
DATE: Monday, June 30, 1997                 TAG: 9706280072

SECTION: DAILY BREAK             PAGE: E1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY SUE VanHECKE, CORRESPONDENT 

                                            LENGTH:  143 lines

LOLLAPALOOZA IMPORTANCE OF SPREADING AN ENVIRONMENTAL MESSAGE HELPED LURE A FOUNDER OF FESTIVAL BACK TO THE TOUR, WHICH REACHES THE BEACH TUESDAY.

IT TOOK A SICKLY young man with a special request to get Perry Farrell back on board Lollapalooza, the annual traveling alternative music festival he launched in 1991 and left last year.

``This kid asked me if I would help him to solve the problem of dioxin, because his mother had died, his father had died, his sister had died,'' said Farrell, the outspoken former frontman for Jane's Addiction and current singer for Porno for Pyros.

``He looked sick and he was on the run from his government, the Canadian government. They tried to shut him up. He asked me if I would help him, and I told him that I would.

``Next night, the Lollapalooza (executives) asked me to dinner, and it just fell like that. It was very simple, a very easy decision. So I said that I would do it again.''

Farrell returns to Lollapalooza, which stops for the first time in Virginia Beach on Tuesday, armed with an agenda: To spread information about dioxin, a highly toxic chemical found in herbicides, and its effects on the environment.

And he means business.

``I'm trying to incite our culture toward the idea of . . . protest. Rallying. Asking for change. Get off your butt,'' he said from his home in California. ``We've been dormant for a decade, and these problems haven't gone away.

``Somebody has come up with a clever way of sedating us. The high-conscious irony about it all is that their children and they themselves are getting ill from their decision to hide what they're doing with the toxic wastes. As a result, now we all have to come to a huge, unison head and say, `OK, what are we going to do about the problem?'

``But the way you do that is first acknowledge that there's a problem. And that's what I want to accomplish this year.''

To aid in his mission, he's created the Greenhouse, a Lollapalooza pavilion hosting a variety of socio-political organizations that focus on environmental issues. Earlier Lollas had similar areas for such groups but never singled out the topic of the environment and toxic waste.

As an avid surfer - one who's surfed Virginia Beach many times - Farrell puts a high priority on clean water and air.

``That is the most important thing I can think of that's going on at the Lollapalooza,'' he said. ``Musically, we have gotten heady and very aware of the current state of music.''

Witness the BrainForest, a foliage-filled, Earth-themed tent on the concourse. It features art, spoken-word performance and regional disc jockeys spinning the latest in electronica, computer-generated music.

Along with techno headliner Orbital and trip-hop artist Tricky, both of whom are performing in Virginia Beach, BrainForest underscores what Farrell sees as the emerging importance of the digital musician.

``Multimedia, the computer age in general, has caused us to try to understand ourselves,'' he said. ``By building a computer, we are in a very slow way starting to understand how we ourselves were built.

``I think it's healthy - it might even lead us to understanding our soul nature, which would be really tremendous.

``But in the meantime, as we build these computers and they become more and more intelligent, we are making music with them. This is where the DJs come in, the rave/techno artists come in . . . this culture that is evolving. I don't know if it's there yet. In all likelihood, I'm probably a little premature.''

Prescient, more like it.

Farrell broke off with Lollapalooza because his enviro-friendly, electro-embracing ideas ``were not on the agenda.'' Instead, macho punk/metal was; Metallica, Soundgarden, the Ramones, Rancid and Screaming Trees muscled last year's bill.

How did Farrell respond? He launched his own futuristic Enit Festival.

Cancellations and band pullouts rendered the rave-culture love-in less than a resounding success, but the vision was dead-on.

``This is the music that I appreciate,'' Farrell said of the digital music exploding into the mainstream and its attendant society of cool computer wonks.

``This is the music that I find fascinating and fresh. This is the culture that I find evolving under the surface. It's going to be here for at least a decade or so. We're finding new ways of making music.''

The main stage lineup for this year's Lollapalooza also includes alterna-metallers Tool and Korn, rapper Snoop Doggy Dogg, alt-popsters James, and Julian and Damian Marley, progeny of reggae great Bob Marley. The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion bailed without comment.

Second-stage acts range from the space age hip-hop of Dr. Octagon to alt-rock from Radish, led by 15-year-old Ben Kweller.

If not rock's most cutting-edge, it's a welcome return to the daring diversity of early Lollapaloozas. At the dawn of the decade, alternative rock was just beginning to prove itself a viable commercial radio format; Lolla's first lineups featured artists just unfolding from the underground.

Those who attended the festival's 1991 debut saw pre-saturation Nine Inch Nails, punk/pop ice princess Siouxsie Sioux and her Banshees, the now defunct Living Colour, punk mouthpiece Henry Rollins, polemical rapper Ice-T and Farrell's own Jane's Addiction all on one stage.

It was raw, exciting, unpredictable.

But as alternative rock has become the money-making mainstream and once obscure acts sell millions of albums, Lollapalooza has suffered from increasing commercialization.

Where previous festivals mixed in relatively esoteric acts such as Ministry, Lush, the Jesus and Mary Chain, Nick Cave and Pavement with the mega-sellers, last year's homogenous headbanging bill was a huge disappointment.

The show's once bohemian atmosphere had also been co-opted by 1996, its captive audience confronted with a relentless cavalcade of corporate hype.

Last year, at a festival stop outside New York City, MTV's Choose or Lose bus was parked prominently on the grounds. Airwalk set up a skateboard ramp, Alternative Press magazine's slick program was stuffed with ads, and skywriters penned logos overhead.

A sure bet for advertisers looking to reach that important 18- to 25-year-old demographic, Lollapalooza has inspired a host of copycat caravans, many with corporate sponsors. This summer alone, the H.O.R.D.E., House of Blues Smokin' Grooves, Vans Warped, Skoal Music R.O.A.R., Furthur, Ozzfest and Blues Music festivals are selling their way across America.

But is there enough ticket-buying pie to go around?

Farrell, true to form, takes a cosmic view.

``I hope we all do well,'' he said. ``I don't pay attention that much to what they're doing . . . because (Lollapalooza) takes enough concentration, and I'm in love with what I'm doing. I know there's room for everybody.

``My science experiment is to see if I can make a better society, a balanced society, a happy people, a loving people, a greater society and higher frequencies.

``All this can be achieved. From my end, I can help to encourage all of it (with Lollapalooza). I just hope that I can do it next year and the year after that.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photos

Korn

Snoop Doggy Dogg

Color photo by John Eder

Perry Farrell

Photos

LAWRENCE JACKSON / The Virginian-Pilot

Lollapalooza crowds are known for getting into the act.

ROSEMARIE MATTREY

The alterna-metal band Tool is one of the featured acts of

Lollapalooza '97.

Side Bar

A Look at Lollapalooza Lineup