Bonnaroo tends to bring out the best in most bands. It’s a broad generalization, but it’s true – the festival is famous for breakthrough performances, unique collaborations and career-defining sets. For 2008, things seemed a bit different, however. With Metallica and Kanye West on the bill, it was clear Bonnaroo had shifted far from its jam band roots had dipped into pop music, of all things. But headliners aside, Superfly Productions had assembled one of its best lineups yet, with a vast range of genres, musical legends and even some only-at-Bonnaroo groups.

But despite the great overall lineup and standout performances, one artist and one performance shrouded the entire festival: Kanye West. The West drama began when Bonnaroo scheduled him at 8:15 p.m. Saturday on Bonnaroo’s second stage, Which Stage. Because this is his Glow in the Dark tour, West had his set moved to 2:45 a.m. Sunday on the main stage, What Stage – the first performer to ever play late-night on said stage. But apparently that wasn’t enough for West. After announcing delays until 3 a.m., then 3:15 a.m., then 3:30 a.m. – by 4:15 a.m., fans were still waiting for West to take the stage. For perhaps the first time ever, Bonnaroo fans were angry. Boos erupted sporadically, as did chants of “Kanye sucks!” and “Asshole.”

Finally, at 4:30 a.m., after all other performances at the festival had stopped, West finally took the stage, to a depleted crowd and a rising sun. He didn’t glow in the dark, he didn’t acknowledge the crowd, and he didn’t even give a good performance. Instead, West talked to his spaceship as he stormed around, rapping in a spacesuit while a band hidden below backed him up. It was West’s version of musical theater – an unfortunate mash-up of Spinal Tap and The Simpsons’ imagined Planet of the Apes musical. Fans who stuck around got an hour of West’s show as the sun rose, no encore, no explanation, nothing impressive. West’s performance will go down as Bonnaroo’s biggest blunder, but it doesn’t eclipse the dozens of fantastic performances throughout the four-day weekend. West’s ego may be bigger than the sum of all other Bonnaroo performers, but his antics shouldn’t be.

Because we can’t be everywhere, Diversions picked eight of our favorite sets to break down. But trust us; this is only scratching the surface of the Bonnaroo experience.

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Vampire Weekend

It may be June, but the buzz on Vampire Weekend still hasn’t dried up. And its headlining set at This Tent on Thursday night solidified the band’s potential, assuming it learns to grow a bit. The band’s pseudo-Afro-pop and punk was a delight to the packed tent full of hipsters and hippies alike, all trying to ride the good vibes emanating from the stage. The band seemed a bit nervous to be playing to a primarily jam happy crowd as singer/guitarist Ezra Koenig joked, “We’re like a jam band – we just play shorter songs.” And both the songs and the set were brief – VW finished 10 or so minutes early, but the band put on a good show, though it was not much different from its February headlining tour.

The band ran through the album, scoring raucous applause and sing-a-longs during “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa” and “Oxford Comma.” The band could loosen up a bit more often, and when it did at one point during a new song, the results were headed to an interesting place until Koenig cut things short by stepping up to the mic. It would have been nice to see the band attempt a cover or two – it was Bonnaroo, after all – but, hey, there’s always next year. – R.G.

Umphrey’s McGee

It’s remarkable to think how you could go to Bonnaroo this year and not see a single jam band during the four days, yet still have a packed schedule. In fact, it wasn’t until 2006 that Bonnaroo really started to branch out, so it’s fitting to see a few bands from the early years still bringing the Tennessee heat. Progressive jam rockers Umphrey’s McGee made its fifth Bonnaroo appearance this year, with an early Friday afternoon slot on the Which Stage. The band ripped through one of its proggiest, darkest and most aggressive sets, perhaps in anticipation of Metallica’s looming performance that night.

After the band segued from the trance-based “Wappy Sprayberry” into newer song “The Floor,” things turned dark as the clouds overhead foreshadowed the night’s eventual rainfall. Once the three-part, 10-minute instrumental “Wizard Burial Ground” hit, it was clear the band was set to shred and it wasn’t going to stop anytime soon. Guitarist Jake Cinninger’s soaring leads continued with a set-closing sequence that featured “Bridgeless,” “Miss Tinkle’s Overture” and an experimental “Higgins” with Jeff Coffin (Béla Fleck and the Flecktones) sitting in on saxophone. Later, UM played a shorter, much more relaxed set to a few hundred fans (and two members of the Disco Biscuits) at the smaller Sonic Stage. Coupled together, the band proved jam still has a place in Manchester. – R.G.

The Raconteurs

Let it be known – The Raconteurs are rock ‘n’ roll stars in every good sense of the word. Sporting an Elvis Presley haircut (or was it more Ronnie Spector?), Jack White commanded the stage from the opening notes of “Consoler Of The Lonely” through the hushed close of the fabulous murder ballad, “Carolina Drama.”

