2014 August – Showbams

First City Festival continues to raise bar in second year

August 29, 2014 by Molly Kish 1 Comment

Photos by Pedro Paredes // Written by Molly Kish //

First City Festival //
Monterey County Fairgrounds – Monterey, CA
August 23rd-24th, 2014 //

First City Festival celebrated its second year this past weekend in Monterey with gorgeous weather, enthusiastic crowds and a lineup filled with incredible talent. In a setting that felt as though it was constructed to host the effortlessly engaging festival, the Monterey County Fairgrounds perfectly displayed what many of the artists and attendees quickly deemed “the most peaceful and beautiful festival we’ve ever been to”.

We were here yesterday and this is the most peaceful/beautiful festival we've ever been to." @CultsCultsCults @FirstCityFest

— Showbams (@showbams) August 25, 2014

Even while boasting two days and three stages full of some of the biggest names currently touring in rock and indie music, FCF managed to curate an intimate experience across the board for both the bands and their adoring fans. In fact, creating an atmosphere that bridges the gap between the performers and audience members is rarely seen in a festival context and with artists of such caliber.

PERFECTLY PICTURESQUE SETTING

The proximity of the fairgrounds contributed heavily to the tone of this past weekend’s event, allowing casual traversing throughout the festival grounds and for crowds to escape the bustle and stress that most anticipate when trying to navigate amidst conflicting set times and stage distances. Notably, the stage positions in relation to their audience gave fans ample room to really take in and enjoy each performance, providing crowds comfortable accommodations scattered throughout the festival’s scenic surroundings. Sprawling lawns and benches under the shade of languid cypress trees, along with aesthetic touches of hanging chandeliers and multicolored spotlights, added to the natural beauty of the fairgrounds. Even in the rodeo area of the Redwood Stage, crowds could get as close as they wanted to the main attractions to elevate their experience in the seated boxes and perimeter rows, or they simply could enjoy the show underneath the glowing strings of bulbs hanging above that illuminated each evening’s final performance.

The National’s Matt Berninger

INTERPERSONAL ARTIST EXPERIENCES

The festival’s artists even took note and spoke directly to their audiences while performing on stage, as well as took in their peers’ performances amongst the crowd. All throughout the weekend, you could saunter around the fairgrounds and catch many of the artists taking pictures, talking with fans, catching another band’s set or jumping on a carnival ride. Many artists took advantage of how intimate the venue was and set out to have personal discourses with their audience by ways of:

• commenting on attendees’ outfits (“I see you blue shorts” – Tanlines)
• encouraging audience participation (“those bubbles are really doing it for me” – Future Islands)
• holding an impromptu singalong (“Happy Birthday” – The Naked and Famous)
• incorporating the audience into their performance altogether (The National’s Matt Berninger stage diving and leading a procession, sharing the microphone and singing with crowd members throughout the entire duration of a song)

VIP TREATMENT FOR ALL

Most festivals go out of their way to truly separate their VIP ticket holders from the general admission crowds, segregating the very important people who choose to drop extra cash from the masses while still providing a memorable festival experience. Whereas FCF did offer perks to the VIP bracelet elite, the other ticket holders weren’t completely left out of the festival’s atypical accommodations. After all, the benefits of simply attending FCF regardless of admission status far surmounted the expectations of many audience members and truly set the bar for competing festivals nationwide.

• Cocktails, micro brews and artisan food options were available to purchase throughout the festival regardless of someone’s wristband ranking
• Access to indoor bathrooms, charging stations and seated areas at all stages we’re open to the general public
• The Monterey County Carnival was also free to everyone who attended (although VIP ticket holders could jump ahead of the line)
• Lines were near obsolete throughout the entire fairgrounds, with the worst being the 15-minute wait while security checked your belongings upon entering

Future Islands’ Sam Herring

BEST OF THE FEST

Beyond the overall successes of the festival, there were also plenty of musical moments and entertainment highlights over the course of the two days at the fairgrounds. Here are some of our favorites from the weekend.

