Heavy Light, Sunny

I like this album. I don't have the musical vocabulary to really say why. U.S. Girls reminds me of Glaspy, but with sounds I find more interesting and lyrics I find more relatable. I appreciate the adventurousness and I jive with the "Stand by Me" vibe. The contours of this album as a piece fit better for me and my general background. Fun listening.

4/5

Since I have nothing interesting to say about the album, I wanted to talk about one of my favorite subjects: (Track 10) "Woodstock '99". I checked to see if anything about Woodstock '99 had been posted already on this music blog (really helps that "the Woodstock Street house" is a thing), but I found nothing. As such, I wish to share some trivia about Woodstock '99 which I personally enjoy.

Remember Fyre Festival? In 2017? I found it fascinating that such a scam could be played on gullible kids with cash in such large scale.

But then there was Woodstock '99. Woodstock '99 was a large planned musical festival attempting to recreate Woodstock in 1969, 30 years later. Keep in mind there was no Bonnaroo or Coachella yet; this was the first of its kind (nevermind the semi-failed Woodstock '94). Even back then, most people saw it as a shameless cash grab, but they had secured some good names and sold some 300,000+ tickets (Coachella nowadays gets ~250K).

'99 was a weird time for music: James Brown, Jamiroquai, Willie Nelson, Elvis Costello, Sheryl Crow, Offspring, Bush, G. Love, Live, DMX, Limp Bizkit, Korn, Rage Against the Machine, Megadeth, Jewel, Alanis Morissette, DMB, Metallica, and Red Hot Chili Peppers are just a subset of the acts.

Should be great right?

• Staff of only 1200 security was hired for the 250K+ simultaneous attendees to save money.
• It was set on a large asphalt lot in Rome, NY in the middle of July. The heat was immediately oppressive to all festival goers Friday afternoon. The planners were not planned for the number of people who came.
• By Saturday, hygiene systems had broken down. Due to poor toilet management, E. coli entered water lines. If you happened to catch it you had three options: 1) Use the already fetid porta-potties, 2) Sprint across the site to a nurse station, or 3) Squat down and shit wherever. Many choose (3).
• By Saturday night, only 175 security guards remained (attendance still strong). People hired on Friday were now senior staff. Saturday night had Limp Bizkit famously play "Break Stuff" at which point the rowdy audience began breaking stuff en masse. Eventually, the mania died down.
• Sunday morning begins with the festival promoters holding an impromptu press conference to say the festival has been "very successful" thus far. Nothing suspicious about that.
• Water bottles had completely sold out by Sunday, but an unexpected rain brought a small respite. That respite, however, revitalized the mob energy of the crowd. Sunday night had Red Hot Chili Peppers who covered Hendrix's "Fire" which, naturally, had the crowd setting larger and larger fires made of broken stage and miscellaneous debris. Security guards were told to turn their uniforms inside out and not intervene with the festivalgoers.
• By late Sunday night, official staff had evacuated the festival. State police in riot gear were brought in and made a perimeter around the grounds. After the festivalgoers tired themselves out, police came in and cleared out the scene.

It's funny to think a cash grab turned out such an embarrassment. Not that surprising thanks to hindsight—it's the Fyre Festival of yore. But Woodstock '69 was a cash grab that failed too—on the day of opening they couldn't police tickets of people coming in (they ran out of money and had to decide between fences and stages). The entrepreneurs of that scam got lucky though and made profits with a documentary and marketing rights on the name "Woodstock."

To bring it egotistically and ruthlessly back to myself, I use this Experimental Indie Pop Rock album to wonder what's next. '69, '99, and Fyre were all reflections in music festival form of the political economy that birthed them. Is there more dead fat to slough off like Theranos and WeWork? And if so, what's the next evolutionary line? Where were you in '99?