“Lonn lives where the reckless heart of rock still thunders in your chest. No one else can throw a literary dinner party where Henry Miller sits side by side with Kurt Cobain and Jon Bon Jovi. That's Lonn's planet, and that's his vivid personality. Soulful and rowdy and always hilarious, Life on Planet Rock reminds you why you ever turned it up, all the way up.”
—Cameron Crowe
Nothing going as planned…minutes after my last blog, I sliced my finger open on the filing cabinet in the press trailer and didn't realize it until I headed out to see some music. I realized I was bleeding like stuck pig (respect to the creatures who permit us those amazing pulled pork sandwiches like Jack's on Broadway, sorry getting off point again) but Nicole walkie talkie'd a golf cart from the first aid tent about a half mile away and I was cleaned up in no time. "Just a flesh wound" in Python parlance. Shortly afterwards, the Metallica bus rolled in and set up camp behind the Main Stage adjacent to the media area and guest hospitality where peeps come and go all day grabbing grub and hanging out. This is when my intention shifted from drifting about like a Brian Wilson leaf on a windy day into content gathering for the assignment mode. First things first...wandering over to the band's make shift village, first face I see is former RIP scribe and longtime So What? gatekeeper, Steffan Chirazi. You know, this is sounding lame so fuck it. Long blog short, I heard about the upcoming LP, ten songs, several over eight minutes in length, some kind of metal monster, old school Ride the Lightning/Master of Puppets in feel with proper evolution from personal time and tide peppered into the mix. Really only chatted with Hetfield, who approached me with extended hand and kind words. He is not your average rocker, never has been. Artists of immense accomplishment often enter your space with an advanced aura of 'please stand clear, special person approaching.' Not James. He is a prince in a land of few gentlemen. We didn't talk a word about the new record of anything else of that nature. I'm getting the story from others, a different approach, which will be revealed when the piece is published in either the Sept. or October issue of Metal Edge. The rain began to fall around dusk and Chris Rock entered the area, beaming a huge smile, shortly post Jack White's visit to bid his fond respects to the drummer Ulrich. Rock brought Metallica on stage after his hour long stand up. Two hours after that, it got wetter and my summer wardrobe began to feel as ridiculous as it looked. Fortune shone upon me through the black wailing skies as attorney Peter Paterno and managers Peter Mensch and Cliff Burnstein offered me a lift back to Nashville where we arrived downtown around 2 am. Printer's Alley -- an odd, narrow stretch of bars and hot dog stands about a block from my hotel -- was roaring with Friday night naked karaoke and severely damaged damsels yelling at their boyfriends in the middle of the street, the local police ignoring the noise, as did I. "I'm going to bed," I said. "Thanks for the lift, Pete." Did not sleep well and finally gave up on the nocturnal ride, waking to an email from 70s music scribe legend and personal literary hero that lunch today or tomorrow was on. Google Chet Flippo so I don't have to compose a lame, quick Wikipedia paragraph that does little service to the amazing shit this man wrote about the icons of rock n' roll when rock n' roll was a toddler (His books on Amazon can be bought at this link). I will elaborate at a later date on Chet but because he doesn't deserve a half devoted blog post. He took me to Jack's BBQ on Broadway where he was welcomed like the local hero he is but the guy chopping the pork behind the counter. We ate, talked, and walked around the festive downtown streets, country music blaring through the open doors of businesses with taps flowing and gullets swallowing. And I mean LIVE music; two piece, three piece, any piece that serves the country muse, youngens and oldsters, singing through their Saturday, Tennessee style, small but captive audiences, hammered and enamored. By midday, it's obvious I ain't getting my ass out to Manchester, 70 miles up Highway 24, instead donating my pass for the day to my buddy Mark's pal, Nick from Kentucky, a big Gogol Bordello and Cat Power fan. Today is your day, Nick, and we'll throw in Jack Johnson, Ben Folds, Donovan Frankenreiter, LIttle Feat and Levon Helm to sweeten the day. And at night, Pearl Jam will jam at 10:15. I still have an odd desire to make Sigur Ros' 1:15 am set but we all know there's as much a chance of that happening as me running into Jewel on Broadway, drunk, sad and in need of a shoulder to cry on. "Took Jewel about a week to develop a southern accent after she moved here," quipped Chet. "Yeah, they're coming to Nashville in droves now. Maybe it's time for me to start thinking about Austin."
