I don’t know about you, but I really, really missed music festivals. And after a year and a half without them, music festivals returned big time this summer, and are now in full swing. Some favorites, like Lollapalooza, Rolling Loud, and Pitchfork Music Festival, all already welcomed fans back to their grounds (and you can look at what’s still to come in our handy hub that we built for you). But there is no festival quite like Life Is Beautiful in Las Vegas.
Taking over Downtown Vegas for the weekend, LiB shows visitors a different side of the desert oasis. It’s not held on the more popular strip area, but in what is commonly referred to as Old Vegas, featuring some of the classic area casinos and hotels as a backdrop and abundant street art on the side of nearly every building. In a city that already feels like a playground, Life Is Beautiful ups the anti, imparting fans with stunning views, top-tier cuisine, educational seminars, and, of course, music. This year saw an impressive slate, including Tame Impala, Green Day, Glass Animals, St. Vincent, Young Thug, ASAP Rocky, and many more. Check out some of the highlights, shot by our own Paul L. Carter, below.
Glass Animals // Paul L. CarterGlass Animals // Paul L. CarterAshnikko // Paul L. CarterTame Impala // Paul L. CarterTame Impala // Paul L. CarterASAP Rocky // Paul L. CarterASAP Rocky // Paul L. CarterASAP Rocky // Paul L. CarterGreen Day // Paul L. CarterGreen Day // Paul L. CarterHaim // Paul L. CarterHaim // Paul L. CarterHaim // Paul L. CarterLudacris // Paul L. CarterSt. Vincent // Paul L. CarterYoung Thug // Paul L. CarterYoung Thug // Paul L. Carter
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Now that large-scale events can once again take place, festivals that had to cancel their 2020 events are now making a 2021 comeback. This means that Post Malone‘s curated festival, Posty Fest, is also set to kick off this fall. Now expanding from one to two days, Posty Fest 2021 has unveiled its lineup, which includes some of today’s biggest hip-hop stars.
Taking place over the weekend of October 30-31 2021, Posty Fest is set to be held outdoors outside of AT&T Stadium in Arlington, TX. Along with Post Malone, Posty Fest’s 2021 lineup includes sets by Megan Thee Stallion, Lil Uzi Vert, Roddy Ricch, Jack Harlow, $uicideboy$, Polo G, Rod Wave, Tyga, Iann Dior, Koe Wetzel, Turnstile, Tyla Yaweh, Flo Milli, Kaash Paige, Kenny Mason, Peach Tree Rascals, RMR, Gatecreeper, Clever, LoveLeo, and more.
Posty Malone originally started the festival in 2018 with a sold-out extravaganza at Dos Equis Pavilion in Dallas. After seeing major success with its inaugural event, Posty Fest expanded to AT&T Stadium in 2019, which is home to the Dallas Cowboys. Since the 2020 event was canceled, this year’s Posty Fest is offering some special travel packages to celebrate its return. Fans who buy the travel package will receive a three-day stay at a hotel, a VIP or GA Festival ticket, Posty Fest official merch, and exclusive open bar event on Friday night in downtown Dallas.
Recently, I wrote about how music festivals have become the new proving ground for emerging artists. But there’s another function that festivals could be serving at the other end of the spectrum: booking legacy acts. While greenhorns and neophytes need a space to work out the kinks in their live shows and build centralized fanbases without the expense and time commitment of a lengthy tour, those who have deeply contributed to hip-hop’s cultural narrative — and have been, unfortunately, overlooked and bypassed for so long — could use the same opportunities.
In the past, Uproxx has addressed the benefits of festival appearances for legacy rap acts like A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, and Wu-Tang Clan… so why aren’t artists like these getting booked at more festivals? Or even for that matter, further down the bill at festivals marked for breakout hip-hop, such as Rolling Loud, Summer Smash, or Made In America? Whenever older acts are booked, it’s usually the biggest names — the Tribes, the Lauryn Hills, the Nases (Jones, not X), or the Snoops — and usually only as headliners.
That leaves a lot of room for overlooked, forgotten, underrated, and tenured rap acts, many of which remain active, playing small, local venues, juggling side hustles, and putting out their newest work independently. Off-hand, I can name dozens who have self-released their music, from AZ (the follow-up to his standout 90s borderline classic Doe Or Die drops this week) to EPMD (who got a nod on the eponymous track “EPMD” from Nas’ first King’s Disease album then appeared on the remix “EPMD 2” on the sequel) to many other artists whose catalogs Gen Z rediscovered through their participation in the Verzuz hits battle series produced by Swizz Beats and Timbaland.
