Kesha
September 19th @ 9:45pm
Upper intramural fields, Clemson University, Clemson, SC
S. wore:
K. wore:
L. wore:
I wore:
Talk about usual suspects--all this crew has been on AC at one point or another for going to a concert with me! K. and I surprised L. with with a ticket to see Kesha with us for her birthday, and we were all stuffed into my Prius for the twoish hour ride to Clemson. The school's performance/production group brought Kesha in, and since she hasn't done a great lot of live performing recently, we jumped at the chance to see her live (again for most of us; this was L.'s first time). K. dumped an entire bag of glitter into her weave, and even now at work I find little clusters of purple glitter on the carpet and in the bathroom. But anyway--the show was supposed to start at 9, and when 9 rolled around, we were still waiting in line and my poor friends experienced their first fan crush. (Or maybe poor me, since it wasn't my first by a long shot.) We finally got around to getting into the field Clemson had blocked off for the show and the show didn't start until 9:45pm, but it was great. Kesha looks happy and healthy and sounds fantastic, and while her set was nothing new, it was still a lot of fun and involved an enormous blow up rainbow to celebrate gay marriage's legality. Kesha mentioned that she was sick all day and her doctor told her to cancel, so I'm really glad we didn't end up with another Miley situation, especially since we had to drive almost two hours to get to Clemson! And Kesha just ain't that kind. She made it happen, and it was awesome.
And as a note: of all the concerts I've been to, I've never been to one whose parking situation was as well done as Clemson's. The Intramural fields were all used as parking, and they were all very well lit (they have sports lighting so our pictures turned out great, and we were super safe!) Clemson's production club also had the police on hand to help direct traffic. This is probably peanuts to them compared to the games at Death Valley, but still--for those of us who are used to pitch black parking lots and sitting for an hour waiting to get out of the lot in the first place, the organization and setup of the concert were greatly appreciated!
Nickel Creek, with Josh Ritter
August 14th @ 7:30pm
Koka Booth Amphitheatre, Cary, NC
E. wore:
I wore:
There are some musicians that you should just feel honoured to watch perform. Like Bob Seger, or Reba McEntire. Or Dolly Parton, or Queen (while Freddie was still alive, of course). There are artists who just take music and performing to a whole different level. It's a surreal experience--an unforgettable one.
Nickel Creek, to me, is like that. The honour that I felt sitting in my folding chair ten rows from the front as Nickel Creek came out onto the stage nearly swelled out of my body and into the air around me. I've been a fan of Nickel Creek since I was a middle school and I have wanted to see them for nearly as long, and when they broke up in 2007, I was crushed. I thought I had lost my opportunity to experience something great.
And then, this year, they got the band back together. And I about had a meltdown and bought tickets and then asked one of my all-time favourite people, E., to come with me, since she lives about 45 minutes from Cary. And she said yes, so we went! I was thrilled; I haven't seen E. since last August, and we haven't had time to chat much in the last few months. My mom loves E. and has noted once or twice that whenever I'm around E. she brings out something better in me. Stronger, wiser, nicer. She's one of three people with whom I can tolerate a long road trip. She never makes fun of my weird eating habits. Everyone should be so lucky to have a friend like E.
So between spending my evening with E. and seeing some of the most exceptional musicians on the planet, I feel very honoured indeed.
Monumentour
Fall Out Boy & Paramore with New Politics
July 24 @ 7pm
PNC Bank Pavilion, Charlotte, NC
A. wore:
I wore:
Part of me is getting too old for some concerts. I know that. For example, I'm probably not going to go to another Against Me! show, or another big music festival in a large city. I have a bad back. I sunburn easily. My ears are getting sensitive to high volumes. I need a seat, or at least a towel and a swatch of land where I can rest my weary bones. (#flairforthedramatic) So when coworker A. and I made the trek to the other side of Charlotte for the Fall Out Boy concert, I was prepared to be one of the old people there.
