Shawty Say I Look Like a Lolla-pop

I hate crowds, I hate humidity, and I hate the sound quality at outdoor concerts, and yet, the IRS convinced me to stimulate the economy with $200 in order to attend this year's Lollapalooza. The music festival/chaos factory will be taking place in Chicago's Grant Park August 1st-3rd and really, the only reason I'm going (besides that sweet sweet government-issued check) is that I love my friends from Chicago/Milwaukee so much, and I was under the impression they weren't going to Pitchfork's fest this year (they changed their minds after I bought my Lolla ticket, the bastards). Seeing as how I can't justify going to Chicago twice, plus after buying overpriced bottled water in 90-degree weather once I wouldn't regain the strength to foolishly do it again for at least another year, I'm going to have accept my destiny to attend the more corporate live music behemoth. The fest announced its official lineup and schedule this week and it's looking like I'm going to have to make some epic decisions, as many of the best artists are conveniently playing at the same damn time on competing stages. I'll try my best to write out my problems and decide, but I will definitely input from you people!

The Cool Kids vs. CSS vs. Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks: I've never had a good experience with outdoor hip-hop, but The Cool Kids' incredibly zany and cheerful brand of experimental nerdcore rap could break the trend. I'll be seeing the spastic electro-dance pop of CSS in the Minneap this July before I head down to Lolla, but I'm almost positive this is what most of my friends will want to see, and a part of me feels lame for ditching my friends who are housing me for the weekend in order to see a different act (plus dancing with Pat is guaranteed fun). Then again, even though Pavement is still my standby "favorite band" answer, I have never seen Malkmus live in the flesh. It's mostly because I don't care for his solo/Jicks work, but I've heard they play a couple Pavement songs every once in a while, so it might be worth it just to hear one live. Also, the fact that the legendary band in question might have single-handedly been responsible for Lolla's initial demise back in mid-90s alone makes me want to see Malkmus react to a sweaty populous (you're going to want to click that link if you want to see one of the best guitarists of all time, Spiral Stairs, moon and give mud-covered grunge fans the finger). What To Do: Unless I get obsessed with Cool Kids' Bake Sale album the more I listen, I'll try to convince someone to see Malkmus with me, as long as people are cool with splitting up (with varying musical tastes between five gents, it'll have to happen at some point, yes?).

Booka Shade vs. MGMT vs. DeVotchka: While two guys with laptops certainly wouldn't be the most visually arresting, Booka Shade's wonderfully deep electro-house will surely boom magnificently into the blazing sun, causing me to lose my brain and possibly perform my first non-wedding worm (emphasis on the possibly). Then again, MGMT can get pretty dance-inducing, though they're also ridiculously annoying and I can only stand a few of their songs (but those songs I can stand are insidiously infectious). Once again, they're the band most people will want to see, however. But then there's the haunting chamber-pop outfit DeVotchka, who I've never gone crazy over, but whose grand orchestration replete with accordions, horns, and harmonizing vocals, could definitely keep the eyes and ears plenty busy in the middle of the afternoon. What To Do: MGMT's set-up might also be complexly impressive (plus Kevin Barnes-esque flamboyance to boot) so unless someone is willing to give Booka a chance, I'll stick this one out with the bigger fans of the frustrating quasi-acronymic band, if only to catch a magnified whiff of the "Time to Pretend" riff in a larger setting.

Broken Social Scene vs. Lupe Fiasco vs. Battles: Definitely the hardest decision to make throughout the whole weekend. Broken Social Scene, while I'm not gaga over the self-titled disc, put out one of my favorite albums of all time: You Forgot It In People. Unfortunately, I've seen this band a ridiculous amount of times and as enjoyable as they are to watch bumble around as a carefree collective on stage, they always tend to get political and ranty, which is one of my pet peeves. I saw Lupe at the Intonation Festival a couple years ago and didn't know who he was, but he had a guy ride a segway back and forth on the stage while he rapped, which was awesome. But I didn't know his songs and like all outdoor rap, as mentioned before, it just kind of went one ear and out the other. So after listening to The Cool more than any other mainstream hip-hop album ever, and simply loving the fact that such a smart and intellectual rapper has taken the world by storm, I am itching to see him and get into it this time. Oh but of course art-rock sensations Battles, who I've never seen and will surely marvel my mind grapes with intense math-rock drumming and insane keyboard/guitar looping work, have to be playing at the exact same time. What To Do: We'll see how much more I listen to Lupe's disc in the next month, but I'm thinking if I don't see Cool Kids, I'll have to give him a chance to quench my ever-increasing thirst for hip-hop during a weekend mostly filled with guitars (unless you count Zach de la Rocha spitting at the audience, as I'm sure he'll do). That is, unless my friends come up with a good argument about BSS spiritually transforming or some hippie crap that will assuredly spew from one of their mouths.

So help me out, people! What would you choose? There are other decisions that will be mildly difficult to make (stick with reliability and see Explosions in the Sky put on another solid performance or risk witnessing the emo anthemics of Brand New in hopes that I won't regret it?). There are also some lucky times when only one good act is playing (I would feel sorry for whatever poor suckers would have to play against Radiohead if the Lolla schedulers weren't so savvy to place them on their lonesome). But these are the big ones. This is basically the same as me asking you if I should avenge my lover's death, or if I should finally kick this meth habit even though I can totally afford it, or if I should get my hair cut or just like get the bangs trimmed or something. The power is yours, my blog reading friends - use it wisely.

This entry was posted by chris, on Thursday, June 19, 2008. You can leave your response.