I’m beat.

It’s Monday night after the weekend at Lollapalooza, and despite 11 hours of sleep last night I have yet to fully wake up. Last year’s festival for me was rife with golf cart sprees, free cocktails, backstage access, and a footloose approach to the weekend. Enter the stark contrast of representing an artist (Tom Schraeder) on the fest’s massive bill – it’s stress upon stress and this year’s scorching, muggy weather didn’t help my ability to enjoy the party in the park. Then again, I can’t complain about the treatment of the artists by C3, the production company that manages the event. I’ll spare you the minute-by-minute report that I did for Chicagoist this morning, but I won’t hold back from a few observations:

Does anyone else think that Lollapalooza might benefit from pulling back to two days or limiting the number of stages? This is purely a fan’s perspective, because I highly doubt that Tom would have made the cut if not for there being three days to fill. While we certainly benefited from the curiosity of folks who arrived early, there’s plenty of exhausted extremities and pulsing blisters that would likely beg to differ.

We Chicagoans have both Pitchfork and Lollapalooza (and their vastly different philosophies) each year, and yet just about everyone I know who attended one, attended both. This may have something to do with Lolla’s no-compete clause, which prevents its performers from playing in Chicago during the 60 days before the fest and the 30 days after. In a way, we’ve got no other choice but to see most of the bands we want to see at an outdoor festival.

I was down with: Ted Leo + Pharmacists, the Hold Steady, LCD, Daft Punk, Kings of Leon, The Blisters.

I was bored by: My Morning Jacket, Ben Harper (on the kids’ stage, even), Satellite Party, Tapes n’ Tapes.

Sorry I missed: Iggy & The Stooges, I’m From Barcelona, Polyphonic Spree, Smoosh.

Your thoughts, my pretties?

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