Voodoo Festival Day Three New Orleans, Louisiana 11/2/14

And we have made it to Sunday.

Everywhere you turned, someone was ranting or raving about Foo Fighters closing out the festival in the coming hours.

Personally, I was super excited to see Foo again, considering it had been over two years since the last time I saw them.

But, before we can talk about the wonderful man who is Sir Dave Grohl, we have to discuss the bands that lead up to the evening.

The first band of the day was Drew Holcomb and The Neighbors.

I had previously seen them in 2013 when they opened for Needtobreathe in Birmingham at Boutwell Auditorium and their set was wonderful. This time proved to be no different.

They played the festival like they were playing to thousands in an arena despite the hundred or so in attendance. There is something to be said about bands that carry themselves in that way.

They played

Good Light

Nothing But Trouble

Tennessee

American Beauty

Here We Go

Live Forever

What Would I Do Without You

Can't Take It With You

Rooftops

Fire and Dynamite

Afterwards, I went to see the John Butler Trio.

I was somewhat familiar with this group because of the song Ocean (which seems to be a crowd favorite)

To classify Butler as a Reggae artist would be too simple.

He blends rock, bluegrass, funk, blues, and jam along with a traditional Reggae sound.

While some people love Reggae Jams, they are not for me.

But, Butler's guitar skills are astounding and he knows how to move his audience.

He played

Cold Wind

Hoe Down

Better Than

I'd Do Anything (Soldier's Lament)

Blame It On Me

Pickapart

Ocean (Extended Improv Jam)

Zebra

Livin' in the City

Since 2011, unless you have been living under a rock, the song "Sail" has been listened to, or made fun of by you or someone you know.

AWOLNATION's Aaron Bruno is the man behind this five times platinum single.

I was looking forward to this band but once I entered the photo pit, I took three pictures and left the stage.

Why?

They were so loud and the speakers were thumping so hard they almost burst.

The bass made it hard to breathe.

After escaping that new kind of hell, I made my way to the back, where the sound was still so loud, but more distorted and it was hard to determine if you were hearing music or static.

Even though the sound was terrible, the performance itself was great for getting the crowd moving and even more pumped for Foo Fighters.

They played

Megalithic Symphony

Guilty Filthy Soul

People

Not Your Fault

Jump on My Shoulders

Kooks Everywhere

Kill Your Heroes

Soul Wars

All I Need

Some Kind of Joke

Sail

Burn It Down

In anticipation for Foo Fighters, Trombone Shorty entertained the crowd with original jazz compositions as well as covers of Green Day's "Brain Stew" and The Guess Who's "American Woman."

*Drum Roll please*

FOO FIGHTERS TIME!!!

I am just going to get straight down to the near perfect set-list.

They played

All My Life

I’ll Stick Around

Rope

The Pretender

My Hero

Generator

Walk

Learn to Fly

White Limo

Arlandria

Cold Day in the Sun

Big Me

Ain’t Talkin’ ’bout Love (Van Halen cover)

Something From Nothing

Breakout

Monkey Wrench

Hey, Johnny Park!

Times Like These

Dear Rosemary

Breakdown (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers cover)

Best of You

This Is a Call (with Trombone Shorty)

Under Pressure (Queen & David Bowie cover)

Everlong

Few bands can play over two and half hours and still have a crowd on their feet. The band played to their crowd, but also to their die-hards (like me) who wanted to hear the deep cuts and rare B-sides.

Overall, Voodoo was a wonderful, spiritual experience for me and I cannot wait to do it all over again next year.

Music Midtown 9/21-22/12

So it was finally time for Music Midtown. I would get to see my beloved Avett Brothers and my favorite Foo Fighter on Friday night and I would get to see the best band ever, Pearl Jam. If this is not a line-up of all line-ups, I do not know what is. I got there right in time for Avett. I can honestly say that they put on one of the best live shows I have ever seen and I have been to a lot of shows. They are just so damn cute. Their music can reach all audiences and there will not be one person standing still when they bust out their awesome banjo riffs and they always have a very big crowd response. They opened with The Fall and went straight into Will You Return. WYR is one of my all time favorite songs and it put a huge smile on my face and everyone around me was dancing along. After that they played:

February Seven

Paul Newman vs. The Demons (My Favorite on The Carpenter)

Laundry Room

Old Joe Clark 

January Wedding

At the Beach (they said "we are gonna go back to an album of ours called "Mignonette." The crowd cheered)

Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise (best crowd sing along of the night)

