Bonnaroo 2009 Music and Arts Festival Review and Photo Gallery

by Fil Manley.

There’s a sign at Bonnaroo that says, “Being happy doesn’t mean everything is perfect. It means you have decided to look beyond the imperfections.” This quote encapsulates the complicated feelings I’ve developed toward the visceral, diverse and sometimes overwhelming experience that is Bonnaroo. Although Bonnaroo has evolved from its hippie, dreadlocked roots of years past to a tightly packaged, well marketed mainstream icon, the bones beneath the skin remain the same. It’s more than the music. It’s the circus.

The eighth annual Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival took place June 11-14 on a 700-acre farm not far from Nashville, Tennessee, and was attended by almost 80,000 people. Headlining this year were Bruce Springsteen, Nine Inch Nails, Phish, Snoop Dog, Al Green, Wilco, Public Enemy and David Byrne.

We drove to Roo through intermittent rain showers and were given just enough of a respite to set up camp when we arrived. Not long after, we ventured into the main camp to check out the mob, the shops and the mud. We barely made it to the center of the camp when the skies opened and the rain came down in buckets.

This was my fourth Bonnaroo, my third shooting with credentials, and this year I felt a distinct sense of déjà vu. The sights and scenery don’t change much. Mother Nature and artist selection are the main variables. This year, the weather was as close to perfect as I’ve seen. The drenching downpour that started Thursday afternoon and continued for four hours in the evening created a mud bath, flooded camps and tents, killed iPods and cell phones, but also served to keep the dust down for the entire weekend, which in drier years has been both unhealthy and intolerable.

There are so many things to occupy your mind and time. As if having a ferris wheel, shopping, art and an air conditioned movie theatre aren’t enough, there are other treats available to the experimental set, which can be attested to by the number of people staring intently at the ground, the sky or the back of their hand with pupils like giant black saucers. The overwhelming scent of high grade ganja permeates the entire camp along with the occasional whiff of opium.

But at its heart, Bonnaroo really is about music and the lineup this year made that clear.

The people in charge at Bonnaroo wear a special emblem called an infinity pass, which lets them go anywhere. Printed on those laminates this year was an octopus and the words “squid brains.” This was a poke at the angsty drama last year following Kanye West’s botched show. That’s the creative term West came up with on his blog when he was trying to eviscerate Roos management by leaving the caps lock on.

When I heard what the octopus and the quote referred to, it made me smile. The amount of effort required to create Bonnaroo borders on superhuman. It employs almost 10,000 people each year from the surrounding communities to pull, push and shove what seem like a million moving parts together. Bonnaroo, like any other institution, has its detractors. By trying to cater to the musical tastes of everyone, they ensure that everyone is eventually going to experience some disappointment. Despite that, Bonnaroo has become more professional, better planned and better executed in succeeding years.

There was another death this year, the seventh in the history of Bonnaroo. An Alabama man was found dead in his tent after the festival was over. In the eight years Bonnaroo has been around, they have hosted upwards of 700,000 people over 32 days. Bonnaroo is like fire - it’s fun to watch, fun to sit beside, fun to cook with, but the warning label should be clear: “Handle With Care.”

We wandered from place to place on Thursday night, briefly listening to bands we had never heard of while trying to unwind from the days of preparation which are de rigueur for life at Bonnaroo. A thick blanket of Tennessee fog covered Centeroo, the place where the bands play, as we wandered between raindrops.

We were only able to really listen to two bands on Thursday night. The first was Hockey from Portland, Oregon. They’re a bit of Wonder Bread soul wrapped in electronica with an underfed bass player, judging from the handfuls of what appeared to be marijuana he stuffed in his mouth. The second band was Passion Pit. They’re poppy for my taste, but have strong instrumentation, especially the guitar and drums and the nerve to put three keyboard players on stage at once. I wound up enjoying both bands.

Friday was ground zero at Bonnaroo this year. David Byrne played a big role at Roo and Friday was his day to curate the Which stage, the second largest. His picks were Katzenjammer, Dirty Projectors, St. Vincent, Santigold and Ani DiFranco. The only band of this lineup I had the chance to see was Katzenjammer, and they were my favorite of the festival.

