The Campus Socialite Goes All Out At Lollapalooza 2011

10:00am Day 1: Lollapalooza is here, and it’s most certainly not your average festival. This circus of 130 musical acts has arrived on August 5th with bands, DJ’s, eclectic mixes of vendors and sponsors. It’s no wonder that The Campus Socialite was asked to cover such an event, because after all, we only do cover finest and most action packed events across the nation. We at The Campus Socialite only strive for such coverage to be stationed in your mind. Tell me you don’t want to click more to see the exclusive pictures and experience and we’ll call you The Campus Wallflower in less than a NY minute.

We’re tired as a dog who just got his rocks off when we arrive in Chicago. After all the bullstuff of taking the train, unloading luggage, paying drivers and occassionally relieving myself, we finally get to the media entrance where I am greeted by scanners asking for my Lolla bracelet. After all is said and done, computer situated and a tall boy beer, we make our way over to the SONY stage and I am pumped. Spin Magazine supplied all of the amenities; We’re talking free Bud Light, Budweiser, Tito’s Vodka mixed with Sweet Leaf Tea, White Castle sliders, Pringles, and of course, what would the Spin tent be without Spin Magazine for reading material while sitting on the couches.

some more pics from the media area:

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First up, The Naked and Famous. If you haven’t heard of them, you better peep them out, download their stuff, go to your nearest torrent site or whatever it is you do when downloading an album(btw, F U Metallica). Their album Passive Me, Aggressive You has topped charts in the international regions and is slowly trickling in to mainstream radio stations in the U.S. They kick off their performance with the first song “All of This” Thriving with emotion, they almost instinctively understand the audience of Lollapalooza. The lead vocalist, Alisa Xayalith harmonizes perfectly with her guitarist Thom Powers. Not only are they excellent, but it is clearly obvious they will be making a radical impact on the indy music scene. In fact, while you’re here, check out the interview that a friend of mine over in Seattle had with the band:

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Photo’s Courtesy of Ben Bamsey…Thanks Ben!

After their single “Young Blood” is played, they exit the stage with beaming gratitude to a giant ovation. Next up! Foster the People, and when I say it’s packed, i am seriously understating the shoulder to shoulder mayhem, that has appeared to see this band that has only been around for a couple of years. For those of you who don’t know Foster The People, watch the episode of Entourage with John Stamos playing Drama in Ping Pong at L.A.’s Spin. That scene has their song “Houdini” playing in the background, which to be honest, I only noticed recently. Sean Camino who has an eclectic mix of talents and an astonishing voice, impressed the crowd by beginning the set with “Call It What You Want.”Ganja smoke filling the air, and me getting high simply by association, the crowd raises their hands about 45 minutes in for their hit single “Pumped Up Kicks.” Nothing like being partially stoned, a little tipsy and conveniently soaking up airwaves from a band playing to a clusterfudge of people. Check out Red’s interview with Foster The People Below.

Once these punks leave the stage, I am off to “Perry’s Stage.”

Now if you read our recent Lollapalooza promo article, you should know that Perry Ferrell, the lead singer of Janes Addiction, is the underlying founder of Lollapalooza. This guy created a movement here, and to tell you the truth, Perry’s Stage is what I call the definition of a movement. The first day out, just take Electric Zoo and put it under a tent for a couple days and that concoction is Perry’s stage. Skrillex and Afrojack set it off hard, hands in the air and robitic dubstep eminating from each individual who doesn’t give a rats ass that their exchanging bodily fluids with guy or girl wringing out their spongey skin and combing their stenches to smell like a Jersey Shore sewer rat.

8:30 on day 1, it was time to mellow out the mood and see Chris Martin perform live with Coldplay. Being that we were entirely dead from the day, I must say it was a great way to end off the night. Songs like Yellow, Clocks, In My Place and Scientist filled the air. Once this night was over it was time to head back and shower up to get out for the evening.

empty-perry's-stage-lollapalooza — Perry's Stage Before The Mayhem

Lets jump over to day 2 of Lollapalooza. To be honest I wasn’t as pumped for day 2 as I was for day 1, but I did make my way over to see Ellie Goulding at around 6:00pm who we had the chance of interviewing a couple days prior to my arrival to Lolla. With bands just like Ellie who are up and coming independent artists, according her to Lolla “is the perfect festival for her to fit into.” She says “Lolla will expose her to new and exciting types of fans in America.” Ellie is from England and is just breaking ground in the Indy music scene and laid down a fantastic performance at Lollapalooza.

After Ellie’s performance, I head back to Perry’s Stage to catch The Glitch Mob In Action.Afrojack, Glitch Mob and Skrillex are some the acts that donned the sounds at perry’s stage and had people fist pumping. People are dressed in funky clothing that reminds me of some the pictures I’ve seen from Camp Bisco or a simple Phish show. As I make my way over to the stage to watch The Glitch Mob get their sound on, I make my way up to the front of the stage to snag some fantastic images of them doin’ their thang…check em out. I really wanted to hear them perform their remix to Seven Nation Army by The White Stripes, but unfortunately they stuck to their album Drink The Sea. Check out some of their pictures that were taken from the pit. I mean this place was packed out!

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As 8:30pm draws near, it’s time to head over to the Music Unlimited stage where none other than Marhall Mathers will be flipping the switch of Lollapalooza. I had such an urge to stay put at Perry’s stage being that Pretty Lights was about to make their way up to the throne, however, I felt compelled to see Eminem as we would would have regretted not seeing the man himself.

As I made my way over to the stage, there must have been 4,000 to 5,000 fans all gathering around the field waiting to hear Eminem come out for the first time since his tour with Jay-Z. First song that he bursts on to the scene with Won’t Back Down from his Recovery album along with Kon Artist from D-12. A couple songs over from this was a throwback for an Em fan like myself, Square Dance. As the show proceeded on Royce Da 5’9 threw in his vocals on “Fast Lane” and then moving right along to Airplanes with a quick cameo from Bruno Mars. Overall an AMAZING performance by Eminem and let’s all hope he is here to stay.

Here’s the entire set list: Won’t Back Down , 3 a.m. , Square Dance, WTP, Kill You, No Love, So Bad , Cleanin’ Out My Closet, The Way I Am, Fast Lan, Lighters, Airplanes Pt. II, Stan, Sing For The Moment, Like Toy Soldiers, Forever, Cinderella Man, ‘Till I Collapse, Love the Way You Lie, I Need A Doctor, My Name Is / The Real Slim Shady / Without Me, Not Afraid, Lose Yourself

Before I finish up let’s pause for a second and brush up on the culture of Chicago’s Lollapalooza festival and its total awesomness. From what I heard about Chicago and directly coming from the lifeline of Illinois, “it isn’t that hipster.” But let me tell you first hand from a New Yorkers point of view, take the West Village and multiply it by 5, then call it fedora central. I mean we’re talking converses….everywhere! The city itself is probably saturated on the average chi-town walk but on this venture you can hear echos in the streets or at least those on the outskirts of Grant Parks, Michigan Avenue. The city skyline surrounds the festival and to sum it up in one word, its gorgeous. For some reason I keep thinking of Ferris Beuller.

Unfortunately we had to cut our time short and leave before the last day as Cage the Elephant, DeadMau5 and Kid Cudi all performed. There is nothing more than we would have loved but to go in to more detail about Sunday but to say the least I think we had a pretty Damn good time.So here’s a toast to Lollapalooza and the fantastic line up that will spoken of for years to come as we say commonly on the internet EPIC! Although we had to cutThe Campus Socialite feels honored to be asked to cover the event