The 2009 lineup promises a return to the early days of Bonnaroo, highlighted by the anticipation of the soon-to-be-starting Phish reunion tour.
The reunited Tre, Page, Mike and Fish will play two shows - if I had to guess, something like the midnight to 4 a.m. slots on Friday and Saturday - and should be rounding into their old form after doing the first six shows of their tour.
After Phish, the 2009 lineup gets really interesting. The Bonnaroo organizers are continuing the experiment this year, diversifying the music away from the jam scene as they have in years past with bands like the Roots, Tool, Pearl Jam, Metallica, Kanye West, Cyprus Hill, and even last year’s main stage show by Chris Rock.
The 2009 lineup has Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band in the festival headliner role, giving the Boss his first Bonnaroo appearance and the chance to show how creative he can be. He’ll be the guy who closes out the show Sunday night, which means Stevie Van Zandt will likely be wandering around the festival grounds for three days doing Sopranos impressions and scoring lots of blow.
Next up and making their dramatic comeback from the obscurity of the European festival circuit, where they’ve been touring since the release of a critically acclaimed instrumental pop album…the Beastie Boys! Yes, the hip-hoppin’ white boys are back on the big stage (literally).
The first thing that came to mind when I saw the Beasties on the lineup was the show Beck put on in 2006, where he really went creative and did things onstage you would never see anywhere else but Bonnaroo - the Boys have the opportunity and the potential to do the same.
Nine Inch Nails picks up where Metallica left off last year, though Trent Reznor will have to do a bit better than the red and white touch-screen lightshow he had on his 2008 summer tour if he wants to win over the crowd, which was lukewarm to Metallica’s antics last year.
The real wild card of the show is Snoop Dogg’s appearance, which could really be a lot of fun. Everybody loves Snoop, but will he be able to handle the expectations of Bonnaroo?
As Kanye West found out last year, you can’t just plan on doing your same old thing - the set has to be musically, visually and culturally on a different level.
Rounding out the experimentation at this year’s Bonnaroo is the techno-pop genius of Paul Oakenfold, the slinky hip-hop rhythms of Erykah Badu and the vocabular verbosity of singer-songwriter Andrew Bird. Three of the new darlings of rock, TV on the Radio, MGMT and Animal Collective, make their first appearances in Manchester, while Merle Haggard brings a down-south touch.
Finally, Phish’s arrival back on the scene had the serendipitous effect of bringing back some of the greatest jammers to ever grace the What and Which stages. Gov’t Mule, Ben Harper and Wilco return after skipping last year’s fest, while moe. and Bela Fleck are back for their first turns since 2006. These are some of the bands who helped create this festival, in all its jammy glory.
Nevertheless, festival mainstays such as Robert Randolph and Medeski, Martin and Wood are nowhere to be found, though the lineup is less than half full. Stay tuned.
Bonnaroo runs the June 11-14 in Manchester, Tennessee.
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