Bonnaroo Day Two: Crowd Goes Nuts, Goes Apes#*t At Kanye West & Demands Double Encore From Sigur Ros
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Lets play a game. The game is: What time do you think it is in the picture below?
The snapshot, taken during Kanye West's Bonnaroo set, might look like midday, maybe around 3PM. But the photo was taken at sunrise - 5AM - midway through his shorter than usual, late night/early morning set on the main stage, which started two hours late. It seemed like half of the entire festival came out to see West's Glow In The Dark production, but after an hour and a half of waiting the crowd started filtering out. People booed and threw glowsticks, one that hit and broke West's light wall.
Finally at 4:30AM, the latest (or earliest, which ever way you see it) a main stage act has ever started at Bonnaroo, West came on without any apology. Normally an hour and half, the set only ran an hour with West taking out his usual "Hey Mama" tribute and focusing more on Graduation tracks.
Rumors for West's delay are running rampant today - some say he was being a diva and didn't want to play until all other acts had finished; volunteer staff said they saw West and his manager dooking it out over the scheduling; others say there were issues with loading in West's production and loading out Pearl Jam's, who played on the same stage right before and played 45 minutes longer than expected.
Pearl Jam's set included all the hits "Better Man," "Daughter," "Even Flow" and Mike McCready playing the guitar behind his head. Eddie Vedder preached, without getting too specific and soloed on the acoustic guitar with "No More," the track he wrote for the documentary Body Of War Other highlights included "Do The Evolution," "Gone," " Down," and "Hard to Imagine." The music was so tight, with people singing along. Pearl Jam survived the grunge era to play Bonnaroo to 70,000+ neo-hippies 15 years later.
Earlier in the night Vedder also joined Jack Johnson on stage for a song . Johnson drew a massive crowd, that rivaled Metallica's turnout at the main stage. "Banana Pancakes" "Good People" and a cover of Paul Simon's "Mother and Child Reunion" capped off the surfer dude's set.
Ladies man B.B. King
While things went off at night, Saturday day sets were pretty mellow. B.B. King proved that at even at 82 he still is a ladies man, as he sweet talked and sang about the other sex and even covered "You Are My Sunshine." Ben Folds' set was a doozer. but the singer-songwriter looked sharp behind a giant black grand piano. Cat Power sang and stretched her face to hit each note, so much it seemed like her face was made of play-doh.
The two most stand out Saturday performances came from the Avett Brothers and Zappa Plays Zappa. Based out of North Carolina the Avett Brothers combine folk and rock, with cellist Joe Kwon cradling his instrument like it was an electric guitar. They also got the award for most impressive following, as people were spilling out from the sides of the Other tent.
The Avett Brothers
Zappa Plays Zappa
Zappa Plays Zappa, a Zappa cover band featuring the legendary guitarist's own flesh and blood - son Dweezil - was the most surprising Saturday performance. The band was electrifying and everyone demanded "one more song," before Dweezil and co returned for their own rendition of "Cops and Buns." Papa Zappa would've been proud.
Sigur Ros' Mariachi
Sigur Ros
A band that didn't deliver after the crowd demanded "one more song" at the end of their set was Sigur Ros, despite it being the best performance of all of Bonnaroo 2008. Backed by the all-female band Amiina, and with an interruption by an Icelandic Mariachi band, lead singer Jónsi's falsetto moved the crowd for two hours. People were so moved they played an encore but stopped short of a double encore, despite the crowd's chants.
For Friday's review of Bonnaroo head here.
For Sunday's review of Bonanroo head here.
For video highlights from the festival head here.
Comments (16)
wow, great report
i dont-ee see a picture....
Great summary!
Really bummed that AT&T's Blue Room didn't have Zappa or B.B. King. That's what I get for being a cheap-ass... :P
double encore would've been amazing...but i wouldn't mind even just one. sounds like an interesting festival altogether.
ok i see stuff now
wtf?
good deal here
Loving the reportage.
That late and no apology on top. This would have enraged me. I just hate bad-mannered-wankers.
Thanks for the report! :)
awesome post.
Kanye: take the ego down a notch & give the fans what they came for.
amazing babe. keep us updated!
this was the greatest day of the festival by far...kanye taking the stage at 4am singing good morning. now that i've been back for a day the fact he made everyone wait so long is overshadowed by how epic the whole thing was now ehn i look back! Bonnaroo 4ever!
i talked to a guy working for the roo and apparently kanye pitched a fit about not playing the main stage (he was originally scheduled on the smaller stage) so they placed him right after pearl jam and warned that vedder and co. might run over (which they did).
i stayed till 3:45 (missed some sigur ros and all of lupe fiasco) and finally gave up. i would have appreciated some kind of apology though :/
haha sigur was awesome gogol too, pj of course and who can forget kanye?
some hellova quasi-riot we had there eh?
you guys DID try out the silent disco?
sorry charley, i simply did not have enough time for the silent disco
noooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!