Tag Archives: Virgin Festival

Festival, Good Times, Live Shows, Music, Road Trip

Virgin Mobile (Free) Fest 2009

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I knew there was a reason today why I did not want to walk my dogs.

It was not too hot out, the sun was shining, and I was not tired…so why did I not want to take the little monsters on their daily walk?  There was something I was supposed to do this morning that I forgot all about.

Today was the day to request a free ticket for the 2009 Virgin Mobile (Free) Fest through TicketMaster and I completely forgot.

Damn.

Back in April I wrote a little blog about the Virgin Fest possibly being cancelled.  Having been to every single V-Fest since 2006 I was a little bummed that it might not go on this year.  For weeks I could not find any news about if the festival would be cancelled or relocated.  With the threat of Pimlico Horse Race Track going bankrupt it was not clear if the festival would go on in 2009.  Finally just last week it was announced that the festival would go on this year with one big change…it would be free.

Free?  A free festival? 

It’s true. 

Although the festival does have some changes such as going back to one day instead of two as well as being relocated to the other side of Balitimore at the Merriweather Post Pavilion the festival is indeed 100% free. 

Limited to only 30,000 tickets previous Virgin Festival goers had gotten emails offering first dibbs on grabbing a free ticket.  Today the remaining tickets were offered to the public by going to TicketMaster and requesting up to two.  The only fee that would come from TicketMaster was if the person requesting the ticket wanted the ticket shipped to their residence for $5.00.  That might be the lowest fee in the history of TicketMaster.

Still I am mindless and forgot.  I knew that this road trip to Baltimore would be without Matt as he is festivaled the hell out, possibly for life.  I am sure I could have suckered someone into going with me to the event on a Sunday for a free concert.

Featuring Blink 182, Weezer, Public Enemy, Jet, The Hold Steady, Taking Back Sunday, The National, Mates Of State, The Bravery, Girl Talk, and others, this is the event of the year many music fans will be eating up…if they got a free ticket of course.

I have always enjoyed my time at the Pimlico Race Track while attending the Virgin Festivals so I am sure this event will be just as fun even if it no longer is held in the middle of a horse track. 

With a smaller venue I am sure there will only be one large stage as compared to the two that were set up on the North and South ends of the track.  I am also thinking there will be less shade tents so I know Matt will not want to be at that festival at all.

I’ll still try to find a way in to the Virgin Mobile (Free) Fest.  Honestly there are not a lot of bands I really want to see there but Weezer and Public Enemy alone are worth the drive out.

Anyone out there get lucky and score some tickets?

Good Times, Hip Hop, Interview, Live Shows, Music, Rap

The Beastie Boys, A Handheld Recorder, & Me

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While clearing some space off of my desktop today I found a certain WAV file I was sure I lost forever.  Perhaps it was a sign of sorts that I found it today so I thought what better thing to do but share the WAV file with the world. The WAV file I speak of is actually a recorded interview with yours truly and NYC’s finest, the Beastie Boys.

The year was 2007 and I was just a freshman at this whole online blogging thing.  I was just getting comfortable with reviewing CDs and live shows for the wonderful Blogcritics.Org.  I was having a good time doing this and decided to try something a little more challenging, review a 2 day festival.

Somehow, some way I scored a press pass to the 2007 Virgin Mobile Festival and successfully covered the 2 days for Blogcritics.Org.  The experience was a positive one and made me want to review more festivals from my perspective because I had so much fun doing so.  You can read the review HERE but I never really got into full detail about the behind the scenes portion of my experience.

Just days before we (Matt, Rad-am, and myself) were to leave for Baltimore I received an email asking me if I wanted to interview the Beastie Boys as they were supporting their latest release The Mix Up by doing select tours and one of the stops was at the Virgin Mobile Festival.  Having never interviewed anyone in person before I was quick to the accepting reply for the opportunity and was told I would receive further instruction.

Day one of the festival once I got situated I received a text message telling me to meet at the press tent to interview the Beastie Boys.  I remember the girl and the guy coordinating it were super cool people and as we made out way through the VIP area I actually passed Virgin owner Richard Branson and gave a “what’s up” nod to the lead singer of the Fountains Of Wayne.

We kept walking till we got to a fenced off area where a couple of the Beastie Boys security members were seated in almost a outdoor living room canopied arrangement and were told that the Beastie Boys were situated inside the trailer next to them.  Security told us to stand aside the fence and wait for our turn.  I chatted with a couple of the guys standing with me and one of them ran an online Detroit radio program and the other was a reporter for MTV online.  Even though I had no idea what I was doing or what to expect I felt good about the situation.

When it was my turn to approach the trailer John Norris of MTV cut me in line and made his way into the trailer.  Time was passing now and I was not sure I was going to be able to interview them.  I was sweating my ass off too as it was hotter than hell outside and the security guys would not share their canopy with us.  No complaints from me though, I was still pumped.

I finally was told I had six minutes to interview the Beastie Boys and made my way into the trailer.

The first thing I noticed when I walked in the trailer were the three Armani suit wearing Beastie Boys all with smiles on their faces.  The second thing I noticed was that the trailer was air conditioned… Score.

I was asked to sit down on one of those fold out chairs and I hit record on my digital recording device.

Here is what happened:
Beastie Boys Interview 2007

As you can hear I was interviewed more by the Beastie Boys but I did not care.  The Beastie Boys are known for not being serious during interviews and I think if anything they really had fun chatting with me.  I was not looking to perform the most amazing interview of my career anyways, I was just looking to hang out with a band I have been a life long fan of.  Talking about LeBron James, breakfast bar buffets, and my Ween t-shirt just made the conversation all the more enjoyable.

