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bonnaroo

Not Stamps, Nor Coins

August 22, 2007 by krisis

As sad as a commentary as this is on my recent listening habits, the excitement I feel about purchasing new music is as of late hardly ever a tangible one.

Really, it’s just the thrill of acquisition, and the subsequent thrill of careful examination and deconstruction. I could just as easily be a philatelist or a numismatist, so irrelevant can the actual fact that I am acquiring or examining a song be.

That said, at the moment I have two discs on my desk that I’m profoundly excited about.

The first is Grace Potter and the Nocturnals This Is Somewhere.

GP&N were one of the bands I had penciled into my Bonnaroo itinerary last summer. The festival was dotted with a precious few front-women, and most of the review I read were positive. So, on Saturday shortly after noon I planted myself in a dusty side-tent to hear the band for the first time.

They utterly blew me away. Grace Potter and the Nocturnals sounded like a feral, weedy, Joplinesque overgrowth of Sheryl Crow’s funky self-titled disc. Grace was an incendiary lead singer, wailing, screaming, thrashing her guitar, dancing behind her Wurlitzer, and leaping off of stage pieces to mark a number of huge crescendos. However, through all of that she was somehow still folksy – more an analog to Bonnie Raitt than to the PJ Harvey she was invoking.

Also of note, guitarist Scott Tournet was terrific, not only to listen to but to watch – a trait so many of the jam band guitarists I witnessed in passing didn’t seem to possess. (Listen below to his superb solo on the still-unreleased “Over Again” – I’m in there, screaming, somewhere. It’s currently available only on the overseas versions of the new disc.)

On the drive back I insisted we stop at the first civilized-looking mall to pick up the debut GP&N disc, but I was quickly disappointed – the disc was a calm, sterile affair, showing none of the vim of the live performance that had riveted me the day before. And, all of the best songs were absent from the disc!

This Is Somewhere has a few of those songs, and I’m hoping it fulfills the promise the Nocturnals made to me last June. Even a whisper of it would make my day.

If Grace Potter represents yet-unheard promise, then Rilo Kiley’s Under the Blacklight is a reverent hope for a return to form.

In 2002 I had no idea what Rilo Kiley sounded like – just that they were fronted by a woman and on Barsuk Record (which, back in the Death Cab’s better days, really meant something). I remember distinctly my first listen to their second disc, The Execution of All Things; I was meant to be drifting off to sleep in Elise’s bed, but I was instead riveted and wide awake.

At first RK seemed like a sort of indy-rock version of Garbage to me, one whose lead singer – lacking the queer confidence of a supervixen – instead wrote wryly about friends and potential apocalypses. But as I continued to listen I came to appreciate the significance of contributions from co-leader and guitarist Blake Sennett, who brought a tuneful, Elliott Smith-like melancholy to the proceedings, even when he was relegated to the background.

As my appreciation for the Rilo increased I also continued to play – and, now, co-write – with my best friend and musical partner Gina. One day, listening to two of Gina’s best paeans to the end of the world – “Real End” and “Fisher Price” – I realized that the strange pair of us had a chance at the same hooky, kitschy relevance that I had grown to love about RK.

It was like realizing for the first time what you want to do when you grow up – because I had. So, it was with great excitement that I purchased 2004’s More Adventurous – hoping to vicariously live out the next chapter of Gina and my musical development. Unfortunately, my excitement was quashed from track one – despite its title, the disc was a shapeless lump of peculiarly unhooky narratives, headlined by a spare duo of the superbly indie “Portions for Foxes” and the 60s Country spin through “Never Again.”

Having conceded that Rilo had lost their touch to the sappy post-folk, it came as no surprise to me when lead singer Jenny Lewis struck out on her own with an acoustic solo disc – Rabbit Fur Coat. More meandering nonsense, I assumed.

Well it wasn’t. Not quite, anyhow. As opposed to Adventurous, on which the band often seemed aimless if not excessive, Rabbit seemed like an eager bed made for absent riffs. And, it made some waves – indy and not.

Under the Blacklight is Rilo Kiley’s first major label disc, and its first after Jenny’s solo breakthrough. And, from the throbbing bass and reverberating guitar on the – yes, queer – lead single “Moneymaker,” I think the band may be back on some sort of track, even if Gina and I have since gone off the rails in our own direction.

I can’t yet recommend either disc, but I recommend getting this excited about a record. Not because you have to have it to complete your collection, or because you love an artist so much you can’t stand the wait, but because you have a fervent hope that you are about to be introduced to life-altering music.

Filed Under: arcati crisis, essays, music Tagged With: bonnaroo, gina, PJ Harvey

What I Found In the Shade

November 28, 2006 by krisis

I’ve been saving this story all month, and editing it all night.

It’s time to live out in the world, little post. Be free.

This summer i went to a music festival and came back happy.

That’s the short of this story. The details are almost immaterial. I left a whiny grump and returned not. Sure, i’ve whined and grumped a little since then, but i can’t summon up the same intensity of either, or of meanness, as i’ve already mentioned.

I can’t say that I can pinpoint a single aspect of the experience that lead to this transformation, but there is at least one specific story emblematic enough to serve for the purposes of this post, and that also – maybe – fundamentally changed the way i think about people and life in general.

It was Friday afternoon at Bonnaroo, and it was hot.

Bonnaroo is a 80,000-person four-day music festive thrown each June in the middle of a dusty farm in Tennessee. When it gets hot at Bonnaroo your forms of recourse are (1) get soaking wet, (2) retreat to your air-conditioned vehicle, or (3) locate shade. There are few other viable options – waiting in line for the internet tent for twenty minutes of cool air and connectivity, for example – but nothing foolproof.

