it's a bit of both decline and fall. There used to be more, like BAM!, and Randolph is weaker. But Do Division, West Fest and Wicker Park are great. Then there's Metronome, Spoon playing World's Largest Block Part, etc. West Fest is especially good this year. It's like a $5 Pitchfork. Hell, even the Rib Fest had some solid acts this year—Those Darlins, Cory Chisel. Plus, they're all about half the cost of seeing "The A-Team," so no complaints.

yeah, i don't see how chicago street festivals have been in decline. the ones that make a point to care about music (like, the ones mentioned above) always bring in pretty strong lineups. and when you compare chicago's weekend street fests to any other city's, no one else is even in the same neighborhood when it comes to balancing frequency and quality. there are maybe one or two weekends between memorial day and labor day without a street festival with at least some decent band to see. i can't think of another city that can say that, aside from new york. (and, actually, most of the outdoor summer shows i've seen in new york have been on weeknights.)

as for lolla, i agree it's an issue. but, as noted, there are numerous exceptions every year. and how often does a band swing through any city anyway? i could probably name a dozen bands off the top of my head now that played in the spring and will have a show here in the fall announced within the month after lolla. that's just how it goes.

akron/family, capn' jazz, superchunk, local h, mission of burma. not too bad

exactly

street fest lineups just seem to get better and better every year... we are lucky here.

Soundgarden are playing the Vic next Thur (August 5th)

sounds like most of the paperless tickets will be sold via random drawing for Soundgarden World email list subscribers and the rest will be walk-up day of show

What? So you just have to go wait in line really, really early or something?

not that i would do it for soundgarden 2010, but i ve had some great times waiting in line for tickets to go onsale. overnighters were the best.

rip waiting in line for concert tix

in the spirit of the thread, my friday prolly looks like this:

these united states
balkan beat box
the walkmen
mavis staples
the big pink
devo
fuck buttons
black keys
lady gaga. i think. still torn, and not very excited for the headliners here, but i've seen the strokes before and haven't been interested in anything they have had to say since their debut. like a car wreck, at least lady gaga should make interesting rubber necking.

i'll second that

So I missed this email I got last night just after 5pm letting me know I had a four hour window for tix. Nice one universe.
---
Dear Soundgarden Winner:

Yesss!!!!! You won a chance to purchase a pair of tickets to Soundgarden's
show at the Vic Theatre on Thursday, August 5th. Due to a small amount of
unclaimed tickets from the second round of the ticket drawing we've gone
back into the pot and pulled new names. You are one of the lucky winners
drawn! Please read and follow the steps below to make your ticket purchase:

1) Visit the link starting at 6pm CDT today Monday, August 2nd to purchase
the tickets. Tickets are $100 for the pair plus applicable fees. Tickets
are sold IN PAIRS ONLY.

2) Enter your unique code on the invoice page of the transaction.

3) Your unique code will expire at 10pm CDT today August 2nd after which
time you forfeit your pair of tickets. This is a historic event in the
making, so please do not miss your chance to be a part of it!

4) A confirmation email will be sent to you from Etix once they receive
payment for your tickets.

Also, if it wasn't already official before, this certainly puts the nail in the coffin. Lollapalooza has jumped the shark.

http://origin.avclub.com/chicago/articles/...a-celebr,43686/

Word is just getting out about this, but event-networking upstarts Do312 are hosting a celebrity kickball game this Saturday in Grant Park during Lollapalooza. The entire lineup hasn't been announced, but confirmed so far are actors Clark Duke (Hot Tub Time Machine, Greek) and Alia Shawkat (Arrested Development, Whip It), members of Wolfmother, Foxy Shazam, Team Bayside High, Kill Hannah, and local "luminaries" like Q101's Ryan Manno, Chicagoist's Tankboy, and restaurateur/schmoozer extraordinaire Billy Dec. There's also a Chris Holmes listed, but whether it's the W.A.S.P. guitarist or Smashing Pumpkins producer is unclear. Here's hoping it's the former, just to mix it up.

Though the event is in the middle of Lolla, "only 50 people will win a spot to cheer the teams on." Whether that means "only 50 people will get to take home the actual chair they sat on" or "only 50 people will actually be able to see the game through the crowd of gawkers," who knows?

Most importantly, this means Clark Duke and Alia Shawkat are going to be at Lollapalooza. How glamorous! Maybe Shawkat can shed some light on the happening/not happening Arrested Development movie.

Apparently the AD movie is half written.

I'm still gonna try to sneak in for Soundgarden.

weather reports look good for this weekend... no high temps.

Thank goodness. I do poorly in the heat at this thing.

i'm digging the friday/saturday forecasts, but i keep seeing rain for sunday.

