Lollapalooza '08 Day 1

Shit I saw yesterday at Lollapalooza:

A famous music writer: I was walking down the street from the Y to Grant Park (shit is mad convenient), and a reddish orange Honda Element pulled up to the stoplight right in front of where I was standing. Inside was Jim Derogatis, rock critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, and the guy who first wrote about the R. Kelly sex tape. I started to holler out, "Hey, Jim!" but that just would have been weird. Plus, the guy's not really a celebrity or anything. In fact, never mind my mentioning this shit.

Mad almost naked girls: It was as hot as a motherfucker. Not St. Louis hot (someone would have died), but probably as hot as it's ever been in Chicago. In order to beat the heat, a lot of broads were walking around in pretty much their underwear, if that. Which was sweet, since Lollapalooza draws a much hotter crowd of women than the Pitchfork Music Festival, where I was a couple of weeks ago. And I notice girls in Chicago, on average, are a lot more attractive than girls in St. Louis. Nothing against my girls in St. Louis. I'm just saying.

Not a whole lot of black folks: I might have seen three or four more black people at Lolla this year than I did at Pitchfork, but there were probably three times as many people here. It may have actually been a lower percentage overall. Then again, the only hip-hop I caught was the Canadian rapper K'Naan, who went on way earler. The Cool Kids played, but they were right in the middle of this three hour stretch where you could pretty much stand in one spot and catch Bloc Party, Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks, and Pavement.

A lot of people though: The ridonkulous heat didn't stop a shiteload of people from coming out. I noticed early on that there were more people than last year. And there were a lot of people here last year. More and more people showed up as it got closer to time for the evening's headliner, Radiohead. I read just now that yesterday was the first day Lolla actually sold out in the four years it's been here in Grant Park, and I'm assuming that's because of Radiohead, who haven't played here since 2001, when they played in the same field they did last night.

K'Naan: They stuck Canadian rapper in the worst time slot of the entire weekend. You had to have a good spot in the ridonkulous line outside Grant Park to even get in in time to catch him. Dude came out in a long sleeve button down shirt with a vest over it, as if he was in Canada or some shit. But you know how those African dudes find it cold here, even during the summer. His band consisted of a big African guy with some sort of drum, a guy with a guitar, and then his records playing back from a recording. But a lot of times, K'Naan would rap a capella, or only accompanied by the two guys with instruments. Anyway, dude really won over the crowd with his tales of growing up in war-torn Somalia, or wherever the fuck he's from.

Yeasayer: Maybe the highlight of my day yesterday - and keep in mind I caught Radiohead yesterday and mad other groups. And I don't generally listen to a lot of Yeasayer. I though their album, All Hour Cymbals, was cool, but not necessarily my kind of thing. It really comes to life when they play it live though. It's loud as fuck, and the dance rhythms are much more pronounced than when you're listening to it on a laptop computer. The lead singer, I noticed, kinda resembles a young Jonathan Richman. At least on a jumbotron.

Black Keys: Same story as Yeasayer. I was struck by how much I liked their new album, Attack and Release, not in the least because it was produced by motherfucking Danger Mouse. (I notice it's gotten a lot less pub than anything else hes' ever done - like the new Beck album, for instance.) But otherwise, I don't really listen to the Black Keys. Live, there weren't any Dangermouse-isms to be had. It's just the unabomber-looking lead singer/guitarist and the sweaty as fuck drummer. Kinda like the White Stripes, but without the memorable songs, and the design sense, and the drummer with the... well, you know.

Rogue Wave: Speaking of a group who could use several more songs I like, there was Rogue Wave. As you might suspect, their sound translates well to a live, outdoor setting. Some groups sound better in more intimate venues, while some groups really excel in big arenas and what have you. Rogue Wave fall into the latter category. They could be the next U2, if only they had more than three songs I give a shit about. Seeing them do "Lake Michigan" on Lake Michigan was admittedly rather cool though.

Cat Power: They has Cat Power playing on the same street busker stage K'Naan played earlier in the afternoon, I guess because the organizers knew good and well she isn't much of a live act. Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of the records. I even like Jukebox more than most albums that came out this year. But live, she's just not nearly as cool as she could be. It looked like she was still touring with the same three dudes I caught her with at P-fork last year. Their Stones-esque sound isn't bad per se, but it manages to be somewhat inappropriate for pretty much anything in her oeuvre.

Bloc Party: I debated sticking around the North side of the park to check out the Raconteurs, but I figured I'd never make it back South to catch Radiohead. This ended up working out well for me. Granted I've seen Bloc Party before, headlining Intonation back in '06, and I've never seen the Raconteurs. But you know what? I fucking like Bloc Party. Even that second album, which somehow managed to be even gayer than albums by groups only gay people listen to. Even Melissa Etheridge doesn't feel quite right listening to A Weekend in the City. Once you get past that though, it fucking cranks. Call me crazy, but I enjoyed their set more so than I did Radiohead.

Stephen Malkmus: There was a camera just behind the drummer for Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks, the broad who used to be the drummer for Sleater-Kinney, and she had on some kind of backless dress. So up on the jumbotron, all you kept seeing was her backfat jiggling in time to the music. The only thing that was worse was the music itself. Stephen Malkmus really ought to consider hanging it up.

Radiohead: Pretty much the same story as when I saw them here in St. Louis back in May or whatever, except the beer was half as much. And Radiohead might have been a bit worse. I think Thom Yorke was under the weather, and I know at one point he complained that the group was jetlagged. I figured they might play more older shit, since this was Lollapalooza, and obviously all of those people didn't show up to listen to motherfucking techno. But the setlist was about as heavy on In Rainbows shit as the show I caught earlier. They did play "The Bends" though, which was just awesome. I notice though that a lot of people just kinda stood while it was playing, looking perplexed. What a bunch of idiots.