The annual Pitchfork Music Festival will be returning to the Windy City in full force this summer July 18-20. To celebrate the announcement of this year’s lineup I’ve put together some brief descriptions of a few of the big names that will be appearing at this year’s festival.
Pitchfork Music Festival 2008- Union Park, Chicago
Lineup:
Friday, July 18
Special Performance by Public Enemy (more details on this to come!)
Saturday, July 19
Animal Collective
!!!
Vampire Weekend
Dizzee Rascal
No Age
Atlas Sound
Fleet Foxes
+ many more!
Sunday, July 20
Spiritualized
M. Ward
Boris
Extra Golden
El Guincho
+ many more!
---
Animal Collective
How can you pull off pop-rock and chaotic electronica at the same time? The answer: Animal Collective. Originally from Baltimore, this New York-based quartet broke through on the indie scene with their critically acclaimed eighth studio album Strawberry Jam. Listeners have described Animal Collective’s studio work as experimental electronic indie rock. Live, Animal Collective’s shows border on pure craziness. However, somehow throughout all the hopping around and dancing, Animal Collective manages to control their chaos and put on a pretty damn good show.
One final thing worth noting about Animal Collective: The band’s drummer Panda Bear, is the musician whose album Person Pitch won the coveted Album of the Year 2007 Award from Pitchfork Media.
!!!
Pronounced “Chk Chk Chk” !!!, like Animal Collective, is a big dance party bottled up into one band. In its full form, !!! has eight members who all play a vital role in creating the party that is !!!. Their live show, if you can believe it, is even more intense and chaotic than their studio work. To be frank, this is probably an act worth skipping. Don’t believe me? Check this out:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Jlr9Mc6pQcI
Vampire Weekend
Few times does a band take off as quickly as Vampire Weekend. Less than a year ago, the college-age foursome from New York was playing shows for free at one of Columbia University’s sorority houses. But after a few New York City music bloggers caught onto Vampire Weekend there was no stopping them. Vampire Weekend has been arguably one of the worst kept secrets in New York music culture; as their mainstream success has quickly forced the band to go on a nationwide tour rather than just playing Brooklyn coffee houses and nightclubs. You can catch Vampire Weekend at Pitchfork, Bonnaroo, SNL, or even an episode of the NBC show Friday Night Lights which featured one of their hit songs A-Punk.
Dizzee Rascal
What? A British rapper that combines American garage hip-hop with Reggaeton? Dizzee Rascal definitely constitutes an act at this year’s festival that only Pitchfork could have dug up. Personally, I couldn’t even get through listening to the tracks on Dizzee Rascal’s myspace, but if British Reggaeton mixed with electric samples is your thing than you’ll go nuts for Dizzee Rascal at Pitchfork 2008.
No Age
Have you ever wondered what Blink 182 might sound like if they tried to make legitimate garage rock? If the answer to that question is yes than you should definitely check out No Age, specifically the song Everybody’s Down.
Atlas Sound
This self-described psychedelic-grunge rock band is definitely another must-see act at this year’s festival. With its five members, Atlas Sound puts together a distinct and unique sound that will probably fit a daytime slot nicely. Sound-wise (no pun intended), Atlas Sound combines electronic beats and synths with classic indie-rock guitar riffs to create a relaxing musical experience. Atlas Sound will likely provide a much-needed break from all the dancing and chaotic music that will consume the first day of the Pitchfork festival.
Spiritualized
For those of you hipsters who love indie rock but want to avoid the craziness of Animal Collective or !!!, Spiritualized is the band for you. In the song Good Dope Good Fun, Spiritualized creates a sound that will fit wonderfully in a concert setting while on tunes like Ladies and Gentlemen the band uses beautiful harmonies to develop a rather overpowering sound that may or may not translate well in a live setting. Whether or not you plan on attending Pitchfork this summer, definitely check out Spiritualized.
M. Ward
In my opinion, blues is a hit or miss genre; either you get it or you don’t. While M. Ward probably has the right idea, in my estimation, he still misses the mark. Some genres should be adapted into the modern era and delta blues is one of them. If you’re having a hard time imagining what M. Ward might sound like, imagine a combination of Ben Harper, Amos Lee, and Matt Costa.
---
Overall, this year’s Pitchfork Music Festival lineup is probably a little weaker than last year’s star-studded lineup which contained acts like Sonic Youth, Clipse, Girl Talk, Cat Power, Iron and Wine and De La Soul. Obviously, there are many more acts to be announced, but it is becoming rather clear that the indie establishment at Pitchfork is trying to take the festival in a different direction, likely capitalizing on getting a large quantity of lesser-known acts for a cheaper price rather than going for a few big names with a greater number of relatively unknown artists.
Luckily, Pitchfork-goers can take comfort in the fact that Yoko Ono will not be appearing at this year’s festival.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Great post!
We added you to our links
Animal Collective: described as "experimental electronic indie rock" perhaps but the clip provided is hardly evidence of "pure craziness" unless you're referring to the camera angles and editing or the gentleman with the headlight strapped to his forehead attempting to be a human strobe light.
!!!: I saw a clip of their performance at Cochella last year and was super psyched about seeing them at Lolla. In this clip and on the surface their album they seem like a fun band to be into but actually watching them was painful. Yes they had the big dance element but the singer came off as trying to be something "harder" than just a dance/electro group. I stuck with them for about 5 songs before ditching them and hating myself for cutting out on Iggy and the Stooges.
I can't say much about the other bands since I've never heard of them and there were no easy links to check them out in this post so I'll just skip right on down to M. Ward. Judging from the songs available on his MySpace I can understand perhaps not liking him as an individual artist but I don't think it's necessary to write off the entire genre of blues or suggest that it be absorbed into "the modern era". So delta blues may not be your thing but there are plenty of other variations of blues out there. Some my my not-so-big-name favorites are The Davey Brothers (punk blues), Indigenous (rock blues), or the Shuffletones (classic blues). These guys might not convert you either but they're worth a listen.
Keep plugging away at these reviews!
I didn't convey it very well, but I'm actually a huge fan of Delta blues. It's really this new mod-blues genre that I don't like.
Keep reading the blog, in a few weeks I'll be doing a piece about the history and current state of the Chicago blues scene.
As for M.Ward...
Clearly, I think my analysis of M.Ward based on his myspace songs was pretty misguided. I've been getting screamed at over at the lollapalooza message board for misrepresenting his music. I guess I'll have to revisit him at some point.
Post a Comment