Lisa's coming by in an hour, the local publicist who moved here 15 years ago. We gotta catch up. She brought Cobain and company to the RIP offices in '92 for that unforgettable lunch recounted in the chapter, "Nirvana at High Noon" in my memoir. I talked to her this morning, got quite a distinct Southern accent.
The good folks over at BWBK has been courteous to take all of Metallica's performances and embed them for your viewing pleasure, go here to watch them...
MANCHESTER, Tenn. (AP) — Bonnaroo began in earnest Friday with the rarest of double bills: Chris Rock followed by Metallica. ADVERTISEMENT
Metallica's Lars Ulrich and Kirk Hammett introduced Rock, and the comedian in turn introduced who he called "the baddest ... band in the world." Both acts were unlikely fare for the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, which began in 2002 as primarily a jam band event.
But in recent years, Bonnaroo has broadened itself and brought more diverse fans to its 700-acre countryside site south of Nashville. Among the tens of thousands of festival-goers, Rock, Metallica and many other performers were very conscious of their entry into a tie-dyed world they seldom traffic in.
In a bit in his set about Prozac and other medications, Rock chastised the crowd, who he said was likely on "performance-enhancing drugs."
"You all should be ashamed of yourselves for taking antidepressants to see a comedian," joked Rock. "I am an antidepressant!"
Metallica also touted its cheerfulness.
"Do you feel good?" lead singer James Hetfield asked the crowd. "Metallica is here to make you feel better."
Performing on the main stage Friday night, Rock jumped right into his material, much of which he's performed during recent touring. Looking on backstage were many of the other comedians performing at the festival, as well as Jack White, whose band the Raconteurs took the main stage earlier in the day.
Rock worked the giant crowd without missing a beat in his timing, hitting on the election, Anna Nicole Smith and high gas prices despite the war in Iraq, ("If I invade IHOP, pancakes are going to be cheaper in my house," he said).
Metallica had a more difficult time winning over the crowd, which was head-banging but apparently not moshing. Hetfield repeatedly urged the audience to sing along. He asked, "We do have a few Metallica friends here, yes?"
Hetfield occasionally informed the crowd the titles of the songs they were playing and which album they were from. "That was `No Remorse' from `Kill `Em All,'" he said, an annotation that would have normally been completely superfluous for the band.
But Metallica is an exceptionally hard working band — they could be heard practicing backstage in a trailer shortly before their set. Eventually, they won the crowd over with their tenacity, as well as classics like "Sad But True" and "Enter Sandman," the latter of which was accompanied by pyrotechnics.
Like a jam band, Metallica has a fiercely devoted following and Hetfield alluded to this Bonnaroo-ness of Metallica: "We support live music ... and that's why we're here."
The notorious Tennessee heat that has in the past made Bonnaroo a chore was thus far bearable (after midnight, My Morning Jacket pulled out a cover of Sly and the Family Stone's "Hot Fun in the Summertime"). But by then, the rain that had threatened through much of the day finally fell.
Friday afternoon…I want to translate this stuff as it’s happening because that’s why I’m here, not to transcribe and process the material for some sort of packaging distribution. Tennessee born My Space friend Rooster and his gal drove three hours from Knoxville to watch me suffer through the Lakers’ meltdown last night at Bailey’s Irish Pub on Broadway, ten minutes or so from where Metallica reportedly performed an unannounced club gig to a hundred serendipitous strangers. I am at Bonnaroo amongst the masses where the past and its inequities are forgot faster than one can say, “Whiplash!”
We took the side roads through emerald pastures populated by rusty roofs and happy cows, stopping once at a Shell station where gas is still $3.80 a gallon so I could pee and my limo drivers could torch their Marlboros. “We’re gonna make sure you get your credentials and everything is cool Lonn before taking off,” crows Rooster, “’cause we don’t wanna leave you out here alone I Deliverance land.” My ass is safe, I assure you, nothing but peace, love and Technicolor musical saturation.
