CHICAGO -- The fans in the front of the line at Lollapalooza's official start came from far and wide to land a choice spot for their favorite artists at one of North America's premiere music festivals. Oregon, Maine, London, Texas, Ontario, and France were just a few of the locales we saw represented up front, but the very front of the line was manned by two Depeche Mode superfans who came three hundred miles in order to stake out a spot right up front and they didn't plan on moving away from the main stage where DM was set to play all day long.
But they weren't the only pair brought to Grant Park by their love of the famous goth-rockers; just a little further back in line, a coed duo had just made acquaintances over their love of '80s legends Depeche Mode (and fellow '80s stalwarts Morrissey and The Cure), and they planned to buddy up in order to make it through their whole day parked in front of the main stage waiting for their faves to close out the night's festivities.
Kings of Leon proved to be the other crowd favorite in Friday's line-up, with every non-Depeche Mode fan in the crowd citing the now-superstar rockers as the band to see (DM and KOL play head to head against each other tonight on separate stages - should be interesting to see who draws the bigger crowd). Hipstery bands were also represented by the more fashionable types - with Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes and The Decemberists all getting call-outs from the crowd.
Unfortunately, as the fans rushed in, so did the bad weather. It got dreary right as the music got right underway, and has been raining steadily since - setting up for a cool and relaxing day in front of the Chicago skyline.
By Steven Roberts, Rich Sancho and Christopher "CJ" Smith
The doors just opened for Lollapalooza 2009, and the theme from Star Wars is blasting over the PA. Despite how lame that is, our team here at MTV News is still really excited for some of the acts that are going to the hit the stage over the next few days. We sat down to give you some of the acts we're really excited to see:
Steven Roberts, Production Assistant: This is my first time at Lollapalooza, and I'm really excited to see what it's all about - I'm hoping it's like that one episode of the Simpsons with the Smashing Pumpkins and Homer taking cannonballs to his gut. But I must say I'm looking forward to one act in particular, Snoop Dogg!
I've grown up on Snoop, but I've never seen him perform. I'm looking forward to just getting lost in the crowd and a cloud of smoke to sing-along to all the classic Snoop tracks with thousands of other people.
Rich Sancho, online producer: I've caught 2 previous Lollapalooza shows - one in the early 90s, and one in 2007. While Jane's addiction and Daft Punk were highlights in my previous Lolla experiences, I'm definitely looking forward to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and Silversun Pickups this year.
Some smaller acts I would love to try and catch are A-Trak, Kanye West's former touring DJ, who is an incredible turntablist. Also The Glitch Mob, a glitch-hop conglomerate out of L.A. that features some next-level mashups and drum programming. Should be a great weekend full of great music!
Christopher Smith, Segment Producer: I'm most excited to see Los Angeles' No Age. They're not sitting on their laurels simply riding the success of last year's breakout album Nouns, they've already got a new EP about to drop and are already working on their new album. They've got a killer stage presence for a duo - and I'm excited to hear new material shine on stage. We're gonna be interviewing the guys tomorrow - so check back to hear more about the new stuff.
Check out some photos of the festival ramping up!
Read more...
Just hours before they take the stage in front of 10,000 more fans across town on the first day of Lollapaloopza, the Decemberists got their feet wet Thursday night with a sweaty tune up show at Chicago's famed Metro rock club.
Veering from the current format of playing their latest concept album, Hazards of Love, in its entirety, the Portland band allowed the 1,000-plus die-hards to vote online for their favorites. The show opened with a 15-plus minute version of “The Tain,” from the EP of the same name from 2004, which swayed and swooped like a drunken, seasick sailor’s song.
As a testament to their fans’ devotion, every dip and swirl of the song was greeted with whoops of joy, which only increased when the band next served up some exuberant pop with "July, July" and the triumphant rock of "The Rake’s Song" from Hazards. After the wistful folk of another nugget, "Here I Dreamt I Was an Architect" – and a poke at people who refer to the festival as "Lolla" -- singer/songwriter Colin Meloy paused for a moment to pay homage to director John Hughes, a Chicago native who died earlier in the day in New York after suffering a heart attack.