Most Underrated Festival Fare: Gerard’s Paella (vegan)
Best Commitment to Character: Puddles Pity Party (crowd roaming and panhandling between sets)
Best Set to Kick Start Your Morning: Lake St. Dive
Most Crowd Inspiring Performance: Future Islands
Set Most Likely to Break the Soundboard: How to Dress Well
Snarkiest Band Banter: Tanlines
Biggest Distraction (tie): Low-flying planes preparing to land over the Cypress Stage; Phantogram lead singer Sarah Barthel’s hypnotizing hot pants and accentuated legs
Best Time Travel Moment: “Funky” Beck’s disco-fueled, throwback interlude

"If you’re ever wondering what its like in a Russian nightclub in'91, this is it right here!" @beck @FirstCityFest

— Showbams (@showbams) August 24, 2014

Best Carnival Ride: Wave swinger from Neverland Ranch (watch here)
Most Enthusiastic Marketplace Crew: Festival poster booth (igniting post-fest dance parties)
Greatest Between Set Activity: Vinyl perusing at the Beat Swap Meet
Most Unnecessary Festival Accessory: Beacon, flag or group location device
Most Memorable Moment: The National’s unlit romp through the rodeo crowd
Best Reason to Come Back Next Year: To experience the festival’s accessibility before it blows up

Future Island’s Sam Herring

The National’s Matt Berninger

Filed Under: Featured, Festivals Tagged With: Beck, Best Coast, First City Festival, Future Islands, How to Dress Well, Lake St. Dive, Monterey County Fairgrounds, Phantogram, Puddles Pity Party, Tanlines, The Naked and Famous, The National

PHOTOS: The Rosebuds at The Independent 8/26

August 29, 2014 by Marc Fong Leave a Comment

Photos by Marc Fong //

The Rosebuds with El May //
The Independent – San Francisco
August 26th, 2014 //

Raleigh, N.C.-based indie rockers The Rosebuds have been going at it strong for more than 10 years now with multi-instrumentalists Ivan Howard (vocals, guitar, drums, bass, keyboards and programming) and Kelly Crisp (vocals, keyboard, drums, guitar and accordion) leading the way. Releasing its sixth and newest full-length album Sand+Silence earlier this month on Western Vinyl, the duo brought its beautiful, yet haunting melodies to The Independent on Tuesday night. El May, featuring Australian musician/composer Lara Meyerratken (currently based in Los Angeles), opened the show just hours after dropping their sophomore LP The Other Person Is You on British indie label Lojinx. Marc Fong was back at work, capturing The Rosebuds do their thing from start to finish.

Filed Under: Featured, Photos Tagged With: El May, The Independent, The Rosebuds

Jack Johnson spreads good vibes (and many hits) at the Greek

August 28, 2014 by Sam Heller 1 Comment

By Sam Heller //

Jack Johnson with Bahamas //
Greek Theatre – Berkeley, CA
August 26th, 2014 //

Returning to the Greek Theatre in Berkeley for the sixth time, surfer-turned-musician-turned-headliner Jack Johnson delivered a setlist on Tuesday that highlighted just how many popular hits he’s had over the years, while also stitching in a handful of covers.

Sam Heller was there to capture the moment.

Setlist:
Hope
Taylor
Sitting, Waiting, Wishing
Middle Man
Inaudible Melodies
You and Your Heart
Radiate
If I Had Eyes
Never Fade
Breakdown
Flake
Answering Machine Message
Tomorrow Morning / Bubble Toes
Not Fade Away (The Crickets cover)
Mudfootball
Wasting Time
Constellations
Upside Down
Rodeo Clowns (G. Love & Special Sauce cover)
Who Do You Love? (Bo Diddley cover)
Tape Deck
Banana Pancakes
Shot Reverse Shot / I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend (Ramones cover)
Staple It Together
At or With Me / Crosstown Traffic (The Jimi Hendrix Experience cover)
Good People
I Got You
Do You Remember
Better Together

BAHAMAS

Filed Under: Featured, Photos Tagged With: Bahamas, Greek Theatre Berkeley, Jack Johnson

If we never see Nine Inch Nails live again, it’s been quite a ride

August 26, 2014 by Josh Herwitt 7 Comments

Photos by Rob Sheridan for NIN.com // Written by Josh Herwitt //

When Trent Reznor told Nine Inch Nails fans six years ago that it was “time to make NIN disappear for a while,” no one knew if they would ever have the opportunity to see the industrial rock goliath perform again.

As someone whose musical palette was heavily influenced by such 90’s masterpieces as The Downward Spiral and The Fragile — two albums that will likely go down as some of the best rock music that’s ever been made — but never got to see NIN live, it came as a shocking blow to my psyche.

