If you grew up in the city or suburbs of Chicago, you have a special place in your heart reserved for the last weekend in July. Lollapalooza is a totally unique music festival because of its location in the heart of the city, diversity of artists and resulting loyal attendees. The wish we make every final Sunday night walking out of Grant Park and into the city amidst the huge, eclectic crowd has finally been granted in the form of the recent announcement of an additional fourth day this year to celebrate the festival's 25th anniversary. It has generated an extraordinary buzz about the potential of 170 artists and another day of gourmet food, the beloved Chicago skyline, and even waiting in line for everything from Port-a-potties to water-filling stations. Even as a four-time seasoned veteran, I can't tell you exactly what this fourth day will mean for this year's Lollapalooza. However, I certainly can tell you what not to expect.
1. Appropriate attire
Or girls wearing anything but crop tops, fanny packs, flower crowns, flash tattoos and converse.
2. A peaceful train ride into the city.
Sorry to all the real people with real jobs just trying to live their lives.
3. To feel anything but uncomfortable watching people grind.
Middle school never ends.
4. To avoid seeing your entire high school, anyone you ever met from any suburb of Chicago or basically anyone you've ever made out with at Perry's.
Shout out to all of the college kids who peaked in high school.
5. A diverse Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook feed.
6. Cell service. Or battery.
7. Less than eight Facebook statuses of people who lost their phones because, "Lolla got the best of them."
8. Successful crowdsurfing.
Except if you're this guy. Amazing.
9. People to take off their wristbands afterward -- ever.
10. Enough time to see all of the bands you planned on seeing.
11. The genius degenerates who snuck into ever stop talking about how they snuck in.
12. To be able to keep track of your friends for the entire weekend.
13. A reprieve from sunburn and dehydration and sweat (your own and other people's).
Or your deodorant to last all day.
14. Tickets not to sell out in an hour.
15. To be able to afford your ticket without selling your soul and your firstborn child.
(General admission is $335 and a single day pass is $120. Ouch.)
16. General sobriety.
17. Boys wearing anything but jerseys or camelbacks as shirts.
A fashion statement I will never understand.
18. Less than five people to approach you asking if you sell drugs.
19. Your shoes, clothes and personal belongings to be intact afterwards.
20. To be able to make it into work the following Monday.
Can you say four-day hangover?
21. Not to have regrets when you look at the lineup months after and realize that you now like so many of the bands that were there.
22. Sunshine for all four days.
Embrace the mud.
23. To actually be able to find that friend at the third pole on the left side of the stage.
Or to spend less than 30 minutes on the phone with them trying to find them.
24. To avoid spending a good chunk of time comforting a crying girl who lost her friends.
25. Not to spend at least five hours watching live sets afterwards and wondering why it only comes once a year.
26. To be able to get off work that Thursday and Friday.
27. The Congress Hotel to be any less creepy.
Even if it's not haunted, I would be terrified to meet their interior decorator... the rugs in the hallway could only have been chosen by a psychopath.
28. To run into that one English teacher from your high school who goes every year.
29. The food to be any less expensive -- or dank.
$10 was a small price to pay for truffle mac and cheese that changed my life.
30. Less than four terrifying Port-a-potty experiences.
There is a high likelihood that they're not only bathrooms but portals into an alternate universe. And that you could get tipped over at any moment.
31. The line for anything to be short.
All complaints aside, what you can expect from this upcoming Lollapalooza is a kick-ass lineup, unreal food and performances, renewed pride in the city of Chicago and a weekend you will never forget.
