I spent all of last weekend at the Sasquatch Music Festival. It was held at the Gorge Amphitheater in Washington state. Whoever had the brilliant idea to set up an Amphitheater down there deserves a great big gold star. It was so beautiful it almost didn’t look real.
There was so much good music I can’t even begin to describe all of it. I can say that seeing The Cure play a live show was one of the coolest experiences of my life. Robert Smith is looking a little chunky and washed up — almost like a human version of his South Park character rather than the other way around — but he still sounded incredible and they played a very tight set. I wasn’t that excited about seeing R.E.M. initially. I was a big fan when I was in high school but I thought their more recent albums kind of sucked (except the newest one is pretty good). I was caught off guard by how much I enjoyed them though. They totally blew my mind, they were incredible. Modest Mouse started off a little shaky but ended up getting their energy going and doing a great job. M.I.A. rocked so hard I can’t even put words to it. Death Cab For Cutie was even better live than they are in the studio. Flight of the Conchords were hilarious. The New Pornographers were amazing. Everyone was amazing. The funnest set for me was definitely The Hives. Those guys know how to get a crowd going. And my favourite new musical discovery — Ghostland Observatory. I also really enjoyed Beirut and the Cold War Kids, neither of which I knew particularly well before I arrived. We also saw Rich Fulcher in the Comedy Tent. He plays Bob Fossil on The Mighty Boosh, one of mine and my roommate’s favourite shows.
Aside from the music though, I think what made the weekend so wonderful was the people I went with. I feel pretty lucky to have such amazing people in my life. We camped together for three nights and, despite the fact that we were all filthy by the end of it, we had more than enough fun to make it worthwhile.
The craziest thing happened on the second day as we were walking from the campsite to the venue. A big gust of wind came through and turned into a little twister. Then it picked up a tent that wasn’t pegged down and hurled it straight up into the air. Everyone watched in awe as the tent flew through the air, around and around, and eventually landed down in the bottom of the valley. Whoever owns that tent was probably pretty choked when they came back to camp that night to nothing. And the worst part is, they would have had no idea of the adventure their tent went on. They probably thought someone stole it.