What top 5 acts is everyone looking forward to? Here's mine, in descending order:

The New Pornographers
Metric
The National
Spoon
The Strokes

Working all weekend unfortunately but hoped for some after fest scoops. A girl working where I got my haircut said Perez Hilton had something going Friday and she said Kid Cudi played some south side warehouse space last year. These are not exactly what I'm looking for (though, Kid Cudi I like). Any head's ups greatly appreciated.

Bud Light Lime, dude...Bud Light Lime.

Festival.

I'm going to see Fuck Buttons on friday. Then i'll leave and won't return again.

Wal-Mart music festival by the lake.

So cool

Raphael Saadiq
Drive-By-Truckers
New Pornographers
Black Keys
Strokes

i really wanna check out the X Japan thing...

Ended up scoring last minute tickets to Soundgarden last night. Great show. 2 hour set. Matt Cameron playing with a ferocity he doesn't get to display with the Pearl Jam material and obviously enjoying it. Ben Shepherd stalking the stage non-stop and he seemed to be a much busier (and much better for it) player than I remember. He was a bit loud in the mix, but it was alright. Kim Thayil just laid back like Iommi and did his thing. Riffing, feeding back, soloing seemingly effortlessly. Cornell surpassed my expectations. Yeah, he doesn't hold the notes as long as he used to and he can't scream all night long like he did 20 years ago, but when he did take it there, he sounded great. The banter was minimal and they just went from song to song without much ado. No backdrop, just a typical light show and a bare bones stage setup and went at it. They all seemed to be enjoying themselves immensly and that vibe permeated the crowd. Great night.

A few favorites left out (Loud Love, Beyond The Wheel, etc.), but really, I'm not complainging with this setlist:

Searching With My Good Eye Closed
Spoonman
Gun
Rusty Cage
Let Me Drown
Jesus Christ Pose
Flower
Outshined
Fell On Black Days
Ugly Truth
Get On The Snake
Burden In My Hand
Pretty Noose
Head Down
Face Pollution
Superunknown
Black Hole Sun
Mailman
Slaves and Bulldozers
Encore:
4th of July
Blow Up The Outside World
Like Suicide

Fuuuuuuuuuck.

Would I be making a mistake if I dropped $90 for a Sunday ticket? Would I be making an even bigger mistake if I saw MGMT instead of Wolfmother?

I know of at least one person who was able to sneak in today so I'd just shoot for that. Live life on the edge.

Don't wanna scuff up my Birkenstocks, bro.

Fuck were there The New Pornographers great tooday. Full line-up including Neko Case and Dan Bejar. First time I have ever seen them, they reaffirmed themselves as my favorite current band.

The Strokes kicked all kinds of ass.

The Black Keys were great, but I wasn't familiar with their stuff.

Mavis Staples ruled, nice to see her getting recognition, Tweedy joined her onstage for a couple of tracks.

The Walkmen were good.

Wavves fucking sucked.

Also saw some of Drive By Truckers and Jimmy Cliff.

Pumped for tomorrow Saturday...Stars, Spoon, Metric, Cut Copy and Phoenix.

I caught some of Wavves set while waiting for Los Amigos Invisibles. He seemed like one obnoxious prick just by his stage banter.

Highlights for me include Raphael Saadiq, Lady Gaga, Devo and Peanut Butter Wolf.

The Wavves dude was reminiscent of that Vines asshole.

the Strokes were great, but honestly played for an hour. didnt start till 8:45, break at 8:25, off stage at 9:45. new pornos are good, so good they shouldnt play at 4 pm. they didnt do much for me in the sun.

no doubt... dude was bringing it hard. that was maybe the best set i saw all day.

favorite sets yesterday:

balkan beat box - doubt i will see a better set all weekend. dudes killed it...fucking I killed it. thank you ladies.
devo - were fantastic. not sure i was expecting them to be so good if we're being honest. groovy dude. once again, thank you ladies, you flatter an old man...those two sets right there were great for dancing and attracting women way too young for you. good ta see twenty-somethings rockin out to devo. myself? i was merely curious to see devo's set but damn did they bring it live...makes me wish i would have wasted some time to see 'em back in the day. note to self: sorry 'bout that
raphael saadiq - another very good set. with the big pink and the walkmen rounding out my top five, my day could have ended at five o'clock and i woulda been happy.

black keys were ok/good/ok.

wavves -- agree, dude's a douche. he had some really good "lady gaga is lame" jokes at the ready. how original.

walkmen -- great as always. hamilton leithauser deserves so much more attention for that killer rock voice.

raphael saadiq -- saw him at acl where he stole the show and he did so again here. nice change of pace.

black keys -- set completely ruined by sound not being loud enough. our whole section was chanting "turn it up" after every song to no avail.

lady gaga -- caught the first 20 minutes and there was way too much vamping and standing silent, dramatic. she hasn't earned the whole stand motionless michael jackson thing yet. she needs to work for it more. plus, i like her behind piano way better than some britney line dance.

the strokes -- sounded fanfuckingtastic. these guys are always tight, even with the long break. reminds just how good those songs are and that they should all just shut up and listen to whatever casablancas says.

