Dreamville delights crowds with few hiccups
All in all, it seemed to go well. One miscalculation, however, was the number of food vendors -- there weren't nearly enough for a crowd this size, resulting in unreasonably long lines for meals.
Posted — UpdatedEven if all of them couldn’t be seen, the crowd of 40,000 could definitely be heard. Cole took a quick poll, asking where people had come from -- California, New York, Florida and even overseas.
“Now I need to know,” he concluded, “who here from Carolina?” The roar was probably audible well beyond the city’s borders.
All in all, it seemed to go well. There was heavy traffic and long lines in the vicinity to get parked and clear security to enter the concert site, but really no more than you’d expect from any gathering of that size. One miscalculation, however, was the number of food vendors -- there weren't nearly enough for a crowd this size, resulting in unreasonably long lines for meals.
While the rain stayed away Saturday, Mother Nature did not entirely cooperate. Friday brought heavy rains in a daylong downpour that left the festival grounds saturated. The areas around the two performance stages – one dubbed “Rise” at the lower end down toward the Farmers Market and a larger “Shine” one at the top of the hill – were mud pits about an hour into the show.
That made for treacherous footing, especially after dark.
Beyond music, Dreamville had an array of artwork scattered around the grounds, with the festival name rendered in everything from sand to sculpture to pink balloons, perfect for selfie backdrops.
Extra-musical activities included miniature golf, and Frisbees and beach balls filled the air. The county-fair vibe was similar to what it used to be like with the Lollapalooza alternative-rock tours, which filled up Raleigh’s Walnut Creek Amphitheatre every year in the early 1990s with crowds almost as diverse as this one.
Some 18 acts performed on the two stages, with the entire roster of Cole’s Dreamville Records accounting for close to half the bill. Cole’s star power is such that Dreamville was pretty close to sold out before a lineup was even announced.
As for who made an impression onstage, venerable St. Louis rapper Nelly still got people shouting along with “E.I.,” “Ride Wit Me” and other early-21st-century chestnuts (he’ll return to Raleigh July 27 to play Coastal Credit Union Music Park at Walnut Creek with TLC). J.I.D. (Destin Choice Route) showed some of the most rapid-fire flow of anyone on either stage. And the Triangle’s own Rapsody (Marlana Evans) just about stole the show.
To close the show, Cole appeared onstage in a bright red Dreamville basketball jersey and looked moved as the crowd chanted his name. Then he started in on “Middle Child,” a 2019 single that also felt like commentary about Hussle’s murder as it concluded, “Pistol in your hand don’t make you real.”
Cole's set list also went way back to early days with songs from a few of his early mixtapes, “The Warm Up” and “Friday Night Lights,” back before he was topping the charts. “I had classics,” he told the crowd, “but I had no hits.”
He does now.
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