World’s Largest Music Festival
During my first year in Milwaukee, I thought Summerfest was Milwaukee’s answer to Chicago’s Lollapalooza. I deserved a slap on my hand for comparing the two, because not only Summerfest is larger by 5-6 times by total attendance, it has also started decades before Lolapalooza came to Grant Park in downtown Chicago. Even bigger than the famous Coachella, Summerfest made the Guinness World Records as the “World’s Largest Music Festival”, and it has used the legitimized title as its tagline to this date. According to this list, though, there are two others that are bigger: Festival Mawazine in Rabat, Morocco and Donauinselfest in Vienna, Austria. Putting numbers and stats aside, we know that Summerfest is gargantuan in size and with world-class acts from Aerosmith to Usher, it deserves more exposure!!
Price Tags
Another attractive point of the Summerfest is the price tag. While a day-ticket for Lollapalooza goes for $100 and sold out months before the gig, Summerfest’s ticket is as low as $11 for the daytime admissions and it's easy to find people around the entrance gates selling tickets cheaper than their face values. Park your car within a 2-mile radius is $20, or find free street parking if you don’t mind a 30-minute walk to the venue. There were also plenty of free/cheap shuttles to/from various parts of the town and even to Chicago and Madison, so getting there is relatively easy. The general admission ticket gets you to about 10 stages and each day, the show features a big name act to close the day. Several of this year’s stage headliners are Arctic Monkeys, Ludacris, B.o.B., and The Fray. If they’re not cool enough for you, you can buy ticket for the special stage at Marcus Amphitheater for as low as $65 and see the likes of Luke Bryan, Dave Matthews Band, Bruno Mars, OneRepublic, or Lady Gaga.
People
I went on a weekday and a weekend this year. Both were packed! If the total attendance is one million people over 11 days, that means almost 100,000 people come to the Summerfest each day. Most of them are local Wisconsin residents, but there are also plenty of people driving from other states to come here. From little kids to gramps, everybody loves the Summerfest. Teenagers and young adults make up most of the crowds. Some teenager groups obviously make their annual visit to Summerfest a who-can-dress-the-sluttiest competition, while some probably made pot-smoking by the lake in Summerfest a prerequisite for a “cool kid” label. Last year I sat next to several novice potheads and saw a kid kicked out by a security guard. To my surprise, the kid was back in 45 minutes with a huge triumphant smirk on his face, so I’m not sure if security is pretty lax on marijuana control in Summerfest or what.
Things to Do (and Eat)
When I had my fill of lovebirds by the lake, I segued into booths/tents/trucks that have cool things like:
- Free t-shirts and sunglasses giveaways through a gumball dispenser or spin-to-win game. I got gifts from 88.9 FM, 100.7 FM, and 99.8 FM radios. KISS FM has a karaoke station and another radio has a dancing station.
- Free toothbrush and toothpaste! For some reason I really like the Sensodyne station. You could also brush your teeth here.
- PS4 game stations. This year we have a Sony Playstation truck that has about 20 consoles inside for people that wants to try some of their games.
- Arts and crafts stalls. Because for Milwaukeeans, it’s not a festival if it doesn’t sell arts and crafts. Bouncing house for the little kids.
- Interactive exhibits such as fortune tellers and conga play-alongs.
- BMX and basketball acrobatics.
Because I’m a foodie, hungry or not I just have to have some festival foods:
- Funnel cake – I can’t miss this classic dough and grease based obsession, although no funnel cake comes close to the funnel cakes sold in Disneyworld.
- Turkey leg – Not for the faint of heart, the $9 turkey leg is almost as big as my lower leg. If you carry this around, you’re guaranteed to be the center of attention.
- Fried eggplant – A stall named Venice Station sells this. I didn’t remember seeing this last year. The eggplant is cut like fries, lightly battered and fried, and served with marinara sauce and parmesan cheese. It was good!
- Scotch egg – Not sure how this Scottish/English dish made to Summerfest, but I didn’t complain! The hard-boiled eggs are wrapped inside sausage meat and deep fried. If you’re Indonesian, picture a “bakso tenes”, except with a better meat.
As usual, my Summerfest experience was great. It was 11.30 pm when The Fray was concluding its show and we exit the grounds hastily, ears still ringing because of the loudspeakers. We walked 45 minutes to where our car was parked and spent another 45 minutes getting through the traffic, which didn’t die down as quickly as expected because of the construction work on I-794 highway.
Thank you for another great Summerfest, and we’ll see you in 2015!!
