All manner of Wilco faithful came to Mass MOCA in North Adams, MA for Solid Sound Festival this year.  The three-day festival centered around the alt-rock band is held at the Museum of Contemporary Art, a renovated 19th-century factory campus.

It's easy to forget you're at a festival.   Listeners sit on the pavement in a courtyard where factory works used to be sipping local beer, or enjoying indie candy while watching an all acoustic set. The hilly backyard is enormous, with a stage at the bottom where headliners preform at night.  The food court has art installations and tall metal letters spelling out "W I L C O."  A river runs through the campus, and the bridges over it guide you in to the museum for galleries and installations.

Every large-scale event is not without it's snags.  The performances carried on despite heavy rains that shifted the schedule, and Nigerian singer/songwriter King Sunny Ade's performance was cancelled due to worldwide computer malfunctions in the US State Department.

North Adams falls in between New York City and the Pioneer Valley (Wilco's management, Tony Margherita Management is in Easthampton.)