Jay Blakesberg’s enthusiasm for rock ‘n’ roll is undeniable.
That much is clear as the famed Bay Area music photographer recounts a shoot from a few years back with eccentric songsmith Tom Waits. The story was told at lightning-fast speed, lasted some 20 minutes and included humorous anecdotes about riding in the car with Waits (who did woodpecker imitations while driving), jumping barbed-wire fences and chasing the star down a dusty driveway in the middle of nowhere. If Blakesberg took a breath while reliving the moment, it wasn’t apparent.
“That’s a true story,” finished Blakesberg, smiling broadly. “You’ve got to wonder if that kind of (expletive) happens to Tom Waits every day.”
The images of that odyssey, as well as pictures from hundreds of other equally intriguing musical trips, can be found in the photographer’s new career retrospective, “Traveling on a High Frequency: Jay Blakesberg Photographs 1978-2008.” Blakesberg will celebrate the release of this hard cover coffee table book with a signing/party on Tuesday (Nov. 11) at the Independent in San Francisco. The public is invited to attend and admission is free.
The book, which retails for $40, is vastly impressive, numbering 304 pages and containing exquisite images of such rock ‘n’ rollers as Phish, Bjork, R.E.M., Nirvana, U2, Radiohead, Dave Matthews and Carlos Santana. Its most immediately arresting characteristic is the sheer magnitude of pics displayed – some shown full page, others in multi-image collages. Read the rest of this entry »
Everything about the inaugural Outside Lands festival was big.
The site itself, which spread across three connecting fields in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, was enormous. The three-day bill was epic, consisting of more than 60 acts, including monster headliners Jack Johnson, Radiohead and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. The turnout was tremendous, as turnstiles spun an estimated 180,000 times for single-day-ticket holders and those holding full-weekend passes. (Final attendance numbers were not available at press time.)
And, most importantly, it was big fun.
Although there were some minor problems with the event _ such as transportation headaches and crowd control issues _ Outside Lands must still be considered a ringing success. Organizers managed to pull off what is arguably the biggest and most ambitious ticketed concert in Northern California history. Indeed, the Bay Area now has a festival that can stand up proudly to such mammoth music events as Southern California’s Coachella or Tennessee’s Bonnaroo. Read the rest of this entry »
A nice set that will unfortunately be remembered for some signficant problems with the sound system.
1. 15 Step
2. Reckoner
3. Airbag
4. There There
5. All I Need
6. Nude
7. Talk Show Host
8. National Anthem
9. The Gloaming
10. Videotape
11. Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
12. Idioteque
13. Karma Police
14. Jigsaw Falling Into Place
15. Just
16. Exit Music (for a film)
17. Bodysnatchers Read the rest of this entry »
Hey, there, I managed to connect to a really weak Internet signal from out in the crowd. And, believe it or not, right now I am writing to you as I listen to Radiohead. Pretty cool, huh? I’ll make it quick.
Just wanted to chime in that Radiohead - the band that, more than any other, makes Outside Lands a big deal - sounds pretty good tonight. That is, the group sounds good when we can hear them. Early on in the show, there were some major troubles with the sound system, to the point where the sound completely cut out on the players for a couple of BIG chunks of time. Read the rest of this entry »
The concert organizers behind this event were gunning to give San Francisco a world-class multi-day music and arts festival _ something comparable to Southern California’s Coachella or Tennessee’s Bonnaroo _ and, thus far, they’re succeeding. Indeed, this could quite arguably end up being the biggest and most ambitious music festival ever produced in Northern California.
Golden Gate Park, as tens of thousands of fans showed up to enjoy a lineup that included alt-rock singer-songwriter Beck, East Bay rapper Lyrics Born, reggae greats Steel Pulse and headliners Radiohead. Read the rest of this entry »
What’s in a name? Well, in the case of next week’s Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival, quite a lot, actually.
Back in the 1800s, Outside Lands was the name used for what’s now San Francisco’s Sunset District. At that time, the area was covered in sand dunes and was considered uninhabitable. Development changed all that, and the former Outside Lands area is now home to Golden Gate Park.
The name conjures up an image of stark isolation — a place Mel Gibson’s “Road Warrior” might visit — but the Outside Lands festival is not alone. This year has seen the birth of many new, non-touring multi-day music events, to the point where 2008 will be likely be remembered in the industry as the year of the festival. Read the rest of this entry »
Much like the huge annual Bonnaroo rock concert, which has been held each June since 2002 in Manchester, Tenn., the Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival, Friday through Aug. 24, will be mammoth, drawing nearly 70 bands and as many as 180,000 ticket-holders to Golden Gate Park.
“I believe that this will be the largest multiday, ticketed event in the history of San Francisco,” says Gregg Perloff of Berkeley’s Another Planet Entertainment (APE), one of the promoters of Outside Lands. “We have people coming to this festival from all over the United States and the world.”
The inaugural festival will be, by far, the biggest musical event to hit Northern California this year. It will also rank as one of the largest rock festivals in the United States, right up there with SoCal’s famed Coachella, the Austin City Limits Festival and, again, Bonnaroo. Read the rest of this entry »
The gigantic Outside Lands festival is right around the corner. The three-day music event, set for Aug. 22-24 at SF’s Golden Gate Park, will draw tens of thousands of people and is projected to be one of the biggest concert events EVER held in Northern California.
The lineups for all three days are solid. As you might expect, I’ll be there all three days, reviewing for the papers and posting regularly online. (And, yes, I do have the best job EVER!) But what if I could only attend one of the days? Which one would I pick? Read the rest of this entry »