The Prettiest Thing ("We are going to play a song by a great man named David Childers)

Down with the Shine

Distraction #74

Paranoia in Bb Major

Live and Die

Go to Sleep

Winter in My Heart

Kick Drum Heart (Great crowd participation)

Encore:

Murder in the City

Talk on Indolence

After The Avett Brothers, everyone made their way to the other stage for Foo Fighters. I have listened to them "All My Life" (I'm sorry, I had to do it.) So needless to say, I was really excited about them. Dave Grohl graced the stage and screamed "WASSSSSSUUUUPPPPPP ATLANTA?!?!" and the band went straight into the song White Limo. They were loud and they were great. Then they played

All My Life

Rope

The Pretender

My Hero

Learn to Fly

Arlandria

These Days

Walk

Everybody Wants Some!! (Van Halen)

Cold Day in the Sun

Monkey Wrench

Hey, Johnny Park!

This is a Call

In the Flesh? (Pink Floyd)

Best of You

Times Like These

Dear Rosemary

Breakdown (Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers)

Bad Reputation (Joan Jett came out and played this song with them.) (I had a miniature freak-out)

And then they closed with Everlong. That song got the biggest crowd response of the night and it gave me chill bumps to hear every person singing because it was so beautiful. That ended the first night and it was back to the hotel for my family and me.

The second day of Music Midtown started a little bit later in the day for me. I did not walk over until the end of Neon Trees. I heard them play Animal and that was good enough for me. I walked in the venue right as Florence + The Machine started. I listened to Lungs and Ceremonials several times and thought it was pretty good but girl singers are just not my favorite. The crowd cheered in response. She played

Only If For A Night

What The Water Gave Me

Drumming Song

Cosmic Love

Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)

Spectrum

Heartlines

Lover To Lover

Shake It Out ("This is for all of your hangovers tomorrow!")

No Light, No Light

Dog Days Are Over

Closer to the end of her set, she said, "It was scary to start the show, but you made me feel so welcome!"

The crowd sang along for that last song and it was cool. Florence is a very graceful performer and, whether it is intentional or not, she dances very well. I love her accent too. After Florence was someone called Girl Talk. I had never heard of this person/group so I waited before I walked to the other stage. It was techno so I stayed on the side and waited for Pearl Jam, my favorite band. (After PJ20 last year, I had really high expectations.) I started out in the back and they came on stage and went straight into Why Go.

During this song, Molly (cousin/bff) and I could hear everyone around us singing and PJ was not loud at all. The night before, Foo was so loud I could hardly hear myself think. We looked at each other and decided we have to try our best to get in the front. So we ran as fast as we could and got into the crowd of people. The band went into Save You. We were singing our lungs out (very badly, of course). It seemed like we were the only ones that were even enjoying it. We finally made our way through the sea of people and found several die hards that were singing the not-so-popular songs. During the time of our adventure, they played

Animal

Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town

Corduroy and

Got Some.

Got Some is not really a popular song and we found this group of guys that were singing it with every ounce of energy they had. When it was over, they looked at us and said “You guys are some true fans, aren’t you?” We looked at them and said yes! Then we walked through more people and we finally made it to a spot about two rows from the front that was great. They then played

Amongst The Waves

Wishlist

Better Man

Do The Evolution

Even Flow

Know Your Rights (The Clash) (Eddie gave a short speech on exercising your right to vote. In my opinion, it was very inspiring)

Nothingman (AHHHHHH!!!) (This was definitely the best surprise of the night.) (We were in hopes of the “Man” trilogy, alas they did not play Leatherman.)

Supersonic

Jeremy

Porch

(Encore)

Crazy Mary

Given To Fly (AHHHHHHHHHH!!! One of my top five favorite songs by PJ and I got to hear it!)

The Fixer

Rearviewmirror

(Second Encore)

Unthought Known

Black
Alive
Rockin’ In The Free World (Neil Young) (Right before this song started, someone on the side told Eddie he had two minutes left. He responded and said “Well I guess we have to play this song fast. I wanna get this song in. Fuck It! I’ll pay the fine”) I laughed. This ended the festival and ironically, the closest I have ever been for Pearl Jam, was probably the less fan enthusiastic show I have ever been to. I am sorry, but it is just not possible to condense a PJ show into two hours. They played for the masses, but I am not complaining because I still got to be there. I am also glad that they were selling Pearl Jam merch on Friday night because they had the poster and I did not have to get to the show early the next day to get it. and that is a wrap. See y’all later!