Kirstiecat | Blog

(Day one should appear beneath this entry)

Before I start talking about the music and post pictures of bands, I wanted to take a quick moment to post a couple of pics of the crowd and the people there:

This was taken along the side of the entrance and one of the stages….very little space to walk which made running around with a camera like a maniac more difficult!

people listening to music with the John Hancock building in the background:

removed from the main stage areas was a section of the festival where you could choose an old record cover, some art supplies and make it into a work of art. Here is a pic of people rummaging through boxes of records to do just that:

There were also a few kids here and there as I believe children 10 and under were let in free. It was really a nice opportunity for families to enjoy music together. I must say, I wish there had been even more children there. It was really nice to see. I did take pictures of the ones I did see here and there. I hope that if another music festival of this calibar is organized again in the future, more families come to experience the music.

Ok…now to the music:

THUNDERBIRDS ARE NOW:

Wow…these guys are from Detroit and are sort of what I would expect to hear when I’m told a band is from Detroit. They had a rocking side to them definitely and I was thankful for my earplugs so that I didn’t hear ringing for the rest of the day. That being said, they were loud but also had a great deal of youthful energy…a really overall stellar stage presence. In terms of their stage presence only, they kind of reminded me of what I would expect if I went to see a very young Guided By Voices play. Their sound, though, had a much harder edge at least live (I’m not sure what they sound like on album.) and I would have actually liked some more of the synthesizer just to bring out some melodies a little more prominently. They were definitely having fun up there and I can see them really growing as a band as they age and their sound becoming more matured and something I would definitely enjoy hearing.

Here are some pics of this set:

As you can see, they were a bit spread apart so here is one of just the lead singer only:

Here is one of just their bassist:

DUNGEN:

Now…I really wanted to like this band. I mean, they are from Sweden (also home of the Shout Out Louds and the Concretes) and not only that but they also sing in Swedish. But I actually, try as I might, couldn’t get into them at all. They didn’t really have enough melodies to capture my interest and they didn’t really have enough catchiness either going that route. They sort of seemed all over the place…there were some moments I did like but overall, I just wasn’t connecting with them as a band. Now, a couple of people later on commented that they sounded great on album and that they had been having guitar problems so maybe perhaps it was a bad live set for them because of that. In any case, I did take a couple of pictures. They sort of reminded me looks wise of a Swedish T Rex:

XIU XIU:

Wow did I really love this band…it really fits into the more experiemental arty type stuff I have been getting into more and more only, unlike Deerhoof, the band features a male lead singer, Jamie Stewart. The instrumentation is bizarre-not only the selection but how it is used but the vocals added a very melodic sense to it, reminiscent of Antony from Antony and the Johnsons with alot of melody and a bit of vibrato…the lead singer really putting his heart into this. At times, you felt like they might not be totally aware of their surroundings because they were so seemingly emotionally into what they were playing…passionate I would say. It’s really quite a shame they didn’t bring merch with them. Ah well, will go record store hunting as usual.

Here are some pics from that set:

OUT HUD:

This was one of the absolute highlights for me definitely. I love Out Hud’s albums but they just aren’t the same when you aren’t able to dance outside to them in the sand, really feeling the bass and the movement. Visually, it was also more asthetically pleasing than Four Tet as they were playing with a whole band…love that female lead singer’s voice (Phyllis Forbes) but the backing violin was also something that set them apart from other bands of this style. All I wanted to do was dance dance dance They were dancing and getting into it as well. The lead singer was actually tossing out many bottles of needed water and all of the snack sized bags of food someone had set out for the band into the audience. Wow, did I ever enjoy their set! I even put on some Out Hud this morning but it just wasn’t the same as being outside and really feeling that music move through you.

Here are some pics:

THE HOLD STEADY:

Wow…after the introduction in which the host went on about all of the talk shows they’d guest starred on, I felt like I was really watching a band that had made it or something. I liked their catchy sensibility but the lead singer also has some wry, perceptibly vulnerable lyrics hidden a bit underneath the raspy sounding vocals. I admit, for some of this set I was definitely reserving myself a close spot for Andrew Bird (sigh, Andrew Bird…possibly the most talented musician in all of America at least imo) but even from a distance, I could hear the Hold Steady holding their own so to speak…every song sounded like a hit that you’d hear on the mainstream radio waves. Of course, it has been so long since I have actually listened to anything besides community radio that I wouldn’t know either way.

