Bonnaroo Music Festival
Manchester, Tennessee
Thursday June 15-Sunday, June 18

Shots/Words by Will Jordan

“Holy shit! Did you see that? A giant milkshake just ran over that guy.”
I look over just as a tin man, a fairy and a couple of angels bend down to help up a life-sized version of Master Shake, the diabolical milkshake in Aqua Teen Hunger.
The “guardian” angels lift him up to his feet again and the entourage dances off into the night.
The poor passed out fella they tripped over, leans up, shakes his head and rubs his eyes as if he can’t believe what the hell just happened to him. At one moment he was snoring away, sleeping off a dreamy buzz and the next he was run over by a dessert treat, a member of Wizard of Oz, a twinkling fairy and a couple of angels straight from heaven.
He stood up shakily, looked at his watch and shuffled off into the night, passing a bearded, 30-year-old crammed into a tiny Superman costume meant for a 9-year-old, a couple of Grouchos holding hands and playing giddily with light-boxes, a storm-trooper with a Budweiser box for a mask, a skull-faced beauty and an enormous Mr. T float filled with members of New Orleans Preservation Hall Jazz Band and a bunch of starry-eyed late-nighters.
Weirdness abounds when 80,000 live music heads of multi-musical backgrounds descend on a small town in Middle Tennessee in the middle of a sweltering June.
The earth shook as thousands of vehicles rumbled through the tiny community of Manchester, Tenn. once again for Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, a familiar scene for the small-town folks, yet hardly something anyone could even begin to ignore. It was people watching to the nth degree as folks sat on their front porch swings and rocking chairs as the hooting, longhaired, day-glow parade slinked slowly past.
When the gates opened Thursday, thousands of folks were already waiting, traveling as far as Maine, Oregon, New Mexico and California to partake in the festival that has trumped all US festivals in revenue (grossing $15 million) and musical diversity.
Thursday’s schedule was light with only a handful of artists performing at various locations throughout the festival grounds giving Bonnaruvians plenty of time to acclimate themselves with the elaborate layout. Bands such as The Cat Empire, Electric Eel Shock, Wood Brothers, I-Nine and Moonshine Still played in the various tents.
This was the fifth year for Bonnaroo Music Festival. It’s come a long way from its inaugural year, where organizers were unsure if they would even sell enough tickets to make back their invested.
Not much has changed since the beginning, though it has grown much grander in scope. The city of Bonnaroo remains throughout the rest of the year with street signs, stages and storefronts intact. Art galleries, discos, arcades and stores encircle Centeroo, which is still the middle of “town,” with the square being the giant mushroom water fountain spouting cold, clear aqua over sweating and sunburned, scantily clad festival-goers. The stages and tents are still as confusing as an Abott and Costello gimic with acts performing on either the What Stage, Which Stage, This Tent, That Tent, The Other Tent or Yet Another Tent.
Parades erupted under giant football field-size smoke rings that wafted slowly in the sky above the festival grounds, emitted by some bizarre machine somewhere on the property.
Many folks shut down the evening with late night bands, but others wandered into the cinema, a large, air-conditioned Dolby Digital theater with a padded floor, couches and chairs that ran movies 24 hours a day including: Star Wars Episode III, King Kong, The Shining as well as NBA Finals and World Cup games.
Friday began early with World Party and Robinella starting the day with noon shows and other acts followed suit including Steel Pulse, Bright Eyes and G. Love & Special Sauce.
Oysterhead didn’t let down the tens of thousands of fans who gathered in front of the What Stage, the main stage at the festival. Les Claypool donned a rubber pig mask, though his peering eyes, glared through the slits with twinkling excitement (Claypool has been at Bonnaroo all five years). Backing Claypool were Trey Anastasio, former Phish virtuoso and a very excited Stewart Copeland, former drummer for The Police. Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder played on neighboring This Tent, though his return home was not as enjoyable, when a dazed fan climbed onto the interstate and walked in front of the bus, marking the most notable death at Bonnaroo and the only one this year.
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers headlined Friday and he poured through his repertoire, nearly as much as the bottles and bags of goodies he seemed to have ingested before climbing the stage.
“We’ve got a long list of musical oddities to play for you tonight,” he said, bleary-eyed and smiling wryly. “You guys are just great.”
