Sarahindie

The Bamboozle is a bi-coastal festival catering to scene kids. Ours is in May in the swamp in New Jersey, so it is either raining on my face or so hot I want to die. Everyone has spent an hour on their hair and is wearing a combination of band merch and stuff sold at Hot Topic or American Apparel. The median age is about 17. Every year I say I am not going, and then a band is playing so good that I have to go. But I think not this year! Yay!

The trouble this year is that they are apparently going to have a scenier day and a hipsterier day. I have a feeling that this will be to mixed effect. Let’s look at the lineup so far, shall we?

May 1st: The headliner is Paramore. This is the scene day. Also Angels & Airwaves, who I thought had busted up, and Hanson, who are not so scene. But then, the Aquabats! It’s like a legacy act! I loved the Aquabats when I was 16. (There’s also a prominently placed Aquabats poster in the classic film Sky High. But you don’t care.) And then there’s a lot more scenester bands, including Versaemerge, The Maine and The Ready Set.

May 2nd: The headliner is Weezer, so now we’re in hipsterville. (Not that respectable hipsters would admit to still caring about Weezer.) Beefing up the hipster quotient, Matt & Kim (who none of the audience will get), OK Go, Girl Talk, and Piebald, plus the scene’s best crossover-to-hipster bands, including Kevin Devine, MuteMath, Steel Train, and the much beloved Fun.. (That looks like a typo, but there’s a period in Fun., so then I had to put another period to end the sentence.) But, this is still the scene’s biggest non-Warped event, and there was too much hot Hot Topic action to fit on one day, so the 2nd also gets Say Anything, All the Day Holiday and The Summer Set.

Also, it bears mentioning that there is a poet. Considering I found it impossible to hear Zack Galifinakis in the comedy tent last year, I hope the poet has a megaphone.

While we’re here, the Bamboozle in California is being headlined by AFI and Something Corporate. They’re the third or fourth band on this list that I was certain had broken up (Angels & Airwaves? The Maine? I’m worried this is actually the lineup from ’06.)

ETA:  Motion City Soundtrack got added to the second day. Now we pretty much have to go. I bet it rains.