It wouldn’t be Bumbershoot if there wasn’t something for everyone, and this year’s installment of Seattle’s legendary music festival is no exception.
Modern rockers, bubble gum popsters, R&B aficionados and hip-hoppers are represented on the main stage Saturday through Monday, while Bumbershoot’s signature variety of musical and comedy acts will fill more than 20 indoor and outdoor venues around Seattle Center throughout the holiday weekend.
The 37th edition of Bumbershoot brings together a variety of music, art, crafts, comedy, dance, film, theater and more, and one $95 ticket gets you anywhere you want to go throughout the weekend (one-day passes are available for $35).
Saturday
The Samsung Mainstage is filled with big-name performers, and it starts immediately when the venerable Australian quartet Crowded House kicks off the weekend as the first main stage act on Saturday. The band, featuring founding members, guitarist and singer Neil Finn and bassist Nick Seymour, along with one-time member guitarist and keyboardist Mark Hart and new drummer Matt Sherrod, achieved its biggest success in 1987 with the hit single “Don’t Dream It’s Over.” Crowded House returns with its first new CD in 14 years, “Time on Earth.”
The Shins will forever live under the suggestion that their music will “change your life” as Natalie Portman promised in Zach Braff’s 2004 film “Garden State.” The film certainly changed their lives, catapulting the band into mainstream success as two of their songs were featured on the Grammy-winning movie soundtrack. The Portland quartet released its third album, “Wincing the Night Away,” in January and it debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard Top 200 album chart.
Founding members of Blink 182, Mark Hoppus and Travis Barker, bring their new project, +44, to Bumbershoot to open the first night on the main stage. They’ll open for Gym Class Heroes, who have taken the music scene by storm with their mix of hip-hop and rock. Las Vegas rockers Panic! at the Disco close the first night, continuing to tour feverishly behind their successful 2005 debut album, “A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out.”
Sunday
Nashville rockers Kings of Leon, who have made it bigger in Europe than in the States, hit the main stage on Sunday. The band, made up of three brothers and their cousin, are touring behind their third album, “Because of the Times.”
Rock gives way to dancehall music when Jamaican rhymer Sean Paul, who won a Grammy for Best Reggae Album in 2004, opens for Fergie. The Black-Eyed Pea continues her successful solo run behind her debut album, “The Dutchess.”
Monday
Labor Day starts early and is unrelenting with its list of big-name acts on the main stage. Joss Stone, who landed on the scene in 2003 with her multiplatinum debut “Soul Sessions,” kicks off the festival’s final day. At 20 years old, Stone has sold more than 7 million albums and grabbed four Grammy nominations. The British singer’s follow-up, “Introducing Joss Stone,” debuted at No. 2 on the album chart in March.
John Legend, another artist with multiple Grammy nods in the past couple of years, follows Stone on the main stage. Legend is touring behind his second consecutive platinum album, appropriately entitled “Once Again.”
The night gives way to hip-hop when Grammy-nominee Lupe Fiasco opens for the final act of the festival, the seemingly timeless Wu-Tang Clan. The group that inspired a multitude of rappers after its 1993 debut, “Enter the Wu-Tang,” is touring in anticipation of its upcoming release, “8 Diagrams,” its first studio album in six years.
Reporter Victor Balta: victor.a.balta@gmail.com.
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