Any number of veteran performers could fill out a festival lineup — especially in the medium-sized print section in the middle of the flyer — and offer an alternative to older fans wishing to skip sets from the newer acts figuring it out on the fly. Alternatively, younger fans catching performances from older artists could learn more about the music that preceded them and perhaps even influenced their current favorites. From a musical standpoint, diversifying the performers’ age groups could also create opportunities for much-needed mentorship and guidance by putting legends in close proximity to rising stars, benefiting both sides.
Imagine a world in which “old heads” didn’t seem quite so out of touch and bitter about being bypassed by the culture as tastes evolve. Imagine one in which “new jacks” were imparted the wisdom to care more about their careers and craft, avoiding the pitfalls and missteps that prematurely ended the relevance of some of those who came before them. In this world, rather than seeing constant internecine conflict between different generations of rappers and their fans, hip-hop could present a united front to the mainstream pop culture that often takes from it without compensation.
There has been some movement in a positive direction, though, with festivals like Lovers And Friends, whose original 2020 iteration struck a near-perfect balance between the classic and the new, casting Megan Thee Stallion and Saweetie alongside their inspirations like Eve, Lil Kim, and Foxy Brown before being canceled due to the pandemic. Perhaps when the rescheduled event returns, its organizers can find ways to include younger artists again after removing them from the 2022 flyer. Likewise, the Once Upon A Time In LA festival organized by Snoop Dogg has West Coast legends like DJ Quik and Warren G sharing space with rising names like BlueBucksClan, Drakeo The Ruler, and OhGeesy.
It’s worth noting that Snoop has always shared himself and his wisdom with up-and-coming artists from the Los Angeles area, and not a stretch to assume that at least some of his impressive longevity stems from that willingness to be a guide for younger artists rather than a judgmental scold. Artists often flourish under his tutelage — Game, Nipsey Hussle, Problem, and more have counted him as a mentor — while he benefits from being included in just about every young artist’s success story, not to mention their music. If/when D Smoke becomes a household name, Snoop Dogg will almost certainly be attached to D Smoke’s story for playing an instrumental role in the Rhythm+Flow rapper’s start and his feature on Smoke’s banger of a single, “Gaspar Yanga.”
Maybe it’s a little pie in the sky, but I can see a world where all our hifalutin ideas about cooperative, artist-owned labels, and rapper-led music industry labor unions could be achieved through this relationship-building putting artists with experience in the same rooms and on the same stages as ones with influence. Such a thing could only be good for hip-hop — and for the artists who represent it. Their recordings and performances could grow fresher, more entertaining, and more universally appealing, increasing the opportunities, platforms, and profits for everybody.
So, hey, promoters, not to tell you how to do your jobs but just think about expanding the age range of these festival rosters. If it doesn’t seem like they’d be much of a draw, I understand. I’m old enough to remember the downfalls of Paid Dues and Rock The Bells, so I know there’s a risk involved. But as the saying goes, no risk, no reward. This is a risk that has rewards far greater than just one event’s ticket sales. It could wind up paying off for generations to come. It could change the face of hip-hop or even the entire music industry. If festivals are really about the music, really about the community, then that’s a risk well worth taking. After all, hip-hop is for the children, but even children of hip-hop grow up eventually.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
New music festivals pop up all the time, especially in California. One of the most promising to emerge over the past few years, though, is Head In The Clouds. 88Rising, the beloved record label and management company that is home to Asian and Asian-American artists, has hosted the event since 2018. After taking 2020 off for obvious reasons, the fest is returning this year, on November 6 and 7. While the event previously went down at Los Angeles State Historic Park, it now has a new home at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena.
With the new venue comes a hell of a lineup; Joji, Rich Brian, Niki, Saweetie, CL, Beabadoobee, Guapdad 4000, Japanese Breakfast, The Linda Lindas, and others highlight the bill. That’s quite the group of high achievers who have dominated the music landscape in their own ways recently: Saweetie is currently promoting her own McDonald’s meal, Japanese Breakfast’s Michelle Zauner is both a music favorite and a best-selling author, and Beabadoobee is one of the biggest rising heroes of indie rock (and the latest Uproxx cover star).
Aside from the level of success on the bill, the stylistic diversity of its artists is noteworthy. Ollie Zhang, 88Rising’s Chief Of Staff, tells Uproxx that this was very much intentional.