Katzenjammer is a quartet of girls from Norway whose music is so funky, stylish, comical and frenetic it’s ridiculous. They’re sexy as can be, but their unabashed vitality is tempered by the kind of extreme musical talent which can only be had through years of practice. The instruments they play include accordion, mandolin, guitar, piano, balalaika bass, glockenspiel, trumpet, drums and banjo, and their drum kit includes a complete set of battered cake tins. Not only do they convey a kind of raw energy with their instruments, they all play multiple instruments and trade off constantly, all while belting out vocals and harmonies that make your hair stand on end.

Watching them, I suffered from a weird sort of schizophrenia that felt like it was part Penthouse forum and part Steve Martin with an arrow through his head. I first heard them play as they sat around a picnic table near the press tent. They tore off one of their songs unplugged, voices ringing out in a way that dared anyone to not listen.

Next on the list for us were Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. Grace is a phenomenal vocalist, guitarist and Hammond B3 player whose star has been constantly rising over the past few years. This was my first time to see her play, but I knew I was going to like her when I saw her crew setting up her custom-built Leslie cabinet before the show. Listening to her, I was reminded of everything I love about '60s and '70s music. The instrumentation says a lot about their style of playing. Scott Tournet, the guitarist, plays the slide with alacrity on a beautifully worn Gibson SG, circa 1970ish, with a tremolo bridge. He and Grace constantly trade out guitars, moving between the SG, and a couple of gorgeous Flying Vs. Every member of the band plays at full throttle and all of them have the talent to make it sound right. Grace has a stage presence that is both commanding and easy, a voice that feels like the Summer of Love and a smile that lights up the room.

At one point we stumbled into a press conference with Triumph The Insult Comic Dog, who spent the weekend skewering everything and everyone. He got to sing with Springsteen and did “man on the street” interviews for Conan O’Brien. At one point he asked a girl if she had to “sell her entire meth lab to get there.” Then later, talking to the Beastie Boys he asked them if they could “possibly look any more like three old Jews?” When Flava Flav showed up he said “Flava Flav is wearing a giant clock around his neck so he will always know how far back he set the civil rights movement.”

The rest of our Friday we spent listening to Béla Fleck and Toumani Diabate, Al Green, The Beastie Boys, David Byrne, Phish and Public Enemy.

The Béla Fleck show was a subdued acoustic set and I was captivated by the Kora playing of Toumani Diabate. I had never seen or heard the instrument before, but it’s a West African harp/lute with 21 strings, which in his hands sounded at times like a guitar and at other times like a harp or bass.

Next, the Reverend Al Green hit the What stage. This is one of the more interesting things about Bonnaroo, how people who were born in the '80s can still relate so well to music that was made for their parents and grandparents.

The sweet spot on Friday night was taken by The Beastie Boys. I’ve largely ignored them, despite the raging of some of my friends, but they went a long way toward convincing me this year. Their skilled performance drove the crowd wild.

Next we saw David Byrne on the Which stage. He took the stage with a finely choreographed group of dancers and played a lot of his new material as well as almost every Talking Heads song I like. My favorite was “Life During Wartime” which I never expected to hear live and he did at least part of his set wearing a very flattering ballet tutu.

Phish closed the main stage with a three hour set and a fantastic light show. I’m a late convert to Phish. This was only the third time I’ve seen them but every time I do, I like them a little more. Trey Anastasio is either gifted, accomplished, or both, because he blends leads and rhythm parts seamlessly.

By far, my favorite big act of the evening was Public Enemy. I first saw them at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta in 1986. Their energy is undiminished, if a little less militant. Flava Flav relentlessly and energetically works the crowd. This show was special to me because their original DJ, Terminator X, played with the band for the first time in years. Terminator X’s 1991 album Terminator X and the Valley of the Jeep Beats was the seminal rap album for me. Before I heard it, I didn’t understand or have any interest in rap or hip-hop. This album turned me on to it and will always be in my top ten. Public Enemy performed their entire album It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.

DJ Gregg Gillis, aka Girl Talk, capped off Friday night in That tent. This is the third year in a row that I’ve missed his frenetic sample swamp and by all accounts, it’s the show to see at Roo. I heard it loud and clear from my tent a hundred yards away, so I can attest to the fact that his music, sampled or not, is excellent. The sun was coming up when I fell asleep, still listening.

