Too Pooped to NoisePop
Four months ago, when February 2018 was but 28 blank, bare, beckoning squares on my calendar, I decided to splash out for a NoisePop Festival badge. NoisePop is a San Francisco music festival every February that features edgy, emerging acts spread out in venues all over town for a full week. The badge gives me access to any and all of them, no forethought involved – just show up for a show.
Talk about a great way of super charging my knowledge of new music! I recognized approximately 7% of the many performers playing the festival – when tUnE-YaRds is the mainstream headliner, you know these are some fringy musicians I’d be seeing.
And the fact that I’d be going to shows by myself was part of the appeal. I never did end up writing the concert review, but I went to a concert alone for the first time in my life last November, to see Tommy Stinson (of The Replacements) and Chip Roberts playing the “Cowboys in the Campfire” tour. The first two people I met at the show were Tommy and Chip, and the last two people I hugged goodbye at the show (there were others, it was a friendly bunch) were Tommy and Chip. That was cool and made me wonder whether I shouldn’t have branched out into solo-concert-going much earlier.
Maybe that’s why back in November, I’m envisioning myself waving that NoisePop badge as I slip in to see Tino Drima, Magic Magic Roses, High Sunn, Bat Fangs, and whatever other band names catch my fancy. Because February was so WIDE OPEN. Nothing’s going on in February, right?
Here’s the reality of February 2018. There is so dingle dangle much going on that I literally don’t have the 55 minutes it will take to pop into San Francisco and back to pick up my NoisePop badge, much less go to any of the concerts. Those 28 calendar squares may be there somewhere, but they’re buried under scrawls of “CnC meeting” and “take dinner to John” and “organize taxes!” I’m not sure why I thought that my real life was planning to give me 1/12th of the year off, but there you go. I blame Tommy and Chip.
It’s not like the badge was cheap. At the end of the day I can live with what I paid because it supports independent artists and the local music scene. My younger daughter wants to see Rostam next Friday night, so that will happen. But really. For what I paid, I have to do at LEAST one more thing on the schedule. So I scrolled through the full agenda the other day and saw a listing that intrigued me: a Sleep Concert. Specifically, “Robert Rich’s Sleep Concert in collaboration with Flow Kana, branded distributor of craft sun grown cannabis.”
I was confused. Then intrigued. Then after reading the description below, confused again.
Sure to be one of the most unique and rare offerings this year, ambient musician Robert Rich will play music from 11:30 p.m. to 8:00 a.m. as attendees relax in the room and drift off to sleep. And even though Rich is from the Bay Area, this will be the first time in recent years he’s performed a Sleep Concert for local audiences.
Honestly, I like the idea of a concert while I’m sleeping. That fits my current schedule. I could go to a show and still get my 7-minus-bathroom-breaks-minus-4am useless worrying interlude-minus-why-am-I-up-at-5:30 am? hours of sleep. But I have a few questions.
It’s valued at $40/ticket? To sleep through the show? I feel like I can sleep for free most nights.
What could possibly go wrong with falling asleep amidst a sea of baked strangers? Especially if you’re a woman. No risks there.
Is anyone actually sure that Rich has played a Sleep Concert anywhere because, by definition, his audience wouldn’t be aware of that?
Does anyone think I am actually going to fall asleep in a public place and risk have someone post a viral video of me snoring, thereby disproving my “it’s not me who snores, it’s YOU who snores!” defense to my husband?
At the end of the day, I’ve decided there is real value of my NoisePop badge. Because it will give me what the Germans might call Stornierungsfreude: The Joy of Cancellation.
“Two boys, one to kiss your neck and one to bring you breakfast…” add in a third boy to bring me a New York Times and a fourth to clean the kitchen, you’ve just described my perfect Sunday. We’re stoked to see Rostam on Friday, anyway.
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