TVD Live Shots: Riot Fest Chicago, 9/16

1:57 PM | The lines to get into Riot Fest are huge today. Well, one line, I should say: the women’s line. Security has divided us by gender despite the fact that male security guards are patting down both lines. I’m obviously not the only one trying to figure out why this makes any logistical sense. Behind me a woman jokes to her friends, “The patriarchy ruins it again!”

2:18 PM | I’m drawn to the sound at the Roots Stage. Turns out it’s Black Pistol Fire. I like their sound—it’s solid, bluesy hard rock. And I like their stage presence—high energy.

2:48 PM | Well Peaches has arrived…in a vagina hat and shaggy pink body suit. Provocative as ever, she’s taken over the festival. She’s all anyone can talk about.

3:15 PM | WTF is up with this small ass crowd for Shabazz Palaces? I blame Peaches, whose crowd continues to grow as she dances and leaps into the audience singing lyrics such as “Whose jizz is this?”

3:21 PM | Ok, here comes the crowd for Shabazz. They’re filling in and grooving now.

4:00 PM | Supergroup alert! Dead Cross has taken the stage. Mike Patton is wailing into the mic and the crowd is losing their shit.

4:17 PM | Fidlar just opened their set with a hair-raising cover of Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage” and I’ve decided that it was one of my favorite Riot Fest moments ever.

4:19 PM | Great t-shirt alert on a teenage dude crowdsurfing: “Girls invented punk rock not England.”

4:57 PM | Celebrities have set up shop side-stage for Bad Brains. Rightfully so: they are legends. The set begins a bit rocky but quickly improves.

5:44 PM | “Is it fucking hot enough out there for you?” Danzig screams. Um…yeah. It’s definitely hot enough (89 degrees F). This is Chicago. People are melting.

6:30 PM | Shout out to the mid-20s white female repeatedly screaming “”I NEED ALCOHOLLLLLL!” all while starfishing in a sea of people trying to leave the area.

6:45 PM | It makes me almost teary to see Mike D in the flesh. And without MCA and Ad-Rock by his side. But I pull my shit together because he’s a more fun, interactive, and talented DJ than all of these millennial ones combined.

7:12 PM | Has Gogol Bordello ever put on a bad show? Highly doubt it. They’re electric.

7:48 PM | Welp, At The Drive In just altered the rhythm of my heartbeat with their pounding bass. Watching them is enthralling and energizing. Frontman Cedric Bixler-Zavala (also of The Mars Volta) whips around, throws mic stands, leaps off the drum kit. This rules.

8:04 PM | Security just announced to photographers that Wu-Tang Clan banned photography at the last minute. I’m super bummed…and Eeyore away in my Wu-Tang shirt.

9:25 PM | Queens of the Stone Age are even better live than I expected, and my expectations were high. The new tunes sound good as do the old ones. Josh Homme snarls and smirks as he sings.

AT THE DRIVE IN