Read more...
You're forgiven if a glance at the top of this year's Lollapalooza bill makes you feel like you've fallen into a wormhole to 1991. Between old-school headliners Tool, Depeche Mode and Jane's Addiction (fellow old-schoolers the Beastie Boys had to drop out due to Adam Yauch's cancer diagnosis) and new school topliners who channel the good old days (Kings of Leon's 1970s AM radio rock, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' '80s new wave and the Killers' early U2 pose), everything old is new again.
But dig a bit deeper and there's plenty of gold on the Chicago waterfront among the 100-ish bands who will sprawl out over the mile-long festival site in Grant Park, which kicks off tomorrow. Your legs might give out before you make it to all these sets, but catch half of them and you'll thank yourself (or me) later.
Day 1
The Henry Clay People
These Glendale, California shaggy dogs bring a West Coast halo to the bleary-eyed barroom rock perfected by the Hold Steady and the Replacements. Songs like the title track from their album Working Part Time, in which they bemoan "We were working part time all the time," perfectly capture the get-in-the-van indie experience. They're on early, but it'll probably be just the wake-up call you need.
Amazing Baby
How can you not love a band with a song called "The Narwhal?" Unicorned sea creatures notwithstanding, this Brooklyn-based psychedelic five-piece made noise at this year's South by Southwest festival and are starting to bend ears with their truly trippy, dirge-erific debut, Rewild. Plus, they're pals with MGMT and Chairlift, so at the very least they have good taste.
Day 2
Read more...
Jane's Addiction frontman, Lollapalooza founder and flash mob enthusiast Perry Farrell has been in the business of rock music for over 20 years. In addition to Jane's, he has also fronted the supremely underrated Porno for Pyros and has worked on a number of other collaborative projects. He was the first person to provide a high-profile stage for many of alternative music's elite (including Nine Inch Nails and Pearl Jam) and basically invented the idea of the touring festival that was later copied by Warped, Ozzfest, Lilith Fair and a half-dozen others. But despite the fact that he's the guy who sang "Ocean Size" and introduced the world to Dave Navarro (which, in turn, gave us "Till Death Do Us Part: Carmen & Dave"), Farrell's greatest legacy is probably normalizing the idea of taking any word and putting "-palooza" behind it.
I'm neither a linguist, an etymologist or an anthropologist, but when Farrell first introduced the word "Lollapalooza" into the lexicon during the first tour in 1991, he not only opened up the use of the word (which generally describes any sort of vaguely chaotic gathering) but he also inspired variations. CNN referred to last year's presidential race as "Campaign-apalooza" dozens of times a day, and though it looks stupid in print, it sounded something like normal on TV. In my home town, our first recycling program was called "Recycle-palooza." A basic search for the term "palooza" turns up events like "Pet-A-Palooza" and "Polar-palooza." All of this seems perfectly normal, which in turn seems utterly insane. Shockingly, the word isn't in the dictionary, despite the fact that it gets used far more often than Homer Simpson's frustrated grunt.
So here's to you and your 'Palooza, Perry. MTV News will be on the ground blogging and tweeting live from Grant Park in Chicago all weekend. In the meantime, enjoy the video for Porno for Pyros' "Tahitian Moon."
Perry Farrell does it to us every year. Yes, his brainchild Lollapalooza is one of the best rock deals for the money every summer, with more than 100 bands playing right on the Chicago lakefront in beautiful Grant Park. But whoever maps out the schedule grid must be a masochist, because this year's lineup has more than its share of conflicts that are going to force some serious musical Sophie's choices. I have already begun stewing over the ones that are trying to break my heart.
Friday is not so bad. Yes, I'd like to see White Lies, but I'll probably choose Jersey punk outfit the Gaslight Anthem. And as much as I've always wanted to check out nutso electronic duo Crystal Castles, by evening I'll probably need to be soothed by the dulcet tones of Fleet Foxes. The headliner spot is an easy one for me, since I just caught Kings of Leon but haven't seen Depeche Mode in six years, and I know their show will have a bit more flash than the Followill brothers' more straight-ahead set.