For me, NIN was always that band whose music felt uniquely original and accessible, yet remained frighteningly dark in image. More than 20 years ago, it was MTV that was forced to significantly censor the music video for “Closer” — still NIN’s most popular song to this day — in which Reznor combined themes of religion, sex, animal cruelty, politics and terror to go along with his disturbingly eerie lyric “I want to fuck you like an animal.”

Still, for as creepy as Reznor made himself appear — and there may be no better example than NIN’s epic performance at Woodstock ’94, which was officially released online almost two weeks ago — there is no band that has bridged the gap between heavy metal and electronic music better than NIN. From his early days as a sound engineer to his passion for analog synthesizers and digital technologies more recently, Reznor created a genre of music that few have ever come close to emulating. While other industrial acts like Ministry, MDFMK, Killing Joke, Filter and Rammstein achieved moderate levels of success at one point in time, none of them ever garnered the same mainstream appeal that NIN has sustained for more than two decades.

But even with two Grammy Awards and nine full-length albums to his name, Reznor has had his doubts about keeping NIN going. It’s why he announced in early 2009 that the band would be done performing live “for the foreseeable future” before embarking on its “Wave Goodbye” tour, which culminated in a 37-song show at The Wiltern in Los Angeles, before that fire was eventually rekindled with the release of 2013’s Hesitation Marks last September.

It’s not that Reznor fell off the face of the Earth during that five-year layoff, though. With NIN on an indefinite hiatus, he went on to win an Oscar and a Grammy for his soundtracks to The Social Network and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, write the theme music for the video game “Call of Duty: Black Ops II” and form the post-industrial outfit How to Destroy Angels with his wife and lead vocalist Mariqueen Maandig, whom he shares two children with now. Over the last two months, he’s managed to find the time to finish composing the soundtrack for David Fincher’s upcoming movie Gone Girl while touring North America with his NIN sidekicks for quite possibly the last time.

After all, from what he told the crowd last Thursday night in Chula Vista, Calif., Reznor has no plans for another NIN album or tour right now. Even if he continues writing music like he told us he would that evening, just miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, there is no guarantee it will be for NIN. And at this point, it would be completely understandable for Reznor to retire the band he once gave birth to 26 years ago in Cleveland, where it will likely return to some day for its induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Reznor, of course, isn’t getting any younger. At the age of 49, the NIN mastermind and only official member of the band has battled plenty of inner demons in his younger life, having overcome both drug and alcohol addictions, depression, social anxiety disorder and sadly, even his own suicidal tendencies. Now as a sober family man, he has openly admitted that the rigors of touring have taken their toll on him.

So, if this was the last time I ever got to see Nine Inch Nails perform live, I have no regrets attending four of the 26 shows that they are co-headlining with Soundgarden this summer.

In fact, seeing one of my favorite bands of all time at the legendary Red Rocks Amphitheatre was an absolute dream come true — a show that no doubt will go down in memory as one of the best I have ever witnessed in all my concert-going years. Then, there was Monday night’s noteworthy performance at the Hollywood Bowl, which marked another important moment for the band in playing the historic LA amphitheater for just the second time ever, with the first coming almost nine years ago following the release of 2005’s With Teeth.

Sure, seeing four shows — Red Rocks, Chula Vista, Irvine and Hollywood — on this tour might seem like overkill to some. For me, it felt like the right thing to do. It didn’t matter that the setlists have varied little from show to show over the last month. Instead, just having the chance to connect with the music and art that Reznor specifically curates for each NIN tour more than once is something I will always cherish, whether or not I ever get to do it again.

Because even if I don’t, I’ll know that those four shows I saw were worth every penny spent.

