It was supposed to be our Hot Vax Summer, months of heady revelry after a year and a half of isolation and fear. But anti-vaxxers and the Delta variant have put a damper on things, plunging a lot of us into the fresh despair of knowing there's a way to end the pandemic but that a lot of people just don't feel like doing their part.
When guidelines for vaccinated adults were relaxed a couple of months ago, the live music industry roared back to life. It was nearly impossible to score Phoebe Bridgers tickets when her fall 2021 tour went on sale. Coachella 2022 passes sold out within hours in June. Lollapalooza drew something like 100,000 people to Chicago's Grant Park each day of the four-day festival, making it one of the largest gatherings in America since the start of the pandemic. Everyone allowed in had to prove they were vaccinated or recently tested negative for the virus. But the risk of catching Covid-19 has also been on the rise again, and the photos of so many people packed so closely together made a lot of folks feel anxious.
