M.I.A. = A.W.E.S.O.M.E.

I spent the weekend in San Francisco, rounding out the trip with my first taste of Bay to Breakers. The annual race/parade/"celebration of the human spirit" is 7.46 miles of pure insanity. A sight to behold, B2B attracts both serious athletes and serious exhibitionists who don costumes and begin drinking heavily, sometimes as early as 6 a.m. Picture your craziest Halloween, cross it with Pride and you're one step closer to understanding B2B.

I suggest everyone who attended M.I.A. last night plan a trip to B2B 2009 because ya'll proved you can go nuts too (or as Bill Frost complained, channel your inner raver). As one of the "idiots" who hopped onstage when the Sri Lankan electro-dance-rapper invited all the ladies up for an impromptu dance party, I feel qualified to declare the evening a success on par with last year's Peaches show. From the moment she stepped onstage (after an opening set by the Egyptian Lover) until the obvious "Paper Planes" encore, M.I.A. threw herself into a set of pulsating hits off Arular and Kala--and the crowd responded in suit. Gonna make you sweat til you bleed, indeed.

Soooooo awesome to see SLC music fans show enough love to actually give touring acts a reason to return.

Anyone have any footage from the show?

Oh, and P.S., not everyone onstage was wasted. I was stone cold sober. Sorry all you party poopers who wanted to just sit and watch M.I.A. Maybe next time she'll play Kingsbury Hall and we can all be well behaved.

(Jamie Gadette)