As it turns out, I was not. There was a vast swath of teenagers there, of course, because those emo kids still love some Fall Out Boy. But as I found with Say Anything, a lot of their fans--and even Paramore's fans--are growing up, which means there are a bunch of actual adults there now. The people I used to see at Warped Tour (I officially retired from Warped Tour after 2008) are now the people sitting on towels on the lawn at concerts like that. We're part of an aging group, but that's okay. We're still here. And as long as the bands that we love continue to tour at places where there are places to sit after we've been running ragged at our mid-level jobs all day, we'll still show up.
Say Anything, with The Front Bottoms, The So So Glos & You Blew It!
June 21 @ 8pm
Amos' Southend, Charlotte, NC
I wore:
I've been a less than perfect Say Anything fan lately. Their newest album, Hebrews (recorded entirely without guitars), came out on June 10th, and I ended up buying it on iTunes a week after it came out. It completely passed me by. And even now, I've only listened to half the album. Oops. I'm kind of anxious about listening to the whole thing--it has a solid rating on Metacritic, but the fact of the matter is, I'm always anxious when my favourite artists put out new albums. What if it sucks? And then you have to live with the disappointment that your favourite band threw in the towel.
But anyway. Needless to say, off I went with my boyfriend (you read that right) to Charlotte for my sixth Say Anything concert, which was truly delightful. We got there just in time for the final opening band, which...was generically fine. When Say Anything came out though, my face kind of melted off. I was in a happy place, like the lead singer, Max Bemis, which is a marked improvement from tours of old. Say Anything used to be a very angry band, but the anger has progressed into self-reflection. We were in the balcony, and had a great view of the band without being physically crushed. Although a couple of the songs that were performed were from the new album and thus mostly unrecognizable to me, almost all of the music was gleaned from the band's six previous albums, along with an acoustic version of Got Your Money by ODB. I'm not kidding. That was a moment that I will probably remember forever.
More than anything, I've always wanted to see the people on the stage be happy and healthy. I was pretty torn up when Kesha announced she was entering rehab to deal with an eating disorder; I'm a huge fan, and knowing that when I saw her earlier in the year she wasn't feeling or being well was heartbreaking. Max spent a long time being angry and unhappy and miserable and unhealthy, and even though it led to some great creative output, it came at a heavy cost. He's a great artist, and I have a lot of respect for anyone who can lay bare the minutiae of his life and the shitty things he's done in the past. He has a wife and a baby now, and it's clear that they've had a positive effect on his life. Although the music isn't the same--it's no longer self-loathing punk rock--it's clearly grown and morphed into something beautiful and brilliant, and as a fan, I couldn't ask for more.
Governor's Ball Music Festival
June 6-8, 2014
Randall's Island, New York City, NY
I have wanted to go to a music fest for a very, very long time, and living where I do, options for music festivals are few and far between. I could drive to Bonnaroo and deal with tents and hippies and mud and no showers and sitting in a car for ages just to get in and out, or I could fly elsewhere and throw down a lot of money for a hotel, a ticket, and travel.
welllllllllll
This year, Outkast reunited. It's kind of a big deal. And while coachella got the first big OMG WE HAVE OUTKAST announcement, the group also announced on their website that they would be headlining at the 2014 Governor's Ball Music Festival. This was a new fest that I hadn't heard of before, and with somewhat good reason--it's only been around for four years. So I started doing research. The fest was three days, on Randall's Island, plum between Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx. It also took place on my birthday weekend, June 6th through 8th. Whoa. Did stars just align? And then they announced the lineup, which included Jack White, Vampire Weekend, Janelle Monae, Outkast (obv) and about a billion other bands that would be ridiculous for me to list but let me tell you I was stoked just reading the list.
It seemed like mostly a pipe dream, because Gov Ball took place at the same time as the start of summer reading at work, but I was APPROVED for time off for the fest and I sprung into action, grabbing a 3 day ticket and emailing my friend E., who lives with her husband in Park Slope, & who was deeply kind to offer to let me stay with them for free while I was in the city. It came together! I got a ticket for the shuttle, planned my flight so I'd have one free day before the fest to do with what I pleased, and started saving money. I had to buy some shorts because most of my shorts are officially barn shorts now, but here's what I wore on all three days. (I was probably the least hip person there. I don't care.)
