Showing posts with label lollapalooza. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lollapalooza. Show all posts
, , , , , , , , , , , — 0 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Wild Belle


Coachella’s this weekend (and next weekend!). I haven’t been, but I would go. I think. The most commercial (and at 400 bucks a ticket—I can only hope—the most expensive) of them all, it doesn’t even have the usual “music festival” suffix. It’s just Coachella. Like Madonna. Like Mao. Like Monsanto. Like Mom.

Much called-for attention has been paid to the corporatization of music (festivals), Coachella often the bright red cherry on top of the conversation. Isn’t that what Occupy Wall Street’s all about? But seriously, if your favorite bands play music festivals and hardly tour on their own (because they can’t afford to or are too tired to), then it makes sense to shell out a month’s rent for a ticket to see (most of) them in a single, drug-fueled, laser-produced weekend. Right?

It’s like everything else. How do we break the cycle of everything vs. nothing? How do we say yes, without saying no to our conscience. How do we tell the world we don’t want corporations to run (everything / the only) creative outlet many working class lovers have left, music? How do we convince our favorite bands (we’re so pleased they made it) they ought to tour in an out-dated fashion, like on a miserable bus, so we can see them at our favorite (God-willing they’ve survived) local  venues? How do we ask our friends to please come with us when we have to relieve ourselves in a public portable bathroom in the middle of a set, because we’re afraid we won’t find our way back to them ever again? I mean, music festivals are insanely fun, but I just don’t know if they’re worth the messy glamour, when it means giving up our precious music to corporate maniacs. "What's the definition of love if it's not material things?"

Which leads us to today’s Festival Bands, Man! feature, Wild Belle. A very fashionable band of Chicago siblings, Elliot and Natalie Bergman, usually joined by various talented instrumentalists. I’ve been following Wild Belle’s tumblr for over a year now (I believe they're currently based in L.A.); it’s a beautiful collection of images that reflects their over-all aesthetic: Afro-fuzz-60s-cool-desert-sex-love-and-light. Try ‘em on for size if you like soul singers, Lykke Li, late 60s African instrumentalists like The Movers, and tape-deck Atlantic Island music. It’s easy listening, and beautifully dispatched. Plus, who doesn’t love the bari sax?

On the track, “Happy Home,” from their debut album, Isles, Natalie sings, “I don't wanna be here,/ that's why I'm acting out,/ I wanna flee,/ but I don't know how,” then in the chorus, “Everybody in fancy clothes…But nobody really close,/ Everybody wear what family chose.” It gives the impression artists are as concerned as we are—even though they’re not afraid to bring it up to us, they don’t know how to ask the boss the big questions either. Not when they’re getting paid well enough. Are music festivals the artistic equivalent of the stable desk-job? Just comfortable enough to survive without going broke or totally mad? A cozy cubicle where—at best—we, “ain’t gonna cut [our] hair, even if you say./ I know it’s growing long, but I like it that way.” If growing our hair is still the best we can do, I’d like to insight a protest. Who’s with me?

DETAILS

Band: Wild Belle

Festival: Coachella, California

Venue/Stage: The Outdoor Theater

Date & Time: Sunday, April 14 12:00PM - 12:30PM 



, , , , , , , , , , , — 0 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Low Litas


Today’s Festival Bands, Man! band is Low Litas, a native all-female trio playing the Easter Island Festival (April 11-13, 2013) outside Tulsa, Oklahoma. Started by Mandii Larsen—who put out the band’s only recording to date in 2008—Low Litas’ song-writing is very straight forward and based on simple observations, but the way it’s woven musically makes it less precious, like silken armor. 

 In “No Good For You,” Larsen reads the phrase, “I’m no good for you,” again and again, and we start to think it’s her. But by the end of the song (and the album), we learn the reason she’s no good for you is because she’s “too good for you.”