I left that trailer with the biggest smile on my face and soon met up with Matt and Rad-am who were both wondering if I was ever going to come back to the festival grounds.  Moments later the Beastie Boys took the stage and blew the three of us away.

When I hear myself speak I think I sound like an idiot but then again I was a little nervous and did not know what the heck I was doing.  I never did so anything with the recording as I was unable to decipher some of the member’s voices from one another when I was transcribing it….then I lost the file (or so I thought I did).

Good times.  I hope you all enjoyed the little WAV file I found.

Here’s a recorded interview I found that SPIN Magazine did with the Beastie Boys on the very same day.

Here are some more vids of the performancee in 2007:

Live Shows, Music, Music Video

Lollapalooza 2009

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I finally had a chance to check out the Lollapalooza 2009 line up and I am a little excited about it.  Ok, a lot excited…


Click HERE for the Lollapolooza 2009 line-up poster.

The poster is kinda large to be putting on my site so instead I will just copy / paste the list of bands that will be performing over the 3 day weekend:

Depeche Mode, Tool, The Killers, Jane’s Addiction, Beastie Boys, Kings of Leon, Lou Reed, Ben Harper and Relentless7, Thievery Corporation, Snoop Dogg, Rise Against, Andrew Bird, TV on the Radio, Vampire Weekend, The Decemberists, Neko Case, STS9 (Sound Tribe Sector 9), Animal Collective, Band of Horses, Of Montreal, Arctic Monkeys, Coheed and Cambria, Ben Folds, Fleet Foxes, Silversun Pickups, Kaiser Chiefs, Crystal Castles, Bon Iver, Santigold, Atmosphere, Dan Auerbach, Cold War Kids, Deerhunter, Lykke Li, Robert Earl Keen, Peter Bjorn and John, Heartless Bastards, Gomez, Glasvegas, Federico Aubele, Dan Deacon, Passion Pit, Zap Mama, The Raveonettes, The Gaslight Anthem, The Airborne Toxic Event, White Lies, Ra Ra Riot, No Age, Asher Roth, Los Campesinos!, Bat For Lashes, Chairlift, Gang Gang Dance, The Virgins, Amazing Baby, Portugal. The Man, The Knux, Ida Maria, Delta Spirit, Friendly Fires, Manchester Orchestra, Constantines, Ezra Furman & The Harpoons, Hockey, Miike Snow, Alberta Cross, Hey Champ, Sam Roberts Band, The Henry Clay People, Davy Knowles and Back Door Slam, Cage the Elephant, Living Things, The Low Anthem, Blind Pilot, Langhorne Slim, Other Lives, The Builders and The Butchers, Eric Church, Joe Pug, Kevin Devine, The Greencards, Carney, Thenewno2

See any bands in there you like?  I know I see a ton of bands I would love to see, even if I have already seen them previously in the year!  There is also a handful of other artists too listed to perform at another stage.

I’ve never been to Chicago so this may have to happen.  I am sure my pal Matt will want to join me as has mentioned it to me a couple of times.  Any of you other Cleveland bloggers thinking of invading Chicago too?

Tickets are $190 for the three day festival not including a place to stay.  I will be highly considering this since I have still heard nothing about this year’s Virgin Mobile Festival.

I would like to say that I was going to the Virgin Mobile Festival for the fouth time in a row but if they move it from the Pimlico Race Track that will really put a damper on if I want to go.  Part of the whole experience was being at that horse race track turned festival grounds…  I wrote a little post about it a few weeks back you can read if you are curious on why they might move the Virgin Festival to another location.

I guess we will see what happens!

Until then here are some Lollapalooza related videos I found…

This video is footage of a terrible crowd in Charlestown, VA in 1995 not giving a good welcome to original indie artist Pavement:

I really wanted to go to Lollapalooza in 2007 because of this band:

Jane’s Addiction in Enumclaw, WA in 1991 with Ice T (NSFW, a little strong language going on here…):

Live Shows, Music

Virgin Festival 2009??? Will it happen?

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Just found an interesting little article on the Baltimore Sun website about the Virgin Mobile Festival announcing that they will return, but to where is still to be decided.

I guess it is safe to assume that they may not return to the Pimlico Race Coarse if the owners file for bankruptcy. 

Honestly I am bummed to hear about that.  I have been at the festival for the last three years, or should I say, every year since it first took place.  I have had a great time each time I was the and saw some amazing acts not to mention enjoyed myself with my good friends.

I’ve seen amazing line ups for the last 3 years including NIN, Flaming Lips, RJD2, Bad Brains, Iggy & The Stooges, The Black Keys, Foo Fighters, Wu Tang Clan, The Who, The Police, Beastie Boys…the list goes on.  It was always a good time too.  I never had a bad thing to saw about that festival…only the motel that we stayed at in 2007…

Rumor has it they may move the festival to the Merriweather Post Pavilion which is not too far away.  I searched online about the possible move a bit and found another article from the Baltimore Sun about the possible move.

That to me is not a good move by any means.  Chopping the capacity from 60,000 to 20,000 (27,500 if they transform their parking lot into festival grounds) people means less of everything including potential acts…

Here is another nice article about the possible move found on baltimore.bizjournals.com.

The race track to me is the perfect grounds for a 2 day festival and I really do not know if I will attend for a 4th time if it is moved.  There was something about parking my car and hanging out for 10+ hours in the middle of Baltimore. 

It’s getting late in the year for a festival to be announced.  I should not speak too soon though because the 2006 Virgin Mobile Festival really was not announced until after I got back from Bonnaroo that year, granted it was in late September…