BFD

June 10th 2005

Tina and I went to BFD two years ago and had a great time, so we thought, “hey why not try it again.” The headliner was one of our favorite bands, The Foo Fighters (and one that has not toured a lot in the past few years). Who by the way was the main reason we went to BFD the first time in 2003 as they were headlining then too. There were not as many bands that we absolutely had to see this time around, but we figured that we would catch a few new bands and hear some new stuff from older bands. The only two bands that we both really wanted to see were the Foo Fighters, of course, and The Bravery. A newer band that we were both hooked on.

We arrived at Shoreline ampetheater at about 12:30 and walked around a bit to get a sense of where things were, we also checked out the stalls selling t-shirts and decided what we wanted to buy later. We then headed for the “Café” area to get a beer. We situated ourselves behind the Live 105 booth and watched all the fans wait for the bands to show up and give interviews. We stayed there for about an hour or so watching the fans and bands interact. The only band either one of us recognized was the Kaiser Chiefs and that was only because Tina had seen them on TV a few days before. See, what you have to realize is that we are actually pretty old compared to the majority of the crowd at these kinds of events and so we are not up to speed on a lot of the newer bands that are out there. But that is one of the reasons we like these things, we get exposed to new music that we might not hear from our “Old Fogy” friends. (Just kidding about the old fogy friends, but not about the new music.)

After we finished our beers we headed to Stages A and B that were in the parking lot area of the ampetheater were all the smaller, or I should say less well know, bands were playing. The stages were set up side by side so that while one band is playing the next band can be setting up, making it so that the crowd just had to shift a few hundred feet from one side to the other to see the bands as they started. We positioned ourselves in front of stage B because all the bands we were most interested in seeing were on this stage. First up, on stage A, when we arrived was the Kaiser Chiefs, I had only heard one song of there’s, but from the one song I was expecting good things. Tina had told me that she really liked them, and I usually trust her judgment (the one exception being John Mayer, who she likes and who I think is complete rubbish.) We were not disappointed. They rocked through a short but sweet set and were entertaining to boot. They are one of what I call the “nuevo eighties” type bands that are hot at the moment they were wearing the requeset attire: jeans and a slightly eightiesish men’s jackets, the lead singer was even wearing a neckchief . Classic nuevo eighties! At one point the lead singer went out into the crowd and sang, loosing his mic in the process and having to sing from the mic of the guitarist until it could be retrieved from the crowd by a roady. At another point he climbed the metal supports on the stage and sang from there, the crowd liked that one a lot.

Next on Stage B was Ash; we had seen them a few years earlier when they opened for Coldplay at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley. I had liked them then, but they were a lot more “popy” back then, so I wasn’t a huge fan (not that I have anything against Pop, I own a great assortment of it including one NSYNC cd, but don’t tell anyone!) It just seemed at the time they were trying to be a hard rock band that was only able to make Poprock. Times have changed. They rocked, and hard! It doesn’t hurt that I have a soft spot for Irish bands. They told us that on the way to the Bay Area, not one, but two tour buses had caught fire so they had come in cars without their equipment. So they thanked The Bravery for letting them use their equipment. Thanks Bravery for letting us hear Ash! They played a straight ahead rock set with out a lot of pretence or theatrics. Very nice. I will be buying their album this time.

Back on Stage A was Lyrics Born; they are a rap/rock group that I wasn’t very impressed with. I am usually a fan of Rock/Rap fusion but it just didn’t work for me this time. The crowd took a little time to warm up to them after coming off the hard rock high of Ash but eventually got into the mood and were jamming right along with the band. I did enjoy the first and last songs they played. The last song was one that I had heard before in a commercial. It is the one with Adrian Brody cruising a around drinking a Pepsi. That tune is pretty catchy and was the only really commercial (get it, commercial song…oh I kill me) song they did, they rest were pretty raw.

Finally the first band of the day we had come to see. The Bravery. I had bought their CD and we had seen them a month before at Coachella and had thought they were great. Another “Nuevo eighties” band that tended towards the punk look more than the new wave look. I was taken off guard by how much everyone else there liked them as well. As they came out and started up the first song the crowd lost it and started pushing to the front. We were trapped in a writhing mass of bodies all swaying, jumping and signing at the top of their lungs. A small mosh pit formed as well as the usual crowd surfing and general pushing and shoving that happens with this many people in one place. Besides almost losing my flip flops a few times I managed to survive. Sam Endicott, the lead singer made his own trip out to audience and was swept along with the crowd until he managed to make it back to the front and back onto the stage. He then dedicated the next song (No Brakes) “to the chick that just full on grabbed my balls.” They played a good, hot, sweaty, but too short for my liking, set and finished out with my favorite song of theirs (Fearless). We were dusty, hot and a little jostled at this point (did I mention we’re old?) so we decided to duck out on the next band and get something to drink.

We came back for the last few songs of the Hot Hot Heat set but were still to traumatized by the crowd to get too close. We watched them from up the hill and except for the fact that from where we were situated a tree was blocking exactly were the lead singer had his keyboard set up, we liked them. We had also seen them two years prior at this same festival. After their last song we decided to go to our seats at the main stage and kick back until the bands started there.

Main Stage-
At Shoreline we normally try to get seating for concerts and only get lawn seating if we absolutely have to (like we had to for Radiohead since they sold out in like 3 seconds) and this time was no exception. But we had never had seats this close before. We were in section 101 about 15 rows up from the stage. We had a great view of the stage from slightly to the right.

The first band up was The Lovemakers, a local band from Oakland. Neither of us had ever heard of them, and after hearing that their first album doesn’t come out until August, I guess I know why. This group had an interesting set up. They had two lead singers, one male one female. They played a kind of mix of alternative rock, synth pop. The songs I liked the most were the ones were the female lead singer played the electric violin. The one slightly weird moment was when the two lead singers started making out on stage. I just remember turning to my friend and saying; “I hope those two are actually dating.” The best thing about this band was their t-shirts that say “Oakland is for Lovemakers” with a pink heart. Oh yeah, I bought one of those.

Ok, You know that there are bands that everyone raves about and that you just can’t get into? I call them the bands I should love, but don’t. Well, Kasabian is one of those bands. They are one of those new style seventies rock bands. They were fine, I guess. I just can’t make myself get into them. Oh well.

Next up was Jimmy Eat World….See my thoughts on Kasabian. Enough said.

I have never been a huge fan of punk music, I like it, but I have never bought a lot of it or listened to it a great length. I own “Never Mind the Buzzcocks” and that is about it. I liked Social Distortion, who was next, even though I only knew about three of their songs. It is always interesting to see a band that has been around along time and were very antiestablishment and now are older and most likely family guys, but are still playing the same antiestablishment music. It is a study in the movement of time.

During the time we were waiting for the Foo fighters to come on we had noticed that every once in a while people from the crowd were going up to a guy about 4 rows in front of us and to a group of guys sitting in the row right behind us and were asking for autographs and pictures, I would like to say I knew who these people were, but I would be lying. But it was fun to see all the excited teenagers with their cameras and awkward approaches to these guys that were not too much older than they were.

Finally! The Foo Fighters were up next!
All I can say is the Foo were as great as I remember them form the last time I saw them. They played all the oldies but goodies and a lot of their new stuff from their upcoming album. At one point Dave went out in to the audience to play to the lawn. He made his way through the screaming crowd to the top of the reserved area and played a song and while he was there posed for a few pictures and drank a lady’s beer (which he thanked her for once he got back on stage.) But the ultimate high light of the foo experience was when Dave announced that the drummer Taylor was going to sing a song for us. I thought; cool we get to hear him sing and hear Dave play drums. But NO! Taylor spoke to the crowd and told them that his favorite drummer, besides Dave, was Stewart Copeland from the Police and that he had been hanging out with them on their tour a bit and that he happened to be here and would be playing the drums. What? I almost peed my pants! This was great! I love the police and though you can still see Sting touring around, you don’t get to hear Stewart Copeland play very often. I was thrilled. He still rocked and that just set the crowd off screaming again. The only bummer was that our camera had run out of batteries about three song prior, so we didn’t get a picture on him playing. The night ended on that high not and we were not disappointed by this year’s festival. This is one festival that we will probably go to again.


Want to see more photos of this festival? Click here: http://flickr.com/photos/50208355@N00/sets/758776/