In a world where girls and women are not treated equal to boys and men—where many girls are raised by a reward system that skews their self-worth (sometimes irreparably so)—the phrase “I’m too good for you” is practically a warrior truth or stotra. Something every girl should utter at least once in her life (not that she'll want to). 

 On the track “You Want Me,” Larse tells a friend who can’t let go of “him,” “Girl, you’re a sucker now…you’ll give up everything, you know you’ll miss out.” This comes in the middle of a nearly entirely instrumental track that begins with the kind of grounded musical excitement many songs can only close with. Throughout the whole EP, the samples are interesting, the composition is very pretty (but dark and heavy in a basement-princess way), and the lyrics are pencil poems.

Low Litas sounds like Warpaint, Metric, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and other great, psychedelic “girl bands.” Bitchin'.

DETAILS

 Band: Low Litas

Festival: Easter Island Festival, Oklahoma

Venue/Stage: The Clubhouse

Date & Time: Sunday, April 13 2:30PM - 3:15PM





, , , , , , , , , , , , , — 0 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Wet Hair


After last week's Festival Bands, Man! feature, I got a friendly email from Mike Siemens of Psychic Rites, thank you. Good luck with your music video! 

This week's feature is an Iowa City experimental band, off the Iowa City Mission Creek Music & Literature Festival going on April 2-7, called Wet Hair—the best best band name I've seen in a while. I love the whole tight-shorts-on-percussion-organ getup: a Night-People record label guy and his friend, both from Racoo-oo-oon (a quieter, more atmospheric, psychedelic quartet that broke up in 2007), plus another friend from Goldendust (a fancier, bleeped-out, shoegazey group). 

So what does Wet Hair sound like? A bit like Atlas Sound, Crystal Antlers, Indian Jewelry, and The Doors. But more importantly, their sound is unique even while calling up vibrations of the collective universe. It reminds me of a French New Wave film score, but it also breaks open with alms of bouncy bass guitar and dial-twisting—as if music itself could become unconscious and dream. It's ethereal yet rooted, sad yet raucous. It's Wet Hair. 

Their latest album, Spill Into Atmosphere, came out in 2012. They have several LPs, each one quite different. (I recommend In Vogue Spirit, 2011) They're opening, along with Love Songs for Lonely Monsters, for Deerhoof at Mission Creek Festival. 

DETAILS

Band: Wet Hair

Festival: Mission Creek Festival, Iowa City

Venue/Stage: The Mill

Date & Time: Sunday, April 7 9:00PM




, , , , , , , , , , , , , , — 0 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Psychic Rites



Psychic Rites, founded in Moscow, Idaho, is today’s FestivalBands, Man! feature. I found the self-described “aimless filters of sentience” cruising the Boise, ID Treefort Music Festival lineup. Moscow (Josh Ritter’s hometown) is a small hilltop university town where of a dear friend of mine grew up. An intense girl with a squeaky clean face and a piercing mind, I often wondered where a rebellious spirit like hers goes to play in a place like that: the woods, mostly; but there’s a hardness in her musings that seems cozier in concrete. Which is probably one of the reasons she’s a scientist. She’s a barefoot Idaho hippie, comfortable walking on cool moss or cold stone.

Psychic Rites has a similar expression—hell, the first single from their self-titled EP is “Concrete.” Another track, “Whispering of Eternal Things,” actually samples the pew-pew of a crowded city crosswalk. Cold, dark, wooded, wild, smooth, fresh: their music captures a European seriousness as well as a sprightly butterfly in its intricate electro-net. It’s sexy, forlorn, and folkloric, but totally Northwest American. Perfect for a chilly springtime night. This is Psychic Rites second year at Treefort. Full album due out this fall.

