I won't forget to cry at my own BURIAL (Lolla Days II & III)

Saturday the Eighth.
My first real concert was Brazilian Girls @ Starr Hill. It was strange and kind of wonderful. The lead singer had pantyhose over her face the entire time (til the end) and used makeup to gradually apply her "face" song after song. I thought it was so rad. I've always been a little self-conscious at concerts. Always at least a little bit. How hard should one dance? How indie does one have to be to be at this concert? When does one start/stop clapping with the crowd?
The self-consciousness has worn away a lot. But it's still been there slightly. It sounds totally stupid but when you've moved almost every year of your childhood, being self-conscious is like a disease.
At the start of Lollapalooza I mad a little breakthrough. I did whatever the fuck I wanted and didn't care about anyone else. No alcohol or drugs needed.
Get ready for a really long post.

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DAY II

Miike Snow: Day II. Fuck yes. Pumped. Miike Snow is at 1ish and is kinda already a music blog legend. His remixes (both by him and of his songs) are some hot shit on music blog aggregators. But this guy is actually 3 guys (counted more like 5 on stage but whatevs). They all came out in white masks. They sound even better live. After the intro synth bit, they start "Burial" After which they removed their masks. AMAZING. "Animal" and the others were just as great. A perfect kind of dark electropop for the beginnings of a hot summer afternoon. Going to be in D.C. soon. I might have to go. They added more processed synth treats and goodies to each song. DELICIOUS.

Got out of Miike Snow. Katie went to Ida Maria which sounded rockin and crazy. And I just wandered around when I saw the crowd and realized that Atmosphere just wasn't happening for me. Not at least in that heat. we ended up hanging out in "our" sweet spot of glorious shade behind Citistage to await the coming of Santigold on the other side of the park.

Santigold: I still kinda have trouble replacing the O with I but anyways. We waited for about an hour for her to get on (she was 8min late. believe me, in that heat, you count each second they don't show). I'd thrown out an emptyVitamin Water bottle. Bad idea. It was totally sweltering and I should have anticipated the pushy, high, crowd. Heat in the mid-90s, direct sunlight, 360degrees body heat surrounding you. When she arrived, SHIT HIT FAN. Her fierce-vintage styled African patterned pantsuit and tiara didn't quite match her sweet demeanor. First song descends, cue crowdsurfing. She was good, humble and sweet, and exactly as you'd expect her to sound live. The best part for me were her backup dancers. Black and beautiful, decked in shimmering gold blazers, they were no joke. When not booty popping themselves into oblivion + rockin out hard at the choruses, they were stone still. Santi's Gold Soldiers. FIERCE.

Lykke Li: After Santigold, we were on the verge of death, so we headed to get some cold fruit and water and then headed to our favorite spotbehind Citistage to chill in the shade and watch the rest of Lykke Li.
I love Sweden. Musically one of my favorite countries. Lykke Li is I think their most valuable import yet. Better live than on the ipod.
I watched this little blonde only two years older than me fling herself across the stage frantically, dancing and singing her ass off. Her voice was whispery sweet @ times, and at others she bellowed with this kind of hollow glow. One song started with a heavy drum beat to which she booty popped better than I've ever seen any white girl do (sorry white girls). My jaw literally dropped when the speakers blared Lil Wayne's "A Millie" and she started rappin. I freaked out a "litttle bit" (haha...). Def will see again. Plus her tshirts were so purely awesomeness that they were the first to run out @ the Lolla store. The Swedes do it again.

Animal Collective: Stayed for like 15 minutes. Random ass-shit. Took forever to actually start on songs. Not impressed. Lame.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs: Choice headliners for the night (Tool is not for me). Plus It's Blitz is pretty great. Karen O came out with a huge neon Native American headdress and the show started off with a bang. I can say with confidence that no one has the level of performance quality and kind of mesmerizing slow languid movement that Miss Karen O does. The entire set was electrifying. "Heads Will Roll" and "Zero" lit up the audience and the north field became a pulsing dancefloor. In the middle of the show they threw out these huge eyeball beach balls that could fit 20+ small children in it. Towards the ends, she paid tribute to the other bands and the Beastie Boys whom they were replacing. And then they started a great acoustic version of "Maps," during which she forgot the lyrics, which was cute. I never really completely liked "Maps" but this rendition was really poignant and sweet, mess-ups and all. Hope she wasn't too embarassed bc she was incredible. My head fell off when she almost swallowed her mic. Twice.

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DAY III

I keep saying that there's "no way today's going to be better than yesterday." False.

