Spitting Out Teeth

THE CHICAGO DIARIES - DAY 2


So...I missed Sonic Youth. Fuck Pitchfork. More on that in a bit.

I woke up with a nasty little hangover yesterday, which I was able to sleep off before we had to head out to Navy Pier (aka "Land of the Screaming Sugar-Crazed Children) to see the new Harry Potter in IMAX 3D. It was a really cool experience seeing a Hollywood film in 3D on a six story screen, and it was a pretty decent movie as well.


We left Navy Pier around 5:00 and headed back to Wicker Park to have dinner & then meet up with some old friends from Burlington, Jeremy and Jared (Jared you may know as the former bass player for "The Interior"). I had my first Mango Mojito (and it won't be my last) and a great carne asada at the Salud tequilla lounge, and then we out to The Green Eye bar to have a few drinks.

And then the whole night started to go wrong.

We took the Blue Line to Clark & transfered to the Green Line. The train was running really slow, but it looked like we still would arrive a little early for the Sonic Youth show. Here were the directions that were posted yesterday on the Pitchfork Music Festival website:

By Train

Located, literally, just steps off the Ashland Green Line Stop.

Of course, they didn't mention that there were TWO Ashland stops on the Green Line. One of them was the end stop of a major route so we figured it must be the one. That, along with the fact that the bus was packed with hipsters talking about Sonic Youth, made us think we were making the right decision.

We got off the train about ten minutes after nine and walked out of the station expecting to see a bright, noisy festival. Instead, it was a dark, quiet run down neighborhood with the only lights coming from the local McDonalds. We asked a policeman how to get to Union Park and he informed us that it was waaaaaay across town.

When we got back to the El station, the attendant told us that we about the thousandth person who had made the same mistake. It was too late to try to get to the show at this point, so we rode the Green Line back downtown with about a dozen pissed off Sonic Youth fans who also missed to concert.

Jaime and I ended up getting back to our hotel around 11pm (3 hours wasted on the El) and had a couple drinks and went to sleep early. Hopefully today will be a little more successful.