Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, 061309

Hurt

HOLY MFG! This has to be one of NIN’s best setlists ever. Those hippies at Bonnaroo were pretty damn lucky to witness an epic show like this. I truly hope that those of you who are NIN fans here in the US got your chance to see them perform live on this tour. It very well may be the last tour the band ever does. My gut tells me that Trent Reznor isn’t finished with music forever and there may be another NIN tour sometime in the future but … you just never know. The rest of the world still has many NIN tourdates to look forward to. The band plays Austria on June 19 and they begin touring Europe after that. At this point, the final NIN concert will take place on August 12 in Taipei, Taiwan … but as for the US … NIN has already waved goodbye.

[Source, Source]

“This is my last show,” the rapper M.I.A. announced from the stage of That Tent, “and I’m glad I’m spending it with all my hippies.” If, as she announced at least three times, it was M.I.A.’s last gig ever, she went out with a boom. The seismic riffs of her songs, which sound like they’re made on the world’s cheapest equipment, puffed bass notes at everyone’s chest, and M.I.A. was all of her interlocking selves: fighter, lover, immigrant, instigator, party girl. Wearing an outfit that included shiny streamers as tails, she shook every part of her body sooner or later, yelping her hooks and spitting out her rhymes, dense with allusions and snappy enough for slogans. She brought “girls” and then “boys” onstage, surrounding herself with happy dancers, and brought the Nigerian rapper African Boy onstage for her encores, rapping about how immigrants have to hustle. For her finale, “Paper Planes,” the audience that spilled far outside the tent pumped fists happily at the gunshot sounds that are also one of the song’s hooks. “Thanks for coming to my last gig,” she said, amid noise that continued well after she was gone.

Now, I simply refuse to believe that yesterday’s performance at Bonnaroo was M.I.A.’s final performance ever — whether I’m in denial or part of me just can’t believe that she would stop putting on the live performances that she seems to love so much, I just refuse to accept it. That being said … if she really did just peace out on live performances, I PRAY that doesn’t mean that she will stop making music altogether … cuz, I’ll just flip my shizz. M.I.A. has to be one of the most electric and inventive music makers around right now and it would be a travesty if she stopped making music after only 2 albums. I’m hoping that she was either just playing around yesterday or she misspoke. Time will tell if M.I.A. the musician is really dunzo for good … I hope she was just messin’ around.

[Photo credit: Wireimage, Source]