On May 1st 2010, I took a two-hour drive up to East Rutherford, New Jersey with my friend Danielle, to go to the Bamboozle Festival. It was hot that day, and when I say hot, I mean it. Once we got to the Sports Complex, everything was already in full swing there were bands playing and people were already getting crazy. The first band I saw that day was 100 monkeys. Now, for all you Twilight fans, here’s a little fact about 100 monkeys: their guitarist and vocalist is none other than Jackson Rathbone, who plays the role of Jasper Hale in the Twilight series.
And this is not my first year at the festival I went to the Bamboozle Festival in 2007, and the festival has changed a lot since then. However, the overall tone was the same, the crowds are rowdy, the people fun, and the bands are just there to have a good time and put on a good show. One thing that has improved is the range of bands they book to play at the festival. For example, this year they booked performers like, Ke$ha, Drake, and MGMT, artist are either pop, rap, or, new wave, and Bamboozle is primarily known for being a rock festival, so it seems that they are opening there arms to all kinds of music now.
The day was going very well; I got to see one of my favorite local bands, Great Big Planes (I talked about them when I saw The Maine at the Electric Factory) they played three new songs, and ended their set with their most popular song, “Were Gonna be in Love.” As the day progressed, it just got hotter and hotter, to the point it became almost unbearable during The Maine’s set. The crowd was insane, people were piled on top of other people, till you had no idea if the sweat on your legs was yours or the person’s in front of you. My favorite performance of the night was Ke$ha, and even though she came on a little late, she was amazing. It seemed more like we were at a club dancing than at a live concert. She came out with medusa-like hair flying all over the place, and of course, she ended with her hit, “Tik-Tok,” and that sent the crowd on a crazy. After Ke$ha, Drake was on. My only complaint of Drake was that his set went over by a half-hour, and we were all waiting for Paramore to come on, but they couldn’t come on until Drake went off. It’s wasn’t exactly his fault; they were experiencing some major technical difficulties with his microphone and his lights. The last performance of the night was Paramore, I love Paramore because their lead singer Hayley Williams, is an amazing female vocalist. She just knows how to command a crowd, and her vocals are amazing, so it was so worth it to wait to see her perform.
At the end of the festival there was trash everywhere I even heard on person say this: “You know you’re in Jersey, there is trash everywhere”. But hey, we were in North Jersey. My only complaints about the festival were that the prices for drinks and food were so much, in order to stay hydrated you had to spend $4.75 for water, and the water was warm because they put it in a cup with as little ice as possible. And my final complaint is that that Hanson didn’t play their 1997 hit, MMMBop.
It was a wonderful experience of music, fans, and little girls who were just there to see there favorite band and hopefully get an autograph. And so The Bamboozle Festival ended with sweat, bruises, and a couple crumpled posters.