Thomas Mars from Phoenix crowdsurfing before the encore.
By Hilary Gridley
Sunday’s lineup may have been the most stacked, making a lot of tough choices necessary. Here are some of our highlights from the third and final day of Lollapalooza.
Bands
MS MR
Overheard at the MS MR set: “She looks like a fire goddess.” The fan was of course referring to singer Lizzy Plapinger, who’s becoming almost as known for her constantly changing (but currently orange/purple) hair as she is for her soulful voice. They may have a dark sound, but the duo lit up the stage with their own hits (“Bones” recently soundtracked a “Game of Thrones” trailer) as well as an LCD Soundsystem cover of “Dance Yrself Clean.”
Two Door Cinema Club
These guys know how to have a good time, and how to make sure the crowd is in on the fun. Their energy is so infectious that even if you’ve never heard a song of theirs, you’re sure to be dancing as much as their most devout fans.
Alt-J
If you were a fan of last year’s An Awesome Wave, you’ll love their live show. The band stays true to what worked so well on their recordings and brings it to the stage; all the complex layering sounds even better as it glides through the open air and bounces off the Chicago cityscape.
Vampire Weekend
It takes a certain amount of stage presence to watch a crazed fan streak across the stage, get tackled by a security guard, and keep playing without sacrificing one beat of “Giving Up The Gun.” But that’s exactly what happened, because as a sea of teenage girls kept screaming, Ezra is perfect. Vampire weekend is perfect. This set was perfect.
Phoenix
It’s hard to watch Phoenix without feeling completely in awe of their talent. From the moment they took the stage via a jumbotron-projected athletic sprint, they never once slowed down, tying their earliest material to just-released singles with familiar riffs from Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix and Bankrupt! As a bright red complement to the tuned-down The Cure on the other end on the park, Phoenix more than proved they can scale up a 1000 person live show to a closing act worthy of the tens of thousands in their audience.
Causes
Love Hope Strength
Visit Lolla, save a life? Love Hope Strength has saved numerous lives at festivals by encouraging fans to swab their cheek and sign up for the national bone marrow registry. So far, 12 donor matches came from past Lollapalooza signups. I’m happy to say I brought them one person closer to their goal of 300 registrations for the weekend. You can catch them both at festivals and on tour with bands like OAR. Stop by and swab your cheek – it only takes five minutes.
ONE
The ONE Campaign was working hard at Lollapalooza to channel festival-goers’ voices into first-time energy access for 15 million in Sub-Saharan Africa. When I spoke to them, booth visitors were averaging well over 300 letters to their congressional representatives each day, enthusiastic about hitting their 1000 letter goal.