Day 1 (June 6)
Top: J. Crew | Shorts: Walmart | Shoes: Toms
Bands: Outkast, TV on the Radio, Phoenix, La Roux, Bastille, Janelle Monae, Little Daylight
Food: mac and cheese (Beecher's), cheesesteak (Carl's)
Day 2 (June 7)
Top: Boden | Shorts: Boden | Shoes: Toms
Bands: Jack White, Sleigh Bells, The Strokes, Broken Bells, Fitz and the Tantrums, Classixx
Food: risotto ball (Arancini Bros), chopped beef sandwich (Mile End Deli)
Day 3 (June 8)
Top: Target | Shorts: Boden | Shoes: Toms
Bands: Vampire Weekend, Foster the People, The Kills, The Head and the Heart, Tyler the Creator, Frank Turner
Food: lobster roll (Luke's Lobster)
I have spared you all a shot of the aggressive Toms tan that I received while at the festival. But here's a look at what my poor Toms look like now that they've been through the ringer:
Gross.
Gov Ball was wild. I will say that going alone probably wasn't AS good as going with someone, simply because I didn't want to make friends with groups of people, but it also allowed me to do whatever the hell I wanted, which was awesome. That's one of my favourite parts of traveling alone--you do you the whole time. It's pretty fantastic. One day I brought a book with me to help pass time between bands, and I found myself more than once by someone else reading a book. It's like a secret handshake for bookworms...except it's blatantly obvious. Whatever, you get the point.
I took my trusty green Jansport bookbag with me, and that thing more than paid its dues (I also used it when I was driving across America, so it's been all over). I was able to haul my camera (which stayed home after day one because security deemed it "professional camera equipment" which isn't allowed), a towel, sunblock, a book, my phone, my charger, a bottle of water, and anything else I wanted to lug with me.
I had a really awesome time at Gov Ball. I might go back someday. I have many tiny stories that I can tell--about charging my phone, about the people I met, the food I ate, and the bands I saw--but they're not interesting when they're all rolled into one. They might leak out bit by bit. But at least there's this post with all my clothes so I can remember it! (I will be writing an additional post about my free day in Manhattan, which...will be much different.) But for now...I'm glad to be home!
Vampire Weekend, with Jacuzzi Boys
May 5th @ 8:00pm
Fox Theatre, Atlanta, GA
(Listen to this while reading this post)
What C. wore:
What I wore:
Ohhhhh boy.
I have waited years--YEARS--for Vampire Weekend to finally come within very long shooting distance of Cardiganland. I have been crushed year after year, because I love this band, I love their music and they are Grammy winners now so I feel like this might be one of the most legit concerts I've ever been to. It was worth the very long (we're talking 7 years here) wait to finally see VW live; it was one of the best performances at one of the best venues with one of the best people I know, and the way everything merged together was almost too good to be true. Fortunately, there was typical rush hour traffic in Atlanta and we walked in the wrong direction three times on our way to dinner, so it was definitely reality. The group in front of us who felt the need to chit chat through part of the concert was also obnoxious, but it didn't ruin the fact that I was in the same room as Vampire Weekend oh em effing gee. The band performed (using my admittedly not brilliant memory) about 15 songs, in addition to a three song encore. The
I feel really lucky that I got to see Vampire Weekend. And I'll be really lucky on my birthday this year, because they're the headlining act for day 3 of the Governors Ball, which I will be experiencing live. I'm so, so excited.
Regular blogging will resume on Monday, after a giant work program that has been absorbing my life takes place. Thank you for sticking around while I deal with a seven month long project!
