With Outside Lands 2018 Eager Beaver tickets going on sale today at 10 am, it’s time once again to review all the reasons you should entreat yourself to this festival wonderland tucked within the homey confines of Golden Gate Park. While the lack of a lineup announcement can sometimes give potential attendees cold feet, not to mention the recent lottery-like outcomes of other big name festivals aiming high and landing low with their bills, it’s understandable to want to wait it out–but really shouldn’t.
For one thing, Outside Lands remains an often imitated, but never duplicated model of what a premier festival should look, feel, taste, and even smell like. Much like the older sibling we owe our individual music taste, playing tapes or CDs in their late 90s or early 00s Honda Civic for us, Outside Lands is essentially the big brother or sister of Southern California’s Coachella Music and Arts Festival.
No Annoying Hives of Pre-Teens
You won’t find a hive of annoying pre-teens or teenagers wandering around the greenery of Golden Gate Park (but there definitely are some kids enjoying the music), as it’s clear that Outside Lands is catered to an older crowd when compared with Coachella. This, of course, means a less rowdy and more family-friendly atmosphere that boasts a wide-array of non-music related amenities that make the festival feel like–well–a festival.
The OG of a Festival that Has It All
To Ranger Dave, the friendly park-ranger who operates as the festival’s mascot, the words “food, wine, beer, art, and comedy” that appear on their lineup posters aren’t just half-baked marketing gimmicks that represent an unnoticeable piece of the festival’s activities. Instead, Outside Lands has always had this wholehearted desire to give its attendees the best of the best, boasting a lush variety of craft beer and wine gardens, a smorgasbord of delicious food items that aren’t solely glorified and over-priced food-truck cuisine, as well as live cooking contests and performances by some seriously funny comics.
Outside Lands 2016
Ample Time to Experience San Fran
Wrap all this goodness up in the cool weather and enchanted isolationism of Golden Gate Park, then stick a 10 pm end time for all music acts (you know, so you can actually experience the city you’re visiting by hitting up one of San Francisco’s many arcade bars or late-night eateries) as the bow on top, and you have yourself a festival like no other.
We haven’t even gotten to the new acts, but honestly, we don’t need to. Without sounding too confident in lineup predictions, Outside Lands 2018 is poised to have one of its best in years. With returns being made by everyone from the Arctic Monkeys to Vampire Weekend, to the recent trend of inclusion of more racially, ethnically, and gender diverse acts across the festival landscape, there really is no reason to doubt the endless potential of the yet to be announced bill. So really it just comes down to a simple exercise in imagination: are you going to be sipping cold beer and wine on the green lawn of Golden Gate Park come August 10-12? Or are you not?
