So...Bonnaroo: Day 3

Day 0 (Thursday) recap
Day 1 recap
Day 2 recap
Pictures from Day 1
Pictures from Day 2
Pictures from Day 3
Gothamist review of Day 1
Gothamist review of Day 2
Gothamist review of Day 3

Ok, day three. This might take a while, so bear with me. Wake up after a very acceptable 5 hours of sleep or so. It's a little bit cooler than the previous days, tho the tent is still an oven. A little breezy when I go outside. Rain coming, perhaps? I remember looking at a weather report before leaving and it saying this was a possibility. Anyway, nothing eventful this morning. We strip down the tents, pack everything up quickly, and it rains.

I put on this American Apparel shell I always trick myself into thinking is waterproof, and it was a light enough rain the the illusion held up for a little while longer. Anyway, sooner or later we head in to Centeroo and plan on meeting up with the Michigan girls later on. Turns out that'd be the last we'd see them, cause when I called one of them a few hours later, they were already on the road heading back. Oh well. They were funny. We hooked up on myspace once we all got home, so maybe we'll stay in touch. TBD.

We plan on hanging out during the day and catching the shuttle bus back after Sonic Youth and before Phil and Friends. I leave all our stuff back in the press area. People were leaving laptops and personal items around there all weekend, didn't think it'd be that big a deal. And it wasn't. Everyone back there was too busy doing their own thing to pay attention. Nonetheless, I make a point to poke back there every couple hours throughout the day to make sure everythings cool. It always was.

It was another great day of music. I was running out of energy tho after 3 days of this shit. I wanted to fight to the front for every set and rock out, but I really couldn't bring myself to it. Got up for BYO Pet, then for the rest I snuck in the sides near the stages and couldn't get much closer. I resorted to sitting back and listening to these bands a lot. It just got to be too much.

A couple backstage moments to mention. First, right after BYO Pet, who I finally was really able to get into, (and subsequently, have been listening to the album more since) I see two of the kids doing an interview with John Norris for MTV. There were a lot of artists back there all weekend, and I more or less minded my own business and kept my camera away, but this was too good. I also saw a very wasted Drea de Mateo stumbling around right around the same time at like 2:00 in the afternoon, hanging on to boyfriend Shooter Jennings. That was funny. People all weekend had seen her and said she is (Ohmagah!) so much hotter in person than she is on TV(!) I thought she looked exactly the same as she does on TV. I mean, come on...she's such a cartoon character of a hot girl. A Jessica Rabbit, if you will. It doesn't change for people like that.

Sorry, sidetrack. One thing back there that did piss me off was Matisyahu's shtick. He's the worst self promoting publicity hog ever. I started writing this whole rant on that dude, but I don't think I'm gonna end up posting it. He's just such a self aware gimmick. And an attention whore. And he gets away with it cause people are scared of the religious thing. 2 things...One, having lunch with all your hassid friends in full garb IN THE PRESS AREA just to make sure that every Journalist and Photographer will see you and take a picture is too much for me. Second was at the press conference, while on stage with Phil Lesh, Mike Skinner, Steve Earle at first to, completely unprovoked, sing a Hebrew prayer into the mic over his bottle of water. You know, just in case you didn't realize he was Jewish. Do that shit on your own time, man. If you actually forgot to bless your goddamn water, mutter the prayer to the side or under your breath. Show some humility, please. It's embarrassing.

But the rest of the day is fine. Until we realize the shuttle bus back to the airport isn't running till 6am the next morning, we have no backup plan and all our gear is packed up. All nighter!!! I was kind of excited. Colin was not. We consider maybe getting a ride with those two girls, but that wouldn't have worked for a number of reasons. Nobody else I know is going back in that direction.

I was really not looking forward to seeing Phil Lesh, but there was nothing else to do, so we all head up and lay out a blanket towards the back of the main stage area. I was so ready to be bored out of my mind, I even made a point to make sure my game boy was accessible. But, as it turns out, Phil Lesh is pretty awesome and plays Dead songs the whole time. I dig the Dead, so that's was very cool. We were dancing around and enjoying ourselves...then it rained. POURED! I was so caught off guard. My pretend rain shell finally proved completely useless and I was completely drenched. Yikes.

We all leave a bit early and duck under some concession stand area to get out of the rain. I fear for my gameboy and Camera, tho it seemed my Sidekick was the ultimate causality from the storm. It's been completely broken and worthless ever since then. I had one clean, dry shirt left and a dirty, but dry and warm hoodie that I threw on. By this point the rain had slowed down a bunch, and the girls and their guy friend decide it's time to go home. It's like a little after 11 at this point. Our bus isn't until 6am. Our flight isn't until nearly 3:00 the next afternoon. God, this was such a bad idea. We head back to help them all pack up and head out. The idea is floated once again to hitch a ride to DC, then take a train home, but after seeing the car all loaded up, it wasn't gonna happen. We say goodbye, they take off, and Colin and I head back in to get our duffel.

I grab the duffel (which was dry, thank god. I randomly moved it from behind some van to inside the actual press tent, just to get it out of the way. Glad I did) and we head back up to where we went to get out of the rain. There are a few people laying around under there. I crack open my last monster and Colin and I try not to think about what we're going to do for the next 15 hours without a tent or a place to stay till our flight takes off. Finally, sometime around 1, a security guard comes around and tells us the mounted cops are gonna come through, and we should get out of Centeroo. He pokes the rest of the people laying around and tells them the same thing. One Bonnaroo all-star gets woken up, and without skipping a beat scoops a big key and BLOWS A GIANT RAIL right there and is up and on her way! Not 3 seconds after the guy woke her up. I don't even think he got to finish explaining why she had to move. Good God. Those keys should be bronzed and sent directly to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

With nothing left to do and nowhere to go, we wander over to where the bus was supposed to pick us up. There were two girls from New Hampshire already there waiting. They were super nice, just like everyone else we met all weekend. There was also this hippie ninja hiding in the woods the whole time with his face totally wrapped up in tshirts so all you could see were his eyes. We didn't talk to him, but the dude never went to sleep. he just sat back and watched all night.

