Saturday Night at Bonnaroo

Saturday Night at Bonnaroo is Nate Barrett's most entertaining story about being a musician at Bonnaroo yet. He waxes eloquently about famous people, partying people, and yes, naked people.

All 10 of the Bonnaroompah Tales Part One: Bonnaroompah Part Two: Getting to Bonnaroo Part Three: Bonnaroo Guest Camping Part Four: Wednesday Night at Bonnaroo Part Five: Bonnaroo Begins Part Six: Thursday Night at Bonnaroo Part Seven: Friday at Bonnaroo Part Eight: The Police at Bonnaroo Part Nine: You Are Here Part Ten: Sunday at Bonnaroo

Saturday night at Bonnaroo, after the main act (during which time no other band plays), is my favorite time at Bonnaroo.

It is sort of the witching hours of the festival. All the other stages begin to kick it. Many of the other Bonnarooers start to really, well, for lack of a better term, “peak”.

After a half hour of the Flaming Lips (which was awesome, just not from where I was standing, for a real Lips Story, corner Phil “I Somehow Got Back Stage During The Flaming Lips” Pollard and get him to spill it) I decided to make an entire lap of all the goings on. No easy feat, but well worth it.

I took in excellent performances by Galactic, Yard Dogs Road Show, Government Mule, but the highlight of that evening for me, Scott Amendola Band featuring Nels Cline in the new to Bonnaroo, Something Else Jazz Tent.

It was killer fusion with bass, violin, Amendola on drums, and a certain Wilco guitarist blowing my mind. The whole show made me wish I had spent more time in the little Bonnaroo jazz club they set up.

Another great part of Saturday night at Bonnaroo was seeing stuff I just couldn’t see anywhere else in one day. One of the great places to do that is the Artists' Compound.

Walking our polka pounding selves to the dinner tent, we passed a large family group on the way in. They all kinda looked like Bob Marley, which is no surprise, because it was Ziggy and damn near all of the Wailers. Don’t see that everyday.

I handed my meal ticket over, got in line, and huh, that’s Keller Williams taking his sweet time dishing out the steamed kale as he chats with fellow WMD’er, Gibb Droll. Keller is even shorter than I thought he was.

And then as I was dishing out some Bar-B-Q tofu, I looked to the end of the buffet. There, going over the dessert choices with one of the caterers, was the man behind the bag end of the only band in rock history to ever write and perform a song about The Hobbit and not get severely laughed at.

As I approached the dessert selections, a thin, graying man walked behind me and with a quiet British accent proclaimed to me “I believe the key lime pie is the thing to do.”

So after he had dished out his plate, I followed suit. If John Paul Jones says you should try the key lime pie, well, by golly, who am I to not try the dang key lime pie?

The pie was quite the tasty, and the Hammer of The Gods approved.

But celebrities aren’t the only sights to see on Saturday night at Bonnaroo.

At the Sasha and Digweed show I studied the ritual habits of the glow stick dancers. Glow sticks are those little trinkets that produce a neon light via the use of a liquid chemical solution trapped inside them.

I believe the technology was developed in the eighties for the military. Now you see them vended at any major gathering of people that happens after sundown. But to see them used to the utmost, you need to see a heavy hitting electronic dance music act like Sasha and Digweed.

I was able to sort out of the thousands of people dancing about me about four or five different dances that are done with the things. All seemed to involve zipping them by your face in some fashion or another. It becomes the dancers own personal light show.

It has nothing to do with looking cool to others, it seems. Think of it as a non-ingested chemical enhancer. Although watching thousands of people all goof them selves off with cheap light toys is pretty interesting.

The most amazing homemade art project I saw was a fellow standing just on the fringe of the crowd. He had made a giant paper mache or cardboard jack o’lantern which he was wearing on his own head.

Inside the head he had lined with electric L.E.D.’s and other flashing oddities. Through the eyes and mouth of the weird helmet, the lights would leak and stream out, like you were standing outside the windows of a mad scientist's laboratory as you wondered what he’s building in there.

The Silent Disco is another interesting sight I took in that night. As people entered the dance floor, which is open on all sides for the passer-by’s to watch in, they were handed wireless headphones.

The DJ for this party also used the same headphones. This created a whole congregation of people wiggling oddly to silence. The only time I was clued in on what the music was doing was when the entire crowd in unison screwed up the chorus of Stevie Wonder’s “Uptight”, and then went back to boogie-ing.

After my giant lap of fun, I decided to make my way back to guest camping for a bit. Just when I thought I had seen most every type of festival go-er, I witnessed one I had forgotten about: the buck naked man being detained by a security type festival go-er.

The fellow apparently got swept up in the party, I guess, and somehow partied his clothes right off. Now the party seemed to be coming to an end and his clothes seemed to be nowhere near by.

He just kind of stood there looking ashamed, with the bits of anatomy that were apparently the main offense covered by his hands, as two staff members "discretely" questioned him in the middle of the path everyone was using.

As I walked past, I could only make out the offender's whimpers of “Oh, man. C’mon. Please, just let me go find my clothes.”

Which brings up a very important lesson: The great thing about Bonnaroo - or any large festival for that matter - is that, in general, people can freely do whatever they want with out shame. You never have to worry about being weird or odd. The crowd embraces you in your joys and even helps aid you in misery if need be.

The community that forms at these gatherings embraces the free spirit and will come together to maintain a sense of harmony. In this, everyone has a better experience as a whole.

BUT, nobody really wants to get stuck dancing next to the naked guy. Nobody. Well, maybe another naked guy.

Even Bonnaroo has its party limits.

That's it for Nate's Saturday Night at Bonnaroo adventures, and I hope you agree, those were some great ones! Coming up: Sunday at Bonnaroo.

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