Filed Under: Editor's Picks, Featured, Live Music Reviews Tagged With: Hesitation Marks, Hollywood Bowl, How to Destroy Angels, NIN, Nine Inch Nails, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Sleep Train Amphitheatre, Soundgarden, The Downward Spiral, The Fragile, Trent Reznor, Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, With Teeth

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2014 complete lineup announced, and it’s incredible

August 26, 2014 by Mike Frash 1 Comment

Photos by Shawn Reiss // Written by Mike Frash //

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2014 //
Golden Gate Park – San Francisco
October 3rd-5th, 2014 //

The complete lineup for the 14th Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park has been announced, and feast your eyes on some of the highlights (we split acts into “Legend” and “Indie/Hardly Strictly Bluegrass” categories):

The Legends:
Emmylou Harris
Dwight Yoakam
Chris Isaak
Steve Earle & The Dukes
Rosanne Cash
Lucinda Williams
Dave Rawlings Machine
T Bone Burnett
Mavis Staples
Robert Earl Keen
John Prine
Holler Down the Hollow: A Hardly Strictly Salute to the Masters (Dickens, Hellman, Reed, Scruggs, Seeger, Watson & Winchester)
Many, Many More

Indie/Hardly Strictly Bluegrass…
Conor Brings Friends For Friday featuring Waxahatchee, The Good Life, Jonathan Wilson, Sharon Van Etten, Dawes, Conor Oberst
Ryan Adams
Tweedy
Built to Spill
Sun Kil Moon
Yo La Tengo
Social Distortion
Deltron 3030 with The 3030 Orchestra
Thao & The Get Down Stay Down
Hurray for the Riff Raff
St. Paul & The Broken Bones
Lukas Nelson & Promise of The Real
Lake Street Dive
Joe Russo’s Almost Dead
Red Baraat
Cibo Matto
Sister Sparrow & The Dirty Birds
Justin Townes Earle
The Felice Brothers
The Lone Bellow
Malawi Mouse Boys
The Sam Chase
The Aquabats! (Friday morning middle school program)
Poor Man’s Whiskey (Friday morning middle school program)
And many, many more!

Daily schedules have not been announced, but we already know Ryan Adams will conflict with the “Conor Brings Friends For Friday” lineup on … Friday. So, that’s one tough one. Oberst has been touring with Dawes this year, and Dawes has been Conor Oberst’s backing band as well, so the Rooster Stage should be a treat this year to start the fest.

This is undoubtedly one of the best HSB lineups yet. Is it too early to camp out for a prime spot? For newcomers, this fest is free thanks to the amazing gift from the late, great Warren Hellman.

Who are you most excited to see? Tell us in the comments section.

Filed Under: Featured, Festivals Tagged With: Golden Gate Park, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2014, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival Lineup

It’s official: Jack White is the biggest rock star in the world

August 25, 2014 by Mike Frash 1 Comment

Photos by David James Swanson // Written by Mike Frash //

Jack White //
Bill Graham Civic Auditorium – San Francisco
August 23rd, 2014 //

Severe ankle sprain, what? No big deal, the show must go on.

On a weekend with appealing festivals all over California, Jack White proved on Saturday that he’s not only a bonafide festival headliner for any occasion, but also the biggest and most essential rock star in the world.

The Jack White that showed up in San Francisco this past weekend was more focused and engaging than prior tours. He’s noticeably more upbeat and punk in how he performed than in the past, while also appearing authentic, positive, comfortable and likable.

So when the Third Man giant proclaimed, “From the Bottom of the Hill to the top of the hill” in reference to playing the tiny San Francisco club twice in 2000 with The White Stripes, he wasn’t bragging. He was stating a plain fact.

Jack White is the king of rock at this point in time, and he was magnificent on Saturday, not showing the effect of a bad ankle sprain within 24 hours of being pressured by his team to cancel the whole tour due the accident Friday night.

White is clearly on a mission to graduate to arenas after this theater-sized tour, and he’s on his way — so he’s not going to let some lower body swelling get in his way.

What’s most appealing is how White is achieving this feat within the boundaries of his established throwback style.

White and his band appeared from behind a massive theater curtain to launch into an impactful “Sixteen Saltines”, while a television from the ‘50s sticks out in the middle of the stage to remind you that this artist, who now sports an Elvis-like haircut, could have thrived in another era from the past. Also, it reminds you that looking at a bright screen is not very fun while at a concert.

Jack White was one of the first artists to speak up about concert smartphone photos and videos, and signs were put up on his 2012 tour asking fans to keep their phones in their pockets during the show. The public backlash was pretty brutal.

To clarify his position in 2012, he wrote “the only thing that we’ve ever asked of the audience is to not take pictures or videos while holding up their camera phones, etc that block other peoples view or otherwise hinder other fans concert experiences.” The message continued, “Along with that, the bigger idea is for people to experience the event with their own eyes and not watch an entire show through a tiny screen in their hand.”