So the girls got our hopes up by saying they heard the bus was leaving every hour from the spot. They were unfortunately proven wrong quickly, as nothing came. The bus stop was right on a corner between the main camping grounds and another one that was a bit further down. We got to see quite the cast of characters walk past all night. At the end of this dark road, there were just a bunch of giant spotlights. It looked like that part in the Truman show that he gets to right before the world ends. We never knew where it went, but we never really wanted to know. It was the end. All we knew was that the Bus was gonna come from there sooner or later. Later, really.

We befriend a couple of the security guards while we're sitting around. One of which was telling us some creepy shit about the festival. Everyone at this point had heard about the two public deaths. One was a kid that got hit by Ricky Scaggs tour bus on the highway. The other was a guy who fell off the back of a pickup truck, hit his head on the road and died. Scary kinda, but stuff like that happens. What THEY don't tell you is apparently of all of the unreported ODs. Since the festival grounds are open 24 hours, people end up not making it back to camp (if they have a camp to begin with.) He told us that every morning, security walks around the tents and stages and pokes everybody who is just down there passed out. Most get up and go somewhere else. Some simply don't wake up. They are quietly airlifted out of the grounds before most people are awake. I guess their taken to a hospital, but they are presumed dead. He personally knew of 5 people from Saturday night. That's some scary shit, if you ask me. You come down to roo for the weekend, get really stoned for 72 hours straight, and when you finally come down, you realize one of your friends is dead. Can you imagine? Gosh. Drugs suck.

There were some lighthearted moments, as well. One of the girls asked to check out my ipod, which of course currently has TWO Taking Back Sunday Albums. Oops. I got my speakers out and we jammed out to some Lo-Fi-Fnk and Godspeed You! Black Emperor for a bit. Neither was much of a hit with the crowd. At some point in the evening, this redneck kid walks by all hepped up and says "Hey guys, can I get a Beer? Some n_gger just punched me in the face" Huh? Whoh. Slow down buddy. You just don't hear that kind of talk every day. Before anyone got to ask him what was going on, he confesses he "Tried to steal his bowl, but whatever." We tell him we don't have any more beer, but there were some cans of salmon, tomato paste and pineapples in the food drive box that was set up nearby. He grabs the pineapple (thank god) and just starts WHALING on a metal gate with it till a hole in the side. he sucks out the juice runoff, throws the can away near the unflinching ninja, mutters "Fucking n_ggers" under his breath and runs off. We all were kinda speechless for a good 20 minutes. What on earth just happened?!?! Are you kidding me? Did that really happen? Did he really just say that? Jesus, where are we?

After that, and running into a number of other colorful (tho not that colorful) kids walking back and forth, I get into my sleeping bag cause it's cold and I'm still pretty wet from the waist down, and end up dozing off by the side of the road for about an hour or so. Colin, who snagged the last red bull, stays up chatting with the security guy.

At about a quarter to 6, the bus shows up. a line had formed behind us. The girls had passed out, the ninja was still crouched in the woods keeping an eye on things and the security guy basically made it his business to make sure nobody got in line in front of us. We get on and I pass out right away again till we get to the airport.

Once there, at around 7:00 or so Monday morning, Colin has the great idea to, instead of checking in right away, sneaking into this bathrooms on the baggage claim level. There's obviously nobody down there this early. We get to use a functional toilet and real running water for the first time since early Thursday. Amen. It was generally not nearly as satisfying as I would have hoped, but it made a big difference getting thought the next 13 hours till we get back to the apartment.

From there it was pretty uneventful. After a failed attempt to get on standby for an earlier flight, I pass out for a good 4 hours near our gate. That was the best night sleep I had gotten in 5 days, pretty much. A short three hours later, the plane starts to board, we get on, fall asleep again, and are home by 8:00. The first thing I think to do, after taking a nice long shower, is download the video of the My Morning Jacket set.

I miss it, I'll tell ya. Even with all the travel wrinkles, it couldn't have gone smoother. The whole place is run with no rules at all, yet everything goes off pretty smoothly and without incident.  It's so obvious how something like Woodstock 99 could happen, but when it's run correctly, it just seems to work itself out. Everyone we met and hung out with was unrealistically fun, friendly and happy to help if we needed anything. It was great to surround myself with great music all day long without having to read and hear 20 peoples reactions and opinions immediately after. There is NO WAY I could take in music like that in New York. It was so refreshing. It makes me want to get out and do this more often. Hopefully one more time somewhere this summer. At the very latest, Bonnaroo 2007.

Comments

[Chris]

Bravo.

My favorite part of the entire Bonnaroo series is the hippie ninja. Classic

[pete]

great write-ups man. it was great to hear the bonnaroo experience through a first-timers eyes. i'm glad you had so much fun. a week later, and i'm still coming down from it. the land, the people, the music, it's all magical and i will be there every year.

[information leafblower]

Sounds like a blast. Although I think you've convinced me to never go. Me and camping don't mix.
But great write ups man. I've really enjoyed them.

[sf]

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