So my last travels had me stuck on a boat in an uncomfortable sea of hair gel and steroids - my next adventure put me smack dab in the middle of a drug-fueled carnival of horrors. Trade Heinekens for horse tranquilizers and hot 30-somethings with plastic surgery for angry wookies that haven't showered in weeks - throw them in a knee-deep mud bath in central New York for a weekend and sprinkle some good music over it....that about sums it up.
There are few festival experiences where I've been truly blown away by the tenacity and idiosyncrasy of my fellow attendees - Burning Man was one, this was the second. That said, I had fun, and despite having contracted one or more bacterial infections through my mud-covered feet, I saw some great music. I arrived late Thursday after the first of several monsoons decimated the festival grounds, but managed to catch the tail end of a wonky left-field-dub set from Flying Lotus. He pulled a pleasant trip down memory lane to his Adult Swim days with a sample from the always-awesome Steve Brule. If you don't know what I'm talking about here, you don't spend enough time on the internetz.
Moving on - my good friends at Red Bull (ok, just kidding, I work for them now) hooked me up with some VIP bracelets and each night the VIP tent was packed with a festival performer. Thursday night I watched Ben Silver and Bethany Lokken of omni-genre DJ crew Orchard Lounge rock a Michael Jackson tribute set while Allen Aucoin of the Disco Biscuits absolutely raged it on drums. I'm awaiting a sync'd up recording of this set, but for now check this little video bit from the occasion (followed, rather unceremoniously, with a short clip from the late-night DFA Disco Tent set that James Murphy and Pat Mahoney (of LCD Soundsystem) played).
The other photos aren't in chronological order - the Disco Biscuits played a Tractorbeam vs. The Perfume set (where they mix vocal-less versions of their songs with fully re-imagined covers of their own songs), lots of crazy people wore lots of crazy things, AC Slater and Kill the Noise brought the fidget-step to the hippie masses, and Somali-Canadian rapper K'Naan made me believe in hip-hop again - but I'll save that for another post. For those that are confused about the first photo in this post - that's Frank McElroy of Dr. Dog on the left and Marc Brownstein from the Biscuits on the right.
Orchard Lounge
Kill the Noise
Brownie during Tractorbeam vs. The Perfume
DFA Disco Tent
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