BONNAROO WAS HERE

John Butler Trio

John Butler Trio

Sunday was heavily weighted towards crowd pleasing finales brought to you by the letter “W” (Wilco, The White Stripes and Widespread Panic), but if you got moving earlier the top half of the day was filled with amazing sets by true masters. 79-year old country pioneer Charlie Louvin showed how you entertain a festival crowd, offering up colorful stories and cheeky band intros (“Every group in the world needs at least one coon-ass”), trotting out chestnuts like “Cash On The Barrelhead” to a crowd that probably learned his tunes from his disciple Gram Parsons. Mavis Staples carried forward the gospel-soul tradition of her family, The Staples Singers, adding in timely covers like Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth” and The Band’s “The Weight.”

The air was distressingly still on the hottest day on record this year in Tennessee, dust and smoke clinging to damp festivarians. It was only the high quality of the music that kept folks moving, and increasingly people found a spot in the shade of a single stage and stayed put. Thankfully, Bonnaroo’s programmers have gotten really adept at sequencing acts with a shared spirit and mood on each stage. If your tastes ran to emotionally rich, gently catchy journal rock you could sit at This Tent for really nice, not too rowdy sets from Elvis Perkins In Dreamland, Martha Wainwright and Feist. If twang was your thing you could stay put after Louvin for down home family band fun from David Bromberg and Angel Band, punk inflected barn burnin‘ by Junior Brown and hill country blues from the always sturdy North Mississippi Allstars.

While the big stage headliners like Ratdog and Wilco were predictably excellent (hey, some bands are just too pro to offer anything less than very good sets), if you ventured out there were real unique moments to be had including a classic bluegrass seminar from Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys and a dazzling, surprisingly noisy performance from legendary producer T-Bone Burnett doing his own material after years of working the dials for others. His crack band included the king of session drummer Jim Keltner and former Tom Waits guitarist Marc Ribot doing a highly modern version of gospel music along with marvelous covers of Dylan’s “Isis” and New Orleans standard “Bon Ton Roulie,” which Burnett suggested as America’s new national anthem. I heartily second that emotion.

A full report coming your way next week after we’ve digested things a bit, and we’ll have more photos to share on Friday. An intense stretch full of every kind of music you could want or imagine. It was Bonnaroo and that word means something different to every person. In that way, the organizers have done a fine job of respecting diversity and individual tastes but executed on a mass scale.

Dennis Cook
JamBase Associate Editor

Dave Vann Saturday Photos


Centeroo



Ben Harper





Ween





Franz Ferdinand


Girl Talk





Sting


Andy Summers


Stewart Copeland







Galactic and Lyrics Born




The Flaming Lips




Gov’t Mule with Bob Weir





Photos by Dave Vann

When I woke up this Sunday morning in the passenger seat of my surprisingly roomy Mercury Montego, as dry & warmed over as a piece of salmon left under a broiler too long, I caught my reflection in the glass. The rear view mirror should have read, “Objects are more worked than they appear.” Three long days of zig zagging between stages and moods and bodies and pockets of heat & light have worn down the collective energies of Bonnaroo. It’s the natural breaking down process we all go through at a big festival like this but when you’re excavating black boogers and trying to find your voice again after a night of revels, well, it’s a slow crawl towards consciousness…

Saturday was shoehorned with perfect pop (Spoon, Fountains of Wayne), string bands that flew with wood & wire (Railroad Earth, Old Crow Medicine Show) and surprisingly effective live sets from mainstream acts (Regina Spektor, Franz Ferdinand). There is much to tell y’all and the massive ‘Roo report coming your way in about a week will be jammed with details, pics and observations (good and bad) but for now, here’s a few thoughts on yesterday…

–The Police as a jam band. Yeah, I’m still getting my head around it, too. Often a little too close to “Sting and Puppet Show” territory but certainly to be admired for trying to play to a scene.

–Ween while very spirited sounded a little desperate to please and really needs to lay some new songs on us. We’ve been hearing this same set with slight variation for years now.

–The Hold Steady are all that and a king size bag o’ chips. Full of urgent feelings and choruses you can belt out while hammered six ways to Sunday, their brand of pure American rock ‘n’ roll is WELL worth buying. In fact, I woke up today and bought their last two albums for the drive home.

–Hot Tuna play mean for really old guys. The blues have rarely been better served.

–Zep’s John Paul Jones is everywhere. Even if not present in the flesh – like when he joined Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals for “Dazed & Confused” or the Mule for a breathtaking “No Quarter,” “Since I’ve Been Loving You” and “Living Loving Maid” – his spirit has infused this year’s festivities including The Slip’s shattering set closing cover of “Heartbreaker.”

