Saturday, August 23, 2008

Outside Lands, Sunset's Latest Fiasco

Note: You can read more neighborhood complaints here:
Akit's Complaint Department: Outside Lands Festival - No Park Street Closure Information
This is a pretty brilliant (if obscenity laced) run-down of all the problems with this mess.
Kudos to Akit (whoever you are) for taking SO.MUCH. time to document all these complaints.


This is apparently the weekend when every wannabe rock groupie and hipster doofus in Northern California (and beyond) descends on a section of Golden Gate Park (the section right across the street from my house, unfortunately) for a three-day music fest.
I've always been a pretty big fan of people watching and as far as people-watching goes, this is prime real estate.
Unfortunately (for everyone else) this is also the weekend of the month where my hormones are contractually obligated to hate e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e. So, my patience is already stretch a bit thin. Not being able to set foot out my front door without getting run over by 20-something posers doesn't help. Consider me the grumpy old neighborhood granny shaking her cane at those darn youngsters.

As I survey the masses of people tromping down Martin Luther King Drive, I can't help but think "Crap! THESE are the people who are going to help determine the outcome of November's election."

Now, this concert featured performers like Radiohead, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Beck and Jack Johnson, not exactly bubble gum pop music. The crowds have been your typical alternative, hipster, pothead types. I would just like to state for the record, seeing so many guys in skinny jeans makes me LONG for the days when they thought it was fashionable to wear baggy pants. It was bad enough when they looked like some prison thug's you-know-what, now it appears they're starting to borrow their girlfriends' jeans. PSA to all guys EVERYWHERE: Skinny jeans are NOT A GOOD LOOK FOR YOU!

And while we're on the topic of 20-something fashion, let's talk about this whole alterna-rocker, counter-cultural, moody persona these kids like to play with - it doesn't take a genius to point out that they ALL LOOK THE SAME. They are all the same in their moody unique-ness. A herd of group thinking lookalikes who all think they're marching to the beat of their own drum. Here's to being a totally conformed non-conformist.

One commenter on SFgate put it this way: "Utter scuzzbuckets were everywhere...or were they? Actual genuine trash wouldn't have been able to afford these tickets, so it was probably just a bunch of rich Marin kids dressed like bums and acting like criminals."

I should note here that I took a break from acting like someone peed in my cornflakes to partake in my own group-think ritual: a decaf soy latte from Starbucks. But hey, I'm a conservative in SF so I'm automatically counter-cultural. :-)

It's infuriating to not be able to set foot outside my front door without being harrassed by promoters (Buy Dell Computers! Drink Honest Tea!) or people trying to buy tickets and the crowds! Swarms and swarms of concert-goers and the cloud of beer and marijuana stinkiness. And hey, let's talk about the noise levels. Radiohead is nice and progressive and they also "rocked" so loud the walls of my house shook until after 10PM. I'm pretty sure that local noise ordinances put the cut-off at 8PM. But this is a "green" event so they get a pass, right? And since when did the powers running SF really care about the taxpayers anyway? I'm told that not only were the concerts sub-par for $85+ per ticket (up to $695 for three-day VIP passes - VIP being shorter lines for booze and bathrooms), the garbage in the park is really, really bad. This was supposed to be a "Leave No Trace" event...meaning all the attendees are supposed to be good liberals who recycle and clean up their trash and that the park wouldn't know they were ever there. NOT.

Since we live a block away from the park, we've pretty much stayed indoors all weekend. My husband took one step outside, realized how massive the crowds and traffic were and circled the wagons for home. I'm glad we don't have a car because this weekend it would be impossible to find a place to park. We've had the *joy* of listening to the stampede of drunken youths past our front door as they stream out of the park well after midnight.

I'm not sure how this event managed to get permits to go so late with the loud noises but a glimpse at the comments on SFGate.com suggest there are plenty of old-school SF residents who are pretty steamed about the noise and the crowds; and plenty of youngsters telling us old codger-types to shove it and get with the times. I'm thinking they better not try to do this festival here next year. There are plenty of great free concerts in the park all year long that manage to not be a total nuisance for the residents of the area (Hardly Stricly Bluegrass comes to mind, but maybe that's because it traditionally attracts a more mature, responsible crowd). At the very least, it seems to me like there should be public hearings for an event like this, it's clear that the locals didn't get much of a fair shake this time around. And since our taxes pay for MUNI and Parks and Rec and all the clean-up that's going to be required to help GG Park recover from the event, we should be getting more of a say.