Pentaport Rock

Oh well boys and girls, I return on the scene to report one of the greatest weekends
I’ve put on record here in Korea, of course at the last (really) stint of my time
here. So, this weekend (July 28-30) was the Pentaport Rock Festival in Incheon,
Korea. And what a time I have to report!

To start, this was the mother of all music festivals, especially for little Korea,
who might just be an up and coming rival to the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan (of
which I’ve never been (~.~). All the big bangers of the Emo, hipster, ‘I’m too cool for school’ scene were there: The Strokes, Franz Ferdinand, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Placebo, Snow Patrol, Kula Shaker (seemingly out of retirement), Jason Mraz, Dragon Ash (boss Japanese group if you don’t know), and a gaggle of other ‘hip rockers’ (and a few really cool Korean groups; I missed Jaeulim… but Super Kidd and Ghettobombs, rocked!)

But oh! My little festival drama (and you know I had bunches) had my weekend finish at about 11:00pm Friday night… the first night of a 3 day festival! So my partner in fun crime, the Canuck with the most and I headed out to Incheon (a metro city on the Western beach about 2 hours from Seoul on the subway) the day before to set up our tent site (“Viva Juarez!” We had a Mexico theme to the area, code named what I like to call: Santa Ana’s Revenge East) and to prepare provisions (Bacardi, Bailey’s, bootleg Kahlua, the usual!) But, if you know Asian summer climates, the summer monsoon had been goin’ on and on… and on! So of course we got rain logged!
 

Any who, the next day, we woke full of expectation and energized for all the great bands we were going to see: Let’s see~ We opened with the Korean bands: Super Kidd and Ghettobombs on the “baby” stage, before socializing with a really cool Italian couple working in Beijing we met the day before. Then it was on! Got to see the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs (did you know that one of Karen Oh’s parents is Korean?) The show was nice! (A little tame for that girl’s rockin’ abilities, but you gotta remember Korea is even more conservative than  Japan!). After that, hung out at the beer tent, out of the rain, socializin’ the Pentaportway we do best! Caught some long shot views of some okay Korean bands, then it was time for Snow Patrol. I wasn’t a big fan before, but the singer is awesome and there was some “je ne sais quoi” about the bass player that spelled a good time (bass players make the world spin right round, baby round round!).

After a wailin’ good show, settled back in that killer beer tent, got a hot dog to
keep the energy up and took a short trip over to the M something or another tent (sponsored by some Korean music network… not MTV!) to check out Jason Mraz.  Okay show, but had to jet early to go stake out a spot for the Strokes. Got back to the main stage, drank one too many beers, got a fucking amazing spot out on the “floor of death” (will be explained later) and started hangin’ out and talkin’ shit with some other foreigners who drank too much like I did, but were also in heaven to see the world-renown Strokes in Korea of all places.

Now, I should have had the right of mind to realize the Strokes playing in Korea was a queer occurrence that should have set off alarm bells; this is where things started to get bad. Ten minutes before the Strokes kicked off I had to pee (see, too much beer really does ruin everything!). So, I scuttled off to the bathroom and rushed back, just in time to be ready for the opening song, only about 30 feet back from my dream spot. Here are some interesting factoids about the scene; it had been raining all over Korea for about 4 days, so everything was wet and muddy, hence why I thought it’d be good idea to take off the slippers I’d been dancin’ in and losing in the mud all day and be a real Chapel Hill dirt dobblin’ hippie. As well, the crowd was pretty excited and just as drunk as I was, so what was the harm in some stereotypical, clichéd festival behavior?

And then they started to play. I’d heard the Strokes put on a damn good live show, but this was too much! As soon as the music started 3 guys standing about 2 feet in front of me took off as if running a 100-yard dash and were instantly 15 feet in front of me! So, I jumped in! This was the mother of all pits, probably topping at about 6,000 people all wet, drunk and hyped up! I don’t even remember the song that they were playing, but it was like a dirty dream set through music, beautiful! All the time, my main goal was to get back to my crew who were still a few feet away.  Halfway through this song, as I was jumping up and surfing the crowd off of high fives and mild, yet suggestive slaps on the ass, I found my buddy of the Great North and the mass of folks we’d recently made temporary family. The slip up: as soon as I got to her I grabbed her arm and started dancing like a National Geographic video from West Africa during some seasonal holiday ceremony and then, 1..2..3 stomps and WHAM!!!!

The pain shot through my right leg like hell, the devil and all the demons possible had thought it a spiritual highway! Then I felt something sticking in my foot, so I lift my foot, feel something hard and solid to the touch, but the shape of a stiletto heel and go to slap it loose of my foot. No dice! So I rabidly pull this
thing OUT OF MY FOOT! I’m alert to the severity of the situation but still feeling
the music and just dance to make me think it all was just imagined or not really as bad as I knew it was! My friend gets winded by the psychos slammin’ into us, since I can’t fend people off cause I’m in some sort of shock and so we get the hell out of there!

A few minutes after sitting down and looking at the hole in the sole of my foot
wondering what I had stepped on (all the while fighting the strong possibility that it might have been a piece of Korean War shrapnel, since this whole concert was on a beach that had been the sight of General MacArthur’s storming of Incheon and all!), I call a truce with myself and go to the Health and Safety tent, where the oh so responsible and dutiful first responders of Incheon City wrap a bandage around the wound and tell me to go to the hospital (mind you no one calls an ambulance, just tells me to walk the 3/4 of a mile to the nearest road and somehow conjure up a taxi to get me to a hospital, somewhere in this city I don’t know!).

I stumble back to the tent and listen to the last few songs ‘live’ from the Strokes
(just as good as being in the pit by this point). My friend comes back after the
show is over and we both realize I should be going to the hospital (that from the
fact that I start going into mild SHOCK!) Lots of stupid language miscommunication and basic lack of compassion from some lazy bitch slut organizers and then I’m in the back of an ambulance, with a 2-inch puncture in my right foot, a very bad infection and mild shock (luckily I knew how to redress the wound and what to do for shock or else I would’ve really been a mess).  

Needless to say, I missed the rest of the weekend and all those other bands (oh yeah, the Black Eyed Peas played on Saturday. Why were they at a rock fest? No real loss to me in the end… probably a blessing in disguise!). As I sat at home back in Seoul, I enjoyed receiving emails from my crew still at the festival and watching old action movies on TV under a veil of very delirious eyes and dementia of some damn good ‘scrips (Korea and strong medication, um um um…).

If I’m ever back on this side of the rock this time during the summer, I will be
back (with strong soled shoes on!) Even though I only got one day in, I did see the Yeah, Yeahs, Snow Patrol and a very dramatic Strokes! I will one day finally see Franz and Dragon Ash live and as for Snow Patrol and the Strokes, well they were so nice, I will be seeing them twice!

Incheon, Korea (July, 2006)