CANCELLED: Bangerz Tour
Miley Cyrus with Icona Pop
April 7 @ 7pm
Time Warner Cable Arena, Charlotte, NC
S. wore:
I wore:
I guess that when one goes to a lot of concerts, one should expect that a concert or two will be cancelled at some point. But one does not expect the biggest tour of the year to get cancelled, and certainly not the one night of the tour that one purchased tickets for over three months ago.
But this is what one gets for wishful thinking.
S. and I had just hopped onto the beltway around uptown Charlotte (277, for those of you wondering), when S. scrolled through her phone and said "oh shit, this better not be true". And just what we didn't want to be true was true: Miley cancelled, and Miley is not rescheduling.
I get a lot of crap for being a Justin Bieber fan (though I've kind of moved on to One Direction), and a lot of crap for being a Kesha fan, and a whole great lot of crap for being a Miley fan. For me, life's too short to lie about what you like, so fuck the rest and enjoy what you will. This is why I have such bizarre tastes, probably: because I refuse to confine myself to any one thing. But it's good, because I go to concerts with basically ALL my friends. I take different people to different shows depending on what they like, and it all works out. (Though S. seems to appear most often, because she's always down for Kesha.)
When we found out that impossible had happened, we trolled the streets of uptown Charlotte, where hundreds of heavily eyelined youth in crop tops and black leggings wandered aimlessly outside the arena. The crushing blow of defeat, to say the least. We went to the mall and bought lipstick at Sephora and ate cheesecake outside the mall. It would have been a good night, had it not been filled with things that we did only because Miley Cyrus stood us up.
So anyway, here's a photo of a lionfish from the zoo in Columbia, SC. I was there on Saturday.
At least the lionfish didn't cancel on me.
Against Me!, with Laura Stevenson and Cheap Girls
April 6th @ 8pm
The Orange Peel, Asheville, NC
T. wore:
I wore:
T. and I have been a team when it comes to two bands, which to me have had similar histories for their lead singers: Say Anything (who we will be seeing for a sixth time in June) and Against Me! (who we saw together for the third time Sunday night). We saw Against Me! once at Warped Tour and once a couple of years later at The Handlebar in Greenville, SC, which is the concert at which I was sucked into a mosh pit and punched in the face. (I'm not big on mosh pits.) This concert was the last of Against Me!'s tour supporting their new album, which is the first since their lead singer, Laura Jane Grace, came out as transgender and began living as a woman.
Against Me!'s performing style has always been one song to another, almost without pause most of the time, and constant sweaty screaming and wailing while an aggressive mosh pit blossomed in front of the stage. (The Orange Peel, thankfully, has an enormous ceiling fan that keeps the hall from overheating.) Against Me! has always been an exceptionally tense and taut band live, which I chalked up to the pretty political punk rock that they play, but a change in lineup over the last year (the drummer and bassist are both recent additions, but the guitarist and lead singer have been the same since 2002), along with a new album and Grace's transition, have seriously changed the band's behaviour on stage in what T. and I both think is a really good way. Their latest album is a lot different from their pervious sound, but it's still Against Me! in there, it's still the same music. But it's being performed by people who are clearly happy, and that's something I couldn't say with any certainty before.
Say Anything has followed a similar path--massive lineup changes over time, major struggles by the lead singer/mastermind of the band until reaching an acceptance of who he is and finally being loved--and the changes have reflected on the band in a healthy way. Their last tour in 2012 (which we also went to at the Peel) was incredible. I'd never seen their lead singer so happy. And it made me happy.
I've been nervous to see Against Me! again because of what happened at The Handlebar, but I'm glad that T. dragged me out to see them. We parked in the back on some bar stools and took it all in. Against Me! played some new music but they also dug deep into their discography for some of the songs they performed on Sunday, and the crowd was deeply appreciative of that. We're getting a little old for the punk rock scene (we were definitely among the older 30% of the audience and I was the only one in the room in a cardigan), but we were still happy to be there. And to see a woman on the stage clearly beaming from all the way in the back, finally at peace and being who she is and doing what she wants, was inspiring. She put on a tiara at the end of the encore, and the Peel nearly fell apart from all the screams and cheers.