I was dead in the center of Centeroo, the sprawling music-venue and village-center to all Bonnaroo happenings. I was attempting to watch Ben Folds, but it was too hot and he was uncharacteristically terrible – i couldn’t hack it.

The Fountain was jammed with human flesh. The car was a deadly half-mile or more hike away, and i didn’t even have keys.

I had to find shade.

I started to wander around Centeroo, assessing my options. The edges of performance tents and out of the way trees were already monopolized by small cities of beach chairs and towels. The prime spots at my favorite café were snagged. I was starting to despair, and maybe inching towards heat-stroke.

Turning down a particularly wide avenue of vendors, i spotted a wizened old tree with a smattering of ‘Rooers relaxing underneath. It wasn’t superior real estate – it was more akin to sitting on the ground in front of a row of shops at a strip mall. But, at least it was shade.

I sat. I rehydrated and ate a granola bar. I reclined. I fanned myself with my floppy cowboy hat.

I woke up.

The waking up came as a surprise, as i had no recollection of going to sleep. I definitely recalled the reclining, and the the last thing i remembered was fanning myself with my hat.

I had fallen asleep in the middle of an outdoor hippy mall. This is exactly the thing my mother warned me about. I was probably robbed blind, stripped naked, and infected with syphilis.

I sat up with a shot, groping around me to see how many of my possessions had been stolen and sold for glass and chocolates on Shakedown street. Everything seemed to be intact (including my clothing and my dignity).

Somewhat assuaged, i reached into my pack to fish out a walkie talkie so i could re-establish communication with the team.

It was then i noticed them.

The nappers.

Around me, where before there had been a few scattered concert goers having a rest was now a gathering of ‘Rooers, alternately chatting and peacefully sleeping. Not just a handful, but an expanse, the limbs of those on the fringe practically inside some of the adjacent shopping stalls.

It was as if the wizened tree’s roots had suddenly blossomed into a gaggle of reclining hippies fending off heatstroke.

It was beautiful.

I gingerly picked myself up, careful not to disturb the woman napping next to me. Carefully tip-toeing my way out of the mass, i radioed the team.

“You would never believe what just happened….”

I’ve been raised my whole life to believe that if you leave a car unlocked a bum will pee in it, and if no bum is available someone else might do the deed just to teach you a lesson. Yet i went to a four-day music festival in the middle of a giant dusty farm and not only camped out, but took a nap in the middle of a busy thoroughfare only to awake unmolested to find that dozens of people had joined me.

Something fundamental about my outlook on life changed at Bonnaroo. No, it wasn’t just the napping. It was the sheer joy of arriving in one piece and pitching a tent, the sheer desperation of morning number three when i wanted to be airlifted back to the comfort of my own home, and the victory of Sunday night as we crossed back into Virginia. It was the resignation that, yes, i made it home improved by the experience.

My outlook was broken by Bonnaroo. I used to be No-centric, delighting in my ability to deny. Now i just want to say yes … to push myself a little farther each day, and to watch all of my friends do the same.

And that’s the story of Bonnaroo and my (so-far) never-ending positive outlook.

(I swear i really am going to write “The Complete Yuppies’ Guide To Bonnaroo” as soon as this NaBloPoMo dealy is over with. Seriously. Much wisdom will be dispensed.)

Filed Under: NaBloPoMo, self-aware, stories, Year 07 Tagged With: bonnaroo

Tastes Like Burning

June 27, 2006 by krisis

During my mucho hanging out with Mary prior to Bonnaroo she turned me on to the magic that is Listerine. My only standing association with the stuff is my grandfather keeping it in his bathroom, and it smelling so toxic that i was sure it was supposed to be aftershave and not mouthwash, as its commercials implied.

In any event, i’ve been using it since i returned from Tennessee, and i have to say that i love it. Anything that makes my mouth numb and my eyes tear is either great for oral hygeine or fantastic for mixed drinks.

Sadly, rarely both.

Filed Under: thoughts Tagged With: bonnaroo

Stab Her Back!

June 25, 2006 by krisis

Think of my what you will, but hearing the Dresden Dolls cover the Marice Sendak poem about me in surround sound in my own living room got me all choked up.

However, it does not compare to the surreal synergy when they launched into a note-perfect “White Rabbit” exactly a week ago at Bonnaroo.

Yet, even that couldn’t hold a candle to the awesome power of their sophomore effort Yes, Virginia…” In case you don’t believe me, behold the terribly destructive catchiness of “Backstabber.” Beware, it may fundamentally alter the course of your musical existence. If that tickles your fancy, perhaps also sample “My Alcoholic Friends“? But, don’t go reachin’ for that “repeat” button unless you first reach for your wallet to purchase the tracks for your very own.

I humbly submit that the Dresden Dolls seem to have finally found their way onto my critical radar.

Once you get past a certain strangeness inherent to parts of Amanda Palmer’s vocal delivery there’s really nothing not to like, especially if you appreciate good drumming, because Brian Viglione is spectacular. I know that this band of the polarizing hipster band ilk, but you have to give a touch of benefit of doubt to any act savvy enough to be regularly labeled “Brechtian punk cabaret.”

Filed Under: mp3blog, weblinks Tagged With: bonnaroo, dresden dolls

A Picture Share!

June 19, 2006 by krisis

This store was the 1st stop on our roadtrip a week ago, and now it’s gone.

Filed Under: phonecam Tagged With: bonnaroo

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