“I think that’s always been 88Rising’s mission from since the start, ever since we were just shooting videos and putting them up on YouTube,” he said. “The goal was always to highlight all different types of music. Asian music is so broad and diverse. Everyone’s coming from a different place and we want to be able to represent that on the stage as well. To have such a broad range of artists all sharing the same stage or same festival, I think, is totally an unprecedented thing anywhere in the world, not just in America.”
MADE WITH LOVE BY 88RISING PLEASE WELCOME 2021 HEAD IN THE CLOUDS LA LINEUP. GA + VIP TICKETS ON SALE TOMORROW AT NOON PST AT https://t.co/NZ2YI86eDR. More artist to lineup to be announced soon !!! pic.twitter.com/A2GfAISmvQ
Even beyond Head In The Clouds, Zhang says that while “there’s still so much road to cover” when it comes to Asian representation in the music landscape, he’s pleased with where things stand now: “I think that what this festival is now probably wouldn’t have existed and couldn’t have existed six years ago when we started the company.”
He continued, “You’ll be able to find an amazing artist who is Asian-American or from Asia that can speak to you and resonate with you, no matter what type of music that you’re into. I think that’s always been the case no matter what point of time you’ve been in, but I think that we’ve definitely been a part of the changing landscape and pushing those artists forward. I’m excited to see where everything goes in the next couple of years.”
Speaking of the near future and the potential thereof, Toronto multi-instrumentalist Luna Li is one of the up-and-comers on this year’s lineup Zhang is looking forward to seeing more. “When we first come across her, it was just her doing bedroom jams with harps and violin and all these different types of instruments,” he said. “I feel like she’s just a really cutting-edge artist that I’m excited to kind of watch her growth over the next couple of years.”
He also shouted out The Linda Lindas: “I think they’re just full of raucous energy and they obviously had a bit of a viral moment earlier in the year. Excited just to see the energy that they bring to the stage.”
While Head In The Clouds had to leave the stage in 2020, 88Rising thrived in the livestream space. Virtual events like the “Asia Rising Forever” festival (a benefit for Asian Americans Advancing Justice) and Joji’s “The Extravaganza” were “some of the best experiences that 88Rising ever produced,” Zhang said. While noting that in-person events and livestreams are “still pretty distinct mediums,” Zhang believes there are elements from the latter that can translate to the former, suggesting that the online stream of this year’s Head In The Clouds can be more than “just simply broadcasting the camera feed.”
While in-person concerts are coming back, though, it sounds like Zhang still sees the value in livestreams: “I think what we’ve learned is that the livestream concert has a ton of value and can be a really great way to present an artist that can be really different from what an in-person show is.”
Whether or not livestreams are a thing of the past for 88Rising, Head In The Clouds has become a big part of its future. The esteem the label has built for itself over the past few years has allowed this year’s lineup to be a truly exceptional showcase of both the best of 88Rising and of Asian music more broadly.
“I think that the lineup this year is really great and representative of the platform that 88Rising has become,” Zhang proclaimed. “I think it’s our best lineup yet and I’m excited to see it all take place.”
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Las Vegas festival Life Is Beautiful was forced to cancel its 2020 edition (of course), but it’s coming back strong in 2021 with an impressive lineup. Even if you can’t make it to the actual festival (which takes place from September 17 to 19), though, some additional “Life Is Beautiful Presents” performances will still pack quite the punch.
The festival announced the series of shows, at Brooklyn Bowl in Las Vegas, today: Jacob Collier will perform on September 15, Brittany Howard (with Ant Clemons) on the 16th, San Holo on the 17th, and Ludacris (with Childish Major) on the 18th.
Those artists are also on the festival lineup, which is led by Billie Eilish, Tame Impala, ASAP Rocky, Green Day, Haim, Young Thug, St. Vincent, 6lack, Modest Mouse, Don Toliver, Lany, Earthgang, Purity Ring, Ashnikko, Shaed, Trevor Daniel, Still Woozy, Noah Cyrus, Yaeji, Remi Wolf, and Jamila Woods.
When announcing that lineup, organizers noted, “When curating the lineup for Life Is Beautiful this year, we challenged ourselves to stay grounded in the realities of the year that we just lived. The way we discover artists changed, the places we listened to music evolved, and the meaning of music deepened as we listened in new ways. This year’s lineup isn’t our 2019 lineup in 2021. It’s our 2021 lineup, and celebrates the artists, both established and emerging, who were the shining lights during our darkest days.”