Before the show began on Saturday, someone from White’s camp spoke to the crowd, reiterating these points in a comedic way, and the crowd erupted in support and applause. A lot can change in a couple years. Also, White has hired a tour photographer to cover the show in leu of discouraging press and crowd-based photography. They’re available on White’s site after every show, and as the speaker mentioned, “You can claim them as your own.” We won’t — the tour photos are courtesy of David James Swanson.

Labeled as grumpy, sad and controlling the past few years, White was the ambassador of fun during this show. Smooth transitions were a plenty, and songs would often play out in three to five song segments. The setlist was upbeat and energetic, slower songs were played faster than their studio recordings on most occasions, and the crowd was along for the ride, bouncing this positive energy back to the stage to fuel the frontman.

“Hello Operator” was absent of words but was filled in by an uproarious harmonica solo. The one Dead Weather song of the evening, “I Cut Like a Buffalo”, transformed into a blues meets ecstatic chaos number that was a high point of the show.

The cavernous space of Bill Graham Civic Auditorium never felt so small.

A couple quick covers were laced into the extended encore, much like what Phish has been doing for years and what Arcade Fire has been doing lately. Jimi Hendrix’s “Manic Depression” slid into the middle of “Icky Thump”, with “Message In A Bottle” emerging during “Steady, As She Goes” by The Raconteurs. This section in particular showed of White’s better than ever shredding skills.

After finishing his part of “Seven Nation Army” and successfully appealing to the audience for support with his stadium anthem, he joined in on drums to bring the show to a thundering conclusion. With the crowd going bonkers, he approached the mic one more time for a sincere thank you to San Francisco as he held his hands over his heart.

Without question, Jack White is one of the best live artists of 2014. And now with a humble, inclusive attitude, his stock should only rise further.

Filed Under: Featured, Live Music Reviews Tagged With: Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, Jack White, Rock Star

Sylvan Esso continue breakout ascent at The Independent

August 25, 2014 by James Nagel Leave a Comment

By James Nagel //

Sylvan Esso with Dana Buoy (of Akron/Family) //
The Independent – San Francisco
August 23rd, 2014 //

One of the biggest breakout acts of the year, Sylvan Esso returned to SF over the weekend to headline a massively sold-out show at The Independent. The electropop duo elicited a palpable crowd reaction when it opened for tUnE-yArDs in June at The Fillmore, but it’s still surprising to see tickets selling for over $100 on the secondary market for Saturday’s show. Sylvan Esso’s meteoric rise in popularity should have them headlining theaters in no time, and they’ll be back to open for Foster the People at Fox Theater Oakland in early November.

If you haven’t heard their hypnotically addicting self-titled freshman effort yet, give it a listen and view photos from Saturday’s show below.

Filed Under: Featured, Photos Tagged With: Sylvan Esso, The Independent

Curtis Harding’s ‘slop n’ soul’ fusion is a recipe for success

August 25, 2014 by Justin Yee Leave a Comment

By Justin Yee //

Curtis Harding (Opening for Jack White) //
Bill Graham Civic Auditorium
August 22nd, 2014 //

Curtis Harding kicked off the first of 2 shows at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium this past Friday as the opener on Jack White’s headlining tour. Based out of Atlanta, one could describe his sound as a fusion of soul, blues, gospel and rock. However, when asked to describe his own music, he uses the term, slop n’ soul. Slop, being a southern term for leftovers, and how he incorporates the ‘leftovers’ of different musical influences into his songs.

Harding’s early career included work as back-up vocalist for Cee Lo Green on the road, adding vocal tracks to the albums Cee Lo Green & His Perfect Imperfections and The Lady Killer, and co writing material with Green.

He is also one half of a collaborative project, Night Sun, with Black Lips guitarist, Cole Alexander, which blends the sounds of garage rock with R&B.

On this night, it was all about Harding’s solo efforts and he definitely held his own in front of a growing and eager crowd. Standout songs included “Next Time” and “Keep On Shining” from his debut album, Soul Power, which released earlier this Spring. Be sure to keep an eye on him because he seems poised to do big things.

