Bonnaroo 2008 Thursday (Day 1): Festies Ain't Easy, But They Sure Are Fun

Going to a festival is not all fun and games. The live concert experience is never assured bliss. There are so many external factors that could go sour. A huge fest like Bonnaroo has an army of these possible setbacks. But sometimes overcoming the odds and the elements can be the recipe for an unforgettable weekend.

So after hanging out in Manchester a little bit Wednesday night, I rode back into town in the morning to pick up my press credentials. I then went to my hotel to await the arrival of my caravan of ATLiens. One of the cars in our group had a road cone fly up and crack their windshield in Chattanooga, forcing them to abandon their vehicle to repair and then squeeze their gear and bodies in other folks' already tightly packed rides. The slight travel delay here would seem insignificant compared to the traffic jam we would wait in shortly after.

Now I'm from Atlanta so traffic isn't new to me, but sitting still on the side of the interstate for 5+ hours is just never that fun. This would actually be the longest I've ever waited to get into the 'roo. As is typical, everyone gets out of their cars and socializes on the side of the road to pass the time, and then as soon as the line starts moving a bit, everyone scrambles into their rides to grab another 50 feet.









After getting through the gate, and then still waiting in line to get a campsite that wasn't too far but wasn't too close, the inevitable, unbridled, and unrelenting blitz of setting up camp and partying begins. There is nothing like a cold beer after sitting in your car all day. Well, maybe like 10 cold beers.





Suddenly it is late afternoon and time to check out Centeroo. The nice stroll across the campgrounds leads to waiting in line to go through security, and going inside to search out a schedule. They had ran out of guide books when we came through the gates and the only ones I have even seen so far are a horde back in the press area. I tested my credentials and took a look backstage. Things were a little different then last time I had been back here, but still pretty similar. It was at this time the partying, heat, and lack of sleep this week struck me like a punch to the face, and after cooling off in the press tent, I went back to camp.

After regrouping and recouping, our crew made its way back to Centeroo, and this time had to wait in a ridiculously slow moving line to get in. We made it to MGMT a song or two into the set and the tent was packed out. The crowd reactions to the songs seemed very surprising to me, everyone was going crazy. It seemed like everyone at the fest knew and loved these songs, so I guess these guys are pretty big now. Just like last time I saw them, at times I really enjoyed it, and at other times I lost interest.

I made my way up closer for Battles, and they put on a hell of a show. When I saw them last year at Pitchfork Fest, I was really far away and couldn't tell how fun they are to watch live. Everyone who saw it was raving about it. With my second wind dying down, I decided I was in no mood to stick around for Vampire Weekend, and went back to camp yet again. Tired, intoxicated, and with everyone else at my camp slowly fading into the night, I sucked it up and took a few brave souls back to Centeroo again to catch the late night Royal Bangs show. It was a wise decision and the grueling day ended with a pleasant reward. The Troo Music Lounge is about the smallest venue in the fest, so the setting was more up my alley, and the band exploited its almost nonexistent barrier between the crowd and themselves. The crowd wasn't huge, but they were all going wild for this one. Seeing them live just reinforced everything I liked about them and I can't wait to have them again at our show next week.







Well, It's time to catch more music, so keep it here for total coverage.

Live Show: Battles (1/23/2008)

Leading up to Bonnaroo, I'm going to try and drop some live shows from artists who will be there. Here's the best band playing Thursday night:

Battles
23 January 2008
Beck's Festival Bar
Sydney Australia

(Beware: Tracklist is a bit lacking and the first track takes a while to get going, but its a cool show)

01 Intro > Race: Out (?)

02 Tij (?)

03 (?)

04 Tonto

05 Atlas >

06 Atlas (continued)

07 Leyendecker

08 Race: In (?)

09 (?)

10 crowd
11 (?)


