One of the greatest feelings in the world is entering a music festival in full swing. Standing from the vantage point afforded by the entrance as hipsters, city people and hippies stumble, run and meander past you, it’s hard to contain your excitement as the stages, art and various booths nearly overwhelm you with possibility. The jam-packed schedule promises a day full of music and companionship, as the aroma of various smokables wafts over from the crowd and promises also a parade of beatific fucked-up concert-goers, who, depending on the depth of their inebriation, are often as entertaining as the bands themselves.

This feeling, one of the very few ineffable truths that I’ve encountered in my short life, however cliché and pretentious that statement and its accompanying emotion may seem, is one that I have seldom felt more strongly than I did the moment I crested the hill at the edge of Polo Fields of Golden Gate Park, wherein the majority of Outside Lands music festival is held. To my left, I saw the Sutro stage, draped with enormous green banners with giant Aztec men emblazoned on them. To my right, a twisting dirt path covered in smiling young people, bedecked with Rayban knock-offs and Vans that led to the second meadow. And directly in front of me, all the way across the Polo fields where I once played lacrosse, loomed the main stage, complete with a massive, shining Outside Lands sign. There, People Under the Stairs were playing the opening set of the festival, as men and women, who, judging from the multitude of accents and languages I would encounter throughout the next two days, came from not just across the state, but the world, stood and watched.

The first show I caught was Pretty Lights, who, without any lag time between walking onstage and the beginning of his set, had the tangibly high and relaxed crowd in a dancing frenzy, with hormones running high and bodies rubbing against one another comfortably, without so much as a hitch between the two energy levels. I have seldom felt so satisfied hearing the bass drop as I did then, nor have I ever heard dubstep more, in the words of William Miller, “incendiary”. Pretty Lights was there to rile us up, to entertain and start the festival off with an upbeat, moving vibe, and so he did. Walking away from the stage, out of all the snippets of conversation I heard from passersby, I only heard one negative comment, which went something like “Damn, this sucks, now I just want to rave…”

Luckily however, thanks to the well-designed schedule and the theory of relativity, I didn’t have to lose that energy between the shows, as Gogol Bordello, the greatest Balkan Punk band around, took the main stage directly after. The crowd was huge, and mostly covered in ratty flannels, ripped jeans and black and white patches, as it seems every punk kid in a hundred-mile radius had shown up to see Eugene Hutz play. And play he did. A more magnetic, energetic and frenetic frontman couldn’t be imagined, as Hutz jumped and punched and danced and sang, while all his “Gypsy Punk” bandmates trashed their respective instruments. And you know how at some shows there’s a nucleus to the crowd, where all the dancing and moving and singing and fist-bumping is happening? Well, Eugene Hutz said, through his music of course, FUCK THAT. His charisma whipped and flew off of him as readily as his sweat, and at one point during the show, in classic Hutz style, opened a fresh bottle of liquor, a fifth I believe, and without much ado, guzzled the entire thing and continued to play. He didn’t just excite the crowd. He enthralled us. No one checked their watches to see when the show would be over. No one looked over their shoulder to find their friends. All eyes were on Hutz. Well, either Hutz, or the huge sweaty guy barreling towards you across the mosh pit.

Bassnectar, formerly unknown house and dubstep prodigy, and now international rave sensation, was next up to bat, and, as anyone who’s been to any rave he’s played ever (or so I was told by the multiple people who were rolling at his set) he makes beats like no one else. The towering fuzz, the looping, swirling throbs and the bass drops were enough to even get the overweight elderly gentleman with a handlebar moustache standing next to me to lose his shit. Except for about ten minutes where the entire set went out, the show was amazing, the crowd stretched back farther than I could see, and everyone was content. He ended with one of his famous rock remixes, this one of Metallica’s “Enter Sandman,” and to all the metal fans in the crowd (myself included), made this show one of the best of the day.

After Bassnectar I had a little down time and began to appreciate the festival set up, and I was struck by how gorgeous even the smallest details of the festival were. If it wasn’t the wares being sold, it was their presentation. The food stalls, somewhat sparsely laid out along one side of Speedway meadow, housed along their tops a large continuous mural, which considering the number of stalls, must have stretched around a hundred feet or so, with the prices and menus hanging legibly, if inconspicuously beneath.

The first flaw I noticed in the organization however, was placement of trashcans. Although, as with the first day of any festival, staff was vigilant, driving around the grounds on their bio-diesel powered rangers and picking up trash and trash bags, by the time Furthur came on (whose performance I will remark upon shortly) the ground was littered with plates, beer cups, flasks and other unsavory miscellany. At many points during the day and night, even the most environmentally friendly considered just throwing their trash on the ground rather than trek to God-knows-where to find a trash can, which were few and far between.

Soon, after resting comfortably beneath the only art instillation at the festival (a minor detail about which I was a bit peeved, as they billed themselves as a music and arts festival, but only have two or three, however awesome and monumental, pieces of art) I made my way towards Furthur’s set as it was beginning. This crowd, in sharp contrast to the others I had been part of the rest of the day, was composed mostly of aging hippies, as opposed to the trendily dressed younger crowd that attended most other shows.

There’s not much I can say about them however, that hasn’t been said before. If you like the Grateful Dead, then you will like Furthur. If you like Furthur, you will like the Grateful Dead. They are seasoned musicians in every sense, and I believe my close friend and photographer said it best: “They just figured it out. They discovered their potential as people, that is, what it is they could best use their life to do, and maxed out. Sadly, the age of following bands around the country has come to a close, and I’m glad I’m here to see the last of what made someone want to do that. It’s inspiring.”

It was a fitting, calming end to an otherwise intense day, and left me excited for tomorrow. It was a nearly picture perfect day of a festival, and I heard no complaints.