Festivals of Learning

In our busy modern lives, it is hard to keep up with all the new bands and musical styles that come out each year. Unless you have satellite radio or spend some serious time wading through CMJ and other music resources, you may fall dangerously behind in your understand of the new trends and artists. Sadly, too often research time keeping up with the cool can be spent unwisely. Look at all those poor people, for example, that spend almost a hundred hours a year to learn who the latest American Idol will be. Is there no solution for keeping in touch with the in-crowd?

Luckily, this task has been vastly simplified thanks to our friends, the Music Mega-Festivals. There have always been music festivals, but there are a new breed of Mega-Festivals which are distinguished by the massive army of performers that adorn their multiple stages. You can recognize these new festivals by a few common characteristics. First of all, the festival names are all difficult to spell, and sound like places that unicorns or other magical beasts might live - Bonnaroo, Coachella, and Lollapalooza for example, just to name a few. Second, the festivals often last multiple days and happen in remote places. Bonnaroo, for example, lasts 3 days, and the price of a ticket includes camping at the event on a huge 700-acre farm in Manchester, Tennessee. Lastly and most importantly though, these festivals contain a huge list of performers spanning the spectrum from indie newcomers to mainstream stars to past greats.

The lineups for some of the festivals this year are particularly impressive. At Coachella, you can see everyone from comeback kings Depeche Mode and Madonna to indie superstars Massive Attack, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and Ladytron, to newer faces like Matisyahu, Scissor Sisters and Bloc Party. Bonnaroo has Radiohead, Beck, Tom Petty, Death Cab for Cutie, Sonic Youth, Bright Eyes, and many more. Lollapalooza will be showcasing some of my favorites including the Pixies, Blonde Redhead, Spoon, Weezer, and even Billy Idol and Dinosaur Jr. as blasts from the past.

So how can you use these festivals to stay in the know? Well, first of all, you could buy tickets and go experience the bands in person. If you have a few days to spare and can travel to where the festivals are happening, this is the greatest way to get in touch with the new sounds. Most of the mega-festivals only cost between $90 and $200 dollars for either a one-day pass or full event pass. Seeing each band individually would cost you much more than that if you could even find the time to go to that many shows.

For those of us not lucky enough to live near where the festivals are occurring though, these constellations of musical talent can still be a great educational tool. Go to their websites for example, and write down the names of the different bands that are appearing. If you did that just for the three festivals I’ve mentioned, you would have over 150 names to listen to next time you are in the record store. These festivals are really a much better source of new artist information than events like the Grammy’s.

Another idea is you might host your own virtual music festival. Get your friends together for the weekend and have them bring their 20 latest CDs (or MP3s) with them. Take turns putting your tunes on for the enjoyment of all. Remember of course for this to be successful your party has to have a silly name and you have to charge a lot of money for drinks. Ideally also, you wouldn’t let anyone shower that day so you could recreate that camping-festival feeling.

So get out there, get festive, and keep yourself in the know.