Download Lossless Torrent Here

Battles Myspace

Torrents Of The Day: DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist, Kid Koala, Battles, Arcade Fire, The Mars Volta

photo by Sleo

There are some some great shows floating around The Traders Den right now, so here you go. First, there's this Arcade Fire:

Arcade Fire 2008-01-30 The Forum, Melbourne, Australia (FLAC)

While we wait to see if that TMV Atlanta show actually happens, here's something to keep us busy. This is the first time The Mars Volta have ever done an FM broadcast of their show, so pick this essential one up:

THE MARS VOLTA FM BROADCAST - 1.30.2008, UC Irvine (en-dw remaster) (FLAC)

If you want to get a taste of what will be one the best shows at Bonnaroo, go get this:

Battles 2008-01-28 Big Day Out, Flemington Racecourse, Melbourne, Australia (FLAC)

If you missed the Cut Chemist, DJ Shadow, and Kid Koala show a few weeks ago, here's another recent show to jam:

Kid Koala 2008-02-04 First Avenue - Minneapolis, MN (16-bit) (FLAC)

DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist - The Hard Sell 2008-02-04 First Avenue - Minneapolis, MN (16-bit) (FLAC)

This video that Sleo got at the ATL show will explain what the DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist Hard Sell concept is:

Friday Free-Style

Bjork Monday night at The Fox was really great, but compared to the other time I saw her at Radio City Music Hall in New York back in 2001, I thought it was a little lacking. Monday night was a little too short, the song selection i thought could have been a little better, and the stage show didn't seem quite as epic, but it is kinda like going to see Micheal Jordan play a basketball game and complaining he only got 30 points. Pitchfork got some really great pics of the show. Here's a little sample if you missed it:



While looking for that, I found this (Yeah Yeah Yeahs covering Bjork's "Hyberballad" at Criminal Records):



Moorish Idols have two hot new tracks, "Saint EOM" and "That's A Moray", on their myspace.

The Echo Project has announced a pre-party Wednesday night October 10th at the Georgia Theater in Athens, Ga featuring Infected Mushroom.

Jens Lekman will be at the Drunken Unicorn on November 16th.

VHS Or Beta will be at the Earl September 24th.

NPR, in typical awesome NPR fashion, has some concerts you can listen to now:

• The Apples In Stereo
• Andrew Bird
• Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie)
• The National
• The Polyphonic Spree

Rage Against The Machine's Zach De La Rocha just finished a solo album that features former The Mars Volta drummer/badass Jon Theodore.

British Sea Power are releasing a new EP called Krankenhaus? in October.

Radiohead are finally releasing their material digitally, but are requiring you to purchase the entire album.

Creative Loafing has a review of the East Atlanta Strut.

Here is the rumored Gutar Hero 3 tracklist.

Check out this video of Thurston Moore previewing his new solo album.

And here's some vids to take you into the weekend:

Battles


Interpol


Les Savy Fav

Pitchfork Music Festival: Day 2

We arrived just in time for Califone, who was running a little late. They played 4 or 5 songs and they were pretty good. They had a horn section with them which was cool, but it seemed a little underwhelming. We went in close for Grizzly Bear and listened to Voxtrot from afar. I have to say that I don't really like Voxtrot that much, I think they are over-hyped by the internets. Grizzly Bear, on the other hand, lives up to all the hype. Despite Chris Taylor having some issues with his ridiculously complex equipment setup, they put on the day's best show. If you have not listened to Yellow House yet, do it now fool! I tried to catch the end of Beach House but only caught the last 30 seconds of "Master Of None". By far this was the worst schedule conflict of the fest, especially for the bands themselves as Grizzly Bear and Beach House are both fans of each other. Next up we went to see Battles. They were very impressive. The former Helmet drummer John Stanier was rock solid and had a cymbal up really high so he had to reach up to hit it. It was gimmicky but really cool. The rest of the band used lots of looping computer programs to put together their songs piece by piece.

