Mi Gusta la Musica, Part II: Vegoose Edition

Not that anything can replace Coachella...but Vegoose was pretty great.

It doesn't help that I did the unthinkable and skipped out on Coachella this year. This year has been pretty slim on the concert front, but I've managed to get to a few here and there. Even though this was a pretty expensive trip ("bought" two tickets for both days, FLEW to Vegas, and stayed in an extended stay room) for a music festival, I think it was worth it, and provided the lineup stays solid, I'll be there again.

Sadly enough, this trip was my first time on a plane since I've been to NY/NJ...back in 2005. How depressing. It wasn't much of a trip either, because we were in the air for not long at all.

Even sadder was the fact that I was still sick. I suppose the dry heat was helpful, but the dust activated asthma attacks. So I was hitting the hot, black coffee pretty hard and shaking up the last bit of inhaler I had to keep me breathing fine. The most disappointing was the fact that my energy level wasn't at 100%; which prevented me from moving and shaking as much as I otherwise would have had I been healthy.

Not as sad but sad all the same was that I didn't really think about wearing a "costume" for the weekend...I just didn't think that way, nor did I really had any interest in doing so sick. There were some great costumes about; of course there were droves of the sexy version of any costume, with a full regalia of Leg Avenue costumes, more Hunter S. Thompsons than I could keep count (compared to the...what, 5 I saw at Monster Massive last year), 4 dicks in boxes, of which I saw 2 (one of them being VERY accurate to the short), amish people, ninja turtles, Marios and Luigis, etc. etc. Fun!

And of course, there was the line up.

SATURDAY
Gogol Bordello was awesome, and was a great start of the weekend.
Blonde Redhead was great, though I do like seeing them in smaller venues (much like how I feel about seeing Yeah Yeah Yeas at Coachella's main stage)
Caught a bit of Mastodon while taking a sitting/bathroom break, then caught some of Atmosphere.
We split our time between Cypress Hill and Public Enemy, both of which were great
Wandered over to see some of The Shins as the sun was going away, and it was very very nice to see them.
M.I.A. was pretty great, and again, very sad energy was too low to properly enjoy her. Also very sad to see that I could have hopped on stage with her and a million other people as we walked over to catch Queens of the Stone Age.
QotSA was great as usual, and surprisingly opened up with "No One Knows" but left after "In the Hollows" to get a decent spot for Iggy and the Stooges.
Iggy is nuts. He's also in pretty good shape for his size. Also very energetic. He had people join him on stage, too. Very cool to see him...and his butt? Greg managed to catch his package as well, but I missed that...
Wandered and listened to Thievery Corporation a bit while we wandered to get a decent spot for Daft Punk.
Daft Punk.
They retired their Pyramid set at this show. Simply put, they are French robot Masters of the Universe from Outer Space.

SUNDAY
Due to miscommunication, we missed Pharoahe Monch, who Greg wanted to see and would have been cool to check out. We listened to a bit of Ghostface Killah before we were checked out Ghostland Observatory. They're a dynamic duo whose vocalist is some little guy with amazing dance moves and a voice like a lady. He knows how to rock it. The other guy was mostly hidden by his machines hidden by a makeshift shield from the sun.
Then it was off to seee Michael Franti & Spearhead, which was very very cool to watch. I had a bit more energy on Sunday, so I was able to groove a bit more, which made me happy.
After their set, we kinda just wandered over to a good spot for Muse (who are going to save the universe), which was a VERY good decision, and did not leave the spot so we had prime view to see Rage Against the Machine. WOW. Thanks to Greg and this other tall Aussie guy, we were spared from being smooshed.
We left right after we were certain things were clear from riots since Rage ended their set 30 minutes early from their 2 hour window.

Also a Vegas first for me was that we stayed in an extended stay inn that's closer to the venue than the Strip. What that meant was that we had free WiFi access (thankfully Greg brought his laptop), a full size kitchen and a "living area." Natilie and I went grocery shopping the night before, packed it all and she drove it out to Vegas when Greg and I flew there to meet up with her and Tony there.

In all, it's was an awesome trip, weekend, and concertgoing experience.

I am all for doing that again...save the sickness part.