Sarah McLachlan, Indigo Girls, Sheryl Crow: you can’t pile those names together without a dreamy haze transporting you back to 1998, when Lilith Fair did its damnedest to kill us softly. Tired of fighting mosh pits to see shows attended by, uh, males, it was a fabulous time for the late-teen/early 20s girl.
I was moved by Liz Phair, and found Paula Cole to be some feral creature only allowed out under close supervision with security and a drum made of some extinct animal close by. I'm pretty sure it was my first and only date with a girl, though I had no idea at the time (sorry!). But I was oblivious, writing down and analyzing setlists—not engaging in womyn power chatter and drawing flowers on each other. Didn’t these girls understand writing their own (shitty) poetry and making out in the lawn meant missing out on seeing Suzanne Vega? Fuck that (lack of) noise.
But like President Clinton, phone books and Y2K, that was a decade ago. The world has changed. It is even faster, sleeker, more sexy and blunt. Which is never the direction Lilith seemed interested in heading. Hedwig’s impression of playing a girl-fest is talking on the stage to one lonely goth chick next to a row of port-a-potties. Not a bad picture for how such intended tours have limped through the past years. Fair and founded or not, the tour has (and often still is) the fodder for many a summer tour joke. (Yet the Warped tour continues--sigh.)
So the summer of 2010 announces the Return of the Lilith Fair. Actually, it is just called “Lilith,” maybe the first yellow flag to be raised. (But the website is still lilithfair.com.) The next flag is that a handful of the original headliners are back.
To headline.
As for Sarah, I get it: it is your damn show; you close out the night every night. As long as you don’t run those god forsaken homeless dog pictures behind you and stick to everything recorded before the 2003, we’re good. But other mainstagers like Emmylou Harris, Heart and the Indigo Girls could be up shit creek this time around. Why? We got old. Sorry, but it is true. The once die-hard audiences for these ladies have aged and might not be up for a day in the brutal heat, seven dollar water and hard stadium benches. It is hard to make a stand when your knees ain’t what they used to be.
I’m not a marketing savant, but my guess is the logic went as follows.
New attendees (ages 23 and under): fawn at side stages, maybe go main stage occasionally, and then stay at main stage for the “originals” while waiting for their rides home.
Old attendees (40 and over): kick it old school at the main stage, check out a few side stage acts and pass to the left during the main stage only evening.
And this formula very nearly makes sense. Moms, aunts, chaperons to the main; tweens, nieces, undergrads to the side. These are also two populations that might have money to actually go to a pricey event. They either have a savings account or they have student loans refunds.
But what the hell am I supposed to do? The seventeen years in between these age groups are faced with a flurry of truths: money is tight, and the artists are lukewarm. Who knows, though, maybe without the 20 and 30 somethings, Lilith will be the hotness. Hmm.
It ain’t all bad, just brief. Yea for Metric (playing five dates), Janelle Monae (three dates), Cat Power (five dates), Miranda Lee Richards (one date) and Lissie (two dates). But Brandi Carlisle, Martina McBride, Verdera and Corinne Bailey Rae? I don’t mind any of those, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to see them live. Or…they just toured. Metric and La Roux have both hit Portland twice in the past year. And when I saw them, I got to drink beer and not bring sunscreen.
Back in the days pre-Facebook, the main critique of the Lilith lineup was a lack of representing all female musicians—just those soft and accessible enough to fit the "girl and guitar" image that was already rampaging the airwaves. But not this time! Rhianna is playing! One show, so I hope you want to come to SLC to see her. And that is likely because her tour with Ke$ha synced up in that city and that city only. Queen Latifah is playing two shows. But generally, if you want females pushing envelopes and bitch-slapping stereos, don’t analyze the artist list too long.
But I’m into figuring out how to solve problems. If I could make my own line-up, or at least send out some invitations, there are some pretty huge names that would excite the general female masses—even some males! Taylor Swift would bring in the bucks; Ani DiFranco tours 400 days a year anyway; I’d pay good money to see what Fever Ray would do with some quality time on the hydrangea stage; M.I.A.’s album just dropped and would raise the percentage of neon clothing at least 8%; Tori Amos is a woman with quite a collection of tunes; Courtney mother-fucking Love is getting back on the scene, and I would punch a baby to see if she played before or after Lily Allen (Lady Soverign could ref if it came to blows); a Sleater-Kinney reunion would be sweet; Ellen Allien DJ set? Yes, please! And while I’m making the best concert ever, we need to remember that the world has only gotten smaller in the last decade. While I don’t know who, I promise you there are some Latina singers out there that deserve stage time (and bring in some bank). China is literally blowing up and going through their punk stage and I want to hear it! Rappers in Iran risk their life to put on a show in their home country; they’d be pleased as cheese even to be on the second stage. And so many other female artists (not female-fronted bands) flood my mind.
Here I am, a decade later, seeing seething potential. I want it to be a mind-blowing, ovary-growing, cell phone-lighting, scream/dance/sing/rap/coo-fest, but once again, we just get the tip of the iceberg. And any girl can tell you that the tip just isn’t enough.