Ra Ra Riot + a little bit of Friendly Fires: I love strings. So it's only natural that I love Ra Ra Riot. They're only about a year old really. Their original drummer died a month before the album was released. Sad. Their music is great. Really evocative. The lead's voice is a bit generic but it's all made up for in the depth added by the cello and violin. Being such a new band I feel like they haven't fallen into being completely comfortable on stage yet. It shows for most of the band (esp. violinist I feel) except the cellist. She looked like she's been performing for large crowds since early childhood. They sounded absolutely great but didn't invoke the excitement of the crowd as well as say Lykke Li or Other Lives, who are also fairly new. For me, that morning was a dilemma because Ra Ra Riot was on one side of the park and Frienly Fires on the other. Ra Ra Riot had the string, but Friendly Fires was British and I was unlikely to see them ever. So I popped out after "Dying is Fine" and made my way to Friendly Fires. As soon as the crowd started thinning "Ghost Under Rocks" made its way out of the speakers. I yelled "fuck" so loud several people turned heads. Just my luck that one of my faves comes on as soon as I decide leave. Oh well. friendly Fires proved to actually not be that great of an idea. I made it to hear the end of "On Board" and song "Paris". Sounded great but I really wasn't in the mood for dance-rock. At all. Should have stuck to my original decision. In the end Ra Ra Riot wins. Their searing albeit slightly stage-awkward renditions of my faves "Can You Tell" "Winter '05" "Manner to Act" and "St. Peter's Day Festival" were just close-your-eyes-and-let-the-music-fill-you beautiful.

Behind Citistage: No not a band. Our fave spot. We decided to opt out of risking heat stroke for Bat for Lashes. Better off today because we'd bought a water sprayer, which made us pretty popular with other people. Still it was the third day, and we were tired of the constant speedwalking from one stage to the other. We opted for some delicious fro-yo and chillin for a few hours under some trees. We stayed there until about 4ish when it was time to start waiting for Passion Pit. While I was sitting there, admiring a girl who looked startlingly like Camille slowly spin a hula hoop up and down her body, this guy in a purple shirt, skinny jeans, and a fro was wandering around behind the stage. I blinked. HOLY ASS POPSCICLES. It was Michael Angelakos, frontman and creator of Passion Pit. I outwardly remained composed and tried to discretely pretend to take a picture of the chain-link fence. He saw me. LOL AT MY LIFE.

Passion Pit: I have been quietly obsessing over this band for about half a year. I DLed all their songs one by one off different blogs way before the album was released. I swear I have like 5 remixes of "The Reeling" alone. When I wove my way to the second row, Gang Gang Dance was still on, and maybe it was my embarassment at having been discovered taking that picture or my general impatience, but I strongly disliked Gang Gang Dance. I have a feeling that most of the crowd wasn't really that into them either because when they went offstage, the people didn't move. Most of them had stayed for Passion Pit.
Passion Pit started to set up. EXCITEMENT and nervousness. I didn't want to disappointed in one of my faves. There was no need to worry. Once they got on stage the crowd went totally wild I was impressed by how many people knew ALL the lyrics. I have never been pushed around and danced on so hard in my life, not even during Girl Talk. More than 20 crowd surfers made their way over my head in the course of the next hour. And this was just where I was standing. Imagine that X20. Not joking. The security guards were frenzied making sure that people were doused with cold water and catching and picking up the crowdsurfers. After a particular song, they looked exhausted and exclaimed "Fuck this shit." Obviously they were not anticipating the power of Passion Pit and its rabid fans. It's Lolla's fault for putting them on such a small stage.
As for the music, the sheer power of each of the songs on the crowd was ABSURD. At each song the crowd erupted, especially "Sleepyhead." During "Little Secrets" the chorus part where children are singing was completely and solely sung by everyone in the audience, an effect that was so awesome my head imploded just a little. And then one of the last songs (Maybe "The Reeling"? I forget) there was a part where the music stopped, the band froze, and for a few seconds it felt like the rest of the world had frozen along with them. Only to start back up again when the music commenced and Angelakos lept and stomped back down on stage. They were so intense and awesome that were broke their kickdrum, LOL, and had to borrow from Deerhunter.
After the show had ended I stood there as most people were leaving, drenched in the sweat of a hundred people, my vneck shirt now hanging below one boob, staring in awe at the place where I just had my mind blown.

Snoop Dogg: LOL

The Killers: I had no idea what Jane's Addiction sounds like and Katie and Francesca love The Killers so that was that. I was prepared to not like the Killers. I had dismissed them as a high school fling, a stepping stone to better music. First of all, their stage was incredible, with phenomenal lightwork and video. Brandon Flowers is gorgeous, and his voice is very nice. It wooed me. I was pleased that they played a lot of old stuff from Hott Fuss. I love the way they told a story about how they found each other and how the drummer gave Flowers a sampler of 5 tunes..."and one of them started like this..." Thus began Mr. Brightside. At one point Mr. Flowers sat down at a piano and played real pretty the chords to "Smile Like You Mean It" while some asian guy not in the band played violin. A minute later the song became the booming anthem that we're familiar with. I couldn't deny that these guys had charisma and could put on a pretty sick show. The last song, "When You Were Young" was ferociously received by the audience and near the end, fireworks streamed from the back of the stage. Hot shit. I'd forgotten how fun The Killers are. I'm officially back in love.

On the way to Union Station, the pilgrimage of people all going in the same direction whooped and hollered and clapped furiously to the end of a fantastic three days of music. I'm still in awe. I'll have this Lolla high for a while. And I'll certainly never forget it.