So, here we are in sunny Chicago, attending our favorite music festival. Yesterday we saw some great acts, including Bang Camaro, a little bit of the Black Lips, the Magic Wands, Manchester Orchestra (who aren't that great live), the Parlor Mob, a little bit of Noah and the Whale's DJ set (which did include Billy Jean, yep, the Michael Jackson one (is there another?)), The Kills, Gogol Bordello (who was absolutely amazing and now I want all of their cds...even the Russian loved them. Who'da thunk he could get into gypsy punk?), Mates of State, Bloc Party, CSS (who was so cute! That's all I could keep saying. We were really close to that one, so I got some good pics. I'm really glad they were able to make it this year after last year's flight debacle.) and RADIOHEAD. We were close enough for Radiohead that I didn't want to get any closer. I took one photo of the crowd on our way down to their stage, it was a total sea of people. Oh, AND we completed the Mindfield scavenger hunt, although we were disappointed that finishing it just gets us a chance to win VIP tix for Lolla 09.
Supposedly this will be a total sellout. I understand that yesterday was sold out, today is already, and they expect tomorrow to sell out sometime today. Crazy!
Anyway, today's schedule is a little more packed than yesterday's: De Novo Dahl, Does it Offend You Yeah?, The Ting Tings (I am soooo hoping they don't cancel, but there have been rumors), Foals, MGMT (who I've been dying to see, BUT, Perry has a "special guest" on his stage right then. Supposedly it's somebody bald, which could mean a couple of people I'd like to see. I'm really hoping it's Moby, since we're going to his aftershow tonight at Visions, so I wouldn't mind missing him at Perry's), Explosions in the Sky, Uffie, Battles (kinda torn here between them and Broken Social Scene. I wish I knew who BSS was going to have on their lineup here), DJ Momjeans (just showing up for a photo, I love Hyde!), and Rage Against the Machine. However, the Russian wants to check out Wilco, so we may wander back and forth between them and Rage. I want to leave a little early to get ready for Moby, and won't care if we miss the Rage riot, because there will surely be one, right? (Overheard during Radiohead last night: Hey, that's the VIP area, when Rage plays tomorrow we should burn that down)
So, I have mixed reviews about seeing Radiohead. The sound was just ok, it could have been louder (I didn't even need earplugs...from where we were standing, not that far away, my car speakers have hurt my ears more), the screen usage absolutely sucked. Most bands will use the 2 giant screens on either side of the stage to show closeups of what's going on onstage, but they split each screen into 6 parts to show macro shots of their hands and Thom's head. I guess you'd have to be there to really know how bad it sucked, but just take my word for it. There was very little crowd interaction, which seemed mean for the people who had camped out on the phone stage all day just to see them, and half the time when they did say something it was unintelligible (I don't think they were on anything, tho, I think it was a problem with the sound). It sounded to me like part of Bodysnatchers was messed up, but I don't know if anyone else picked up on it or maybe it's supposed to sound like that live. They played everything from In Rainbows, and the Russian and I were betting on whether they'd play Creep. I said no, because I think they quit playing it at least 5 years ago, he said they'd have to play it so the rest of their set wouldn't suck so bad (he doesn't like IR), but they didn't play it. Anyway, Elijah Wood (Frodo!) was there! And, it's Radiohead, who I still love, but might try to see again some other time without 80,000 people around in a festival setting.
Off for today!
Posted by tomiandc at August 2, 2008 10:34 AM