. I’m not sure if it was their pop-ified version of punk, Billie Joe’s affected singing accent, or all the endless media adoration. It wasn’t really until American Idiot that I began to appreciate them for being anything more than a snotty pop hook generator. Even then I’d say I wasn’t a fan of the band, but rather a fan of a handful of songs. That would change tonight.

Even before SocialD finished, but especially after they did, fans flocked to that field in droves. I don’t know if Green Day drew more people away from their headlining rival (Phoenix) than Gaga did from hers (The Strokes), but I wouldn’t doubt it. As the crowd rushed in, I worked and worked my way to Mike and Justin who were more centered in front of the stage. Turns out we’d only be together for a short time – a couple songs in and the moshing ripped us in different directions.

Early into the set Billie Joe announced “You paid your hard-earned money to buy a ticket to tonight. It is my honor and my privilege to give you the best fucking show you’ve ever seen in your life.” And man he wasn’t far off. OK, I might be hard pressed as to whether it made my top 5, but it possibly was the best set I’ve witnessed at any Lollapalooza (and that’s going back to ’91).

For a solid two and a half hours Billie Joe, Tre, Mike and their touring players put on a clinic in running a rock concert. Their set list was constant stream of greatest hits spanning the past 20 years. Even their older stuff which I didn’t think I cared a lot for turned out to be a fun blast of nostalgia. The crowd was captivated, sometimes thrashing, sometimes swaying, but shouting along every note of the way.

But how in the world do you keep tens of thousands of people entertained for that long? I mean, these are people who have been rocking out in the hot sun for two days. You throw everything but the kitchen sink at them, is how. As we learned, Billie Joe is really a master of working a crowd. For starters, he’d coordinate crowd chants constantly throughout the show. They also took tangents at two different points to play snippets of covers (including “Sweet Child O Mine”, “Ironman”, “Highway to Hell”, “Shout”, “Satisfaction”, and a great sing along of “Hey Jude”). Then there was the firing of t-shirt cannons and fire hoses into the crowd (which was sweet relief). They even had big concert cheese in the form of pyro and (really loud!) fireworks to punctuate points throughout (and a barrage at the end). Hell, he even dropped trou and mooned everyone at one point.

But what was most cool were the many opportunities he took to pull fans on stage. In one song Armstrong brought up about a dozen fans to sing and dance around the stage. At another point he brought up a kid to stage dive back into the crowd (which was pretty scary given the stage setup). He also got a little girl to come up at one point and lend some acting. But the most memorable came during “Longview,” when he called a random “skinny little shit” up to completely take over the vocals from start to end. The kid (obviously a huge fan) nailed it – he worked the stage like a pro, running from end to end, and never dropped a line. Impressed, Billie Joe gave the kid his guitar when the song was over.

The show ended with a 1-2 punch of “When September Ends” and “Good Riddance”. For at least the last hour, my voice was shot, my feet aching, and my arms too tired to raise, but as the last of the fireworks ash fell on our heads and the field began to clear we couldn’t stop talking about how utterly surprised and amazed we were.