No mere one-man show, The Raconteurs is most definitely a sum of its individual parts, borrowing pages from the main acts of all its contributors. Brendan Benson, though not quite a guitar virtuoso in the league of White, traded tasteful licks with his counterpart throughout the show. As witnessed in the rousing lead-in jam to “Blue Veins” or in the extended “Broken Boy Soldier,” The Raconteurs have only grown tighter in the last two years, begging the question of whether The White Stripes will in fact continue to be White’s top priority. – Z.H.

My Morning Jacket

Bonnaroo was set to be My Morning Jacket’s release party for its fifth album, Evil Urges, but leave it to Jim James & Co. to take a party and make a spectacle. Already one of the true “Bonnaroo bands” – MMJ has played the festival five times – MMJ’s late-night set at Which Stage cemented the band as the Bonnaroo band with a career-defining four-hour performance. Not only did the band dust off most of Evil Urges and all the venerable MMJ classics, but the band also brought the covers with unexpected readings of Bobby Womack’s “Across 110th Street” (complete with horns!) and Velvet Underground’s “Oh! Sweet Nuthin’.”

As the rain poured down – almost constantly during the set – the band ripped through a series of classics to close the first set, including a horn-backed “Dancefloors” that had the crowd jumping and “One Big Holiday,” featuring Metallica’s Kirk Hammett on guitar. By the time MMJ closed with a cover of Motley Crue’s “Home Sweet Home,” you couldn’t wipe the smiles off the thousands who stuck around to brave the rain and the 4 a.m. end time – this was a show for the ages. – R.G.

Cat Power

Putting her past troubles behind her, Chan Marshall was all smiles with her current incarnation of the endlessly soulful Cat Power. A bit sleepy in the afternoon heat, Cat Power’s Saturday afternoon set chugged along, pulling heavily from her most recent covers album, Jukebox. Guitarist Judah Bauer (Blues Explosion) proved to be a valuable addition to Marshall’s touring band, counterbalancing some of the organ/piano-heavy compositions. A few surprises, namely a cover of Smokey Robinson’s “The Tracks of My Tears” and an appearance by Spooner Oldham, made Cat Power’s performance a worthwhile venture for those who dared to skip B.B. King’s conflicting set. – Z.H.

Levon Helm and the Ramble on the Road

Giving My Morning Jacket a run for Bonnaroo 2008’s must-see show, Levon Helm emerged from this year’s festival as the most appreciative performer with the most appreciative audience. The reverence on and off the stage was not merely out of dutiful respect for the man’s past accomplishments – emboldened by his solo album, Dirt Farmer, Helm is as relevant and captivating a performer as ever.

Backed by Larry Campbell (Phil Lesh and Friends), a smoking horn section and occasional harp from aging bluesman Little Sammy Davis, Helm alternated between mandolin and drums, delivering a perfect mix of solo material and classic cuts from his days with The Band. There are not a whole lot of Bonnaroo moments capable of competing with Helm’s show-stopping performance of “The Weight,” a song as well-worn as the performer behind it. – Z.H.

Phil Lesh & Friends

If any one living musician could be considered the forefather of Bonnaroo, he might as well be Phil Lesh. As a performer, the bassist has headlined the festival three times. His return to the festival was set to be another marquee performance: Saturday at Which Stage from 12:15 a.m. to 4:15 a.m. The show started a bit late, perhaps bowing to Pearl Jam, which was still finishing up on the main stage. Lesh and his current band – featuring folk rock guitarist Jackie Greene, lead guitarist Larry Campbell, drummer John Molo and keyboardist Steve Molitz – took the stage to a depleted crowd, but it didn’t seem to affect them. Greene ripped through the “One More Saturday Night” opener with a Bob Weir-like vocal delivery.

Things really started to pick up once it was clear the band wouldn’t be taking a set break during “Fire on the Mountain.” A set-closing “Sugaree” stole the show with Greene belting out the vocals with a passion and intensity not seen since Jerry Garcia sang the song. But then the set ended abruptly at 3 a.m. when Lesh came out to announce that, due to schedule changes and Kanye West’s big show on the main stage, the encore would be the band’s last song. The crowd jeered and Lesh looked more than irked. As someone who helped build Bonnaroo’s foundation, he deserved better. – R.G.

Robert Plant & Alison Krauss featuring T-Bone Burnett

With the Sunday sun low in the sky, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss brought their Raising Sand revue to a welcoming Bonnaroo crowd. The band’s psychedelic-Appalachian sound could not have found a better home than echoing through the Tennessee hills from which it came. Backed by Sand mastermind T-Bone Burnett, the once unlikely, now wholly natural Plant-Krauss duet plowed through a mesmerizing set of covers, narrowing the gap between Sun Records and Led Zeppelin.

Krauss’ gothic country reading of Tom Waits’ “Trampled Rose” chilled to the bone, while the band’s rocking set-closer, the Everly Brothers song “Gone, Gone, Gone” kept things grooving along. Though the set felt a little truncated at 90 minutes and some of the intimacy spoiled by noise pollution from other stages, the crowd-pleasing renditions of “Black Dog” and “The Battle of Evermore” washed over the festival grounds, announcing Plant’s presence as finite across any generation. – Z.H.