virgin free fest ...

so my head is just now officially wrapping itself around the activities of last saturday, also known as virgin free fest. i want to share a quick recounting of the music, the atmosphere, the wackiness, and the fun times had on what normally would of been a disheartening weekend.

so saturday stared with arsenal fc losing what would of been a crucial early season home game to a much lesser mid/low table contender in the epl. normally my saturday would of taken a slight turn to the south, but the sun was shining, and i had to race out of the pub to get home, pack the coolers, and head to merriweather post pavilion. 2 car caravan (boy car and girl car), a 15 mintue tailgate ruined by paratrooper-esque howard county police officers, and my group finds themselves frantically stuffing beers in pockets, wolfing down sandwiches, and making the walk to the festival that doesnt cost anything .... to get in.

dance forest dusting it up

like any other festival there are acts that you want to see, acts that you are curious to see, and acts that you could care two bits less about seeing. this festival was no different, and in fact had some potential line up conflicts.

our first stop was the dance forest. ummm amazing. we all walked into this dust filled, tree lined, bass pulsating, dance area dubbed 'the dance forest' right when we got into the venue. wolfgang gartner was just beginning his set and we were eager to hear music and break the festival dancing ice. wolfgang hit the spot. bass, bass, dance beats, and remixes of the bloddy beetroots, yeah yeah yeahs, and mstrkrft all set the tone for our afternoon.

yeasayer on the west stage

after a quick stop at the main stage for some edward sharpe we headed out to the sun backed west stage for a little local flavor provided by yeasayer. these baltimore/brooklyn neaveau indie demi gods came out swinging for the home crowd. their set was high energy, but it was an energy that built with earlier tunes and culminated with the set closers being the 2 singles off of their most recent album, one and ambling alp. my favorites of the set were mondegreen and i remember

looking for something to do next (joan jett was not what i wanted to do next) some of us fell into the default of  heading back into the 'ball pit' also known as the dance forest. and in the ball pit/dance forest is where we wound up spending most of the next 3.5 hours.

it was during those 3.5 hours that we were able to listen and boogie to some high and low acts of the day. unfortunately the low act of the day award goes to maximum ballon. they brought some jazz focused/dirty bass/plenty of air horn to the table, but just fell short of dance forest expectations set by wolfgang. the next act, chromeo was one that i really set high expectations for only to have them supersede said expectations.

chrome .... oooo

chromeo has a limited catalog (2 albums) which can be a blessing and a curse, and in this case it was a huge blessing because what ensued was a dance forest inspired dance off/sing along for an hour while the sun set, people rejoiced, and the mood was getting set for the night time finale of the festival. if youre not familiar with chromeo check out a couple of tracks (mommas boy and bonafied lovin) from their album 'fancy footwork'. But without a doubt it was pretty freaking cool getting to see tunes like hot mess and night by night off of their september 2010 release, business casual, played live.

the final act to play the dance forest wasnt exactly a dance act per say, but rather another brooklyn based genre defying duo called sleigh bells. for those who havent heard this summers boy/girl phenomenon they are a mix of karen o like vocals with the ear piercing guitars of someone like dave navvaro latered over top of a dance based drum machine. try out a track or two. these guys with their wall of amps, bright lights, and fist pumping tunes got the dance forest rocking, and that might be an understatement. but alas i left their set a tad early because i wanted to prepare myself and try to get the best spot possible for the festival closer (and the act i have been wanting to see for the longest), lcd soundsystem.

you can get much closer

rather than go into basic lcd info ill just point you to some of my previous posts about the dance/punk.indie rock super group. seeing how their album 'sound of silver' is one of my all time favorites and their summer release, 'this is happening',  has been on proverbial repeat for the past 3 months i was bursting with excitement for this set. lucky for us we walked into the pavilion section right when they opened the floor to the general audience. this allowed us to grab amazing floor space to the stage right area (see photo).

from the moment they took the stage for dance yourself clean (best opener ever in my mind) to the last note of home, the band put on a professional high energy fist pumping dance/rock show. to try and describe this show tune by tune would be a futile exercise. all i know is that i was singing along the whole time, dancing with friends, high fiving strangers, and incessantly jumping up and down ... oh and i was sweating as well. im still grinning thinking out that show.

all in all the sun, the dust, the $8 beers, the militant cops, the sweat soaked tee shirts, and the ringing ears were well worth the price of admission to the virgin free fest.


**if you want any of the music mentioned here please post a comment or send me an email.**