Any plan of specific action entered the air conditioned trailer I’m sitting in, copping wireless from Jim Merlis (Bob, what a fine fellla he is), Ken Weinstein, Chris Vineyard and the charming Nicole. This is my sanctuary? Cool…I’ll be back. For I know not where my green shoes take me. Jeff the photographer of venerable accomplishments and contraband sojourn shouts my name. “Lonn Friend!” from behind the artist hospitality tent. Within minutes, the discreet, narrow glass implement of Rasta intake emerges and the festival begins to take on proper proportions. “I’ll be on the stage shooting Umphrey’s McGee in an hour,” he blurts. “Dude, you’ll LOVE them.”
Time to eat…one problem, where? Out into the wild where the fans and freaks are dancing and reclining and occasionally twirling where it’s still early in their hearts and minds. I lumber into artist catering where one usually requires a meal ticket to get the best grub in the entire valley (you see when the word artist appears on anything the quality must be beyond reproach). Cous cous, tuna salad, pita, eggplant in marinara sauce, I know I sound veg but that wasn’t the intention just looked yummy and was. Forget about the oatmeal raisin cookies. But wait, the rap at the table.
Jaylaan who owns a record label called BluHammock in New York and took the final glance last week of my Spearhead liner notes before I sent them to Michael Franti; she’s the first person I run into entering the grub tent. Yeah, that “S-word” again. Not even close. We sit down (random) next to Dan a writer from the New York Times who’s nuts and brilliant and doing a business section story for the pulp icon. “Kirk Hammet is using Jimi Hendrix’s foot pedal tonight.” I’m just writing this as it happens so forgive me if I drift. “Have you heard the Madonna rumor? With Kanye?” “No, but I heard that Kirk Hammett is going to jam with My Morning Jacket.” Press trailer. People talk. Bloggers listen.I go into the serendipity rap for Dan, the psychology of success that has breed Bonnaroo and Coachella where the model is, there really isn’t one. He’s smiling and taking notes on a small pad like the kind Jack Webb used in Dragnet. “Right, thanks, I got it.” God I wish I had a link to Webb’s classic drug monologue right now to add atmosphere. Anyway. Dan and his bride of 15 years disappear and the table reverts to dudes, Jay also on her way.
“You’re the lighting guys for Metallica?” Yeah, I know. Synchronicity, but you don’t know the half of it. Never mind the history, 20 years, documentary sound bites, drummer composing the foreword to my book or the sheer volume of time spent doing good media works, I am anonymous here, one of the crowd, a mosquito on the exposed nipple of a Carolinian teen. And I tell you this with reverent sincerity, I have no expectations. Don’t give a fuck if I even see the boys face to face because the story is not THEM, it’s THIS; The underbelly, the fans, the crew, the heart and most importantly…the soul. The music will fill the night and we will ride the lightning like mythical pilots. “They’re using Pan Cans, old school…ike the 70s. That’s how they want it to feel.” These are the facilitators of light, the illuminators, part of the mighty concert machine.
“What are pan cans?” All the miles I’ve trekked, I never paid attention to the specs and the techs. That right brain imbalance, I guess. “They’re basic lights, bulbs, no automation or movement.” It’s how people saw Zeppelin, Blue Oyster Cult, Pink Floyd and everyone else back in the day. “I’ve heard the new LP hearkens Ride the Lightning and Master Of Puppets,” offers the scribe, feigning cliché. No reaction. They don’t care. “We haven’t heard anything about the new record or a tour. We’re just hired to do this. I have ten other crews on tour right now from Def Leppard to Tim McGraw.” Road warriors, businessmen, cave dwellers and stage sparklers. The story…yeah, the story. Text comes in from Forrest. “Check out Umphreys McGee if you are near their stage now, dude, prog rock kings!” Two minutes later, I find myself in front of the WHICH stage and who is launching into their celestial set? Of course but not hardcore “S-word” ‘cause F is following the preceding from his Macbook in Hollywood. “I’m watching online. It’s awesome!” I’m back at Yes at the L.A. Forum Topographic Oceans tour ’75, where guitarist Steve Howe noodled the electrons out of the atoms. Bet the pan cans were firing like novas that night.
