It was either this photo or one I have of Jon Caramanica looking like Bear Grylls after too many days in the wild
In truth, the fate of Liberty State Park's two year old All Points West festival has been in doubt ever since the first drop of rain fell on Fleet Foxes sometime on Friday afternoon, early on day one of the festival's second year. Your festival is not going well when you have to remind your putative crowds via Twitter that despite the lightning storm currently perched overtop Coldplay, the show will go on. And it did, in muddy misery--still potentially an upgrade over 2008's edition, where inept ferry piloting and draconian drinking rules overshadowed a rare Radiohead performance on this coast. Attendance figures dropped in 2009 to levels far below the type of business Coachella, Lollapalooza, and Bonnaroo regularly do, and in the aftermath APW promoter Paul Tollett essentially told the New York Times that the future of his festival was very much in doubt. "I'd like it not to rain," he said.
Well, the first thing to know is that Adam Yauch is doing well. "i'm about a week and a half out of surgery now and rapidly recovering from it," he writes in an email that was sent out this morning. Next up? Radiation, which apparently "involves blasting you with some kind of beam for a few minutes a day, 5 days a week, for about 7 weeks." So there's still a long way to go, but MCA is at least at home, with family, friends, and "home cooked food." And this past weekend's spate of Beastie Boystributes at APW did not go unnoticed. "saw the jay-z cover of no sleep, and the coldplay one of fight for your right from APW on youtube," writes Yauch. "good shit. and i heard karen o a "get well MCA" armband, and that q-tip gave a shout out too..... very kind of them." And to all the people who shouted along with Jay, Karen, and Chris: "just wanted to thank them and everyone else who sent positive thoughts my way. i do think that all of the well wishes have contributed to the fact that my treatment and recovery are going well. much love back at all of you!" Which is enough to get a person a little misty-eyed, really. Keep your head up, man! The full letter, reproduced below.
The attendance numbers are in for this year's All Points West. The festival drew 71,500 people over three days, according to APW promoter Paul Tollett, down 4000 from last year. In an interview with the New York Times, Tollett chalks the inferior numbers up to the weather, which was indeed abysmal and which likely retarded last-minute ticket sales. By contrast, Coachella drew 160,000 people to Indio, California in April, over a similar three-day stretch, while last year's Lollapalooza in Chicago set a record with an attendance of 225,000. This year's Pitchfork Fest pulled around 55,000, selling out all three days. Bonnaroo reported hosting 75,000 people this year. And Paul McCartney drew around 42,000 to Citi Field in a single night last month. Tollett told the Times that he'd like to do All Points West again, but had not yet made arrangements with Liberty State Park. "I'd like it not to rain," he added.
Those like our own Rob Harvilla who showed up at All Points West on Sunday to see the Gaslight Anthem and instead found themselves deciding between the sweet, pathologically generic stylings of Elbow, We Are Scientists, and La Roux will now receive a consolation prize, assuming their APW ticket stub is not now a shriveled ball of mud and sweat at the bad end of a public park's trashcan. The Gaslight Anthem, whose set at the fest was cancelled on account of the appalling rain that fell during most of Sunday afternoon, are being exceedingly nice guys about the whole thing. To wit, they're getting the next round, come October at Terminal 5:
I wore straight-up hiking boots to this motherfucker, clunky and impenetrable, and sloshed invincibly across acres of gushy, foul-smelling New Jersey mud like a hovercraft, like a Range Rover, like God moving across the face of the waters. The mud is what we'll all remember about APW, first brought to life by Friday's torrential downpour and sustained Sunday morning and early afternoon by apocalyptic storms that deferred ferries and kept the gates closed for three-plus hours as folks Twittered irately. Once everyone finally got in around 4:30, the weather was actually lovely, not a drop to fall on our pretty little heads all evening. A fabulous environment from the knees up, provided you had a gas mask. Nearly every band's banter included a simple, paternal, deeply concerned question: "Are you all OK?"
So there you have it. As of 2:30, APW Sunday has been delayed for at least a few hours: Twitter chatter, which I encourage you to monitor before making the trek yourself, suggests a several-hours delay that may go on for a few hours yet. More updates as events warrant. Yoy.
The goal for day two of All Point West, at least in the eyes of the promoters, was to make you forget that just 24 hours ago, you or someone you know got drenched. And probably complained about it, or warned you to stay away. So they cut a deal: if you bought a Friday ticket, you could come back Saturday or Sunday. Just show that crumpled, crinkled dried out stub and you'd get in today, or tomorrow, for free. A nice gesture, aimed squarely at making those sodden Friday festivalgoers forget that terrible, terrible downpour (unless you bought one of those $239 three day passes--then you just felt like a chump).
For maximum poetic impact at the otherwise sodden, mudsoaked trench-fight of All Points West 2009's first night, let's go straightaway to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, whose luck it was to climb onstage at the precise moment the sun fought back, through the clouds, and then commenced immediately to set. The igloo-sized inflatable eyeballs that the YYYs have evidently taken as their insignia in the year of It's Blitz formed weird, bouncing punctuation to a New York skyline that was suddenly visible again, if briefly. And the band looked dry--enough, basically, to turn Karen O into more of a goddess than she usually is, diaphanous multi-print robes and spiked leather jackets and wooly alien ponchos evoking, for the first time, not just awe but envy, since after all she looked warm, unlike the rest of us. Have I mentioned yet that it rained for most of the day yesterday?
Like everyone else on the planet (except yours truly), New York's very own White Rabbits will also be at All Points West this weekend. They're scheduled to regale ambitiously eager folks on the Blue Comet main stage tomorrow at 1:10 pm. It'd be worth your while to get there tomorrow early--forecast calls for sun, and live, the six-piece are furious balls of sweat. "Percussion Gun," the single from their most recent It's Frightening, is killer, a rapidfire drum-line tool that, on endless repeat, propels hyper-productive spells. (Personal iTunes playcount: 213.) That said, the best way to interact with these guys may very well be from the safe distance of the stage--you certainly don't want be seated near them in a movie theater. As they told us back when John MacDonald interviewed half of them back in May, a group movie fieldtrip can turn into a ruckus.
So the Beasties aren't playing All Points West, and in their place Jay-Z is playing All Points West, and if that's not an even trade, musically speaking, then who knows what an even trade is, really. But parotid cancer is a grim diagnosis, and the Beastie Boys are the home team, and so it seems like the very least Friday's APW line-up can do is take a moment or two out to pay homage. Ben Greenman, at the New Yorker, has a modest proposal: "what if the other rap acts not only step in for the Beastie Boys, but agree to perform one of their songs as a tribute to the act and as a get-well message for Yauch?" Which we wholeheartedly second. Greenman suggests "No Sleep Till Brooklyn" for Jay, as both artists have worked with Rick Rubin, and because "99 Problems" was half an homage to the song anyway. Plus, Brooklyn. So alright, what else?