DETAILS

Band: Psychic Rites

Festival: Treefort Music Festival

Venue/Stage: The Crux

Date & Time: Thursday, March 21 12:30AM -1:30AM




, , , , , , , , , , , , , — 0 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Daedelus


Considering thousands of arts lovers are trying to figure out their SXSW schedules and the website doesn’t have the bandwidth for it, I’m moving onto the March 8 & 9 festival, the New Orleans Buku Music + Art Project. I’m a sucker for anything with the word project in it: equal parts academic and workhorse. Which is exactly why prolific L.A. producer, Daedelus (Alfred Darlington), is the Festival Bands, Man! feature of the week. Also, because I’m reading Ulysses for the first time.

I went to a small Daedelus show a couple years ago, and his set up is unbelievable. A labyrinth of soft bright buttons EVERYWHERE! It’s hard to imagine each one is actually responsible for a new collection of sound. I found myself mesmerized by his speed—like a snake charmer—and could visualize the inside of his brain, each fold a cushion of light and music.

Just as James Joyce’s work is filled with abstract diversions, beautiful descriptions of intellectual goings on that make way, ever so subtly, to the daily transcript of what was going on all the while—the reader gets to day dreaming with the narrator—Daedelus (spelled differently than the Greek artisan and Stephen)’s gorgeous outpourings are fucking hard to understand.

I don’t even like it that much. It’s a bit much! (Like your really smarty pants friend who sometimes gets on a roll talking about a topic of Passion and you just have to bail until he catches on with a joke to break it up). And that’s what Daedelus is known for: throwing in a couple pop songs that are instantly transformed into a better quality leather, and in turn, make the rest of his furious ramblings seem much less eager.

He’s a genius producer and deserves a lot of respect and for us to lend our ear, because if he were a scientist, he would get a ton of funding, and if he were an author, we would read between the lines with painstaking gaiety. 

 DETAILS 

 Band: Daedelus (producer)

Festival: Buku Music + Art Project

Venue/Stage: Float Den

Date & Time: Saturday, March 9 11:00PM -11:45PM




, , , , , , , , , , , , , — 0 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Equals


The second band in our Festival Bands, Man! series (in which I compare a band playing in a festival lineup to other, more familiar bands, and give you some details about their live show), is Equals. An experimental band from Austin, Texas, playing The Hideout at SXSW this year, Equals is like your friends’ bands, those that play art houses and tour locally, and sometimes get in a mini-van and play a few hours away. That’s not to say they’re not extremely talented musicians, but ambient, jazzy post-rock is a challenging genre to garner public interest, because it’s more personal reflection than musical expression. You have to be exceptional in some way; for Equals, it’s in the musical composition. 

With the release of their first (self-titled) LP, engineered by Alan Douches (who’s worked with Animal Collective and Sufjan Stevens), Equals quickly (though not with certainty) sweeps up a little jam-band debris into a heavy can of silvery snare reps, scraps of guitar madness, and electrified, lolling melodies. It’s spell-casting music that will get festival goers in the mood for something rougher and weirder as the days tick by at SXSW; Equals, upbeat and impatient, like a séance calling up someone newly buried. 


Band: Equals

Festival: South By South West (SXSW)

Venue/Stage: The Hideout

Date & Time: Tuesday, March 12 9:00PM -9:40PM




, , , , , , , , , , , , , — 1 comments

Festival Bands, Man!: Suuns


Today’s the first post in a series I'm calling, "Festival Bands, Man!"

The idea is I pick a band I like that’s playing on the U.S. festival lineup, compare it to stuff, and give you the info on their show. I’ll go through music festivals (chronologically) like SXSW, Coachella, Austin Psych, McDowell Mountain, Electric Forest, Bonnaroo, Camp Bisco, Pitchfork, Newport Folk, and Lollapalooza (to name a few!), and hopefully locate some hidden gems.

Today’s Festival Bands, Man! band is...Suuns!