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
As live shows begin to come back during the pandemic, Cole Bennett’s Lyrical Lemonade annual Summer Smash festival made its return to Chicago’s Douglass Park as a wholly independent-ran event with ASAP Rocky, Lil Baby, and Lil Uzi Vert headlining the event.
Though this was my first time attending Summer Smash, I was the most excited about this festival’s lineup in particular. It included a good mix of performers such as the trailblazing underground rap icon Xavier Wulf, Chicago’s own DCG, Queen Key, and C Dot Honcho, as well as all the artists you’d expect at a Lyrical Lemonade event such as Don Toliver, Lil Tecca, Blueface, Dro Kenji, and Warhol.ss.
From day one, fans swarmed Douglass Park that overstretched miles of land allowing plenty of room to move between the main Lyrical Lemonade Stage, the SPKRBX stage, which was catacorner next to it, and Lenny’s Tent, where the most rambunctious up-and-coming acts came to play.
Despite the rise of Delta around the world during the festival, much about the event felt as safe as possible, including what appeared to be fewer people at this festival than others and that proof of vaccination and a negative COVID test was a requirement for entry (though those can easily be faked). It provided a level of comfort where I could freely walk around without fighting my way through sweaty bodies and BO. It was great. The staff at the festival were very accommodating and this was one of the best festivals to get around logistically. As a plus, a majority of the performances were on time.
On day two, Baby Keem had one of the more stand-out performances. His set drew out an intense and passionate mob that clung on to his every word and they had no problem opening up a mosh pit to get dirty to some of his most popular cuts like his self-titled anthem “Baby Keem,” latest release “Durag Activity,” and popular banger “Orange Soda,” which really got the everyone amped. Remember, Baby Keem only has a handful of songs out and he’s still on the come up despite his relation to Kendrick Lamar. The crowd’s reaction to him foretells a certain future for him that includes packed-out and sold-out shows from dedicated fans (as if he’s not doing that already).
Lil Baby was also really impressive. Seeing him perform live made me even more of a fan because he put effort into his entire stage set and design. Before Lil Baby hit the stage, the lights were shut down and the festivalgoers went crazy. With blue lights beaming down on him, Baby hopped off something that looked like a couch, which sat above the stage and over the crowd. Soon after, he began to rap his verse off his Drake collaboration “Wants And Needs” before getting into “Sum 2 Prove.” His energy stayed high the entire time and so did the legion of fans watching.
On the final day of Summer Smash, there was a Juice Wrld tribute helmed by DJ Carnage on the Lyrical Lemonade stage with fans singing along to his songs and paying their respect. The tribute was followed by a few surprise guests. Over the weekend everyone had their guess on who it could be. Kanye West? Polo G? To the crowd’s shock, it was Lil Durk. The Voice popped out with his crew, filling out the entire stage, and a few fans hopped over the fence into the pit, where they weren’t supposed to be, to catch the Chicago icon perform his hits. First, he made the crowd sing praises to the late King Von by saying his name before getting into his 2020 cut “Redman” off his mixtape The Voice. The crowd ate up every word and at one point Durk hopped into the pit to interact with the energetic crowd and began shooting a music video. The show abruptly came to an end, with Durk not really wanting to dip, but being told he had to. One of his boys tossed hundreds into the crowd and I managed to scoop up a few for myself.
There was also a second surprise guess and it was none other than Chance The Rapper. He only did one song though, and quickly left the stage. Some backstage shenanigans going on after their surprise set caused the festival to shut down for a little bit, and The Kid Laroi, unfortunately, was not able to perform.
Closing out the festival was Lil Uzi Vert, one of the most energetic and engaging performers, ever. His alien stage set design was ethereal and really set the tone for the entire show. One thing is for sure, it’s obvious that Uzi loves his fans and had no problem with them throwing their phones at him on stage — or throwing anything on stage for that matter. Uzi loved the chaos as his set was a maelstrom of space rage. Almost immediately he wanted a taste of the crowd so he hopped off the stage, into the pit to be closer and in tune with the people to rap “Move” with them. Then he ran to the end of the pit to climb the soundstage’s tent to do a massive stage dive into the crowd to the sounds of “POP.”
The chaos didn’t end there, though. Throughout the night Uzi would stop and playfully grab a phone thrown on stage to have the crowd participate in saying a long “hello” to each one. While he was performing “The Way Life Goes,” one kid hopped on stage and did a backflip, but security was too slow to catch him. Uzi on the other hand absolutely loved it.
It was the perfect ending to a 3-day festival that was already smooth to begin with.
Summer Smash is just one of many festivals to make its return post-pandemic and it did so in a grand way while priming itself as a premier hip-hop experience. Considering that this festival has no ties to a big corp like Live Nation or Goldenvoice, it was one the most polished and well-run festivals I ever attended outside of normal festival annoyances such as entry and exit. Heck, even the entry and exit weren’t that bad. Cole Bennett certainly outdid himself with the return of Summer Smash, especially as the world seems to be an apocalyptic blender. Attendance was so worth it.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
As live shows begin to come back during the pandemic, Cole Bennett’s Lyrical Lemonade annual Summer Smash festival made its return to Chicago’s Douglass Park as a wholly independent-ran event with ASAP Rocky, Lil Baby, and Lil Uzi Vert headlining the event.
Though this was my first time attending Summer Smash, I was the most excited about this festival’s lineup in particular. It included a good mix of performers such as the trailblazing underground rap icon Xavier Wulf, Chicago’s own DCG, Queen Key, and C Dot Honcho, as well as all the artists you’d expect at a Lyrical Lemonade event such as Don Toliver, Lil Tecca, Blueface, Dro Kenji, and Warhol.ss.
From day one, fans swarmed Douglass Park that overstretched miles of land allowing plenty of room to move between the main Lyrical Lemonade Stage, the SPKRBX stage, which was catacorner next to it, and Lenny’s Tent, where the most rambunctious up-and-coming acts came to play.
Despite the rise of Delta around the world during the festival, much about the event felt as safe as possible, including what appeared to be fewer people at this festival than others and that proof of vaccination and a negative COVID test was a requirement for entry (though those can easily be faked). It provided a level of comfort where I could freely walk around without fighting my way through sweaty bodies and BO. It was great. The staff at the festival were very accommodating and this was one of the best festivals to get around logistically. As a plus, a majority of the performances were on time.
On day two, Baby Keem had one of the more stand-out performances. His set drew out an intense and passionate mob that clung on to his every word and they had no problem opening up a mosh pit to get dirty to some of his most popular cuts like his self-titled anthem “Baby Keem,” latest release “Durag Activity,” and popular banger “Orange Soda,” which really got the everyone amped. Remember, Baby Keem only has a handful of songs out and he’s still on the come up despite his relation to Kendrick Lamar. The crowd’s reaction to him foretells a certain future for him that includes packed-out and sold-out shows from dedicated fans (as if he’s not doing that already).
Lil Baby was also really impressive. Seeing him perform live made me even more of a fan because he put effort into his entire stage set and design. Before Lil Baby hit the stage, the lights were shut down and the festivalgoers went crazy. With blue lights beaming down on him, Baby hopped off something that looked like a couch, which sat above the stage and over the crowd. Soon after, he began to rap his verse off his Drake collaboration “Wants And Needs” before getting into “Sum 2 Prove.” His energy stayed high the entire time and so did the legion of fans watching.
On the final day of Summer Smash, there was a Juice Wrld tribute helmed by DJ Carnage on the Lyrical Lemonade stage with fans singing along to his songs and paying their respect. The tribute was followed by a few surprise guests. Over the weekend everyone had their guess on who it could be. Kanye West? Polo G? To the crowd’s shock, it was Lil Durk. The Voice popped out with his crew, filling out the entire stage, and a few fans hopped over the fence into the pit, where they weren’t supposed to be, to catch the Chicago icon perform his hits. First, he made the crowd sing praises to the late King Von by saying his name before getting into his 2020 cut “Redman” off his mixtape The Voice. The crowd ate up every word and at one point Durk hopped into the pit to interact with the energetic crowd and began shooting a music video. The show abruptly came to an end, with Durk not really wanting to dip, but being told he had to. One of his boys tossed hundreds into the crowd and I managed to scoop up a few for myself.
There was also a second surprise guess and it was none other than Chance The Rapper. He only did one song though, and quickly left the stage. Some backstage shenanigans going on after their surprise set caused the festival to shut down for a little bit, and The Kid Laroi, unfortunately, was not able to perform.
Closing out the festival was Lil Uzi Vert, one of the most energetic and engaging performers, ever. His alien stage set design was ethereal and really set the tone for the entire show. One thing is for sure, it’s obvious that Uzi loves his fans and had no problem with them throwing their phones at him on stage — or throwing anything on stage for that matter. Uzi loved the chaos as his set was a maelstrom of space rage. Almost immediately he wanted a taste of the crowd so he hopped off the stage, into the pit to be closer and in tune with the people to rap “Move” with them. Then he ran to the end of the pit to climb the soundstage’s tent to do a massive stage dive into the crowd to the sounds of “POP.”
The chaos didn’t end there, though. Throughout the night Uzi would stop and playfully grab a phone thrown on stage to have the crowd participate in saying a long “hello” to each one. While he was performing “The Way Life Goes,” one kid hopped on stage and did a backflip, but security was too slow to catch him. Uzi on the other hand absolutely loved it.
It was the perfect ending to a 3-day festival that was already smooth to begin with.
Summer Smash is just one of many festivals to make its return post-pandemic and it did so in a grand way while priming itself as a premier hip-hop experience. Considering that this festival has no ties to a big corp like Live Nation or Goldenvoice, it was one the most polished and well-run festivals I ever attended outside of normal festival annoyances such as entry and exit. Heck, even the entry and exit weren’t that bad. Cole Bennett certainly outdid himself with the return of Summer Smash, especially as the world seems to be an apocalyptic blender. Attendance was so worth it.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
As a kid growing up in Milwaukee, I looked forward to Summerfest with a holiday-like anticipation; as a teen, I grew to mock its supreme un-hipness, even as I still occasionally attended; as an adult living through a time in which music festivals happen on more summer weekends than not, I can only now appreciate quite how unusual my hometown’s version actually is. Summerfest isn’t necessarily better than your Lollapaloozas, Coachellas, or Newport Folks, but it is undeniably broader than those or any other big-name fest. It’s been running so long without a particular musical niche that it’s fallen into that rarest of zones: It’s an all-things-to-all-people gathering. If you can’t find something to like among roughly a thousand bands over ten days, well, you can still go eat some bratwurst, stare wistfully at Lake Michigan, or watch a juggler do his thing.
It’s easier not to be niche-bound when you’re the “World’s Largest Music Festival,” a title that Summerfest could rightfully claim for decades, based on attendance — which peaked in 2001 with just over a million people cumulatively through its gates. That’s quite a few more souls than live in the city of Milwaukee, to give it some perspective. It’s a yearly tourism boon, pushing $186 million into the local economy per annum, according to president and CEO Don Smiley. It’s the single biggest attraction the city can claim as its own — and it does so, loudly and proudly: You can see the smiley Summerfest logo all around town, all year round.
You also can’t miss Summerfest’s highly unusual site: The Henry Maier Festival Park spans 75 acres of absolutely prime real estate, right on Lake Michigan and directly adjacent to downtown Milwaukee. In the 1920s, the strip of land was an airport, and during the Cold War it was a military installation that housed nuclear-capable Nike missiles. Summerfest, which launched in 1968 at various venues around the city, took over the park — a generous word for it at that point, considering there wasn’t much there — in 1970, and slowly but surely built something permanent, both literally and figuratively.
In addition to Summerfest, the Maier Festival Park is also home to Milwaukee’s yearly ethnic festivals, which are generally much smaller affairs but nonetheless charming and fun: German Fest, Festa Italiana, Polish Fest, and others keep the park busy for a few extra summer days in normal years. Weirdly, the park is otherwise locked up tight the rest of the year, visibly lonely from the freeway that runs just above it, its stages and Skyglider quiet and still.
When I started going in the early 1980s, Summerfest still felt a little ramshackle, with only a few permanent structures on the grounds. The stages were typical of what you still see at most fests, erected and removed as needed. They were (and still are) strategically placed throughout the festival so that acts weren’t in sonic competition: If you were busy listening to Weird Al, you wouldn’t necessarily be disturbed by Greg Kihn or REO Speedwagon.
Summerfest
One ridiculously cheap ticket — under $10 per day at the time, still a crazy bargain at $23 — got you general admission access to every stage. Much of the schedule during the daytime back then was taken up by local bands playing to empty bleachers, but the nighttime programming was radically diverse, even then. Looking at the mid-’80s, I’m seeing R.E.M., Huey Lewis, Los Lobos, the Pointer Sisters, Bon Jovi, Eric Clapton, Kool & The Gang. The Replacements and Fishbone had day-ending slots in ‘91, as did Kansas. In 1989, I camped out overnight at the Summerfest box office for tickets to perhaps the coolest triple bill of all time — New Order, Public Image Ltd., and the Sugarcubes — and wound up in the front row.
Then as now, the vibe at Summerfest can be as tough to pin down as the music programming, and while it’d be slightly unfair to compare it to a more urban state fair, that’s also partly true. There’s very little of Coachella’s see-and-be-seen energy, perhaps because the families excited to see Michael “mouth noises guy from the Police Academy movies” Winslow don’t really give a shit about the neon mesh bodysuit-clad Foushee fans or the old metal dudes there for the latest iteration of L.A. Guns. It’s democracy in action, with space for a massive swath of popular and semi-popular music. Smiley tells me that’s all by design: “We purposely construct it for everyone.” He’s equally proud of booking international touring acts like Guns N Roses and Megan Thee Stallion as he is of the brand new Children’s Community Park, which includes sensory rooms, nursing rooms, and playground equipment.
As years passed and Summerfest grew, the park that contains it became more like a small city of its own. In 1987, they added a 23,000-seat amphitheater to draw even bigger bands — though tickets for those shows cost extra. Just last year — when Summerfest was canceled, rescheduled, then canceled and rescheduled again due to COVID — they completely rebuilt that amphitheater to better accommodate the kind of massive stage shows that have become the norm in more recent years. Other permanent stages, food service buildings, and offices are now in use, including the new-ish 10,000-capacity, separately ticketed BMO Harris Pavilion. All of the stages have delightfully corporate names, naturally, and Smiley proudly notes that Summerfest — which is a 501(c)(3) non-profit — has lots of corporate sponsors but much lower ticket prices, a fact that Milwaukeeans find a perfectly acceptable trade-off.
Which brings us to the uncertainty of 2021. With the early part of the year still so COVD-uncertain, Summerfest moved away from its usual June-into-July dates and will now take place over the first three weekends in September. The artists are, as usual, all over the map in the best ways: Green Day, Chance the Rapper, Chris Stapleton, Run the Jewels, Dave Chappelle, Miley Cyrus, Diplo, Pixies, 311. Thurston Moore is on the schedule right there next to the Steve Meisner Polka Band. At one end of the grounds you can see a David Bowie tribute band, and the other a ventriloquist act called Red Hot Chili Puppets that, sadly, has nothing to do with the band (beyond the name, anyway). As of this writing, the reserved seats for REO Speedwagon are sold out, but plenty remain for Joan Jett.
The delightful whiplash goes on and on, and it’s a big part of the Summerfest draw. The whole thing is unpretentious in the same way its home city is: People are there for a good time, and whether that involves waiting all day to be up in front for Coheed & Cambria or happening upon a juggling demonstration while munching on some ribs doesn’t much matter.
This fall, Mansfield, Ohio will play host to a festival that has a great lineup if you’re a fan of alternative rock and metal, as it features Slipknot, Rob Zombie, Mudvayne, A Day To Remember, Mastodon, Halestorm, Chevelle, Killswitch Engage, and others. The festival is also focused on tattoos, so if you’re looking to get a some ink, more than 75 tattoo artists will be on hand.
All in all, if you’re into those sorts of things, this seems like a great time. There’s one significant issue, though: The event is called the Inkcarceration Music & Tattoo Festival, the name of which plays off the fact that it takes place on the grounds of the Ohio State Reformatory, which is perhaps best known as a primary filming location for The Shawshank Redemption. As the festival is getting ready for its 2021 installment (on the weekend of September 10 to 12), some folks are talking notice of its allegedly problematic nature.
For example, Kim Kelly, a journalist and author of the upcoming book Fight Like Hell: The Untold History Of American Labor, shared her thoughts, tweeting today, “I get a lot of press releases for a lot of bad music festivals I will never attend, but the emails about this one in particular always make my skin crawl. Prison isn’t an edgy ‘theme,’ it’s torture and enslavement and horror. It’s repulsive to see an event promoted this way.” Other people chimed in and echoed the sentiment.
I get a lot of press releases for a lot of bad music festivals I will never attend, but the emails about this one in particular always make my skin crawl. Prison isn’t an edgy “theme,” it’s torture and enslavement and horror. It’s repulsive to see an event promoted this way. pic.twitter.com/6xdp9RPJCh
The festival previously hosted editions in 2018 and 2019 before making its return this year. Aside from music and tattoos, this year’s event will also feature tours of the prison, as well as a “special engagement” of “Escape From Blood Prison Haunted House,” which is a yearly Halloween event held at the Ohio State Reformatory.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
With the internet hyper-accelerating the average artist’s life cycle and “democratizing” the already overcrowded market to the point of a constant blur of white noise, it can get a little tricky for rising stars to separate themselves from the pack. Where in the past, there was a long lead time of artist development before artists were thrown into the deep end to sink or swim, nowadays, your make-or-break moment as a potential star can come just weeks after your initial breakthrough on the back of a viral hit. For the modern generation of rising rap stars, that moment is often their first festival performance, which has come to be the ultimate proving ground separating the future kings and queens from the one-hit-wonders.
