It’s that time of year, friends: Lollapalooza lineup time. Spring is in the air, but soon enough summer will be here and so will Chicago’s great music festivals. Unless you bought tickets well in advance, I’m sure this year’s Lollapalooza lineup will be the deciding factor as to whether or not you make your way to Grant Park this August 3-5. Ticket prices have risen this year, no doubt in part because the supreme tax deal the festival was getting from the City of Chicago has all but gone away. Early bird tickets have all sold out, and general 3-day passes are currently on sale for $230 (service fees included). Is it worth the cost? Well, that’s for you to decide. The full lineup is listed below, and is headlined by Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Black Keys, Black Sabbath, Jack White, Florence + the Machine, and At the Drive-In. Okay, so those last 2 headliners don’t really seem like they deserve the official “headlining” slot. I’d argue that The Shins and Sigur Ros are more deserving of headlining than Florence + the Machine and At the Drive-In are. That said, I’m still excited that reunion acts Black Sabbath, At the Drive-In and The Afghan Whigs will be there. Other noteworthy acts include Passion Pit, M83, The Weeknd, Bloc Party, Metric, Childish Gambino, tUnE-yArDs, The Tallest Man on Earth, Of Monsters and Men, Alabama Shakes, Tame Impala, The Walkmen, Neon Indian, Dum Dum Girls, Washed Out, Givers, Chairlift, Sharon Van Etten, Polica, First Aid Kit, FIDLAR, Bombay Bicycle Club, Bowerbirds, JEFF the Brotherhood, and Chicago’s own JC Brooks and the Uptown Sound. If you’re a fan of Perry’s electronica stage, Avicii, Justice and Bassnectar will all be headliners, with others sets from Kaskade, Calvin Harris, Santigold, and Little Dragon, among others. Again, have a look at the full lineup after the jump. If you ask me, this is pretty damn good. Worth the price of admission? I’d say so. Buy tickets here.
Tag: lineup
Well friends, let me use this post to keep you apprised of some of the latest happenings with the good ‘ol Pitchfork Music Festival. The complete lineup was finally revealed today, after two separate doses of acts to try and get you interested earlier. The end result? I’m interested in this lineup but also a bit disappointed. Things are certainly less high profile than last year, even as Feist and Vampire Weekend are still pretty big names. My main concern is how good this is all going to sound in an outdoor, daytime setting. Artists like Beach House, Real Estate, Oneohtrix Point Never, and Clams Casino, among others, don’t exactly make music to be enjoyed under the sweltering sun. Now Sleigh Bells, Iceage, Wild Flag, Grimes and Cloud Nothings – those are acts to get you moving. There’s lots more hip hop this year too, none of which can be considered bad at a festival thanks to heavy beats and guys shouting instructions at you (hands in the air!). A$AP Rocky and Danny Brown at least should be good for some high energy halfway crazy sets. So though I might not be totally thrilled with this year’s lineup, I’m convinced things will turn out well anyways. Even if they don’t, it’s kind of nice just to hang out in Union Park with everyone. You can buy single-day passes to the festival for $45 by clicking here. You can have a look at the full lineup by going here. Come on out to the fest this July with me. We’ll have some fun, drink some beer and see some good live music. Okay, onto the business of Pick Your Poison. Recommended tracks today come from Alexander Tucker, Caltrop, Father John Misty (aka J. Tillman ex-Fleet Foxes), jj, King Tuff, Midnight Magic, MNDR, Ólafur Arnalds and Young Hines.
Alexander Tucker – Window Sill
Beast Make Bomb – Flagpole Sitta (Harvey Danger cover)
Father John Misty – Nancy From Now On
Giant Giant Sand – Forever and A Day
Joshua McCormack – The Phantom King
Midnight Magic – Psycho For Your Love
Ólafur Arnalds – Allt varð hljótt
SOUNDCLOUD
It’s that time of year again, when all the little girls and boys eagerly anticipate exactly what’s going to emerge from Lollapalooza’s secret headquarters in regards to a festival lineup. If you can’t tell from the logo above, Lollapalooza is celebrating its 20th Anniversary this year. Congratulations to Perry Farrell and the whole team behind the festival for making it happen every year in Chicago’s own Grant Park. It has helped craft Lollapalooza into one of the top-tier U.S. music festivals. Okay, so let’s get right to it. I’m not going to offer up any comments in regards to this year’s lineup, but if you’ve got something to say about it yourself, by all means let loose in the comments section. Without further ado, here’s the official lineup for Lollapalooza 2011!
When preparing for your Lollapalooza weekend, unless you digest your music by the gallon, chances are you’ll wind up with at least a handful of moments where you’re not sure exactly what artist to go see. That will either result from a conflict where multiple artists you like are on at the same time, or you dislike or are completely unfamiliar with all the artists performing in a particular time slot. In this Lollapalooza preview guide, I aim to help you out with the tough decisions on each day, and hopefully inspire you enough to check out some different acts you might not think about otherwise. Please keep in mind that this is being written with zero regard for stage location, and if you want to walk from one stage to another it could take up to 15 minutes should it be on the other side of the park. So plan accordingly, and try to do yourself a favor and go see some artists you wouldn’t normally catch otherwise. Broaden your horizons a little bit – that’s sort of what a music festival is all about.
This year Lollapalooza is set to be bigger than ever before, with the festival grounds now extending across Columbus Ave. to a new section of the park, where one of the smaller stages along with the electronica stage known as Perry’s will be located. That also allows for tens of thousands of more people to attend the festival each day, which will probably go from bad traffic jams to worse traffic jams as it gets later in the day and people start to pack in for the headliners. But this is a new layout, and in its first year it’s going to be a game of trial-and-error to see what officially works and what doesn’t. On that note, I’ll have a full day-by-day report of this year’s Lollapalooza, so please check back to hear about the good, the bad and the ugly. For now though, let’s get started with this hour-by-hour preview of the must-see acts performing this year.
Yes my friends, it’s that time of year again. Winter has ended and we’re getting into the nice thaw of spring. Soon enough, summer will officially be here, and with that comes music festival season. It’s one of my favorite times of year, being able to hang out in some large park area and listen to bands upon bands at stage upon stage. And in my hometown of Chicago, we’re privileged to have two of the world’s most predominant summer music festivals when you’re talking about rock music. Far smaller and with a distinct emphasis on the independent and up-and-coming artists, the Pitchfork Music Festival is a “boutique” version of larger fests like Coachella and Bonnaroo. Of course Chicago also has their large fest to compete with those other two American institutions, and that comes in the form of Lollapalooza. As a one sentence history of all you need to know, Lollapalooza was a traveling festival for much of the 90s and featured a large number of big-name artists all performing under one roof. Since 2005, Lollapalooza has called Grant Park its home, and it will continue to do so for at least the next 8 years. I’m happy and proud to have both these festivals become mainstays in Chicago, and if you’re a resident or merely a frequent visitor, you know that its a great music city.
Now then, enough with the stalling. At midnight, the lineup for Lollapalooza 2010 will be published on the festival’s official site. I’ve been talking it up, as I do every year, for the last couple weeks (especially on Twitter) in anticipation of this announcement. If you’ve been paying attention there, you’ll already know much of the lineup. For the rest of you, feast your eyes on this:
