Firefly

Live music – the stuff summer weekends are made of.

This weekend, Mr. T and I spent Friday night through Sunday night in Dover, Delaware at the Firefly Music Festival.

It was one of the best weekends I’ve had in a really long time, and definitely the best music festival I’ve ever been to. (I can’t seem to stop ending sentences with prepositions today, and I’m too worn out to get all fancy and fix it.)

There were a lot of really outstanding acts, the grounds were really organized and beautiful, and the weather… mostly sucked – but you can’t win them all.

We hit the road after work Friday night, which was a terrible idea. The two hour trip wound up taking almost four hours due to traffic. We missed most of Silversun Pickups, but arrived in time for the night’s headliner – Jack White.

This was the act I was anticipating the second most, and Mr. White didn’t disappoint. Well, he kind of did by going off six minutes early with no encore. I thought that was bullshit, but apparently true Jack White fans don’t whine about that stuff. According to one of said true fans, “Jack White goes off when he wants to.” Um, whatever.

The guy is a genius though, and definitely worth standing in the surprisingly chilly rain after a four hour ride from hell, completely sober.

The next day was a marathon of music and walking back and forth across the huge expanse of grounds from stage to stage. Music festivals are work. One must fuel accordingly.

Sonic. It had been over a year since I’d last experienced the sweet euphoria of hamburgers and fries for breakfast (well, it was actually lunch time by the time we ate breakfast, but whatever). When will DC hop on the Sonic chain? It needs to happen yesterday.

Dogfish Head was the official sponsor of the festival and released a brew specifically for the event – Firefly Ale. It tasted like illegal substances, and hops.

We saw too many shows Saturday to show pictures of all of them (saving that for the best show, later on) – but they’re worth mentioning.

Kids These Days – Only listened to a song or two whilst checking out the port-a-toities and getting a beer, they sounded good though. Kind of hip hop meets indie, or something like that.

The Felice Brothers – Very interesting – their sounds ranged from indie pop, to blues, to electronica. They were enjoyable to listen to while wandering around.

Charles Bradley and his Extraordinaires – Hilarious throw-back funk band.

Grouplove – Good, but nothing to write home about.

Young the Giant – I’m a fan of this band. I like that the lead singer actually has a good singing voice. While not a necessity in the rock land, it’s always cool when it’s there.

Cake – I’ve wanted to see Cake live for a really long time, and they definitely delivered. They played a lot of tracks from their new, self-released album and a couple of the hits. They’re just goofy and fun.

Modest Mouse – I think this show was a hundred times better than the one I saw at 9:30 last month. They sounded better (I think maybe Isaac was a wee bit more sober) and I could actually see them, which is always enjoyable (I’m too short for floor shows at 9:30). Modest Mouse is my second favorite band, so I was happy to get to see them again.

Yeasayer and the Killers played after that, but we peaced out. One can only sit on their canvas folding chairs and drink Bud Light so long before they need to stuff their face with a plate of fried things and cake. Actual cake this time.

The next day got off to a slower start. We knew it would be a late night (driving back to DC after 10 p.m.) so we slept in and missed some of the earlier acts.

We got there as The Head and the Heart was wrapping up, grabbed a glass of wine from The Vineyard (there was a brewery, vineyard, arcade, and several food stands – top notch) and settled in to watch Awolnation. They were alright.

Then I jittered my way through Cold War Kids and Death Cab for Cutie (both good shows, but Ben Gibbard was sick so that kind of sucked) and checked my watch ever twenty seconds waiting for, what to me, was the main event.

You guys know I’m obsessed, so I’ll say very little and then show a lot of pictures, probably mostly only for my own benefit.

I was worried that I’d over-hyped how good this show would be to Tom. They’ve been amazing every time I’ve seen them, but I’d never seen them at a big festival like this, so I didn’t know if they’d have all the usual props and such.

But that was stupid. You cannot over-hype a Lips show.

It was just, fucking amazing.

We left after the last note of Do You Realize?? wrapped up to drive back home. We missed The Black Keys, and even though everyone is creaming their culottes over them right now – nothing could have topped the Flaming Lips.

And now I’m done being that girl who brags about how cool her weekend was and shall proceed to try to live through this day – which is bound to be long and dull in comparison.