I'm typing this entry so fucking hard I might break my fucking Mac book Air!!!!!!!! HAHA JK I don't even own a Mac Book air. Nor am I really angry right now.
Much has been said about Kanye West's performance about Bonnaroo. It ended up being the most controversial and talked about performance of the festival because of it's epic, colossal failure. This is the best roundup of the performance can be found here.
It's probably better than anything I'll write but fuck it, I'm gonna do the same exact thing and just try to objectively approach this performance from the point of view of someone interested to see the glow in the dark performance, had seen Kanye twice before, but isn't a huge Kanye fan, just likes the spectacle and doesn't mind the music.
No more than a week before Bonnaroo, an e-mail was sent to ticketholders with the following words verbatim: "We are excited to announce that Kanye West will now be performing a late night show on the Main Stage on Saturday, June 14th instead of the previously announced time! This scheduling change is being made to allow Kanye to fully present his critically acclaimed "Glow In The Dark" show. " OK so that seems pretty reasonable. His time slot got moved from 8pm across from Jack Johnson on the smaller mainstage to 2:45 am on the bigger mainstage. Rumors flew around everywhere that Kanye also was not happy about being on the "second" mainstage and did not want to be opposite anyone at all, nevermind Jack Johnson. Also, there were reports his stage couldn't fit on the second mainstage. Regardless of the actual reason, a 2:45am Glow in the Dark show sounded awesome to me and I was looking forward to a novel concept for a live show. Afterall, novel live shows continue to be one way to save the music industry (although they might be going extinct too because of gas costs). Honestly, I kinda wish the only reason was so that he wasn't opposite Jack Johnson, because that would be a hilarious conflict. Kanye would yell at him and Jack Johnson would probably just passively sit there and not do anything, possibly asking "Why can't we get along?" At least that's what I'd expect from his music, which is as boring as that response. Maybe it would be awesome if Jack Johnson went to his trailer and got a rabid raccoon and had it purposely bite him. And then he would go attack Kanye West while foaming at the mouth and Kanye would do dance moves in his stupid spacesuit from the performance to get by him and then he stabs Jack Johnson who's soul goes crashing into the abyss. Because that's what raccoons can do to you. That and make you look like Robin from Batman and Robin. It would be hilarious if Kanye put on a Robin mask while dancing away from rabid Jack Johnson too. I completely forgot what this post was about.
So after Sigur Ros I go to meet up with Erin and Arthur for Kanye at the mainstage. Naturally, we meet near the beer tent and the jumbotron on stage reads "KANYE WEST WILL PERFORM AT 3:30". A little late means right on time for a rapper. We ran into my coworkers again who were looking for their drugs which I really only mention because I find it hilarious and slightly disturbing that my coworkers are so willing to share their drug habits with me despite having never been in Waterworld. Now keep in mind that at smaller stages, other bands are playing. Phil Lesh was playing (hippie fare), as well as Dumpstaphunk and another jam band. According to SOPTRANTA, at 3:30 Phil Lesh and others just stopped playing and said, "Sorry, but we were just told we had to end so Kanye can be the only performer." Fact: it is VERY POSSIBLE to anger hippies. Stopping their crunchy grooves and painfully lame dancing is the secret.
Don't worry Kanye, I do too
Only there's another problem: Kanye doesn't start at 3:30. Now I'm assuming that Pearl Jam going an hour late had A LOT to do with Kanye starting late, afterall, it takes a while to take one stage down and put perhaps the most complex stage out there up. But does a drunk crowd, tired from dancing for 12 hours straight care? Hell no. That crowd assumes that Bonnaroo has been planned for months, and that there are backup plans when things go wrong, and that Kanye's tour manager has an idea of what they are doing. And that's when the boos started. And kept going. And kept going. And then FUCK KANYE chants started, and people started throwing bottles. Allegedly someone threw a bottle that damaged Kanye's screen as well. I really can't communicate how pissed off at least half the crowd was, it was a shitshow of angry hippies. 4am rolls around. Still no Kanye. Many people leave. Those that stay get louder.
An angry and confused concert goer
Finally, at 4:25 am Kanye West begins playing. For all that I crap, I do have to hand it to Kanye, the man did not flinch in the least bit to begin his show and danced his heart out and still did a great job of entertaining. I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy the first part of the show. It actually was a very impressive stage set-up and the glow in the dark concept was really cool at times.
It was glow in the dark for realz with lots of lights, not like crappy t-shirt glow in the dark or rave glow stick glow in the dark. Kanye had a chance to make me mostly forget how late his show was except for two problems.
First problem was the type of show. Kanye's show was a very scripted sci-fi adventure where his computer named "Jane" leads him from planet to planet while he sings a song on each planet. At no point is anyone else on the stage. This is fine, but seriously man, you aren't Jessica Simpson, you can stray from the script for 1 minute to acknowledge the people still there. Kanye did not say anything about the late start time, didn't once thank people or apologize, he just very bizarrely did his little weird concept show. I just about lost it when he complained to "Jane" that there wasn't "any pussy in space". Way to go guy. You stay classy Kanye West. Unless by space you meant Bonnaroo and by pussy you meant attractive women who aren't hippies. But even then you'd still be drastically and incompetantly wrong.
The second problem was irony. Kanye West had his time slot changed to present his "Glow in the Dark" show in full form. One problem when you start at 4:30 am is... THE FUCKING SUN RISES AT 5 AM. This represented one of the most surreal moments of my life.
The sun clearly came up evident from many pictures as if to mock Kanye West and say, you may think you're the best in the world, that people don't show you enough respect, or that you are always correct, but fuck you bitch, I am the motherfucking sun, and I will rise every day and stomp your bitchy ass whether you like or not. Fuck yeah sun, you're a super hero.
Now Kanye took a lot of shit in the presses for this show and here is his response (I really highly recommend you read it in it's entirety, it's so hilarious and awesome):
Who fucking cares what his points are, I will summarize the hilarious phrases that needed to be added to my daily lexicon of speech-
I'm typing so fucking hard I might break my fucking Mac book Air!!!!!!!!
LET'S BREAK DOWN THE WALLS ON THIS TRUMAN SHOW AND LET YOU KNOW WHAT REALLY OCCURRED!!!
I HAVE A FUCKING LIGHT SHOW DUMB ASS, IT'S NOT CALLED GLOW IN THE DARK FOR NO REASON SQUID BRAINS!
REMEMBER WHEN YOU WERE A SHORTY AND WATER WOULD HIT THE TV??????
I HAVE TO ICE MY KNEES AFTER EVERY SHOW AND THEY HURT WHEN I WALK THROUGH THE AIRPORT... HAVING AN EXPENSIVE STAGE CUTS MY PAYDAY IN HALF...
SQUID BRAINS HAHAHAHAHA awesome.
We trudged back to camp after Kanye's performance at about 6am and got a whole 2 hours of sleep before the sun's hell heat vanquished us as well. Brothers in Kanye's war we are. The next day featured a whole mess of FUCK KANYE graffiti and FUCK KANYE t-shirts. It was sprawled everywhere as seen here.
I can say that morale about Kanye West was could not have been less "Stronger".
Let me end with this:
Kanye West: You may be a great producer, you may perform your heart out every night, this may have been almost 0% your fault, but man, don't be a douche about it. You should not have asked every other group to stop play NO MATTER WHAT and you 100% should have said something to the crowd. If you had done that, you would have come across as the saint, and not the sinner. Instead, I have little sympathy for you. The words are "I'm sorry" squid brains.
Walking back
(Also, stop typing in AIM speak you don't write for LOLcats gosh that pisses me off).
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