Bonnaroo-porting, Concluded

Here's the final installment of the report from the field at Bonnaroo in Tennessee. My apologies for not posting on Friday; 'twas a busy day. Similarly, my apologies for leaving a note clarifying that no, Franz Ferdinand is a dead man, and the band is named after him.

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SUNDAY DAY

By now we are all completely exhausted. We are content to find a spot further from the stages, where we can lay out a tapestry and nap through shows. Wolfmother and The Decemberists both please (though The Decemberists is another band I wish I could see at a smaller venue). The steal comes with Wilco however, who obviously enjoy their time on stage. I don’t think I have ever heard a better live sound, and Jeff Tweedy is the songwriter of this generation.

CONCLUSION

It’s tricky to cover Bonnaroo with four pages of shitty journalism. You have to be there during the day, and you have to be there during the night (because they are distinct universes). You have to be there, losing count of how many times you are offered drugs. Losing count of the topless hippies. You need to realize just how divine an intervention a cold cup of freshly squeezed lemonade is.

The only thing I really want to impress is that though there were well over 100 performances, the music is only half of the experience. The other half is being completely removed from modern America for four days. The culture is so wildly removed that it really does seem that you are in another universe. Have you ever turned in a circle and seen literally tens of thousands of people walking around you, every one enjoying themselves? One hundred thousand strangers instantly turned neighbor by virtue of Bonnaroo. That’s one hell of a drug.

-jpm

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Hope everyone enjoyed that. Tomorrow, I'll have my write-up on the no-frills Police show I saw last Wednesday. Until then, it's back to the daily groove in the office.