Thursday, September 10, 2009

For Those About to Rock!


So my wife and I headed out to San Francisco for the Outside Lands Music Festival at Golden Gate Park at the end of August. We have a bunch of great friends who live in SF so it was an easy decision to head out for it. We landed on Friday at about 10:00 AM and got picked up by our friend Maglie. We headed back to her place so we could drop our stuff off, pack up some supplies, meet my buddy Oldie and then head to the show. When I say pack up supplies I mean we had to smuggle in some clear liquor into water bottles and then super glue the tops back on.

We made it through security with no incidents and started down the trail to the Polo grounds where the main stage is. After we got in we met up with my boy Flindle who arrived a few minutes after we did since he had to pass the day teaching SF's finest young academics. Along the way we passed a ton of very good looking food options, a wine tasting tent, a Visa Signature private tent and the beer stand. My only gripe with the refreshments was that there were only three kinds of beer options. Heinekin, Heinekin Light & Newcastle. Upon arriving at the Polo grounds we were immediately faced with a conflict. Should we head over and see Built to Spill on the main stage who I have seen a bunch of times or wander over to the smaller stage for the Los Campesinos show who I've never seen. I went with Built to Spill show with Oldie & Flindle while Maglie and my wife headed over to Los Campesinos show. BTS was very good but they really aren't the best band to play a main stage show at a festival since they spend most of the time shredding their instruments from the standing still position. My wife tells me this fairly often but apparently we look like the kind of guys someone wants to walk up to and offer to sell us some $5 joints, probably laced. This actually happened while we were standing around an empty field by ourselves. Weird. I don't think I look that scruffy I actually just really don't like to spend time or money getting a haircut. I've been like this since I was kid.

After the Main stage we decided to head over to Lindley Meadows for a flurry of acts. We started out with San Francisco's own The Dodo's who put on a good show. Next up was Blind Pilot who also put on a nice set of indie/folk/rock that was quite tasty. The third set was The National right about at dusk. I've listened to all of their albums but never seen them live so I didn't know what to expect. Much to my surprise they came out blasting. Song after song the deep baritone voice of lead singer Matt Berringer thumped out of the perfect acoustics of the Sutro stage. They didn't just bring their A Game they flat out stole the Friday show. Many a body part was rocked off Friday night. If they show up near you GO SEE THEM! We rounded out the night by seeing DC's Thievery Corporation who got the crowd pumping with a furious set of old classics. Oldie waded his way into the mosh that is Pearl Jam but we held strong at Thievery.

Saturday's show was a late start for us because we headed over to Oldie's place in Sausalito via the ferry after we hit the Farmer's Market. We had a quick little barbecue and then headed back to the park after a stop to refill the water bottle/vodka bottles. We walked in Via the Twin Peaks Stage to catch TV on the Radio who were putting on a good show but the sound system seemed a little of from one side. After TV on the radio we loaded up on Heinekin's and Newcastle and strolled over to what would soon become our favorite place, Lindley Meadow and the Sutro stage. Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band were playing what ended up being their second to last show. Their last show was later that night in downtown SF which we tried to rally for but missed. Oberst and the band put on an amazing show and since my buddy Happy has a total man crush on him we knew what to expect for this one. They did not disappoint. I don't know if it was the Vodka & Vitamin water which by the way is the new Gin & Juice or the $7 Newcastle's but we were feeling pretty lubricated and this set was blowing us away. After that we headed over to the main stage where Dave Matthews was playing. Not much to report there except I think the Black Eyed Peas came out and danced and Matthews sounded like he had lost his voice. All in all the Main stage shows were a Major disappointment. Exhausted we headed home and while we didn't rally to the Conor Oberst show we did make it down to the bar for one more completely unnecessary drink.
Sunday came a little early and I sprung out of bed because over on the East Coast my fantasy football draft was happening. It's safe to say I like draft day like Seth Rogen likes porn. After knocking out a few rounds of the draft I left it to the capable hands of my not so silent partner. He did a great job for Pittsburgh fan. After the draft we headed back to the park sans vodka bottles. We started out with the John Vanderslice set in Lindley Meadow which was a very good show albeit mellow. After that my wife and I went to the Solar stage for the Matt & Kim gig while the rest of the crew stuck around the meadow to see The Avett Brothers. The Matt & Kim stage and sound sucked but this duo put on a super entertaining show. They talked to the crowd a bit and spoke briefly of a tough decision they had to make this year to either get health insurance or a T-shirt gun. They went with a gun and I think this was the right call. Has there ever been a toy you'd rather blast you friends with more than a t-shirt gun? After this set we headed over to the main stage for Modest Mouse. I've seen the Mouse a few times and they never disappoint. They rocked and they rocked hard. I was afraid they might tone it down a bit to appeal to a wider audience but the brought out the heavy stuff and easily justified having two drummers. Next we headed up to the Ween set at the Twin Peaks stage for an hour. We manged to hear Your Party which was entertaining but I half expected to see David Sanborn himself come out and rock the saxophone but alas he did not. Funny side note there was some huge dude wearing a shirt that said "Fuck You hippies". We left that show early to head back our second home in Lindley Meadow because Band of Horses was up soon. We swung by the porta-potties where some dirty hippie was selling and I quote"$5 fatties" and actually had a line almost as long as the bathrooms. Only in San Francisco does this happen. We carved out a nice little space for Band of Horses and we were pretty psyched we did. They were amazing and completely stole the Sunday show for best band. The cool thing about the digital age is you can immediately tweet and post updates if a band is crushing it and then you see a steady stream of fans leaving one venue and heading the next. Pretty cool phenomenon. The show was so good they were the only non Main Stage bad to get an encore the entire show. Just awesome and don't miss them if they play near you! After that set we strolled back to main stage where Tenacious D was closing out the show. We saw a couple of songs but bailed early. Unfortunately they were the replacement act for the Beastie Boys having to cancel their show. The Beasties would have been an awesome close to an unbelievable weekend of music.

All in all this experience was amazing. I won't be craving Heineken any time soon and I'm pretty sure my boy Oldie won't be craving a cheese steak as he pulled of the trifecta of cheese steaks. In hindsight I don't think he ate anything but cheese steak the entire weekend. I'd like to head back next year as long as I can get my hands on some of those baby headphones for the impending little one. If I see another Heinekin I might throw up a bit in my mouth.