Sunday - 11/24/2019 - The final day of Wonderfront. So for Sunday, I had the great fortune of having my wife join me for the adventure. This meant help with carrying my bag and some different logistics. Usually for events like this, my wife would drop me off and pick me up, but with her joining me we looked at different ways to get there and get home. The Wonderfront website listed different parking locations which was a blessing, we grabbed a prepaid parking spot right by Broadway Pier for $15.00. Less than the cost of a single Uber/Lyft ride. We started the day at the Belly Up / Music Box / Casbah stage (again) for the English Beat. What a great way to start the day. All the hits from my youth played live on a beautiful Sunday out in the sun. Then we headed over to check out the Tony Hawk Huckjam. Thats where I ran into my first issue of the day, where security told me that I was not allowed to shoot the skateboarding from inside the barricade as I had the previous day with out a special Tony Hawk wristband... so after grabbing a few shots from, the edge of the crowd we headed over to the Uncle Ed's stage and caught the second part of Grace Vanderwaal's set. Great energy and happy crowd.
Right after the set from Grace ended, Hippo Campus started up on the C3 Bank stage and I shot a few shots in the pit. That was the second issue of the day, the pit was tight and it looked as if the speakers in the pit were pushed forward from the previous days, making it nearly impossible to get across to the other side of the stage. So I biked off and shot from a little further back getter some fun images of a fun band. Then we decided to head on back to the Broadway Pier stage for the Donovan Frankenreiter set as he was an artist I have always wanted to check out and I am really glad I did. On the way back, we stopped by the KUSI stage and caught some of the Khea set.
At every festival there are bands you have never heard and sometimes, if you are lucky, you get introduced to a new favorite. Donovan Frankenreiter was that act for us this last weekend. It was a great set of music with a touch of comedy. Gear issues with his bass player at the start of the set had Donovan taking a request for what to play next, this turned into an all request set with some great banter between songs. Looking forward to seeing him play again soon.
After we watched the full Donovan set, we headed over to the SDG&E stage for X. X is an American Punk rock band formed in 1977 and while we are area little older, they are still belting ou the tunes with the energy they showed in their youth. It was great seeing them play with the towering San Diego downtown behind them. And the crowd was really into it. Then it was time to head back to Broadway Pier for the Rob Machado and Friends show. Rob is one of the Wonderfront ambassadors and had put together. fun band for the evening... even had Donovan Frankenreiter sitting in on bass for the fire on the Mountain set opener. Great vibe, great sound, and great lighting. Kudos tot he crew who ran that stage.
We had to skip out on the final part of the Rob Machado and friends to make it over to the Uncle Ed's stage for the final performance of the night for us, the Guitar Legends III. Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top will hosted and performed at the “America Salutes You presents Guitar Legends 3,” The show was filmed and will be televised on the CW Network as a fundraiser for brain and mental wellness charities that assist U.S. military veterans and first responders on Dec 27. Gibbons was joined by Nancy Wilson, Toto co-founder Steve Luthaker, Charlie Starr of Blackberry Smoke, Warren Haynes, and George Thorogood. This was a great way to spend the final hours of a very long weekend. After the final note was played and we walked back tot he car, I had logged another 20,000 step day and was ready for some serious sleep. Already looking forward to Wonderfront 2020.
Credits:
All Photos © Alan Hess