Day 2 of my San Francisco adventure started out with a massive headache. A literal one, in this case. But after a trip to the Farmer’s Market and a fabulous cup of Blue Bottle coffee as well as the best darn Buffalo Burger I’ve ever had (possibly the only one I’ve ever had), I was ready to live again. My number 1 pal decided to skip Day 2 though, as all that crowding during Radiohead’s set had put her off festivals (at least for the time being).
I decided since Day 1 was spent essentially camping out for Radiohead, I’d spend a bit more of Day 2 checking out the ‘attractions’ at the festival as well as checking out some of the less crowded stages. According to someone at the box office, Day 2 had around 15,000 fewer attendees, which I buy because it was so much easier to navigate the festival grounds and to get into the concessions.
The Sutro stage was located in Lindley Meadow, which was off to the right of the Land’s End and Avenues stages. The two acts I was most interested in seeing were M. Ward and Regina Spektor. And thanks to that aforementioned crowd decrease, I was actually able to get close enough to get some decent pictures.
M. Ward put on a hell of a performance, and was more ‘plugged-in’ and rockin’ than I thought he might be. Thankfully, there were no shouts of ‘Where’s Zooey?’ and the crowd definitely seemed to be more than pleased. He made sure to give a lot of credit to his backing band, but he showed off a decent amount of guitar versatility himself.
There’s no question the crowd was enthusiastically supportive of Regina Spektor when she took the stage. The cheers and whoops were loud and plentiful. In fact, I was standing in front of one ‘fan’ that had indulged in a few too many festival beers (I’m not sure how he could even afford to get drunk at those prices) and felt compelled to tell Regina that ‘SF f**king loves her’. This behavior, of course, nearly begat fisticuffs on at least 3 seperate occasions during the set until his friend convinced him that he was…well, drunk.
But back to the cute redhead at hand - Regina shyly took stage with a spoken-word gem, fidgeting a bit and looking like your 6 year-old niece at her first school play. She then took up behind the piano before returning to the front of the stage and pulling out her turquoise guitar for several songs. Her between-song banter was shy and playful, and she was incredibly gracious to us (even tolerating the aforementioned ’superfan’ quite well). Honestly, if I had to pick my favorite performance of the festival it would have been this one, particularly her live versions of ‘Poor Little Rich Boy’ - which involved not only playing drums on a chair, but a spectacularly fast vocal delivery - and ‘On The Radio’.
After Regina’s set, I walked across the meadow to the Presidio stage to catch a little chunk of Two Gallants. They had an excited crowd of their own to play to, and seemed to have a strong stage presence. I didn’t see much of their set, but the 2 or 3 songs I did hear I liked quite well. I know I’ll revisit their album again as a result.
So the verdict on Day 2? By skipping the main stage headliners and checking out the smaller acts, I found myself having a much better overall experience. Plus, the reduced attendance meant I had to wade through far fewer bodies to see the bands I wanted to. Day 2 was full of fewer big splashes like Radiohead’s amazing Friday set, but many wonderful ’small’ moments to treasure instead.
MP3: Regina Spektor - Poor Little Rich Boy
- Sean
August 29th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Smart Day 2 strategy! Another great report!