The other thing that frustrates me about the Pitchfork/Lolla comparison is the people that attend both, and how much they enjoy, or at least act like they enjoy, the show. The people that go to Pitchfork are people that read the stie regularly and listen to the music that’s discussed on the site (predominately under-the-radar indie rock). You don’t necessarily get the casual fan at Pitchfork. Which means you get a lot of very hip, perhaps overly self-conscious people who are at times a tad too jaded, and/or have too high of expectations for what a good musical performance is or isn’t. Therefore, they often times don’t look like they’re enjoying themselves at a concert at all. They just sort of stand there and look at the bands. I’m not gonna make some broad sweeping statement that the people that attend Pitchfork assume they’re hipper-than-thou because they know about bands that other people might know of (which is often what they are described as). In some of my friends’ eyes, I am one of these people. And I admit I often stand at concerts with my arms folded at my chest, probably looking bored out of my mind. I understand that people who really love music, and spend a great deal of time reading about, listening to and exploring new music, are likely to have high expectations for that music. And perhaps are more apt to be disappointed or at least not have their expectations met as easy as somebody who doesn’t. I too think about music in perhaps an overly critical way, and perhaps I don’t always have the ability to truly relax, let go, and enjoy myself at a concert. I get people who are like that. I really do.

But as a human being who also likes to have fun around other people, I must say that the crowd at Lollaplooza — while loaded with ex-frat boys, chatty, oft-annoying sorority girls, 35-year-old investment bankers and dudes that were only there to see Pearl Jam — as more enjoyable to spend three days with. Why? Because they allowed themselves to enjoy themselves. And they didn’t give a goddamn about the music snobs who sneered whenever they got bumped into. From my vantage point, the people that were really enjoying themselves at Lolla were some of the least cool-looking people there.

While discussing this phenomena with a friend, he pointed out to my why this is true. Many of the people at Lollapalooza had never even or heard of the bands they were viewing before. Bands such as LCD Soundsystem. They just stumbled across them while wandering about aimlessly, liked what they heard, and started dancing. They weren’t analyzing anything. They weren’t comparing the set they were currently seeing to the five previous ones from the same band. They weren’t thinking to myself, “Man, I wish I saw these guys after their first album came out,” or “man, these guys were so much better at the Empty Bottle five years ago.” They’re instincts were more primal; they liked what they heard and they reacted to it. That simple. I think there’s a certain beauty in that.

The conclusion I came to somewhere during the festival was this; it’s more fun to be at a concert with a person that knows very little about music who’s enjoying himself than to be at a concert with an overly critical hipster who’s not.