Saturday I went with six friends to Randall's Island to see, among other acts, the Dave Matthews Band and Barenaked Ladies- two of my favorite bands, both of whom known for delivering kick-ass live shows, and both of whom I had never seen before, despite owning about six albums per band.
So why was the show a colossal disappointment? A few reasons- Randall's is a horrible venue, not at all condusive to concerts, with horrible sightlines and shoddily maintained grounds. Both the lighting booth and (!) a t-shirt stand were placed directly in front of the stage, totally obstructing the view of large sections of the crowd- and organizers didn't even bother to turn on the screens for BNL's performance. And the island was practically impossible to get to and from- I think we took five different modes of transportation to get to New Jersey at the end of the night.
And besides, I should remembered from my Phish-going experiences that these outdoor "lawn shows" are never worth their trouble anyway. Not to mention DMB's annoying habit of stretching the average song to about 15 minutes in length. And those stupid improvised raps that BNL does...
One highlight though- buses left for Randall's from 125th St. and Lexington Ave., right in the heart of Harlem. Quite a juxtaposition, with hundreds of Dave-heads, almost all of them white, who had almost certainly never stood on that corner in their lives. One neighborhood resident summed it up: "What are all these white people doing here? They scare me."
Posted by Stephen Silver at August 1, 2005 08:12 PM