Over the July 4th weekend in Des Moines, a set of strong legs was just as, if not more valuable than an 80/35 Festival ticket. It would have been easy to pony up the $50 for entry and relax on a blanket in front of the main stage for two days, taking in various acts before getting ready to jump up and celebrate the weekend’s headliners – the Flaming Lips on Friday, the Roots on Saturday. But this was not in the spirit of the weekend, and in truth, you didn’t even need a festival ticket to see some of the best music offered. You could simply walk between two free stages at opposite ends of the fenced in main stage area.

You see, what we learned was that the folks at 80/35 – so named for the two interstates that cross paths in Des Moines — are all about keeping it real. And for as much as they spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to bring in nationally renowned acts to make Des Moines as much of a destination as anywhere, they also hooked up the free stages with some killer talent so that anyone who had the initiative to show up at Western Gateway Park could be treated to some awesome music. As evidence of this, one need look no further than the pre-Roots entertainment closing out the free stages on Saturday evening. Following Black Francis’ set on the main stage, Ames, Iowa’s the Poison Control Center played the free east stage to a raucous crowd, eager to be up close and personal with the band. This felt more like a celebration than a rock concert in the traditional sense. The front of the stage was crowded by close friends of the band, and took on a feeling of jubilation that was unique to this experience alone. It isn’t the same as the elation you get when you see the Flaming Lips stream confetti into the Iowa twilight with 15,000 other faces. There was pride on the lips of these revelers, savoring every moment of this triumph. Driven by the energy of the PCC, who are famous for their guitar slinging somersaults and headstand guitar solos, the fans/friends crowd-surfed and danced on stage while the band seemed to enjoy playing as much as we enjoyed being there. We may have been at a festival with thousands of others, but it felt more like a party in our backyard.

Following the PCC’s euphoric set, a brief trek over to the west stage meant arriving just in time for another Ames band, the Envy Corps. This was a different scene entirely, but not in a bad way – the Envy Corps had drawn by far the biggest crowd of the free stages this weekend. It was a struggle to get to the front, but well worth it. The Envy Corps’ stadium rock sound was perfect as daylight waned and segued into night. We still had the Roots to come, but I could’ve settled for this band closing the festival. And whereas the PCC relied on their energy to fuel a drunken, fervent crowd, Envy Corps commanded a more reverent respect with their expertly executed pop songcraft. They draw on early Radiohead and early Coldplay for inspiration, and as such were well-suited to be a festival closer. Anthems such as “Rhinemaidens” brought us to a state of sing-along joy that was sadly nullified later by fatigue, an excess of $1 beers, and the Roots’ approximately hour too-long set. Had the last chord of the Envy Corps echoed out as the final punctuation of this great bacchanalian weekend of music, we would’ve gone home feeling that we’d missed nothing. Once you got past the gloss of the bigger names, 80/35 provided an atmosphere that hooked up the local bands and catered to the user experience. Best of all, if you were on your game you could actually do this free of charge.