california state lines: Sunset Junction Street Festival (22-23 August)

We went to this on Sunday. It's held annually in Silver Lake, which is inland, which means it's held in a tarmaced desert. The organisers, despite this being 29th edition of this event, haven't thought of putting up some shady areas for people. It starts at midday. I mean, if it started at midnight - ok, but... It was hot as sh*t (I think I said that every two minutes (minus the asterix)). My beer evaporated before I could drink it. Smart people had sun shades (R had a sunshade). The majority of people at this festival weren't that smart. A lot had tiny dogs.

Whinging complete, it was pretty cool. There were a lot of rides, hipsters, and random stalls offering everything from massages to sunshades to Mexico Extreme Makeovers (proudly serving the gay and lesbian community (there's a big one in Silverlake) and offering Breast Augmentation for $2995.00 @ 2 ppl Same Day Surgery). They weren't cutting people at the stall, thankfully.

The bands made appearances roughly every half an hour on various stages dotted around. Built to Spill and Conor Oberst & Mystic Valley Band were the biggest names, but for $20 a ticket ($15 in advance) we thought it was pretty good value. Caught a few bands in the afternoon, and here's what we thought:

African drumming band - Lazy journalism, I know, African drumming band probably isn't their name, but at the same time they were so generic ( a lot of drumming and crazy dancing) that I don't think it's going to serve anyone by me finding out there name. But they did what they did well. There was also a Janet Jackson style wardrobe malfunction at one point. It didn't seem staged.

Night Horse - Caught the end of this Wolfmother-ish sounding band. Only had a taster, but they seemed entertaining if a little run of the mill old-school rock. (pictured below)

Local Natives - Were a really good 5-piece. Harmonious without tending towards wussy, a bit of a My Morning Jacket thing going on, but definitely their own band.

Charangoa - Cuban grooving. The front-lady's flute fell apart at one point which was pretty funny, but she recovered well.

Tiny Masters of Today - Had a punky Moldy Peaches thing going on with the female singer/male singer combo. The male singer was fine, but the lady just got painful. Tiny Mistress of Misery. She drove people away with her shrill, flat tones, and that's saying something considering nobody wanted to move in that heat. I'm a big punk fan, but this grated. Chuck her out and be a Tiny Master of Tomorrow, long hair male singer. (pictured below as Tiny Masters of McDonalds)