It's amazing what a little love can do.
Moonshine Jungle World Tour
Bruno Mars with Fitz and the Tantrums
August 21 @ 7:30PM
Time Warner Cable Arena, Charlotte, NC
A. wore:
I wore:
First of all, I got accidentally trapped in the VIP lounge in the stadium. There were two bathroom doors, and guess who used the wrong one? I was behind a wall of glass. I felt like a penguin in a zoo.
Second: A. and I agree that this concert got us pregnant. Bruno Mars is a human being with a sizable amount of sex appeal, and Bruno Mars is a human being with a band whose members all have a sizable amount of sex appeal. But beyond that, Mars is just an impressive singer. He sounds good, you guys. Concert season has been really excellent in terms of musical quality, and this one nailed it. Ending with Gorilla--possibly the raunchiest song I've heard in recent memory--was beyond blush inducing. When an uptick of baby births is noted in Charlotte in 9 months and no one can figure out why, you'll remember this post, and you'll know exactly what happened.
Kesha, with special guest Mike Posner
August 15 @ 7pm
Time Warner Cable Uptown Amphitheatre, Charlotte, NC
K. wore:
S. wore:
C. wore:
S. wore:
I wore:
If I'm willing to see a musician twice in one year, you know I am a fan. Kesha: I'm a fan. I have so much fun at Kesha concerts, partly for the music, but also party for the people watching, which is beyond prime. No rain, no cold, just lots of fun, lots of crazy people, and a shitton of glitter. You should see the inside of my car, and the asphalt where I parked when I returned home. There is a fine coat of glitter on almost everything in my living space, and I'm all right with that.
Next year: the pit.
Hey y'all! I'm on vacation, so I've asked some lovely ladies to babysit the ol' AC while I'm gone. Rebekah is awesome, so show her the red carpet, will you?
Hello, Animated Cardigan readers! My name is Rebekah of the blog From the Mixed-up Files, and I'm so excited to be guest posting for Jess while she is on vacation. I'd like to cover a topic near and dear to both of our hearts - concert attire. Summerfest, the world's largest musical festival, just wrapped up in Milwaukee, and I convinced my friend Erin to take some pictures of her outfits so that we could both show you what we chose to wear during each of our visits to the fest. I also came up with some Dos and Don'ts for dressing for Summerfest, which you can find below the pictures.
What I wore:
What Erin wore:
Do:
● Check the weather. Normally around this time of year, it's hot, and the idea is to wear as little as possible. But the forecast during the first few days of the fest called for rain and cool temps, which made rain jackets or disposable ponchos and sweatshirts necessities.
● Pack light. A small-to-medium cross-body bag is great so that you're hands free. All you really need is money, tickets, your ID, phone, and possibly sunscreen. Our bag check was only $2, which was handy when we didn't want to carry around a blanket and outerwear all day.
● Wear comfortable shoes. Cute sandals, sneakers, or even boots if you're so inclined are ideal. I'll even give flip flops a pass here. It's Summerfest - fashion-wise, it's the next step up from the beach.
● Dress comfortably in general. Breathable fabric is good. Sequins and other embellishments can sometimes be scratchy on your skin, so consider that, too.
● Wear something than can be easily washed, and do expect that someone will spill beer on you. I spilled something every day I was there, and I wasn't even drunk.
Don't:
● Wear heels or any shoes that will give you blisters. You're going to have to walk a lot, and stilettos in this setting just make you look like you're trying too hard. If you really need Jordan Knight of NKOTB to see you in heels, I suppose you could stash them in your purse and change into them right before the show. But that's a big IF.
● Wear the T-shirt of the band you're going to see if you're an adult. Kids, go for it. It's cute then. But feel free to wear a different band's T-shirt; that's fine.
● Wear leggings as pants. Leggings are comfortable; they are great for adding warmth and modesty (see how Erin wore them above); but they are not pants.
Or, you could ignore me completely and wear this.
Thanks for having me, and enjoy the rest of your summer!
