This past weekend, I made the journey up to San Francisco from Los Angeles to the Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival in Golden Gate Park. Here is my story.

FRIDAY

12:35 p.m.

Looking for parking in the Outer Richmond, a foggy neighborhood with limited spaces. K-Flay is on in 10 minutes. Fuck. Is that a parking spot? Nope. Keep driving, keep driving… what about that? Is that parking? Nope.

1:23 p.m.

At long last, I get into the park and already I’m annoyed: two 14-year-old neo-hippies knock into me on their way to Collie Buddz. Is this going to be to what the Outside Lands crowd is like? Uh oh.

As I anticipated, the Bay Area rapper is killing it – at least that was apparent from the two songs I’m able to catch. The crowd is decently packed for it being 1 p.m. on a Friday. Apparently no one works anymore, except me of course. The buzz from this set extends to other side of the park to the press area, where every artist who caught her says how impressed they were with her.

3:35 p.m.

Finally wander to the Sutro stage where Foster the People is about to start. I take two steps away from a group of girls who I can only assume will be dance-y and flail-hit me with their gangly arms.

The charismatic Mark Foster is energetic and gets the crowd jumping, dancing and clapping along to his energetic music. Bad news, they’re doing it right in my face. “Call It What You Want” is particularly popular and gets a nice reaction.

 

Once “Pumped Up Kicks” jams, the crowd goes ballistic, singing every word to the band’s signature tune. As soon as it’s is over, however, nearly half the crowd leaves to catch MGMT onstage, who’s about to start on the main stage. But that’s a debacle for another piece.

The hardcore fans who stick around are rewarded with a neat, long-winded story from Foster about Rivers Cuomo and they launch into an interesting cover of “Say It Ain’t So.” A collective swoon goes through the crowd of girls. Set was a success and the band is on the fast track to stardom.

4:35 p.m.

I walk through the crowd during the MGMT set on my way for more beer.

6:30 p.m.

Though I hear rumors that Dave Chappelle is here, the thought of hanging out with Phish fans leads me to exits.

 

SATURDAY

??? – 1:45 p.m.

Parking. Is. A. Nightmare.

1:55 p.m.

The Stone Foxes is a pretty good band and decent early-afternoon listening, but none of their songs stood out much for me. The local boys’ set has a terrific turnout and they are coming into their own. They look super comfortable on stage and there is a lot crowd interaction. Nice guys too, you’ll read the interview and agree with me.

I cruise by the Ximena Sariñana set and she is awesome. She is a reserved performer, but has an interesting voice and performs well. Her band really enhances her sound and as we said last week about her album, the sky is the limit for the Mexico City-native. A terrific mid-afternoon set with a decent number of fans packing the small stage area, especially for a Saturday.

 

3:15 p.m.

OK GO is on the main stage and they have a pretty cool opening. Not sure what else I expected from the band that created an epic Goldberg Machine. After the opening, I zoned out and headed to see Christina Perri.

Once I get to the Perri show and  all I see are girls, girls and more girls (not in the Motley Crue sense either). This should be pick-up central – it’s like shooting fish in a barrel. She sounds incredible and has a lot of talent. Probably the most pleasant surprise of the day, I didn’t realize that Perri was so multi-dimensional and it seems like neither did the people who were watching her. She knew how to work the crowd, led them in a sing-along version of “Jar of Hearts,” which was well received and appreciated. Overall a solid set.

 

STRFKR is cool, but don’t move around a lot. Fun dudes, great show and justifies my review on the album. Their sound is on point and the crowd seems to dig, which is the consensus amongst us scribe folks.

 

5:00 p.m.

The Arctic Monkeys are better than I thought – but still overrated. My friend is way more interested in seeing them than I am. They’re just… okay.

 

6:15 p.m.

The Black Keys are killing it. Enough said.

 

SUNDAY

Noon

I find parking in a record amount of time: 20 minutes. Today is already awesome.

Charles Bradley was amazing; he didn’t get the “Screaming Eagle of Soul” nickname for nothing. Bradley has a very James Brown-esque vibe to him and the crowd is digging it. You just feel happy that he’s finally finding success at this age and at this point in his budding career. His cover of Neil Young’s “Heart of Gold” is outstanding and seems very poignant.

 

2 p.m.

Must head over to check out the incomparable Grouplove. The group is jumping and very energetic: the opposite of what’s going on from the main stage with Mavis Staples. It’s a good contrast. They are playing a ton of songs that everyone knows either by radio, the Internet or whatever. I’m jumping around on the inside. It’s really nice to see our local L.A. act hitting the big time now. All of their tunes sound terrific and at the end of the set, they unleashed about five balloons, though that backfired when the wind and crowd pushed them back on-stage and had band members ducking out of the way. Overall a great set and it’s awesome to see them really come into their own

 

3:05 p.m.

!!! is on and rocking the stage… and some serious short shorts. The lead singer has some sweet dance moves though. The crowd is groovin’ and dancin’ to the Sacramento-natives up-tempo indie-dance-pop.

 

5:24 p.m.

Little Dragon have an interest keyboard-based sound and singer Yukimi Nagano is much better live than on the record, since you can’t account for her live energy, which in this case hopping around the stage, like Hannah from Grouplove. Their music is perfect for headphones, but surprisingly translated into a good, live sound.

 

For some reason, I kept thinking of Asobi Seksu the whole time, but that could just be the whole Asian-Girl-Lead-Singer-White-Guy-Band thing.

8 p.m.

Arcade Fire time also known as time-to-wind-down. Hope everyone enjoyed this quick hitting wrap up of the Outside Lands Music and Arts festival in San Francisco.

All Photos by Dianne de Guzman