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  • MARK KAUFMAN

Something feels different about Bumbershoot this year. In the weeks after One Reel announced the lineup for this summer's festival, artists, musicians, critics, and friends began saying something I hadn't heard in years: "Wow, this year's Bumbershoot looks amazing."

People aren't talking so much about this year's classic marquee names (including The Replacements, Wu-Tang Clan, and Jonathan Richman, though even they seem like an improvement over the creakier nostalgia acts and radio superstars One Reel was programming just a few years ago) as they are about the smaller, mid-range, and quasi-underground acts: Gregory Porter, Mexican Institute of Sound, Negativland, Black Weirdo, Mission of Burma, Evan Flory-Barnes, ILLFIGHTYOU, and the Both.

Anecdotally, it feels like a better spread and a break from Bumbershoots past that seemed to spend a huge amount of money on superstars like Bob Dylan and leave the rest of the acts in relative neglect…

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