Setlist
1) Soul Power
2) Drive My Car
3) Next Time
4) Heaven’s On The Other Side
5) Castaway
6) Beautiful People
7) The Drive
8) Keep On Shining

Filed Under: Featured, Photos Tagged With: Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, Curtis Harding, Jack White

Epically horrible line at FYF Fest inspires Twitter gold

August 23, 2014 by Mike Frash 2 Comments

FYF Fest in Los Angeles kicked off today with a new location at LA Sports Arena & Exposition Park, one of the best lineups of the year and a major logistical problem — the epic line to get in. The festival has admitted as much:

We know many of you are still in line trying to get in. Rest assured, scanning and searches are moving as quickly as possible. Thank you

— FYF Fest (@FYFFEST) August 23, 2014

When you get to the fest before any music starts and you are handed your program two hours later, there’s plenty of time to come up with warranted hate-snark to blast on social media. Just check out the comments in response to the above tweet from FYF, and look at some interesting comments and comedy gold below.

Can anyone confirm that you can get inside or is #fyffest just a line?

— ONTV (@ONTV_chaz) August 23, 2014

This line is worse than the U.S Mexico border line. #fyffest @FYFFEST

— Angela (@applesky) August 23, 2014

Local vendors are creating a WHOLE NEW ECONOMY selling things to people waiting in line to get into #fyffest @FYFFEST

— Matt Kowalick (@MattKowalick) August 23, 2014

Line from hell! People cutting, nobody knows what's going on. Starting to fear I might miss @slowdiveband. @FYFFEST #fyffest #fyffail

— Kathleen (@krobbins24) August 23, 2014

#fyffest patrons, plan for a 3.5 hr line at least! Leave now and chances are you'll be in by 8:30

— Erika (@generika) August 23, 2014

I think we should get 2 free drink ticket for every hour we wait in line. #fyffest @FYFFEST

— alex curran (@Alpod) August 23, 2014

Ridiculous line. Inefficient and under prepared. We've been here for 2 hours! @FYFFEST #fyffest #fyffest2014

— Mia Carmella Bontol (@bravethewaves) August 23, 2014

Best concert I've ever heard from a 2 mile line wrapped around all the parking lots. The worst. #fyffest

— jujierochelle (@jujierochelle) August 23, 2014

Theory: the people tweeting from inside the festival are bot tweets by @fyffest workers. There is no festival. #fyffest

— dave pinder (@dave_jpg) August 23, 2014

I've seen two fights….but still have yet to see the end of the line #fyffest

— Anissa (@Anissa_Dee) August 23, 2014

Just avoided a 3-4 hour line and missing acts at #fyffest by walking to the front and walking in like I owned the place #thelineisalie

— Jackson Palmer (@ummjackson) August 23, 2014

Should have brought a board game for the line in #fyffest

— dave pinder (@dave_jpg) August 23, 2014

The line to get into @FYFFEST is 10 people wide and at least a mile long, stretching down MLK and around Fig. #yowza pic.twitter.com/J3H26SyQIF

— Sarah Bennett (@thesarahbennett) August 23, 2014

Hope someone's taking aerial shot of #fyffest line to get in. Epic!

— Adrian (@crazedberry) August 23, 2014

Filed Under: Featured, Festivals Tagged With: Exposition Park, FYF Fest, FYF Fest 2014, LA Sports Arena, LA Sports Arena & Exposition Park, Line, social media, Twitter

We’re all just Fucked Up, after all

August 22, 2014 by Kevin J Quandt Leave a Comment

Photos by Pedro Paredes // Written by Kevin Quandt //

Fucked Up with Tijuana Panthers, The She’s //
The Independent – San Francisco
August 19th, 2014 //

Just the other day I was having a discussion with a buddy who was explaining his overwhelmingly preference for live band concerts, as compared to a live producer. He went on to discuss his love for a good frontman, or woman, and I fully agreed with this observation. Alas, he did not make it to Fucked Up at The Independent this past Tuesday to witness one of the most authentic frontmen in the business.

The masses came early to The Independent on this evening as a variety of rock bands were holding court — The She’s took the opening slot while Long Beach natives Tijuana Panthers handled the second slot. Tijuana Panthers brought an enjoyable amalgam of scuzzed-out surf punk that seemed to be received well. But folks were here to see the six-headed art-core beast that many have come to cherish as Fucked Up. By the time each member was ready to launch into the opening song, “Paper the House”, it was hard to ignore that legendary Fucked Up singer, Damian Abraham, looked like half the man he used to be. Abraham later explained he had lost 120 pounds over the past year or so, which received a blast of applause. Yet, this was not the only characteristic of the band that has changed as they, and we all, get a little older.

