Sasquatch 2007

Sasquatch was both fun and miserable. We left before noon on Saturday morning to catch Neko Case at 3:30, but there was a car accident on the pass that caused some major delays and ended up an hour and a half behind schedule. When we finally arrived, we quickly set up our tent and walked the mile or two to the Gorge entrance. We had already missed both Neko Case and Visqueen (déjà vu’), and arrived just in time to see a half a song of Ghostland Observatory at the Wookie Stage before they had an unfortunate power outage. We decided to stake our claim on the grass at the mainstage while Citizen Cope was playing. I trekked off to go see Grizzly Bear while Bridget held the fort during The Long Winters. We then ate some food and listened to some of Beastie Boys “instrumental” at the Wookie Stage. We then headed back down to the mainstage during Manu Chao while some hippies rolled around in the grass in front of us promting us to find a better spot. We stayed put during Arcade Fire which were absolutely amazing and stayed for most of Bjork (we were getting cold). Bjork was also spectacular.

On Sunday we woke up early and spend some of the morning driving around, which was nice. It took us about an hour to get through the entrance line for Sunday Sasquatch, which is something that really annoyed me. When we arrived we sat on the grass and watched Minus the Bear and Helio Sequence at the Yeti Stage. Part of that time was also spent sleeping and getting a little sun burnt… I went to see was The Polyphonic Spree at the Mainstage while Bridget went to see Tokyo Police Club at the Wookie Stage. However, the wind started to pick up during The Polyphonic Spree and the stage lights were blowing around like crazy. I started to worry about the bands safety. The event managers ended up shutting down the Polyphonic Spree down for safety reasons. They said the needed to let “nature take its course”. Bridget made the hilarious comment that it wouldn’t matter so much if the lights took out a couple members of the members of Polyphonic Spree because they would still be able to play (Note: the band consists of 24 members). I added that it wouldn't be hard for them to recruit some new members anyway (Note: they give off the impression of being a religious cult). I ran up to catch most of Tokyo Police Club as well as half of the Mainstage audience. Tokyo Police Club were good, but there ego must have grown huge because the crowd ballooned up (more than the Beastie Boys "instrumental" show the night before) once the Mainstage closed. I imagine Smoosh had a similar experience at their show.

The next several hours were spent undercover waiting to figure out if the main stage would reopen. From our location we were able to hear some of the Black Angels, which sounded more appropriate in the windy chaotic setting that it if they had played while sunny and cheery. Spoon finally went on about 2 hours late. I watched a little bit of the show (Bridget still undercover) but it was so cold and windy that we decided there was no point in being miserable and decided to drive home and miss Dandy Warhols (although they were playing while we were leaving and I did hear two of my favorite songs), Interpol, and Beastie Boys. I wonder how the show ever ended up.

It is two years in a row that we had to take off earlier than planned because of the miserable weather.

It seemed like Sasquatch was much more crowed than previous years and filled with way more annoying people. There were some improvements. The Wookie Stage was a much better stage this year and able to hold a larger capacity. The food and drinks were as pricey as always, but there did not seem to be any problems getting a cold beer or soda. It is probably the first year I ever bought a beer at the Gorge because there were no lines, the beer was cold, and you can actually bring the beer with you when walking around.