Friday
We rolled into the Pole Yard Parking in the early afternoon, we had heard nightmarish stories from those people trying to come on Thursday and Friday morning so we were a little concerned with what we would face. Apparently, we arrived at a perfect time we faced no major traffic delays and were able to park with no issue. We boarded the shuttle after a little delay as people brought way to much stuff and cramming on a yellow school bus with backpacks, tents and sleeping bags made the drive to the festival site hot and uncomfortable. We got off the bus and were told where we needed to go for camping, carrying a ton of gear we started the lengthy walk to the campsite. After many stops to readjust and pick up fallen gear we made it to an open plot of land to set up camp. Thankfully, Metric was on the main stage and we were able to listen to most of their set while setting up. I being a great camper, set up my tent and such in a few minutes and as I do at festivals ditched everyone else off in search of music.
Metric had finished their set by this time so I wandered to the Lillooet Stage which was the side stage. Shearwater had just started their set so I grabbed some dusty dusty ground and watched the set. The set was good, very much like their album a subdued set would have been great to take a nap to if it hadn't been so incredibly dusty. During the break between Shearwater and The Secret Machines I wandered back to the Mount Currie Stage (the main stage) to watch Wolfmother. I have seen Wolfmother before at the Sasquatch Music Festival, it was virtually the exact same show as two years ago. They put on a good rock show sounding much like their album. The have a great energy on the stage and are certainly a fun band to watch live.
I headed back to the Lillooet Stage for The Secret Machines as I wanted to get close to the front, I was looking forward to checking out this band as I listened to some streaming tracks on their Myspace page and they sounded pretty good.
The show didn't disappoint, it was great. A three piece band they put on a good rock show the lead guitar player was a lot of fun to watch as he clearly played air guitar when we was younger. When he hit the higher notes you could see he was making the sounds like an air guitarist would, it was great. They were probably the highlight of bands on Friday for me. It was fun to be at the front for the concert and I was surrounded by their fans who clearly knew all the songs quite well.
After Secret Machines it was time to wander back for Serj Tankian, I was looking forward to seeing him, however at this point was I getting pretty tired from the drive up and the first few concerts so I chilled out a the back of the masses to listen and enjoy. Serj Tankian's show was very good, he is certainly a good performer and a wonderful musician. Naturally, their were a lot of political statements made which got a little old as the set went on. The crowd was buzzed when he played his hits and I was certainly feeling it when he played "Feed Us" which is my favorite Serj track.
After that I made a quick stop at the other stage to catch a song by Kathleen Edwards which was great and I am sure the rest of her show was just as great, but long drives on a sketchy highway and a lot of sensory overload made my body scream for a nap. So back to the campsite I went for a quick nap so I could stay up for the NIN set, I missed Interpol which I wasn't that concerned with as I am not a big Interpol fan.
NIN put on another great live show, I saw them two years ago at Sasquatch and it still measured up to that performance. Trent Reznor plays a great live show and the the light show was fantastic. Everyone was rocking out pretty good, probably stoned out of their minds as most of the concert goers seemed to be. NIN capped off a great start to the concert even though the dust was horrible and a lot of people were quite grumpy with the transportation issues from earlier.
Saturday
I woke up early on Saturday, we wandered around the camp ground got some coffee and breakfast. The camp grounds were very well behaved and everyone respected everyone else which was great. The garbage and portable toilets were starting to feel the effects of 40,000 people and the company in charge were doing a very poor job in taking care of things, this trend would continue through the entire weekend.
I spent the entire early afternoon/evening at the Lillooet Stage, to catch all the indie bands. Brazilian Girls cancelled their set due to a "schedule conflict". So the sets all started later then expected. Low vs. Diamond whose album was released today, came on stage and put on a fantastic show, they were clearly an emerging band as they were just as excited to be their as we were to watch them. They were taking pictures of us and thanking us a lot during their set, very cool band and great sound. Check out their album, kinda generic but a good sound all the same.
Carolina Liar was next up, they didn't really impress me at all. If Low vs. Diamond was generic these guys were one step up. Kind of a cross between the Killers and Theory of a Deadman, I did not enjoy them very much. In the middle of that set I made my one stop at the beer gardens to drink my dust filled $7 beer and headed back to get a good spot for Mates of State.
Mates of State were so much fun! It is hard to pick a highlight from Saturday but this show would have been close for sure. I was hanging with some great people and they put on a high energy, extremely fun show. They got a big turn out from the as all the set times were conflicting and they got the break between Sam Roberts Band and My Morning Jacket. We were very close to the front for the show and it was fun to watch the people dance along to the songs.