2009 was a great year for Fucked Up as all their hard work in the early years was paying off in dividends as their banner release, The Chemistry of Common Life, garnered universal praise, eventually leading them to winning the Polaris Music Prize. Now, five years later, they have released a few more well-received albums, most recently Glass Boy, which relies heavily on themes of aging in the punk scene. How does one grow old while holding onto their youthful ideals of rebellion? Well, for this band of punks, they keep on blasting brutal music into the ears, and eyes, of devote fans who keep on returning as they too grow a little more grey and develop just a few wrinkles.

But enough of that sappy shit, as Fucked Up brought their pummeling sound on this evening. Within only a few minutes the three-guitarist band launched into fan favorite “Queen of Hearts” as Abraham paced around on stage reciting phrases of lyrics with blistering intensity. It’s this characteristic that keeps one foot well-rooted into hardcore punk, while the band has recently floated towards a slightly less-hardcore sound, overall. Luckily those who were early fans were treated to some of the older, more raw songs like “Police” — chants of “I can’t stand the police” were included.

Now, it’s hard to not say that Abraham is the show here. Not only because he is a musical madman who would rather be in the pit with his fans than on the stage with his longtime band, but also because frankly, the rest of the band seemed aloof at times. Sure, all but one help in the vocal department, but trying to compete for attention with Abraham would be a futile effort. The frontman, now shirtless (which is tradition), was cruising all over The Indy like a whirlwind. First, he was up in the seats on house right, and the next thing you know, he is having a full-blown mock-luchadore wrestling match with a fan in front of the stage. I kid you not.

“I Hate Summer” and “The Other Shoe” were highlights of the set. Each song seemed punctuated by Abraham’s off-the-cuff banter where he remarked on everything from the lack of pot smoking in the club to his newfound love for Olive Garden. And, it’s with this spontaneity that keep fans returning, tour after tour, even if we are just a bunch of aging punks.

Filed Under: Featured, Live Music Reviews Tagged With: Fucked Up, The Independent, The SHE'S, Tijuana Panthers

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2014 proving to be as diverse as ever

August 21, 2014 by Mike Frash Leave a Comment

Photos by Shawn Reiss // Written by Mike Frash

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass //
Golden Gate Park – San Francisco
October 3rd-5th, 2014 //

The 14th incarnation of Hardly Strictly Bluegrass is shaping up to be one of the finest offerings yet, especially if the four rounds of medley preview clues are any indication.

Adept at balancing legends, local Bay Area acts and fast-rising talent, the curation team for Hardly Strictly Bluegrass never disappoints the hundreds of thousands of music lovers that show up for the free event.

The HSB website has shared the traditional four medleys that preview many of the acts that will play, and variety is the key word (listen below). Returning legends include Emmylou Harris, Chris Isaak, Lucinda Williams, Shawn Colvin, Dave Rawlings Machine and Buddy Miller.

But take a look at the standout indie, rock and neo-soul acts announced so far, including a dash of hip-hop and punk:

• Ryan Adams
• Sun Kil Moon
• Deltron 3030 with The 3030 Orchestra
• Social Distortion
• Yo La Tengo
• Thao & The Get Down Stay Down
• Jonathan Wilson
• St. Paul & The Broken Bones
• The Sam Chase
• Cibo Matto
• Malawi Mouse Boys

History tells us the complete lineup will be announced after the four rounds of medleys — it could come as early as next week!

Watch webcasts, read our survival guide and view our photos from Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2013.

Filed Under: Featured, Festivals Tagged With: Buddy Miller, Chris Isaak, Cibo Matto, Dave Rawlings Machine, Deltron 3030 w/ The 3030 Orchestra, Emmylou Harris, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival 2014, Jonathan Wilson, Lucinda Williams, Malawi Mouse Boys, Ryan Adams, Shawn Colvin, Social Distortion, St. Paul & The Broken Bones, Sun Kil Moon, Thao & The Get Down Stay Down, The Sam Chase, Yo la Tengo

Death from Above 1979 start new chapter with LA warm-up gig

August 19, 2014 by Josh Herwitt 1 Comment

By Josh Herwitt //

Death from Above 1979 //
Troubadour – West Hollywood, CA
August 14th, 2014 //

It hasn’t been an easy ride for fans of Death from Above 1979.

