MGMT and the Ting Tings, Waiting in Line: The Review

Two of the most buzzed-about bands in the indie music world

Plus ...

A free concert in the hippest venue in the heart of Hipsterdom

Plus ...

Did I mention it was a FREE concert?

Equals ...

A scene akin to the most colorful and exuberant refugee camp that you've never seen.

The JellyNYC Pool Parties at the McCarren Park Pool are always well-attended events (partly due to the high-quality lineup of bands such as The Black Keys, Wilco and Sonic Youth, and also due to the fact that they are very free) and feature 'like being in middle school again' activities such as Dodgeball and Four Square. But when it was announced that The Ting Tings and MGMT were going to be sharing the stage on the 25th of July, it was clear that even a venue as large as McCarren Park was going to be pushed to its limit.

I knew that I had to arrive early in order to guarantee that I would make it into the show, and so made the extraordinary effort of waking up at 9AM and heading out the park. Surely that far in advance I would be the first one there. I mean, it's not like I was trying to get an iPhone. Oh, how wrong I was. The saga began:

10:30 AM

I joined the already-lengthy line around 10AM and mentally prepared myself for the wait to come. Spirits were high, and in sporting fashion, everyone did a good job of making the wait an event in-and-of itself. There were many games of Keep-Me-Up using the oversized beach balls provided to us by the corporate sponsor, and there was copious mingling and flirting among the hipster herd.

1:00 PM

As the day wore on into the heat of the afternoon, patience started to wane and tempers started to flare as the outside temperature rose and the lines only stretched longer and longer. The Keep-Me-Up games devolved into something much more aggressive and destructive. The enmity between the two separate lines, the North and the South, heightened and a mere mention of the other line would inspire comments such as "Oh the North? I hate those guys so much."

2:30 PM

There was clearly a rift growing between those who had arrived early in the morning and those who had just wandered into the line later in the day, and as the threat of line cutting increased, some were inspired to threaten violence on those who would try to commit the cardinal sin of cutting in line. On the 'Southside' this guy vigilantly kept watch over the line threatening all suspicious-looking bystanders with 'If you cut the line, Ill cut you.'

2:45 PM

Fortunately, right before inter-directional violence broke out, the chain link fence was loosed and the giddy hordes of hipsters poured into the pool; with not many stopping to look back at those less-fortunate still stuck on the other side of the wall.

Gazing back, I only hoped that the concert itself would be as half as exciting as the line had been. (It was pretty good; the Ting Tings definitely took the cake.)