Dead Body Found By Cleaning Crew At Bonnaroo Site

The crew cleaning up after this past weekend's Bonnaroo festival in Manchester, Tennessee, discovered the dead body of a man in his 20s on the camping grounds Tuesday, June 16th, one day after the fest had ended, the Tennessean reports. An autopsy is being conducted to determine cause of death. According to the report, the unidentified man was last seen alive on June 15th at 3 p.m., and police theorize that he was from Alabama. The body showed no signs of trauma, leading Coffee County Sheriff Steve Graves to speculate that the death was either drug-related or the result of a pre-existing medical problem.

(See all of Rolling Stone's Bonnaroo Coverage.)

"All we know is that he was alive [Monday] at 3 p.m.," said Graves, who added he was unsure whether the man was a worker who stayed behind to help clean up the site. The death marks the seventh in Bonnaroo's eight-year history, the Shelbyville Times-Gazette reports. Of those seven deaths, two were the result of drug overdoses in 2004 and one was caused by sleep apnea and possibly drug use in 2005. A Bonnaroo worker was killed when he was thrown from a truck, and one festivalgoer was struck by Ricky Skaggs' tour bus in 2006.

There were no deaths at 2008's Bonnaroo, and this year saw a decrease in arrests at the festival. "Arrests were down about a third, but summonses were up 60 percent," Sheriff Graves explained. "We found a lot of drugs, but it was smaller amounts. We did make several large drug amount arrests and seizures." Well, Phish did headline two nights; when the band made their return in Hampton, Virginia in March, police arrested 194 fans, primarily for drug possession, use and distribution. The complete Bonnaroo crime stats have not yet been released.

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Song Stories

“Smells Like Teen Spirit”

Nirvana | 1991

"Smells Like Teen Spirit," named after a brand of deodorant marketed to girls, was Kurt Cobain's attempt to "write the ultimate pop song," he said, using the soft-loud dynamic of his favorite band, the Pixies. Cobain "had that dichotomy of punk rage and alienation," the song’s producer, Butch Vig, told Rolling Stone, "but also this vulnerable pop sensibility. In 'Teen Spirit,' a lot of that vulnerability is in the tone of his voice." Sadly, by the time of Nirvana's last U.S. tour, in late '93, Cobain was tortured by the obligation to play "Teen Spirit" every night. "There are many other songs that I have written that are as good, if not better," he claimed.

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