Bonnaroo. I don't even know where to start. It was an even bigger adventure than I ever thought it would be. In that sense it parallels a lot of the experiences I've had abroad, which, for some reason, I've never quite had in the US. Something about being abroad simply made me more flexible, more willing to fall into these kinds of crazy situations. I'm more cautious when I'm home.
In any case, last week on Wednesday morning, I was ready to head out for Manchester, Tennessee with a couple of strangers I met on the internet (
not as sketchy as it sounds). After a few hours of waiting, I started becoming a little impatient. Turns out, my ride and I would not be leaving until after 8:00 in the
evening (a little mix-up there, because I had assumed morning...it is after all, an eight hour or more drive). So we had a fun little night drive, other than the fact that I was so nervous the guy driving was going to fall asleep at the wheel that I stayed up nearly all night long to keep an eye on him. He held out for a good while but eventually we all took turns at the wheel. I drove the last couple hours and then we were there (at around 8:00 AM - long night!).
I met up with my friend from study abroad, Ellie, getting my stuff situated and then we hit the town. Or centeroo, that is. There was no one I was particularly excited about on Thursday but it was a good chance to get situated and work out where everything was. The stages were humorously named but unnecessarily complicated and the joke got old quickly: This Tent, That Tent, The Other Tent, What Stage, Which Stage. You can probably guess the confusion that developed whenever people asked for directions...
After an exhausting 40 hours of travel and exploration on about two hours of sleep, I collapsed back at the tent I was staying at with Ellie and her friends. Over the course of the next few days, I saw so many amazing bands, some I'd been looking forward to from the second I bought my ticket and others I'd never heard of before. The Kooks were really fun, although they were only given about an hour of stage time. I loved it when the crowd sang along with
Seaside. I stumbled across Afrocubanism, Fiest, and Blind Pilot, all of which were really good. Rodrigo y Gabriela and C.U.B.A. were great. I was surprised to see how shy Gabriela was when she addressed the crowd because she plays with so much passion that it is almost as if the audience knows all her secrets anyway! At one point, she started a song very enthusiastically (jumping around and dancing) but the whole band just stood silently and watched her. Rodrigo walked towards her, gesturing her to stop but it took a few seconds to get her to realize what was going on - she was playing the wrong song. She hid her face away from the crowd in embarrassment and took a few seconds to compose herself before starting again. The crowd was forgiving and they went on, finishing up an amazing set! Small sample of their performance
here.
One of the most boisterous (and kind of violent) performances I have ever been to was the Flogging Molly concert. Which, ya know, it would. Anyways, I'm glad I had a small buffer between myself and the
people dancing/fighting/pushing each other. There was a lot of
crowd surfing too, which was all good and fun, although I was a little worried for the girl with a cast on one arm and a beer in the other. Deciding between
Dispatch and the
Red Hot Chilli Peppers was painful, although I managed to get some of both.
Skrillex was...interesting to see, but I did not really get the point of a concert like that at a festival like Bonnaroo. Or any festival really. Isn't that what clubs are for?
My all time favorite concert was
Bon Iver. The reason I even found out about Bonnaroo was because of this song:
Blood Bank. I've always liked Bon Iver, but when I saw the youtube videos of Justin Vernon playing at Jazzfest this year (you know, just to catch up on everything I was missing), I knew I had to see Bon Iver playing that song. Bon Iver's live performances are just leagues ahead of their CDS. A little research and I found Bonnaroo, which not only had Bon Iver, but a multitude of other bands I'd been wanting to see. Anyways, I managed to get right close up to the stage by waiting in line for three hours (with the
Beach Boys to kill the time). The ground was soggy with water and mud and it reeked so badly I couldn't even identify what the smell could possible be, but it was
all worth it! Just. Amazing. I feel like part of me died and came back to life during that concert, which hopefully isn't a too overly dramatic statement.
Anyways, when it ended I'm pretty sure I was in shock. Ellie dragged me along with her to the
Civil Wars concert, which took me a little bit of time to transition into because I was still dazed from Bon Iver. It was good concert though and Joy Williams was so pregnant that their roadies were taking bets on whether or not she would go into labor while on stage. Soon after, we went back to the campsite. Ellie and her group were heading off to spend the night at a town a ways outside of Manchester while I had to gather my stuff. I wasn't meeting with the zimride guys until around midnight, after the Phish concert -
the last concert of Bonnaroo - so I sat down amongst the crowd with all my stuff, snuggled into my sleeping bag because it was cold, and set up my umbrella because of the rain. It was a nice setup but I was a little paranoid about falling asleep - what if I didn't wake up until long after the concert had ended, and everyone left without me? However, despite some troubles, I managed to find the zimride guys and, after catching some sleep, we set off the next morning. Alabama, Mississippi, and home!
UPDATE
One of my new favorite websites:
Music Festival Junkies