Read more...
By Rya Backer
As a production assistant, my duties on the 29th floor vary. A lot. So when it was confirmed this morning that Depeche Mode would be headlining Lollapalooza, I was brought back to a few weeks ago, when I did nothing for days but watch archived interviews with the British new-wave act — a task that had to be taken care of for MTV News Canada.
After watching hours upon hours of the band, or just the lead singer, Dave Gahan, talk about everything from fashion to their feelings on Erasure, I feel like I kind of know the guys, and there's so much to know about them. Let's just say their "Behind the Music" episode was deep — rife with drugs, bandmembers hating each other and subsequently quitting, and worlds of other gory rock-and-roll cliché details. But they've also sold more than 100 million records, and their sonic style is credited with influencing bands as diverse as Franz Ferdinand, Radiohead and Linkin Park.
Read more...
By Kathleen Newman-Bremang
Before he was winning over fans on "American Idol," Adam Lambert was wowing audiences in Los Angeles' underground glam-rock scene. See what Lambert's friends had to say about the "Idol" contestant's outrageous performance style.
The complete Lollapalooza 2009 lineup is finally here! The Killers, Tool and the Beastie Boys are set to headline this year's event.
Get ready, "Transformers" fans! According to some of the sequel's new castmembers, "Revenge of the Fallen" will be "bigger, badder, and better" than the first.
Head over to the Movies Blog to find out why Judd Apatow's new comedy made Seth Rogen and Adam Sandler want to punch their good friend in the face.
Everyone's favorite web-slinging superhero is about to get the "Saturday Night Live" treatment. Our Splash Page blog has the inside scoop on an upcoming "Spider-Man" comic written by Bill Hader and Seth Meyers.
Kanye West, Pearl Jam, Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead ... Senator Barack Obama? The Democratic presidential candidate has booked the same area in Chicago's Grant Park that hosts several of the stages at the annual Lollapalooza festival, and if early estimates hold, the crowd in his hometown on the evening of November 4 could best the daily totals put up by the granddaddy of alternative-rock festivals. Maybe the Lolla attendees who were bummed that Obama didn't show up in August should have stuck around.
It's still unknown if attendees wishing to join the party will need to register online to get a ticket in advance, but Obama's team has already begun prepping the park for what is expected to be a "massive" rally on election night, according to the Chicago Tribune. Security will likely be tight for the event, with the area fenced off, much as it is for Lollapalooza, and attendees going through metal detectors. The Obama campaign has promised to pick up the tab for such expensive measures.
Organizers are expecting a crowd of 100,000 or more, rivaling the 75,000 daily totals for Lolla, which is spread out over an area twice the size of the one in which Obama will be setting up. No other details about the rally have been released yet.
The campaign of Republican rival Senator John McCain has not yet announced where it will be on election eve.
Lollapalooza 2008 is a wrap, but that doesn't mean you're up on everything that went down this past weekend in Chicago. Let's break it down day-by-day ...
Friday: Radiohead dazzled the glassy-eyed crowd, opting to play some of their more low-key songs amid a digital rain shower. The fans appreciated the soft landing after a frenetic day with CSS, the Cool Kids, the Black Lips and others. (Read more about Day 1.)
Saturday: The festival took a violent turn during Rage Against the Machine's set, as aggressive fans overstepped their bounds and the band urged them to calm down. It was an ugly and unfortunate end to what had been an otherwise idyllic day in Grant Park with Lupe Fiasco, the Ting Tings and more. (Read more about Day 2.)
Sunday: Lollapalooza 2008 wrapped up Sunday night not with an appearance by Illinois Senator Barack Obama (as had been rumored all weekend), but rather, with a much-hyped showdown between homecoming king Kanye and Trent Reznor's rejuvenated Nine Inch Nails. (Read more about Day 3.)
For even more on Lolla (yes, more!), check out all our coverage here in the Newsroom blog.