Now came the highlight of Saturday. Buck 65 took the stage and blew every one's mind. This was the 12th time I have seen him and he never disappoints, a great show with a ton of energy, as we were sitting around the camp site later that night, everyone was still talking about the Buck 65 show. He told some great stories about the not so glamorous state of the artist port-a-potty and was fairly graphic in his description which he blamed Sam Roberts and Gord Downie for. He played his favorites such as "Wicked and Weird" which got the crowd jumping, he was one of the few artists I saw where the crowd was demanding another song, however due to the time schedules no encores happened.A quick pit stop at the campsite for some food and I headed back for Black Mountain, ran into some friends who were also going for the show so went with them to watch a great Canadian band. I saw Black Mountain earlier this year, but we left before the show was over as it was a Tuesday concert and it was late and I am old. This time I got to see the entire set.
It was great, a few songs in they played "Angels" which is one of my favorite songs and they finished with "Tyrants" which in my opinion has one of the best intros to a song ever. Great drums and an amazingly deep guitar sound. It was a great live show and they are certainly a better outdoor venue band then inside a club. They need that open air to really bring out their true sound. Check Black Mountain out live if you get a chance.It was a bit of a break between sets and so it was off for some horrible festival food, even though it was perogies and sausages it was pretty greasy and gross. But at least the coffee was good and surprisingly the sandwiches weren't too bad either.
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers finished off the night and they were Awesome! Such a great show, experience counts for a lot. He played a ton of his hits and it was a great sing-a-long. during "Free Fallin" the crowd nearly drowned Petty out and it was great. A perfect way to finish of Saturday and a great concert to add to the list of artists I have seen. After all the shows and putting up with drunk, high people it was pretty much straight to bed for the final day.
Sunday
The final day, started off a little wet after a night of rain and it was nice to keep the dust down. The garbage had piled up so much it was disgusting and the toilets were overflowing to the point that it was the constant topic to hear.
Vampire Weekend kicked things off for the final day on the main stage. They were good, although their set seemed quite rushed. I was in a pocket of fellow Vampire Weekend fans so we had a great sing-a-long session. They played about half of their debut album and covered all the best songs. They didn't banter with the crowd much, but put on a good show. I would see them again perhaps at a smaller venue. I went to the Rogers tent to charge my phone and made it back in time to see N.E.R.D.
N.E.R.D was the exact same as a few weeks ago at the Kanye West show. They put on a solid live show with high energy, Pharrell did his customary track upon which all the whorish girls from the front come up on stage to grind with him and lick his chest....yeah. The show ran long which put all the other shows behind schedule. A little bit of a piss off for those who wanted to see Coldplay and DJ Shadow.
Death Cab for Cutie came on and where I was the audio was distorted and horrible, it also wasn't a good follow up to N.E.R.D or a good lead in to Jay Z. So I headed back to the camp for some food and a break for the day. Thankfully, I was getting text message updates from Rogers and was set the new set time for Jay Z. It was nice to relax a little bit and I wasn't feeling very well after the constant crappy food and lack of healthy food. But after some Advil my stomach settled down and I was ready for Jay Z.
Jay Z!!!!!! This show was my highlight for Sunday. It was crazy good, he played his hits, he played his hooks and got the whole crowd singing "Umbrella". It was a crazy high energy show everyone around us were dancing and throwing up the rock, including me! It is very fun to throw up the rock, you should give it a try. The surprising thing was that there was no collab between Chris Martin and Jay Z. For a time it sounded like there was going to be one, the crowd was calling for "Beach Chair" to be played but we were out of luck. It was wicked though that Jay Z brought Memphis Bleek out for some tracks it was awesome.
Finally, Coldplay took the stage. They put on a great show, had the whole crowd going nuts and singing along to every song. They did a great two song performance from the small sound stage in the middle of the crowd, this got me pretty close to them, not as close as row 3 during their Rush of Blood tour a number of years ago. They played their hits "Yellow", "Fix You", "The Scientist" and "Clocks" and covered their newer songs on Viva la Vida. It was a really good show and a great way to finish off the weekend. By the time I got back to the campsite we were all pretty exhausted and hit the tents for a early start to Monday morning. It was an early start and things went smoothly on the way home. It was great, Trant and I had some good sing a longs in the car that made the 11 hour drive a lot nicer. Overall, the concerts were great, the people were good and the filth and garbage was horrible. It made for a good experience, but there are certain things that this festival will have to fix for this to run for year and years.I kept out some of the most horrible scenes I saw at the festival, whether your high or not you should never ever do some things in public! Don't believe the media in the fact that the festival goers created all that mess, if there were more garbage cans and recycling areas it would not have been so bad. But, there were maybe 20 garbages on the festival grounds and they got emptied at the end of the day, 40,000 people can create a lot of waste in a short time. The camp garbages were not emptied all weekend and the port-a-potties were cleaned sporadically. I hope you enjoyed the review, I hope you check out some of the bands you haven't heard of and let me know what you think. There will be no New Music for the next week or so as I am running Death Race this coming weekend and it's going to take a while to recover from.
-Dave
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