Some pictures of this set:

ANDREW BIRD:

yeah..can’t say enough good things…between the whistling, guitar, and violin and that sweet wonderful voice of his making the atmosphere lighter with every breath…I have probably seen Andrew Bird at least fifteen times and he just continues to grow lyrically and musically with every album. My only regret for this show is that he didn’t have Nora O’Connor backing him. He did have Kevin O’ Donnell on drums though. I’ve noticed he seems overall less neurotic when he has Kevin or Nora there. It was so nice to let that music make your bones soft while the curtain in the back billowed to show a partly obscured house. He played mainly newer songs off of The Mysterious Production of Eggs (brilliant album) and I would have liked to have heard a few songs off of Weather Systems but it was still so relatively perfect…felt a tear around “Sovay” and “Nervous Tick Motion of the Head to the Left” was perfect perfect…so good. I was singing it all the way home on the el and I caught someone whistling along with me further down the el car. It was so beautiful…so special…of course, most of the others all had their ipod buds in so they were spared.

But yeah…such a great inspiring set…And even amidst lyrics of “We’re all basically alone” he did manage to talk a bit about how he had been walking around Chicago yesterday after guest starring as a whistler on AC Newman’s set and that he really felt very optimistic. This was precisely before he sang “Armchair of the Apocalypse”

Here are some pics:

DEERHOOF:

Hello mood swings! I’ve been a Derhoof fan ever since they released MilkMan and then I started going back into their catalogue…I was able to see them not too long ago at this place called the Open End Gallery here in Chicago and I have to say I enjoyed them in that more intimate setting better. That said, this San Fransisco band still played a good set…missed some of my favorites but overall played well.

Now, let me tell you something about Deerhoof…they are a bit scatterbrained and inaccessible at first. I had the same sort of reaction when I first heard Clinic on the radio. It was an automatic, “I’m going to turn this crap right off” so to speak….BUT THEN….it was like I couldn’t get enough of it!! Seriously…all of a sudden the notes were like blood in my veins and I NEEDED Deerhoof. Ditto for Animal Collective, who are also great live in an intimate setting. Gosh, I’ve gone entire days with the inane lyric “Strawberry fields banana trees” stuck in my head over and over and over again. I just can’t get enough. And the lead singer and bassist, Satomi Matsuzaki at first almost seems like she’s just shrieking nonsense but then all of a sudden, after you listen to it more and more, something just clicks and makes sense. And it’s melodic in its own way. So if you hate Deerhoof on first listen, I advise you to give them about fifteen more chances until it feels right. That’s what I did.

Here’s some pics. Some are through a fenced in area. At first, I was going to delete them but then I thought they might fit in with the nature of the music.

THE WRENS:

I don’t have anything against the Wrens but I connected way more with their music when I saw them at Schubas (200 person venue) a while back. It just didn’t seem to translate well to a huge outdoor venue…very emotional which I usually like but it kept coming off a bit whiny and off key. The only album of theirs I own is called Meadowlands and I find just listening to that at home on a nice afternoon much more wholly enriching than seeing them like this I guess. The Wrens are also another band that Pitchfork heaped multitudes of praise on whilst bashing albums I thought were more creative and thought provoking.

My state of mind also wasn’t the best at this point just because it was coming to the end of two days and I was feeling tired, very overheated, claustrophobic, dehydrated. a little sunburnt and with no place left for even one more freckle. Oh wait I’m whining..but considering I’m talking about the Wrens here, it kind of fits, no? Just kidding. I really like the Meadowlands to reiterate. And I don’t like saying negative things about any band…so instead, I will just post a couple of pics. In one of these pics, they had some friends join them and sing with them on stage.

ALSO, I cut out a couple of times during the Wrens set and managed to take this pic of James McNew of Yo La Tengo doing a dj set. Now, the quality is really poor because it was very very dark in this dj tent. I apologize for this.

LES SAVY FAV:

I’ve never really gotten into these guys…they have a harsher sound and yet their songs do have a subtle catchiness…I think maybe because I recognized all of them from the community radio waves here in Chicago. It’s possible. The lead singer, as you can see, is quite a ham and he brought a bubble machine to highlight his more sensitive side…er that was a joke.

THE DECEMBRISTS

And finally, the end. It sounded great with the sweetness of the male/female vocals and the violin and cello really adding something special. I took a couple of pics but now, cut me some slack with this one because I have a crappy digital with a crappy flash and there were about ten eight foot tall men standing in front of me no matter where I went. So these couple of pics I actually took on tip toe balancing on the top of two stacked sandals. Like I said, cut me some slack:

I wanted to do more for the Decembrists, to capture their beautiful essence and fragity..their hidden delicateness that touches me. At one point, people were dancing in the sand with happiness and so I did some long exposure pictures. If you can’t see people dancing, it’s because you aren’t looking hard enough.

I’m going to end this with a picture I took right before the green line pulled into the Ashland stop and before I got off for the music festival. I could really relate to this little boy…he was looking out onto the city just like I look out onto the world of music, with curiosity and hope for the future…with a sense of wonderment. I could really relate to him. I hope that never changes for me.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 18th, 2005 at 2:14 pm and is filed under music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.