Suuns, one of the many, many rock bands playing at SXSW this year, is a quartet from Montreal whose next album, Images Du Futur, comes out March 5, 2013. So they're touring with new material, but kind of like Tokyo Police Club (after their first LP), they don’t need it. Their 2010 debut, Zeros QC, is very complete. The white-light, pretty rock reminds me of fellow Canadian pop artists, Caribou (who, btw, played one of the best live shows I've seen), but with way more electric guitar (to a classic rock degree) and not quite as much synthetic jingle bell. It also sounds like post-punk band Clinic, splashy electronic duo Fuck Buttons, and like me, when I sit down with a chaos pad and vocoder on my mouth (which means -loosely- it’s got a psytrance, home-sound vibe). The bass these guys supply can be powerful, so their live set could be nice and sweat-heavy.


Band: Suuns

Festival: South By South West (SXSW)

Venue/Stage: Red 7

Date & Time: Thursday, March 14 9:45PM -10:20PM

Venue/Stage 2: Swan Dive

Date & Time 2: Thursday, March 14 1:00AM - 1:50AM





, — 10 comments

Lollapalooza Announces Lineup, Immediately Disappoints


I don't make it to many festivals.  I can never seem to find one where I love the lineup(although last year's Pitchfork lineup was amazing), and when I do, I have a conflict and can't make it(damnit Pitchfork).  One of my best, and only, festival experiences was Lollapalooza in 2006.  Nearly all of my favorite bands - Wilco, Broken Social Scene, My Morning Jacket, Iron & Wine, the Flaming Lips, the Shins - were there and I have been trying to return since to recapture that magic.  My goal for this summer was to go back.  The fesitival, which since 2005 has gone away from the traveling circus to staying rooted in Chicago's Grant Park, is slated to go down on August 3-5 this year.  While Lolla tickets when on sale a couple weeks ago, the lineup was not revealed until later last night, something that still annoys me.  How can you pay for a lineup that is not even out yet?  No matter because with all of the rumors that have been floating around the past month (Sigur Ros!  M83!), the festival had to be good this year right?  Right?  As I eagerly clicked the link to check out who was going to play, I was immediately let down by the headliners.

Black Sabbath?!?  I am sorry to all Sabbath fans out there, but if I wanted to see Ozzy Osbourne mumble around stage, I would buy season one of The Osbournes(ugh) and call it a day.  Red Hot Chili Peppers?!?  They were one of the headliners in 2006(one of the only weak parts of that weekend) and they still are not relevant in my opinion.  The Black Keys round out the headliners, and while I don't dislike the Akron duo, I can't be the only one who is just frankly a bit sick of them can I?  Now headliners are not everything, but I want at least one act to look forward to ending the evening, and I have zero.  Those M83 and Sigur Ros rumors turned out to be true after all.  Couldn't one of them headline?  Can't you imagine M83, who never may be bigger than this moment, playing "We Own the Sky"or "Wait" as the sun sets over Lake Michigan, or Sigur Ros making the tens of thousands in Grant Park tear up by playing "Staralfur" on one of those beautiful Chicago nights.

Some of the smaller acts do catch my interest.  The Walkmen, one of the better live acts and most consistent indie acts of the last decade, will certainly be a highlight as they play some new tunes from their upcoming album Heaven.  Sharon Van Etten released one of my favorite albums (Tramp) of the year and would certainly be worth a look on one of the smaller afternoon stages.  The War on Drugs are one of my favorite new(er) bands, and while I never got into At the Drive In, I certainly wouldn't mind checking them out as they reunite and experience the hype I missed out on years ago.

Maybe I will still go for a single day.  My best friend lives in Chicago so I could always make a weekend out of it.   Lets wait for the schedule to be set though.  Wilco is playing in Rochester that same weekend so maybe I will just save some money and check them out instead.  And I apologize for my bitching, but it is what I do best.  The full lineup, tickets, and everything else Lollapalooza can be found here.  The two rounds of early bird tickets ($70, $200) are no longer available, but you can still get the three day pass for a reasonable $230.  See you there!  Well, maybe.



mac mcguire

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)