In fact, the festival performance — and the fact that there are so many festivals that cater to hip-hop, not to mention so many facets of it — is both a gift and a curse. Rather than plugging away for months, years — heck, decades — at a rap career, refining your performance skills in half-empty dive bars and 300-cap theaters, you can play for many times that number at even the smallest stages at festivals like Rolling Loud or Day N Vegas, even in the least desirable time slots, getting the kind of exposure that it used to take a whole regional tour to acquire. Now that you’ve got a viral hit, this is your chance to capitalize on the curiosity of fans at your stage and prove you have enough material to fill a solo set and pitch your real product: Your personality, your energy, and your unique story.
However, this can be a double-edged sword. While a standout set can earn you fans for life — or at least, for the duration of the ride home from the festival venue — a lackluster one can torpedo any forward momentum you’ve managed to earn for yourself. While streaming numbers can be faked and industry relationships can be leveraged to “get on,” you can’t fake a live reaction. This is why so many of the artists that draw so much attention early in their careers can seemingly fade over time. Plus, bad sets tend to stack up on one another; the first bad set leads to skepticism for the next, and so on, meaning each new performance can bring back diminishing returns. Also, if fans don’t see your name moving up the lineup and getting bigger, they can assume it’s because you have very little to offer with your live show.
We’ve seen these principles in practice over and over again but for the most extreme example, we can look at someone like DaBaby, whose raucous festival performances played a huge part in his building such a dedicated fanbase so quickly. Even before he blew up in 2019 with “Walker Texas Ranger,” when he was still going by Baby Jesus (yikes), Jonathan Kirk was an expert at drawing attention, walking around festivals in a huge diaper, and delivering energetic performances that endeared him to fans early in his career. When he finally got that name thing sorted out, it seemed like he blew up right away, right? None of that success would have been possible had he not positioned himself for it with his stellar performances early on.
DaBaby also helped make the downsides to a bad performance more clear this year, ironically at Rolling Loud, the hip-hop-centric festival of which he’d become a fixture over the past two years. Thanks to livestreams of festivals, performances both good and bad can be broadcast to even more viewers at a time, making the stakes more precarious than ever. Even as DaBaby delivered his usual action-packed set, his between-song call-to-action to fans came across as less-than-enlightened and has drawn plenty of complaints of insensitivity and hate, marring his public reputation seemingly overnight (his repeated doubling down didn’t help). Bringing out Tory Lanez as a publicity stunt further disrupted any positive perceptions his performance may have picked up, sparking the viral moment he wanted, but bringing the opposite response he likely expected.
Kirk’s woes, though, are extreme. Some other examples might be the way newer rappers like Polo G, JID, or Guapdad 4000 were able to convert new fans after a festival season, growing their followings to the point of intense fervor. I personally watched Kyle unexpectedly pull in hundreds of curious observers on the big stage at Coachella a couple of years ago, overhearing conversations to the effect of “Who’s that?” “I don’t know but I like him!” Aminé packed out a tent at that same Coachella, the spillover crowd sparking increased interest from passerby and growing it by the second. By the same token, at the most recent Rolling Loud, breakout sensation Coi Leray mystified attendees who realized they didn’t know any of her catalog past “No More Parties,” but seemed to be engaged by her enthusiastic performance, even if they didn’t quite show it on the livestream.
Even the choice of the festival to perform at makes a huge difference for a rising artist. A Camp Flog Gnaw set can attract one sort of fans (Tyler fans are hella loyal) while something like Soundset can benefit a more heady-sounding rapper. Back in the day, I knew if an artist was on Paid Dues or Rock The Bells, they were my kind of artist — and that was where I saw groups like TDE and Slaughterhouse make their bones. Since then, a good festival show has only become more important to any artist’s strategy. It’s a shame so many are tossed into that fire without getting the practice they need to deliver an impressive set. In the future, maybe artists, their labels, and their managers will realize that importance and dedicate more resources to ensuring they are ready to take on that challenge.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
@lyricalemonade @lilbaby 
