Ah, finally -- it's December. 'Tis the season for chestnuts roasting on open fires, Jack Frost nipping at your nose, and music geeks fighting across the battlefields of social media.
December is a great time to be an obsessive music fan. It's that magical month when you can pretend you're a critic and sit around figuring out all your favorite records of the year. Back in the day, I used to keep a mixtape in my car filled with my favorite songs of the year, in hopes of getting to explain my picks in lengthy detail to any of my friends unfortunate enough to ask for a Yuletide ride.
In the modern era, though, we don't need mixtapes. Nowadays, music nerds can post their picks to social media and spend the entire month bickering with one another over their assorted merits. It's a grand and glorious time to be a geek. This year, though, a new app has thrown a ridiculous monkey wrench of silliness into our annual squabbles.
Instafest.app is a gloriously pointless time-waster that looks at your Spotify listening history and uses that information to curate a professional-looking flyer for an imaginary three-day music festival based entirely on your personal listening habits. The bands performing at your phony fest, and the order in which they're appearing, are all based on your Spotify plays and which artists you've listened to the most. It's the kind of thing music nerds drool over, and the results have been pretty epic.
Take my friend Sharon, for instance. Her dream festival line-up includes a resurrected Prince showing up to throw down a set. That'd be pretty awesome. I'm guessing if Prince came back from the dead to headline a festival, tickets for that shindig might be hard to come by. But the BEST part about SharonFest? Prince isn't even headlining. As it turns out, the ghost of Prince, alongside the ghosts of David Bowie and Freddie Mercury, are all turning up to SharonFest to OPEN for the big headliner -- who is, you guessed it, 70s teen-pop idol Shaun Cassidy.
There's no lying to Instafest, that's what makes it so great. Music snobs like me pride ourselves on telling the universe that our favorite artists are weird esoteric bands that only a handful of music critics and record store clerks have even heard of. We don't tell anyone that we secretly get in our cars and blare Shaun Cassidy and Britney Spears when no one's looking. But on these Instafest line-ups, there's no hiding your secret shames. If you secretly listen to a bucketload of Nickelback, they're gonna be headlining your imaginary festival for all to see.
For example, let's look at ShaneFest, the imaginary festival that Instafest curated for me based on my Spotify history. Out of all the countless musical acts on Earth, ShaneFest is being opened on the first day by... Bananarama. Clearly ShaneFest is going to have to invest in loads of security, because the crowd rush would be intense as fans try not to miss a second of Keren, Sara, and Siobhan breaking into "Cruel Summer." And yes, fellow nerds, I'm well aware that Siobhan left the group in 1988, but if it's MY imaginary festival, it's most definitely MY imaginary Bananarama original line-up reunion.
Day Two is where ShaneFest takes a turn for the odd. We start with the Northern Ireland pop-punk band Ash, and then go straight into a much-anticipated reunion set from 80s coffeeshop-soul heroes The Style Council. I'm pretty sure the Style Council were the second band to take the stage at the legendary Live-Aid festival, so kudos to the ShaneFest organizers for paying homage. After their polite set of catchy tunes, it's straight on to the industrial metal fury of Ministry. Style Council songs have choruses like, "You're the best thing that's ever happened to me or my world." Ministry songs have choruses like, "I'm chewing on glass and eating my fingers / Stigmata!!!! / You've run out of lies!!!!" This should be a smooth transition.
And what do Ministry fans clamor for right after their favorite band? Why, the jazzy noodling and clever wordplay of Steely Dan, obviously. Then it's back to more obscure indiepop for the rest of the day, until we get 80s indie darlings The Smiths to reunite at the end of the day. Note: If you know nothing about The Smiths, know this: They HATE each other. I mean, HATE each other. Pigs will fly and hell will freeze before The Smiths ever reunite. But they're doing it at ShaneFest, in order to open for the Trash Can Sinatras, a fairly obscure Scottish band often unfairly derided by critics for being, you guessed it, derivative of The Smiths.
On the third and final day of ShaneFest, I'll probably have to stop the show for a bit to explain to the crowd of indie fans why Chicago are taking the stage mid-day (my dad listened to them ALL the time.) Then, naturally, it's time for the Monkees. I'm hoping the SharonFest rules of resurrection are in play here as well, otherwise it's sadly going to be poor Micky Dolenz on stage by himself singing, "Hey, hey, I'm a Monkee," so I'm hoping I get to conjure up Davy, Pete, and Mike. They're opening for R.E.M., who are in turn opening for My Bloody Valentine. It's a banger of a day, people.
I'd certainly go to ShaneFest. I realize not everyone might appreciate the Pet Shop Boys opening for Weezer, but it's not called EveryoneFest, is it? Like all the other music nerds out there, I posted my fake festival flyer online, and within hours, I had numerous friends saying they'd certainly attend. In fact, two of the bands on the fake lineup even commented and said they'd be thrilled to be there. Weirder yet, 48 hours after I posted my silly fake festival line-up, two of my fake headliners (Ride and The Charlatans) announced a REAL joint double-headlining U.S. tour. Clearly, it must've been my fest that gave them the idea. I guess we'll know for sure if Bananarama or Steely Dan turn up.
Find out your own ridiculous festival lineup at Instafest.app. Another one of my friends just did it and his fest has the Beatles opening up for Kanye West, so hurry and make your fake fest quick, because I'm pretty sure THAT line-up might just herald the Apocalypse.
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