Dreams of Being Hip: Summer Music Festivals

What festival are you wasting your money on going to? Lolla? Pitchfork? Spring Awakening? What better time to go to music festivals than when bands are the busiest touring and the concerts cost the most.Not to mention, everyone you know is free now and they can go to festivals. But it's not all your cool college friends, they have internships and jobs. It's the college underclassmen who are on break and can take off from being a camp counselor or a clerk at the local ice cream shop to spend their time in the city. Worst yet, the high school seniors who just graduated and are stoked AF to be freshman are going to be there in their bro tanks hitting up Perry's like no other.They're gonna ask you if you know Molly and the hipster in your is going to think of Molly Ringwald but they want something else. And so do you...You want to go to a good festival that isn't overcrowded, isn't overpriced, has good bands, and won't destroy your bank account with travel, food, drinks and the tickets themselves. You want to go to Riot Fest or Pygmalion. You don't know it, but you do, you hipster you. Those are the two best festivals I can think of right now. Pygmalion is local, has great bands, and it's right at the end of the festival season so the bands don't require as much money to book and the festival itself is cheaper. Riot Fest has a spectacular line up. One weekend where you can see Mastodon and Slayer in one place? Not to mention Rise Against, Weezer, The Flaming Lips, Social Distortion, Primus, Wu-Tang Clan, Patti Smith, Die Antwoord, Gogol Bordello, Mastodon again because they're amazing, and I haven't even gotten a fourth down the lineup picking out awesome bands. Besides, if you're a hipster, why would you go to the popular festivals anyway? Hit up Riot Fest or Pygmalion, save some cash, be hipper, and revel in yet another way to inoculate your superiority complex with arbitrary self-imposed regulations. It's truly much hipper to go to the festival that not everyone else is going to. Even if you do it ironically. Especially if you do it ironically. And that's why this week's dream of being hip is for people to recognize that Lollapalooza is just getting worse and a bigger waste of money.