I dig the improv and virtuoso musicianship and then start floating away into other environs. Is that Marley I hear? I follow the vibrations to the main stage a hundred or so yards around the bend of food and smoothie sands and the strains go from shred to groove. “Don’t worry, about a thing/cause everything little thing, is gonna be alright.” Stephen is channeling his papa, Father’s Day weekend, three little birds in my heart start to flutter. This is why we came. To feel it. To forget about the state of the world, John McCain’s gaffes, talking heads and empty beds. We just want to be Ram Das for a spell. Be here now. All rhyme, no reason.
Sanctuary calls. The trailer is buzzing with writers and reporters, no names, just laptops and assignments. Merlis and Nicole are dealing with something. Publicists are always dealing with something because everybody always wants something. I don’t want anything except this space to decompress and talk to you.
Opening my email, I am greeted by the news of the death of NBC’s Tim Russert. Shock and sadness sit for a second. I recently became a big fan of this political reporter through his participation on Countdown With Keith Olbermann. Russet has been the most conscious, tempered, at times, visionary voice during the current presidential campaign. Heart attack. Dead. Boom. Here. Then. Gone. Now. I take the sign to draft this installment because who the fuck knows? I could go back out there, meet a hippie that looks like Ellie May Clampett and by the time My Morning Jacket hits the stage sometime after midnight, I’m a statistic. What a way to go, though. “Writer Brought Down by Boner at Bonnaroo.”
If I do get a second with the boys before they hit the lights, I’m gonna ask ‘em to dedicate “Fade to Black” to Tim. Hey, even if I don’t, I can do it myself.I am, after all, a meditator. What’s that I hear? Claypool’s bass? Yep. Better get out there. He and Kirk grew up together. Wonder if Les has seen the pedal?
I needed a road trip. And this one revealed itself. Bonnaroo.com. Though I ran the iconic rock mag, RIP, back in the day, irony has me traveling to Nashville to gather sights, sounds and sweat for an upcoming Metal Edge cover story on Metallica. Back in the day, the light-hearted metal fanzine didn't really compete journalistically with our Larry Flynt published bible of bang but they did offer commercial distraction. When Zenbu Media, publishers of Relix -- where I compose the ongoing Soapbox column -- acquired Metal Edge and instilled veteran pit-dweller, Phil Freeman, into the editorial captain's seat, redesign commenced in earnest and now Metal Edge resembles RIP in both graphic and text attitude. And since RIP died 12 years ago (14 months after I departed for the record business gig that would fill my wallet and empty my soul-it's in the memoir, Life on Planet Rock), I figured why not write about the band I've known and covered for 20 years for a new platform where there's a goodly amount of respect for this veteran pilgrim of six string adventures.
But it ain't just the four horsemen of Bay Area thrash-turned global hard rock juggernaut that got me jazzed about the bountiful Bonnaroo '08. I'm also excited about reconnecting with old friends whose musical evolution I have also witnessed and enjoyed. The entities are scattered throughout the four-day festival, disparate deities of riff and word like Pearl Jam and Robert Plant, united with Allison Krauss and an old golfing buddy named T. Bone Burnett. Got a friend in Las Vegas who lives and dies for Widespread Panic yet I confess I've never had the live experience. My daughter is crazy about MGMT. Jack White does little wrong in my book so the Raconteurs are high on my list. I could go on and on but this is the debut entry so let me get back to the set up.
My gut has me going early Hunter S. this trip, like real bohemian, leaving my lodging up to serendipity and the synchronous appearance of new media 'apprentices' who'll aid and abet me in my mission to translate what I capture on site, helping me bring the content to the fans via this blog. Given the blessing of access from being around this world for so fucking long and never having blown up the bridges I helped build, I anticipate words, sounds and images -- both moving and still -- that will serve to relate the magic, essence and music of this southern festival fantastique.
Okay seed planted. Communicate at will. Get excited if you're heading to Tennessee and wish me luck. Turn off the muse, find the muse, raise the volume but lower the noise. Back at ya soon.
