Noticing the little things at Bonnaroo 2023

Kendrick Lamar, Three 6 Mafia, Noah Kahan, Black Midi and The Midnight highlight day two

Story by Bill Foster and Rusty Odom • Photos by Bill Foster unless otherwise noted

There are so many little things that happen at a festival like Bonnaroo. And in many cases – especially with a somewhat diluted pool of headliners these days – it’s the little things that set these events apart. Bonnaroo always has had an off-center, unique and peculiar bent. That’s what I fell in love with originally. The music is the reason we are all here, but everywhere you look, you’ll find things you’ll only see on a farm in Manchester, Tennessee, one time a year.  Little things that make all the difference.

Here’s an example:

In the middle of the media compound is an enclosed 3-by-60 air-conditioned tent where daily press conferences are held. On the side of this tent is the Lily Shaw Memorial ADA Ramp. Shaw was physically bound to a wheelchair but from all accounts never let it stop her from doing what she loved. And she loved attending Bonnaroo. She recently passed, but festivals are places where we celebrate our friends present and past. I know when I’m tired or hesitant to dance, I think of Brandon Gibson and how much he would appreciate the moment if he had the opportunity. The ramp is not just a ramp or a nice, memorializing touch; it’s a way to keep our friends with us, right where they’d want to be.

Bonnaroo hasn’t lost its soul after ownership changes, and this story speaks to that narrative. But it ain’t all peaches and cream, either, dear reader.

I bet they’ll fix this platinum situation next year. Huge gashes of prime real estate right in front of the tent stages are desolate, leaving vast deserts between bands and their fans. The few people inside these areas mainly talk the whole time and don’t clap after songs like good little boys and girls. I even saw a person in platinum duck to avoid a weightless, T-shaped balloon. To be fair, it was a capital T, but what are we doing here? I’m not sure if the person thought they’d be injured by it or just didn’t want to touch it in fear that our plebeian residue would make them poor or diseased. I dunno, maybe I’m just jealous I’m not in there. Take that for what it’s worth, I suppose.

Christone “Kingfish” Ingram

When I was young, I loved the blues. Not just loved: It was all I listened to and played. As I grew, though, the genre began to seem limited to me, and I could no longer feel the music in the same way. Then one day five years ago, a then-18-year-old “Kingfish” Ingram played the Open Chord in Knoxville. He blew me away, and all the reasons why I loved that music came flooding back. Five years and a Grammy award later, I’m happy to report that Ingram can still evoke all the same feelings. It’s hard to review a blues show, though. You know what they are, and he played them. But there is a world of nuance and feeling that separates the good stuff from the rest. It’s something you feel, and Ingram delivered in spades. It was an early show on a hot day, but it didn’t slow Ingram down any, as he performed most of the material from his two albums while including two guitar solos per song, the crowd growing louder at each flurry of notes or impossibly long bend. If you don’t like blues, I don’t know if he changed anyone’s mind but if you do love them, it was heaven. – Bill Foster

Madison Cunningham

Cunningham is a former worship artist and collaborator of Chris Thile and Andrew Bird. She has improved every time I have seen her, reminding of nothing so much as a Joni Mitchell who can really play guitar with a modern feel. She is the type of songwriter with whom her audience feels a deep connection, and the small but loud crowd sang along boisterously as Cunningham led it through selections from her most recent album, a Grammy winner, and her previous Americana award-winning effort. She doesn’t talk or move around much during her performances, but if what you wanted to hear was a great collection of songs rendered flawlessly, it was a treat. – BF

Morgan Wade

As a native of Floyd, Virginia, Morgan Wade has been on our radar for some time, and we have been watching her slow ascension to the big leagues with interest. Opening with bumper music from Nine Inch Nails and covering Miley Cyrus (“Bad Karma”), Wade seems determined not to be pigeonholed, but her music remains straightforward country in the best of ways, albeit with a rock edge. Dressed simply in black and gray, the heavily tattooed singer led her band of ringers through all of her Sadler Vaden-produced album and a pair of new songs and choice covers. Her new song “Psychopath” was particularly well received. Wade isn’t quite comfortable on the large stages just yet, but she is getting there, and her continued ascension is gonna be fun to behold. – BF

JD Clayton

Look, I know getting to photograph Bonnaroo is a privilege a lot of folks would love to have, but it’s a slog sometimes, too. Especially when it’s 3 p.m. on a hot and dusty day and you already have shot six bands going on four hours of sleep. I left Morgan Wade and went to take a break and came across young JD Clayton from Fort Smith, Arkansas, playing on the Who Stage. It was a small crowd, maybe 200 folks, but Clayton played like he was headlining Madison Square Garden. He had an incredible guitar player and a great band, and he sounds like a young Dwight Yoakam. By the second song, half the crowd was two-stepping (which I have NEVER seen at Bonnaroo), including by buddy Femi, of pink cowboy-hat fame. Not having a lot of original material yet, Clayton played a good bit of covers, including “The Joker,” “One Good Reason” and “The Weight” (on which he really let loose). However, his originals fit right alongside those classics. Hopefully, he will play Knoxville soon. Go see him wherever he is if you get the chance. – BF

Black Midi

Technically, Black Midi is a guitar, bass and drums trio. However, with a posse of fantastic collaborators from which to draw, their shows can be wildly different from one to the next. The last time I saw them, they were a saxophone-led, jazz-rock ensemble. This time, they were a dual-guitar, math-rock, full-on frontal assault. Their songs were often lyric- and spoken-word heavy, sounding like The Hold Steady mixed with Animals as Leaders. They drew a mosh pit from the first notes to the last, and the set never slowed down. Spectacular. – BF

Noah Kahan

Certain artists of every genre and time have a way of speaking to the current generation. Perhaps because of his openness about his anxiety and depression, Noah Kahan is currently exploding in popularity. The crowd at That Tent was huge, far exceeding the confines of the tent and covering every surrounding lawn to such an extent that I missed a song while getting to the photo pit. His current album “Stick Season” has been out for a bit, and the crowd sang every word – sometimes louder than the performer himself. Kahan himself was funny and self-deprecating but obviously delighted to be playing before such a huge and lively audience. It was a wonderfully fun start to what I imagine will be the first of many trips and stages at Bonnaroo. – BF

GRiZ

EDM music always remains controversial among the kind of old music fanatics who tend to inhabit photo pits. I often find myself explaining that not everyone listens to music for the same reasons. If you want to think deeply about lyrics or feel an emotion or have a song define your relationship, GRiZ is not for you. But if you want to dance and feel good, then buckle up, sonny, because GRiZ has bass drop after bass drop punctuated by lasers, confetti, rockets, every imaginable dynamic light and enough pyro that my face felt sunburnt. He is a little different than the average electronic act, though, adding live horns and touches of soul reminiscent of The Meters. In the end, however, GRiZ’s sole goal is to make sure that everyone has a good time, and he is relentless in providing the backdrop for a party that one hopes never ends. I certainly didn’t want this one to. – BF