Lyrics Born, Common and Blackalicious finished out the night with slammin’ sets in That Tent. Lyrics Born spit tongue twisters as he pointed his fingers to the sky and “Called Out” the crowd, which undulated to his every command. Common pulled out a googly-eyed female fan from the front row and grinded with her until she was thoroughly discombobulated. When she was lead to the back stage area, all she could do was sit on top of a speaker and stare spellbinded at the new love of her life. Blackalicious did what they do, bouncing verses off the audience until everyone in the vicinity was singing along in unison. They kept it bumping until the sun threatened to rise.
Friday night’s happenings drifted into early Saturday morning and some folks wandered around until the big stages lit back up again with song.
The Neville Bothers, Buddy Guy, Elvis Costello and The Imposters as well as Gomez started off the day Saturday as the sun beat down upon the grounds. This was the first year the festival wasn’t saturated by rain, uncharacteristic for Tennessee in spring, and people stared to the sky hoping for a little drop to help cool down the tropically warm temperatures.
When Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley took to the Which Stage at 4 p.m., it seemed to be the hottest of the day, but also appropriate, as if he had brought Jamrock weather to the grounds. Marley’s dreads nearly dragged the ground as he pumped his fist to the sky and ran through his repertoire as well as playing many of his father’s familiar hits.
Beck followed on the What Stage with a characteristically entertaining set that featured all sorts of theatrics, from the band donning bear costumes during “Loser” to wheeling out an enormous boom box during “Two Turntables…” and sitting at a mock dining room set for a bizarre percussion set. During the entire show marionette puppets mimicked the band’s every move on the twin Jumbotrons and afterwards strolled out into the crowd.
Halfway through Beck’s set, Cypress Hill fired up the Which Stage, literally after fans tossed up baggies filled with stinky, green nuggets of marijuana.
B-Real and Sin Dog rallied the crowd into a red-eyed raucous. At one point B-Real demanded the audience to pull their weed out of their pockets, “right now” and “take a hit” and followed with “Hits From The Bong.” It may have been the most concentrated place of actual pot smoking ever in history.
“I don’t even smoke weed, but when B-Real tells you to take a hit, you do what the man says,” laughed a fan after the show.
After the smoke cleared, the What Stage illuminated and a gaunt Thom Yorke and Radiohead sauntered out as teenagers screamed in joy and some fainted either from the sheer appearance of the UK group’s first US show, or perhaps from heat and exhaustion.
Yorke even flashed a haggard, toothy smile a couple of times, after looking out at the sea of people that seemed to stretch miles and were all singing along to the familiar songs.
The evening ended with theatrics that lasted way beyond dawn.
Performances by Balkan Beat Box, Sasha and Ivan Neville’s Dumpstafunk kept the dancing going, but all were surprised by the intoxicatingly creepy and psychedelic performance put on by Dr. John of all people, who pulled out his Night Tripper character, someone he hasn’t revisited since the late ‘60s. Wearing a giant feathered headdress and cloak, he tossed pixie dust into the air at a gyrating girl, reminiscent of the Voodoo priestess Lisa Bonet portrayed in the movie Angelheart.
Elsewhere on the grounds, a Masquerade Ball erupted and the costumes seemed to be everywhere. Mermaids, Ghostbusters, bananas, pirates and a woman holding a five-foot tall inflatable penis stumbled giddily through the property in and out of performances, up and down the Shakedown area, around the shroom fountain and into the fire garden, where sculptures spit flames high into the sky next to the drum circle, which folks never stopped beating. There was also a Silent Disco, where fans listened through headphones to live mixes by DJ Logic, Motion Potion and DJ Quickie Mart. Other activities included: a playground, yoga classes, MLB batting cages, a Ferris wheel and the “Build A Drum” booth, where a sign warned, “If you're high, it’s gonna take twice as long.”
Sunday came hard for most. Sitting in the empty bleachers, folks cringed as the sun began to rise and memories of the past day’s heat came back as rays started pounding down on raw flesh once again.
Fans braved the weather and wandered sleepily to the different stages, though it was obvious the fun was soon coming to an end.
But the bands played on with more stellar performances by Shooter Jennings, Refugee Allstars of Sierra Leone Sonic Youth and headliner Phil Lesh & Friends. Matisyahu introduced his son, Levi, during his performance on the "Which Stage.” The infant wore a pair of ear protectors to prevent any damage and looked at his father with solemn eyes.
As attendees were taking down tents and packing up their gear, prayers were finally answered and the rain came, a blessing after temperatures in the mid-90s.
It was a somber scene, watching the caravan of 80,000 festivalgoers returning to the “real world.” Some seemed sad, others were elated and still others had the look of fear on their faces as if it were unfair to have to leave the magical Bonnaroo world.

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