700 acres surrounded by reality

"Bonnarooooooo!" It's 5:30 in the morning in mid-June 2006, I'm walking back to a campsite in the middle of Tennessee after spending the last 2 hours dancing my ass off to Sasha, and Bonnaroo's unique and ubiquitous version of "Marco" rings out over the steaming campground, inevitably followed by numerous "Polo"'s in the form of "Woooooo! Yeaaah!" emnating from otherwise silent tents. Even at this hour, with the sun barely peeking over the horizon, the 700-acre farm where the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival takes place is starting to sweat.

"What the hell is Bonnaroo?" That's the usual reply I get when I mention the 4-day psychedelic music fest in casual conversation. First held in 2002, Bonnaroo is the largest music festival in the United States and the most profitable festival in the world. At one point drawing well over 90,000 people but topping out at a mere 80,000 these days, the festival becomes Tennessee's sixth largest city in its brief annual existence. Diversity (of acts, not attendees, more on that later) is the key word, providing a plethora of performers running the gamut from groups dripping with the festival's original jam band flavor, to indie rockers and drum and bass DJ's, to bluegrass ensembles and hip hop entourages, and everything in between. While headliners like Radiohead, Tool, and The Police capture the ledes in most post-Bonnaroo write-ups, for most attendees, the big names quite possibly take second fiddle to the long tail of breakout performances from up-and-coming bands, borne out amidst psychedelically-enhanced interactions with other festival attendees.

It's a long and dusty road back to our campground that year. Camped out in BFE (Bum-Fuck Egypt, by veteran attendee standards), Chris, a then-UW grad student wanders out in front, followed by UW alumnae Deidre and Robin, arms over each others shoulders, walking with a tired but happy sense of accomplishment along the road that by daytime is filled with mounted Coffee County sheriffs who clip-clop past tie-dyed hippies selling home-blown glass. For now, though, this road is remarkably empty. Light violet hues in the eastern sky give way to an intense, blaze orange sunrise; then-UW poli. sci. undergrad Kevin and I round up the rear, and I put on my shades as morning becomes too much to bear.

Bonnaroo does many things right. Like many contemporary music festivals, it comes steeped in environmental awareness and education. Planet Roo, "an area dedicated to preserving the environment and promoting healthy living", has been a longtime fixture at Centeroo, the main festival grounds. In 2007, Bonnaroo recycled a total of 94,340 pounds of potential waste, and 67% of the festival's diesel consumption was locally sourced bio-diesel. Promoters are touting this year's carbon neutral status, and even as you finally make it through the annual nightmarish traffic jam on I-24 and pull in to the campgrounds, ticket counters hand out a garbage bag and a separate recycling bag to every car.

As well as being relatively environmentally conscious, these days, music festivals are far more technologically empowered than their predecessors. Even in my inaugural Bonnaroo visit in 2005, Cisco provided wireless internet access, and in 2006, I called my dad on Father's Day courtesy of the VOIP tent. At the very least, (spotty) cellphone coverage is provided, and festival organizers send out a variety of text message updates ranging from weather outlooks to any last minute lineup changes. This was, in fact, one of the main sources of inspiration for my relatively successful CRASH Madison Halloween text message update service from a couple years ago, and while headlines roll about college campuses just now tapping SMS for emergency updates, most music festivals have been happily buzzing people's pockets for nearly a half-decade now.

Even as we finally descend on our camping spot that muggy morning, Megan and Kim, our fortuitously Wisconsin-based camping neighbors are sprawled out in our shade tent, sipping on water and looking spent and agitated. It was a remarkable coincidence two days before, after completing the 700 mile drive from Madison to Bonnaroo, jockeying for position in the 4 hour line of cars, pulling into the campgrounds, cracking open some cold PBR's and setting up our tents, when we discovered that our neighbors parked next to us also hailed from Wisconsin. We'd shared a wonderfully juicy watermelon upon getting settled in that afternoon, learning that one of them was the little sister of a Madison talk radio/traffic DJ. Their CamelBak full of Franzia earlier in the day, now left only with a fresh sunburn upon their backs, they quietly acknowledged our return to camp and retired to their tent for, at most, 2 hours of sleep before being cooked out of their tents with the rest of us by the sweltering Tennessee heat.

If you had asked me right after my first Bonnaroo in 2005 whether or not I'd be back, I probably would've laughed and blown smoke in your face. Bonnaroo is such a ridiculously taxing experience, financially and physically. But I've been back every year since, and I'm not alone. In many ways, Bonnaroo is a very Madison experience. It is spectacularly good music surrounded by happy people. It is simultaneously selfish and selfless, alienating and unifying, cliché and innovative. It is for many Madison folks, a yearly pilgrimage from one bastion of denying reality to another slightly farther south. Thanks to Dane 101, I'll be taking you along the journey from Madison to Bonnaroo in 2008, profiling Madisonians both Bonnanewbie and Vetaroo (my apologies: it is so easy to just make shit up by prepending "Bonna-" or appending "-roo" to anything related to Bonnaroo). Check back here frequently in the next few days, as I'll be providing updates from the road and from 'Roo, and following some fellow Madison-based adventurers south of the IHOP/Waffle House line. So grab some whiskey and pack a fresh bowl - Dane 101's taking you on a trip to Bonnaroo this year, baby! Bonnarooooooo!