Saturday started out with a surprise appearance by Jimmy Buffett. ILO and the Coral Reefer Allstars were scheduled to play the Which stage, but Buffet’s appearance was a late addition. His 1978 album You Had to Be There, recorded live at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, is another top ten for me.

Next we took in more Katzenjammer and Grace Potter, followed by Rodrigo Y Gabriella. They’re a phenomenal classical and acoustic guitar duo who play a percussive and dramatic fingersytle set of mixed originals and covers. After that, we saw Warren Haynes and Gov’t Mule. He brought Grace Potter on stage to play some B3 and sing Neil Young’s "Southern Man" with him.

Saturday's headliner was Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, who played an almost four hour set to a lot of die hard fans. Saturday late night was filled to the brim with Nine Inch Nails, .moe and MGMT. The most popular act of the evening seemed to be MGMT in That tent, jam packed, and attended by Bruce Springsteen and his son.

The Nine Inch Nails show was my first and was excellent in every way. The music and light show were perfect, as was Trent Reznor's performance. He said from the stage that this would be their last performance in the United States.

.moe closed out Saturday night with a set that started in This tent at 1 a.m. and by my count, didn’t end until somewhere around 6.

We woke Sunday to overcast skies and cool winds that remained through the day. One of Sunday's highlights was Erykah Badu, who was praised by everyone we talked to who saw her. The day was rounded out by Andrew Bird, Merle Haggard, Snoop Dog, Band of Horses and the obligatory four-hour closing set by Phish, complemented by a special three-song guest sit-in by Bruce Springsteen.

My favorite Sunday performances were put on by singer-songwriter Todd Snider and the thrash band Shadows Fall.

Snider sang his eclectic, Dylanesque brand of poetry from the stage in This tent, and Shadows Fall thrilled the crowd for an hour in That tent.

Sunday, we got to catch a showing of The Big Lewbowski in the Bonnaroo Cinema. We sat for a while listening to two guys dressed as bowling pins pitch the upcoming Lebowski Festival Speed of Sound tour before we got lost in the high drama of “The Dude.” Sitting in the dark with my skin burning and my feet throbbing, I couldn’t help but draw comparisons between The Dude and Bonnaroo. Both sometimes show up in a dirty bathrobe and are prone to fits of nakedness, both are either usually high, drunk, or both. Both are at times philosophic and intelligent, but at other times stumbling and obtuse. The major thing they have in common though is that both are for some reason incredibly likable.

The more I go to festivals, the more I start to believe that the current trend in home brewed music recording is leading the resurgence of the popularity of live music. Piracy is up and profits are down as the RIAA tries and fails to keep up with the bleeding edge of file sharing. These days it seems that the only way to build a following is through live performances, and festivals like Bonnaroo, Rothbury, Outside Lands and a few others aren’t missing that point.

This was my fourth date with Bonnaroo, and despite myself, I think I’m falling in love.

Bonnaroo abides.

About Fil Manley
Filson "Fil" Manley is a guitarist and writer, but is best known for his music photography. Fil is a full-time web developer and founder of the non-profit organization HelpForHumans.org that includes a non-profit search engine, the Backpacks for the Homeless project and the Help For Humans video documentary project. He conducts interviews, writes music reviews and reviews of live shows, and loves the music festival scene, which he covers whenever he can. He enjoys all kinds of music, but especially likes roots rock, reggae, blues, soul and bluegrass. Fil comes from a musical family. His grandfather, Verne, was chairman of NAMM for thee years and played trombone with Tommy Dorsey. Manley's father, Lance, has played in bands in the Atlanta area for 40 years and his mother, Sandra, is a vocal coach. Fil has owned and played a number of different guitars, from a Gibson Les Paul to a Martin D-18, and is currently playing a 1987 Ovation 12-string.

About Laura Turner
Laura Turner is a camera obsessive music lover, writer and photographer with diverse tastes in music, ranging from Jethro Tull to the Eagles of Death Metal. Laura resides in Snellville, Georgia, and is studying photography at Gwinnett Technical College.

Related Links
Bonnaroo 2008 Music and Arts Festival Review and Photo Gallery
Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival

---