My Odd Future experience began at the Green Line platform near Chicago’s downtown. Of all the people waiting to go to the final day of the Pitchfork Music Fest, quite a few had made it blatantly obvious who they were going to see.

One particular group of fans sported homemade t-shirts with Odd Future insignias on the front, followed by the devil’s number and some choice words for Casey Anthony on the back. They were certain it would be the most chaotic thing any of them had ever seen. They also asked if Pitchfork was a fest consisting entirely of DJ’s, so it was clear that they were going solely to experience Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All (OFWGKTA).

That occurred around 1:00 p.m. Sunday, and the fans boarding the train at that point would have been lucky to see the action that was to take place almost 3 hours later.

Many fans present for indie-punks YUCK’s set were just staking claims and waiting for the 3 o’clock hour to roll along to see Odd Future, the 9-member hip hop collective who’ve generated buzz releasing their music free via their Tumblr account and rapping about the most despicable acts of random violence plaguing American society, including (but not limited to): murder, rape, sexual-orientation driven violence and stabbing Bruno Mars in his esophagus and not stopping until the cops come in (they also hate cops).

Sunday at Pitchfork was the only day which sold-out in advance, and it was obvious many came to see one act. The massive crowd gathered hours early was also predominantly white and teen-aged, lowering the median age of the festival some years from the previous two days. They stood shoulder-to-shoulder, fronts-to-backs for hours in the 90-plus degree heat. To pass the time, the masses began to chant. At first it was “swag,” then “Golf Wang,” and finally “kill people, burn (expletive), (expletive) school.”

One nationally-renown music critic stepped up to a viewing area near the side of the stage and, upon inspection of the crowd, said the scene was “most distressing.”

The remark may not have been addressing the crowd’s brooding violence as much as that the sight of Odd Future’s name on the Pitchfork line-up was enough to many into frenzied protest. Multiple gay-advocacy and domestic abuse awareness groups threatened to picket outside the festival against the misogynistic nature of OFWGKTA. They drummed up enough noise in the press that they were allowed booths inside festival grounds to counterbalance Odd Future’s words.

The negative press may have caused the Pitchfork people to sweat, but Odd Future reacted sarcastically. Ring-leader Tyler arrived on stage wearing a tie-dye shirt with a peace sign as the Black Eyed Peas’ ‘Where is the Love” played. He proclaimed his love for the anti-domestic violence groups while rapper Hodgy Beats shouted “one love!” to the crowd who was uncontrollably swaying from the pressure being put on them from late-comers in the back.

But the party was over before it began for many fans up front, as event staff began pulling fatigued kids from the crowd before the first chorus was shouted. And if a fan was not in reaching distance of the staff, the masses would crowd-surf their half-limp bodies overhead and towards the stage so that they could receive ice and water from the staff. One young girl turned up covered in blood from an apparent head wound (first aid did not report any major injuries).

Brutal mosh-pits formed stage right when the rappers would occasionally jump off stage and into the crowd. Afterwards, a fan told me that Odd Future’s tour manager jumped from the stage and landed on a teenaged girl, who was injured during the ordeal.

It may sound as though the note-worthy occurrences happened anywhere but the stage, but that is only half true. OFWGKTA knowingly curated the chaos through their aggressive rhyme schemes, which have been hailed as complex and visionary in many publications.

I may not be one to disagree with that sentiment, but it is worth pointing out that many Odd Future choruses or hooks are repetitive chants championing the most mindless of violent acts. They say them because they can and ascribe no deeper meaning to their words, which can work to devalue their well crafted and terrifying versus.

For example, a lyric like “I’m stabbing any blogging (expletive) hipster with a pitchfork” is, yes, violent, but also contains some humor and creative word play. But a chorus such as “I’m Dracula, (expletive)/ don’t got a problem smacking a (expletive),” isn’t exactly satirical.

Still, the legions of Odd Future diehards would repeat such a line like it could mean something to them, like it was this generation’s “Born to Run.” How can that be? Well, no one present Sunday would wish for Bruno Mars’ death, but his omnipresent, terribly cheesy pop tunes do make one want to bang their head against a wall. Odd Future’s popularity derives from their taking a somewhat universally felt sentiment and dramatizing it.

But what about an elementary school-aged kid who appeared up front after being crowd-surfed to the stage. He was dressed like Tyler in blue Vans and knee-length socks, and he was young enough that people were asking where his parents were.

He stuck around long enough to scream at Hodgy Beats as he was walking off stage. Hodgy jumped the railing to go meet the kid, and spent a couple minutes waiting for the boy to figure out his camera. It would have been a heartwarming moment if not for the fact that Hodgy had just finished announcing his violent desires to a mind-altered crowd of teens looking for pop culture figures with some semblance of an unpredictable side.

For that boy’s sake, here is hoping that the random violence in Odd Future’s lyrics is intended as a creative way to relieve stress. Better yet, let’s hope it is construed that way by their legions of young fans.

_Joe is a senior in Media._