Sasquatch Musical Festival 2013

"Attend an outdoor musical festival" can now be checked off my life list.

(And speaking of life lists I really need to make a concrete one.)

Last weekend three of my friends and I caravaned to George, Washington home of The Gorge Amphitheater for the Sasquatch Music Festival (along with about 25,000 other people).

It's close to a seven hour drive from my house so we went up to Portland on Thursday night and went to a Vampire Weekend concert to start the long weekend off with even more music. Perfect way to begin.

This is my friend Amy. I've known her since my freshman year in college (just about 20 years now). If you've been around a long time you might have seen a few layouts that have included her over the years. She was my partner in crime in planning this adventure and she brought her boyfriend Jeff.

I brought Aaron.

He's a pretty big music fan - plays a bunch of instruments, writes his own music, has unique tastes - and it's cool to hear what he looks for/watches/cares about at live music events. Totally stuff I know nothing about. And I like learning. And I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been going to Sasquatch if we wouldn't have been introduced late last year.

Having new friends is cool.

We went for the upgraded camping option which meant a quieter, less crowded area that had little to no lines for the bathrooms or showers, a shuttle service that took you over to the actual music venue, and free coffee and doughnuts each morning. This was totally worth it. The demographic at this event is definitely younger and crazier than the four of us and we all appreciated being able to go to sleep and not have loud partying happening all around us all through the night.

Not that we didn't have fun but, you know, we aren't as young and crazy as we once were.

Well, maybe we are all still a little crazy.

This is looking over at the camping area from the music venue.

The view from our campsite.

Once you get into the actual music venue there were a few different stages set up where you could catch a show. We ended up spending most of our time at the main stage.

The first two nights we sat up in the grass (this shot is looking up from the main stage area).

And then on Sunday and Monday we hung out down on the cement area of the main stage.

My favorite performance of the weekend was Imagine Dragons. I thought they were fantastic. The music, the energy, everything. I was so happy that I had been listening to their whole album in advance so I knew the songs. They were seriously awesome. Here's a video I found on You Tube:

Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros was probably my next favorite. We got right up in the mix of people close to the stage for this one and it was so cool. This is another band I've been listening to a lot lately - being able to sing along makes it that much more fun.

Here's Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros at Sasquatch via You Tube:

Next favorite for me was Mumford & Sons. They were the headliner and I imagined they'd be my favorite and they were great but I enjoyed those other two just a bit more. Their encore was definitely one of the best moments of the weekend because they brought out Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros and they all sang Fleetwood Mac's The Chain. The awesome thing about that was that Aaron and I had traveled to Tacoma last Monday night to see Fleetwood Mac - it was the perfect bookend to a week of live music.

And of course I was able to find it on You Tube. I was singing just as loud as everyone else.

I also completely enjoyed The Lumineers and The Postal Service.

Here's who we saw:

Friday:

• Built To Spill




• Arctic Monkeys




• Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

Saturday:

• Andrew Bird




• Bloc Party (they had people dancing all over the place)




• The XX




• Sigur Ros

Sunday:

• The Tallest Man On Earth




• The Dropick Murphys




• Edwards Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros




• Elvis Costello & The Imposters




• Mumford & Sons

Monday (my favorite day & in the rain):

• Imagine Dragons




• Cake




• The Lumineers




• The Postal Service

Something I so loved about the adventure was obviously the view - but more than that I loved how the weather changed, how we got to see the sunset, how it was super hot and then the rain came down. I liked the variety and just being outside no matter what the weather was doing.

Good, good times answering the invitation to find the fun again.