Festivals So Far: From London to California

It is hard to believe that August is half over and soon we will be saying good-bye to another summer. If there was only a way to make the summers stretch out like they seemed to when we were kids.

In the past month, there have been dozens and dozens of major music festivals across the United States and the world.

The much-anticipated rock fests for August are Chicago’s famed Lollapalooza, The Virgin Festival in Baltimore, the New York City metro area’s (actually Jersey City, NJ, just across the river) new, major rock festival – the All Points Festival, aka “Coachella East”, not to mention the much anticipated Outside Lands Festival in San Francisco’s beautiful Golden Gate Park Polo Fields, just a few hundred feet from the ocean amongst the carpet green grounds and Monterey pine trees.

After years of trying, promoters were granted license to hold a major outdoor festival this year featuring dozens of top indie bands and artists, with Radiohead playing two nights of the three day festival.

Nearly two weekends ago, the Download Festival ‘San Francisco’ (actual location was Mt. View, CA, about 30 miles south of the city) was held at the Shoreline with disastorous results, giving a totally different meaning to “down” and “load”. The attendance was shockingly down from the previous year, almost off 60 percent and it showed by the thin crowds. There was not much “load” to the fest as far as line-up, especially when you consider that there are so many major festivals this year (including the debut of the Outside Lands Festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park in September).

hove festival – norway – june 23-26 – beck, the raconteurs, brain jonestown massacre, panic at the disco, the raconteurs, the kooks, yeasayer, foals, flogging molly, les savy fav, the cool kids, stars, dinosaur jr. and more.

rock werchter – july 3-6 – belgium – headliners: the national, rem, my morning jacket, the hives, panic at the disco, editors, beck, band of horses, air traffic, cool kids, hot chip, radiohead, the kooks, neil young and many others.

o2 wireless festival – july 3-6, london – jay z, hot chip, beck, the raconteurs, the national, morrissey, black kids, sea wolf, the whigs, cornershop, fatboy slim, goo goo dolls, counting crows, the hold steady and dozens more.

fib heineken 2008 – july 17-20 – the brian jonestown massacre, my morning jacket, gnarls barkley, the raconteurs, my bloody valentine, sigur ros, death cab for cutie, leonard cohen, spiritualized, justice and many others.

ruis rock 2008 festival – july 4-6 – finland – him, floggy molly, anti-flag, interpol, the national, bullet for my valentine, primal scream, the sounds and others.

optimus alive 2008 – july 10-12 – portugal – neil young, bob dylan, spiritualized, interpol, ben harper and the innocent, rage against the machine, galactic, the hives and a dozen others.