Blogging Again? Yes!

So, the Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival has come and gone and I know what you have all been wondering. You have been sitting in your homes thinking, “What did Danger Potential think of the festival? What was his reaction to the musical event of the summer and the first night concert in the history of Golden Gate Park?” Well, I will keep you waiting no longer.

First, let me just say, Radiohead was awesome. Radiohead definitely rocked the crowd of 70,000 and was a great end to the night. So great that it almost made up for the rest of the festival. Almost.

As I anticipated, the scheduling of the concert was a problem and I was not able to see the Black Keys at all. Instead I opted to “watch” Beck. I say “watch” because the organization of the stage made this a very difficult task indeed. The stage was too low to actually see over the heads of the people from the ground so we sat on a hill, but were kept far away by the fenced off “VIP” section, so we could see a miniscule Beck, who I believe was wearing a cowboy hat. The effect was similar to listening to a live album with 30,000 of my closest friends and half-hour long beer lines.

On top of that, the concert was ridiculously oversold and gave me the feeling that I was in some sort of a highly orchestrated social psychology experiment (this being an attempt at a more clever way of saying that I felt like “a rat in a maze,” or better yet “a rat in a cage,” despite all my rage…). So that was kind of a bummer, especially trying to get to Radiohead and trying to leave Golden Gate Park afterward.

Anyway, I would go on and on about this but seeing as the concert has now been over for quite some time and much of my rage has dispersed. Also, I realize that the whole idea of the blog is to keep current with news, and the Outside Lands Festival is no longer current. So I will end my rant with this email conversation between myself and Aaron Axelsen, music director at the Bay Area radio station, Live 105 (FM 105.3). I was listening to his show and heard him praising Another Planet for its production at the Outside Lands Festival and became so outraged that I had to express my feelings in a way that only the internet can provide: an angry yet respectful email. Anyway, this is the conversation that followed. He’s actually a really nice guy and wrote me back.

OK, here is my email:

Aaron,

I heard your comment about the Outside Lands Festival on your radio show a few minutes ago and I just wanted to set straight your perception of the concert. I don't know what you saw from the VIP section, but as a general admission customer I was disappointed and even angered by the organization of the festival, especially the sets you mentioned (Beck and the Cold War Kids). In fact I was disappointed to the extent that I was literally offended by your "kudos" comment to Another Planet Entertainment. All of the headlining bands were scheduled at the same time so we were not able to get our money's worth and for the Sutro concerts in particular the stage was too low to even see Beck or the Cold War Kids over the heads of the other concert-goers. I just wanted to let you know this because I felt that by encouraging Another Planet Entertainment you are just encouraging further shittiness in the future. This is not meant to offend you, only to inform you of what the rest of us experienced.

Sincerely,

David

And here is Aaron's reply:

thanks david for the feedback, i appreciate it.

make sure you email someone over at another planet with your unfortunate experience on Friday so they can use it as ammo to work out these wrinkles and deliver an even better outside lands festival in 2009.

a pretty ambitious effort for another planet and yes, even from the VIP section i still had to venture out into the masses to the other stages for sets by Beck and Cold War Kids, but i still stand my support of these local 'independent' promoters for overall, brining something utterly epic and grandiose to san Francisco. (i spent at least 50% of Friday and Saturday outside the VIP section)

i agree that it wasn't flawless or plagued by various problems by any stretch of the imagination BUT maiden voyages for massive music festivals usually aren't. (i.e. the first Coachella i went to in October of '99 was riddled with problems and catastrophic sound issues, etc, but they stuck with it!)

with your permission, i'll personally forward your email to the event organizers as i feel your objective and constructive feedback will be beneficial in helping improve next years efforts

thank you for listening to soundcheck, too

sincerely,

aaron axelsen

I replied encouraging him to forward my email to Another Planet so I could get my feedback heard. Anyway, I was really impressed that he took the time to respond. Also, you guys should listen to his show "Soundcheck" on Sunday nights because it is really the only thing worth listening to on Live 105. I have yet to hear him play Sublime.

So this ends my saga with the Outside Lands Music Festival (for this year at least). In conclusion, it was disappointing, but Radiohead was cool. I probably could have said that in less words.