Having seen the Strokes out-draw and blow away Lady Gaga, I wake up content with the world. I won some bets on that one. Lady Gaga, your decline begins... now. The Strokes sounded like the best rock & roll band in the world.

and, yeah, TSLOW, Hamilton sounded great. He's getting better at control, too. That hold in "All Hands and the Cook"? Holy shit.

the strokes did sound great. as for drawing more people im not sure about that. just read 80,000 for gaga. when i was watching the beginning of Hot Chip i was further away than when i arrived for the Strokes 75 minutes before they were set to play. the north side was dead at 7:15 PM

Definitely a highlight of the day.

the Strokes drew more when all was said and done. People flooded away from Gaga. By the end of the Strokes, the field was packed tight.

definitely. His singing on "in the new year" keeps getting better, too. I loved the mellower reworking of "Louisiana."

yeah, i caught the first 20 minutes of gaga before racing over to the strokes and gaga had more people. but the strokes were complete opposites in every way from her set -- tight, controlled, fierce. i have nothing against gaga, she's definitely talented (and i appreciate someone trying to be a rock star these days), but the 20 minutes i saw did not suit her. it was sooooooo overwraught, to the point of distraction.

it was my first time seeing the strokes and i thought they were great and would go see them again. i had heard they were sloppy live, i thought the opposite. glad to hear more people showed up. i was close and couldnt tell, but video made it look like crowd was big.

also someone didnt do their homework. on the video vault shown on the massive screens they have MMJ playing in 2005. they played 2006 and 2007, the video they showed was from 2006

The XX were not meant to play live music. Period. Boring boring fucking boring. I really enjoy the album on headphones, but otherwise there's no point to it much if anywhere else, most of all live.

That guy in The XX is just plain creepy.
Best band I saw today was Social Distortion. Tomorrow will be a better day.
Did see Squirt Boy, today.

Exactly!! Boring is the exact same word I said to my friend like 9 times during their set. Had some of the worst repetitive guitar parts I have ever heard.

Metric and Spoon fucking owned today. Stars were good too.

Fest was more crowded today than yesterday Friday.

The lobster corn dog from Graham Elliot may be the best thing I have ever eaten.

And it's also The Go! Team, not The Go Team! It peeves me everytime.

No way The Strokes outdrew Gaga. Was just in the same field tonight for Green Day in pretty much the same spot I was last night and there was ample room to move around. I don't recall the south part of the fest being that crowded since Kanye in 2006. And it's frickin' Gaga, only one of the country's biggest pop stars of the moment. You know she's huge when you've got the bros pushing through the crowd trying to get closer to the front.

As for Gaga's show, the Monster Ball dialogue part of the set was the weak point, but everything else was ace, from the set changes to performance and the spectacle of it all. I found her banter about finally making it to the main stage more heartfelt and engaging. I saw her back in 2007 at one of the smaller stages and it was awful, so everything she said just felt that more sincere. It was a side of her you usually don't see. She's also quite the show woman too. I would have probably enjoyed myself without all the fancy stuff. All in all, I had fun.

Today's highlights include: Stars (killed it), Grizzly Bear (murdered it), Dragonette (slayed it), Metric (didn't quite kill me, but put me on life support), Green Day, Gogol Bordello and The Soft Pack.

I really like the location of the Sony Bloggie stage, which would usually be the stage on Balbo which always got super crowded and hard to walk through or even watch a band around 6:00. Kudos to the organizers for that one.

I wanted to stay for The xx after Stars but it was way too crowded in that area and I could barely hear them, so I left after a song or two in favor of Gogol Bordello. All I could think was, "Wow, I bet that would sound good on record, but it's not worth it to check this out right now." From all the boring talk, I guess my instincts were right.

She sounded really bitter about that 2007 show. I caught half of it then, and the haters were spot-on: it was a trainwreck.

I've probably seen Spoon a dozen times now, and they've never been better

Other highlights: Wild Beasts and Empire of the Sun, both very danceable. The BMI stage was great today too with good sets from Dragonette and Royal Bangs. Love stumbling onto stuff like that.

The xx were indeed the opposite of a band that should be playing at 3:30pm at an outdoor music festival. The other lowlight was waiting in line for a stupid Kuma's burger. I don't care that your restaurant is popular. You're a food vendor at a music festival with a very simple menu. Get your shit together and figure out how to serve a large quantity of people in a timely manner. Burger wasn't even good, especially for $10. Overcooked and dry.

I too saw Squirt Boy

To the one of the posters above I've seen The Strokes twice in a Aragon type venue and they were amazing each time. I've haven't heard of them being sloppy on stage, they were tight and unrelenting and just ON FIRE.