THE BEST

Best Guest Appearance: Springsteen & Phish
Phish's festival closing set was a solid redux of their Friday night appearance. Trey, Mike, Jon, and Page played different songs, sure, but the formula was the same. Whimsical pop-rock that goes on long digressions into spacey funk that, eventually, arrives at major-key guitar crescendos before returning to the chorus. In between these good-natured journeys to the center of your mind, the band played their oddly charming, lyrically nonsensical classic-rock-influenced tunes ("Gotta Jiboo," "AC/DC Bag"). Perhaps the second performance showcased a slightly more muscular version of the band -- Trey's guitar solos seemed more soaring than Friday's winding trips -- but it was pretty much the same jammy goodness as from two nights earlier. Oh, except for one thing: Bruce Springsteen joined the band for "Mustang Sally" and rip-snorting tears through his own "Bobby Jean" and "Glory Days," the latter of which ended with Trey and Bruce playing simultaneous guitar solos, huge grins on both their faces. The P Street Band has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? --David Marchese

Best Honest Statement: Snoop Dogg
Unlike the Beastie Boys, when Snoop Dogg raps about drinkin' 40-oz.-ers, beddin' ladies, and flippin' the po-po the bird, he's entirely believable: "Fuck the police / Fuck the police / Fuck ’emmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!" His set was a classics revival, from "Gin and Juice" to "Sexual Seduction," and he praised his BFF Tupac along the way. "Ain't nothin' but a gangsta party," the shower-cap-adorned Dogg rapped alongside a recorded tape of the Shakur jam, C-walking the stage from side to side as two GIGANTIC bodyguards stood with watchful eyes and bulging biceps at each end. Surely, these lyrics helped him score a lenient sentence in his recent case for gun and drug possession. --William Goodman

Best Use of a Cliché About the Weather: Ted Leo
"It's not so much the heat," said Washington, D.C., indie mainstay Ted Leo from the stage, "as it is the humidity." The sweat stains forming on his green button-down shirt made it clear that he wasn't kidding. With help from his always urgent backing band, the Pharmacists, Leo invigorated some of rock's most overused clichés during a stirring set on a sweltering Sunday afternoon. Whether swashbuckling through Celtic-tinged twin lead-guitar lines a la Thin Lizzy (on "Timorous Me") or banging out wiry up-tempo Clash-like punk (many) and songs about drinking ("A Bottle of Buckie"), Leo and Co. know that these tropes are only as tired as the musicians employing them. --DM

Best Damn the Weather Fashion Sense: Erykah Badu
Erykah Badu didn't care that it was fry-an-egg-on-a-hippy hot. She was going to wear her green Public Enemy hoodie anyway. Hood up, dammit. Her music was equally quirky, ranging from hip-hop break-up ballads (the hit "On and On") to burbling, aqueous funk. At all times, the mercurial funk ebbed and flowed on the strength of Badu's regal bearing and rubbery soul vocals. Proudly weird and weirdly alluring, she and her large, funky band raised the local temperature by at least a few degrees. Not that Ms. B seemed to mind. -- DM

Best Band to Hear While Drinking Beer and Watching Sunsets: Band of Horses
They can be noisy when they want, but grungy alt-country kingpins Band of Horses opted instead for mellow during their twilight set. Ben Bridwell's steel guitar twinkled as his warm, high voice wafted into the thick air, his bandmates complementary guitar and bass lines sparkled, the organ swayed, and, as on a cover of Gram Parson's heartbroken "A Song for You," the crowd swooned in response. The denim-loving band did kick up some dirt a couple times, especially on the coruscating crescendos of "The Funeral" and "The Great Salt Lake." The latter seemed to catch the attention of man-about-Bonnaroo, Bruce Springsteen, who was bobbing his head while watching from the wings. -- DM