-Speaking of The Slip, their early afternoon set shows further evolution on their path towards the most fearless, inventive ROCK band since Wilco started collecting accolades.

-Apparently smoking is still cool. I didn’t realize but the free packs of American Spirits have folks puffing like it’s the ‘5os again!

-The obtuse and disturbing have become commonplace by this point in the game. When a guy in inflatable pants in the shape of a duck or a naked tribal chick walk past you and you continue to talk about what a nice if utterly unchallenging performance String Cheese laid on folks the other night it’s clear we’ve passed through a door of perception or two. I didn’t even flinch when a teen in full crimson body paint and alien antenna puked on my flip flop clad feet around sundown. I just poured water on both of us to clean up a bit and made sure his friends took him away. Why comment on the strange & unusual when they’ve ceased to be strange & unusual?

–Gov’t Mule’s three-and-a-half hour late night performance showed off their increasingly perfect quartet chemistry while making room for sit-ins from Bob Weir (“Sugaree,” “Loser”), Michael Franti (a very clever, lengthy freestyle during a dub conscious version of the Rolling Stones’ “Play With Fire”), blues workouts with Luther Dickinson of North Miss. Allstars and Jorma Kaukonen & Jack Cassidy of Hot Tuna, and a weird splash of anger from Lewis Black.

There’s more but there’s also much more music to catch today including our annual dose of Dead music with Ratdog, country legend Charlie Louvin, jazz maverick Ornette Coleman, Broken Social Scene’s chaunteuse Feist and a fest closing two-setter from Widespread Panic. This is a LOT more than a jam music festival now, and as Warren Haynes pointed out in a press conference here, that’s a good thing…

Dennis Cook
JamBase Associate Editor

As the sun slipped behind the Ferris wheel, Bonnaroo 2007 settled into what it would be. Travel jitters behind us, cold beverages in hand, the shambling masses (which looked eerily like an outtake from Dawn of the Dead in the shadowy artificial light) were hooting & grinning as they migrated between the skinny white boy blues clatter of The Black Keys, the dirty mouthed good fun of Lily Allen (who finished off the better part of a bottle of Jägermeister during her set) and the VERY effective, infectious show band styles of The Roots and the truly amazing Manu Chao Radio Bemba Sound System, which mixed crunching percussion with strains of Latin music & roots reggae in a really forward thinking entertaining way.

While the day offered a lot of really good music not a whole lot felt transcendent in the way one hopes for at a big festival like this. This comment isn’t offered with any meanness of spirit – I have nothing but HUGE respect for the musicians here – but there’s an indefinable thing one waits for at a place like Bonnaroo. And it arrived in the form of Tool. Disorienting and shaking, Tool mixes the grandeur of Holst’s The Planets with the seamless, subconscious tapping power of Pink Floyd and the mountain shaking tendencies of heavy metal. In a word, stunning. For a festival that’s consciously avoided “aggressive music” this was a big step forward and the capacity audience at the main stage signalled that attendees are into it.

Other Friday Highlights:

-Crazy talented string pickers Uncle Earl with Led Zep’s John Paul Jones sitting in on mandolin. No day that begins like this can be bad.

–Tortoise’s conjuring of ’70s Miles Davis in their two drum kit fueled instrumental exhibition. Gone are the sometimes sterile math rock tendencies of their past. They’ve hit a snarling, fully engaged new plateau that makes one excited about the new album this Fall.

-Seasoned Brit cult musico Richard Thompson and his electric band tearing into all corners of his almost 40 year career, showing us all how much fun true professionals can be.

-The genuine intimacy and quiet power of Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, who stilled the air and thousands of noisy listeners with stirring versions of “Revelator” and other old-time-meets-our-times jewels that were greeted like monster hits on some lovely alternate Top 40.

-Major find Halle from NYC, a powerful, hypnotic trio led by singer with the power & presence of a young Patti Smith or P.J. Harvey. Their mixture of Gaia-centric themes and punkish spirit burned a happy hole in the brains of the handful of folks not at the main stage late nights.

All in all, a very fine first full day, marred only by overzealous security who seem a little frightened by the huge of number of people. To all I say, relax, don’t do it…

More thoughts and field finds to come…

Dennis Cook
JamBase Associate Editor

Bonnaroo 2007 fully blossomed during Tea Leaf Green’s evening closing set. A sardine tight sea of smiling, shining faces belted out “Taught To Be Proud” as the good time boogie band of our times shimmied like most white boys can’t. From a bird’s eye view behind Trevor Garrod I watched thousands get their wondrous, intoxicated freak on. Cares left in a jar at home, one felt the outside world slip away and this ephemeral playground begin to form.

