Sunday afternoon, I sat on a hill near one of the main stages at Music Midtown watching young kids mosh and throw water on each other as Gucci Mane performed the ever so classic song, Freaky Gurl. I was perfectly happy sipping on the mini bottle of vodka I smuggled in, not having sweaty teenagers push me or block my view as they added a million Snapchats to their story. I love music and I, too, had a bunch of videos of Fall Out Boy and Kendrick on my Snapchat the next day, but I realized that 29 was probably the last year I could do festival life this way. Is there such a thing as being too old for a music festival?
For the record, when Freaky Gurl came out I was a freshman in college watching Kappa’s shimmy at Armory parties. A majority of the kids throwing water were in elementary school. When did I get old-ish?
A few observations… Music Midtown 2018
Highs: Thirty Seconds to Mars, Post Malone, and Kendrick Lamar for sure. Jared Leto is beautiful and hypnotizing. Full stop. I want to deep condition Posty’s hair while he plays guitar for me. Seriously, I wonder if I can be his deep conditioner-ist. This is a thing now. He needs it. Kung Fu Kenny is a genius. Drops Mic. 10/10 would go see all three again. Fall Out Boy was also amazing, but Pete Wentz looked so bored. It was a little off-putting. My inner high school girl was still screaming though:
And Sugar, we’re going down swinging
I’ll be your number one with a bullet
A loaded God complex, cock it and pull it
Lows: I was very excited to see Bazzi and he was TERRIBLE. It was like watching Mariah Carey during New Years – reaching for notes and not even coming close to finding them. He’s pretty young so maybe he was nervous, but he sounded nothing like what he does in the studio. The crowd sounded better than him.
Everyone was so young.
Raise your hands if your parents would let you go to a two day music festival in the middle of Atlanta with no chaperones (all while wearing next to nothing and a ton of glitter). I had so many questions how did they get their tickets? Do they get an allowance? What’s the going rate for allowance in 2018 and can I get one? (Oh, that’s my salary!)
Everything was so expensive.
I have a monthly budget I stick to religiously. So I was very mad at myself looking at everything I spent money on swiping my cashless wristband at all the food vendors. I spent $6 on a single slice of pizza!!! Knowing good and well I could get a large take and bake pizza for $3.49 with my Kroger card. Don’t get my started on those $11 tall boys.
No New Friends. Or Have Better Old Friends?
I don’t know if people came with acquaintances, people they met on Bumble BFF or what, but there were a lot of girls crying by themselves and people being left behind. What about the buddy system? I also watched young girls try to flirt their way into the VIP section. No, sis. It’s not worth it. You’re better than that. My friend tried to save a lot of people at the festival.
Unfortunately, you can’t save everyone. I mainly danced with strangers and passed back water bottles.
View this post on Instagram
Overall, with Hurricane Florence threatening to shut the entire thing down, I had an amazing weekend. Next year (depending on the lineup), I’m going to pony up for VIP tickets so I can miss some of those gosh darn youths and their drama. I don’t think you’re ever truly too old for a music festival because music transcends time and age. However, you do need to know when it’s time to change the way you attend.
Anyone else get to attend Music Midtown 2018 or another festival this year? What did you think?