We skipped Iron And Wine to check out the festival grounds, which were expanded from Friday's setup. They had a huge poster shopping area with almost 50 tents each selling handbills. After that we checked out Atlanta's Mastodon. Their typical badass performance had a mixed reception from the pitchfork kids. Most of the people farther away were complaining and those that stayed up close were rocking out. There was even a mosh pit. Because it was so crazy up front for Mastodon, I was able to get front row and center for Cat Power afterwards on the stage as most of the other Chan Marshall fans weren't so much into the Mastodon scene. It pays to like all kinds of music. I listened to Clipse from the front of the other stage and they were what I expected, decent for a live hip-hop show but nothing to get excited about. Cat Power came on with the Dirty Delta Blues Band. In this performance, Cat Power would not touch a guitar or piano. Instead, she would be leaning over the crowd singing songs from The Greatest, covers, and songs I didn't recognize. I am not a big fan of the nu-Cat Power that is sober, doesn't freakout, and does country/blues music and this was farther in that direction than the three times I saw her last year. It was still great to see her, especially as close as we were, but i don't think I'm going to see her again live until she either starts playing old stuff again or does some new stuff that is not so conservative and, well, ordinary. We wanted to check out Girl Talk but the tiny staging area was packed out beyond belief and the sound system over there was not powerful enough to hear farther back. If I had one complaint about Pitchfork Fest so far it was the sound system problems, of which there were many, and the sound checks drowning out quiet parts of bands performing on the adjacent stages. We skipped Yoko Ono and went into the city to drink into oblivion. Here's some pics from the day:

Friday Free-Style

In case you haven't noticed, our blogging has been a little brisk lately as we are enjoying the summer. But don't dismay as we have a bunch of cool stuff cooking in the lab for you.

We'll start today off by getting krunk with Kanye West:



Pitchfork Fest has sold out and released set times. While you are enjoying Corndogarama, we will be covering this in Chicago.

John Vanderslice will be at The Earl on September 20th.

Weezer is about to record another album.

In case you don't, Beach House are awesome, and they be talking.

The Cure are working on the new album still and will be at The Gwinnett Center September 15th.

Band Of Horses are just finishing up their new album.

The Led Zeppelin reunion rumour mill is on again.

Rage Against The Machine will be headlining this year's Vegoose Festival in Las Vegas. The full line-up will be announced in mid-July.

Here's Ryan Adams on Letterman:



Here's an old The Rapture video:



Here's a Battles video:



Some Cat Power for you:



A Califone video:



Some Girl Talk:



Some The Ponys:



And finally, some Of Montreal:

Bonnaroo Weekend In The ATL

If you aren't going to the 'roo this weekend, it is still a really great week for shows in Atlanta. Tonight you can see Rush at Hi-Fi Buys, The National at The Earl, or Les Claypool at Variety Playhouse. Thursday night there's a great show at The Earl I highly recommend with Maserati, The Liverhearts, and Good Friday Experiment. Friday night there is a ridiculous amount of great shows. First, Battles, who I've fallen in love with recently, will be at The Drunken Unicorn. That's my pick of the week. But there are three other great shows. Lenny's is hosting The Stills and Go Motion, who we saw and was amazed by earlier this year. The Earl is boasting my new ATL faves Snowden, plus All The Saints and The N.E.C. Then Feist and Grizzly Bear, who we heart, are at The Variety Playhouse. Seriously, if you are not going to Bonnaroo you are required to go to one of those four shows friday night or you will lose mega cool points.

The New Hottness: Battles

"Math rock" is a genre that I always kind of understood, but could never really explain until I read up on wikipedia after hearing this album. Whatever you call it, this avant-garde supergroup is amazing. I had been listening to some really great albums lately, but this is such a standout. Listen to these tracks and then go buy their album, Mirrored.

• Tonto
  
• Leyendecker

Here's the bonus tack from the Japanese version:

• Katoman

Now here is video of their entire show at the Empty Bottle in Chicago earlier this year:



Buy Mirrored Here

Battles Myspace Page