From the afternoon forward the grounds felt fuller and more alive than they have in a couple years. Folks were here and excited and ready to be entertained. And there was no shortage of options. Everywhere you turned there were stringed instruments being tuned, propane tanks being hooked up to flame throwing sculptures and impromptu hobo parades, all coated in a haze of dust and sweet, funky odors. With several new stages, including a swanky Blue Note style jazz club called Somethin’ Else, you couldn’t walk more than a couple hundred feet without music reaching out to you. And it really felt like an invitation.

The general mood, especially amongst the musicians, is high spirited to say the least. All seem to have come with the intention of doing something special or, like Tea Leaf, present the very best parts of themselves. The Thursday night assortment catered to the increasingly wide age range. SoCal’s hyper jangly The Little Ones entertained the MySpace kids while ’60s soul throwback Ryan Shaw evoked Sam Cooke & Otis Redding in a way that made both teens and their grey haired daddies dance. Canada’s Sam Roberts Band proved classic ’70s rock still has some real blood in the new millenium, and an expanded 5-piece Apollo Sunshine layered percussion and pop smart imagination on their enduringly brilliant tunes. After a late start flamenco metallicos Rodrigo y Gabriela proved acoustic worldly sounds has more faces than New Age music. Austin’s The Black Angels stirred up a mighty brain buzz that drew hungry handfuls from vintage ’60s psych and gutbucket ’30s blues, all accompanied by a fantastic, mood expanding light show.

That’s a small taste of the main stage acts but in the new nightclub spot Bonna Rouge the Yard Dogs Road Show mingled vaudeville, Tom Waits’ Wild Years and Christopher Isherwood’s Berlin stories for a hugely entertaining, saucy update of carnival chic. The discoteque was bumping while people blipped away on antique arcade games and state-of-the-art home consoles. The lotus shaped fountain in Centeroo had a near constant stream of freshly washed, barely clad festivarians splashing in it until “The Man” shut it down in the wee wee hours.

The only stumbling block thus far has been the colossal lines for the Yet Another (Comedy) Tent and the jazz venue. People have to miss hours of other acts to wait to get in AND the limited capacity of both seated, air-conditioned stages means there’s no guarantee that you’ll get in for the set you’re waiting for. For those who based their decision to come to Bonnaroo on these interesting, unique options this is an ongoing frustration and disappointment. There may be no good solution to the capacity issue but the current situation means most attendees will simply skip this part of Bonnaroo.

Onwards to Friday…

Dennis Cook
JamBase Associate Editor

Look up Weather Channel 10-day forecast for Manchester, Tennessee. Check. First aid kit, rain poncho, single malt scotch. Check. Annotated set schedule in easy to find spot. Check.

Everyone has pre-festival rituals. In my 20+ years of traveling around for music I’ve developed a lot of highly personal but deeply important steps in the final days before a festival. I make lists and check them more than twice. Every item going into my duffel bag (yes, one of those long, green Army surplus numbers) is laid out like a Popular Mechanics photo spread. I want to see what I’m bringing because it may trigger some primal memory of crucial items forgotten in the past like a back-up pair of glasses. Nothing like wandering around amongst thousands of scrungy denizens without your eyes.

Given the size & scope of Bonnaroo, one feels compelled to really get their act together. Once you’re in the middle of all that humanity, frivolity and near constant musical stimulation you don’t want to be wondering if you have enough underwear to make it home. Freeballing is fine for some but as I near 40 I’ve developed just a shred of dignity. Thankfully, it’s just a shred because despite one’s best efforts, despite daily showers and various sweetly scented unctions one always looks (and smells) a little worse for wear after three or four days of festival life. And I love it.

There’s a besmeared charm to festival folk. One knows they’re surrounded by like minded people who love music and don’t mind a little dirt & sweat in pursuit of their groove. We bring in glow sticks and mix CDs to share. We drink water and push one another to smile despite being up for close to 48 hours. It’s one of the few times we lose our fences and walls, greeting our neighbor with a grin as we stumble over bottles and beef jerky wrappers towards a bank of pungent Port-a-Potties.

Bonnaroo is something I, and many others, are happy to cross the country for. Full of big and small pleasures it calls with the promise of fresh experiences and musical treats we cannot possibly predict. Each of us will experience it in our own way but we will experience these things together. There’s a strange, comforting feeling to that.

This coming Saturday, June 16, marks the 40th anniversary of the Monterey Pop Festival. Bonnaroo, and those who attend it, continue the tradition of Monterey Pop, mixing high level musicianship, pop culture and the blessed energies of those who gather for a ritual worth repeating every year.

Dennis Cook
JamBase Associate Editor

We’re sending a team down to Manchester for this year’s Bonnaroo Music Festival and hope to bring you daily updates from the fest, photos, features and more!

Stay tuned…