Just two years after the release of its highly acclaimed 2004 debut You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine, the Toronto-based, dance-punk duo disbanded after Sebastien Grainger (drums, vocals) and Jesse F. Keeler (bass, synths, backing vocals) agreed that they could no longer work together.

With creative and stylistic differences pulling them apart, Grainger and Keeler went their separate ways. While Grainger would go on to start his own solo project — signing with the Omaha-based label Saddle Creek Records in the U.S. under the name Sebastien Grainger & The Mountains — before later forming the band Deserts (formerly Bad Tits) with Tangiers guitarist and singer Josh Reichmann, Keeler achieved plenty of commercial success and fanfare in teaming up with his close friend Alex Puodziukas (aka Al-P) to create the electronic duo MSTRKRFT.

It wasn’t until early 2011, though, that Grainger and Keeler decided to give things another try, speaking to each other for the first time in five years and reuniting for a scintillating performance on Coachella’s main stage that April. By September of the following year, DFA 1979 had written new material for the first time in almost eight years, but there was still no guarantee things would last.

Early last summer, the two-piece canceled its appearance at Governors Ball Music Festival in New York City because it had been struggling to write new music together. Merely a month later, Grainger and Keeler axed more shows, this time in Europe due to a “medical emergency,” but left their fans with an ounce of hope after revealing on Facebook not long after that a new album was indeed on its way.

Yet, it wasn’t until a year later that fans would actually hear new music from DFA 1979. Releasing its first single “Trainwreck 1979” early last month, the band disclosed more details about its second full-length The Physical World at the same time.

So, if last Thursday night’s warm-up show in LA for DFA 1979’s upcoming North American/European tour this fall was supposed to make up for lost time, well then, mission accomplished.

Despite the show’s announcement coming a little more than two weeks before the gig, the band sold out the Troubadour just minutes after tickets went on sale. And for those of us who were lucky enough to be in attendance, DFA 1979 treated its fans to a night they won’t forget for a long time.

Playing material from The Physical World for the first time in a live setting, Grainger and Keeler ripped through an epic 21-song performance, playing almost every track from both albums. They stepped on stage and immediately put the pedal to the metal, blasting off with the blistering “You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine” before turning to their newer cuts like “Right On, Frankenstein!,” “Virgins,” “Crystal Ball” and “Government Trash,” which they officially released to the masses yesterday.

For a band that incorporates just bass guitar, drums, vocals and occasionally keyboards, you’d think that DFA 1979’s sound could only stretch so far. But at the Troubadour, Grainger and Keeler proved that the tracks from The Physical World are every bit as good as they play out on the record. And having listened to the new album, which will drop September 9th, already numerous times, I can say that with the utmost confidence. Distorted? Yes. Heavy? Yes. But with this show also marking my third time seeing DFA 1979, it’s hard to find more raw energy coming from solely two musicians in a recording studio or on a stage.

When it came time for the encore, Grainger and Keeler took us back in time, playing all five songs from You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine — including the finale “Do It!,” which was originally released on their 2002 EP Heads Up — with the same ferocity that first took the music industry by storm nearly a decade ago when they joined 90’s alt-rock giants Nine Inch Nails and Queens of the Stone Age on tour.

While certainly a lot has changed for DFA 1979 since then, they’ve never forgotten how to get the blood pumping fast through their fans’ veins.

Setlist:
You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine
Cheap Talk,
Right On, Frankenstein!
Turn It Out
Blood on Our Hands
Cold War
Virgins
Crystal Ball
Government Trash
Going Steady
Gemini
Nothin’ Left
White Is Red
Trainwreck 1979
Always On
The Physical World

Encore:
Little Girl
Black History Month
Romantic Rights
Pull Out
Do It!

Filed Under: Featured, Live Music Reviews Tagged With: Coachella, Coachella 2011, Coachella Music and Arts Festival, Coachella Music and Arts Festival 2011, Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival, Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival 2011, Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival 2011, Death from Above 1979, Troubadour

Tame Impala ‘plagiarism’ coverage grasping for straws, clicks

August 18, 2014 by Mike Frash 1 Comment

Tame Impala performing as The Spice Girls on Halloween 2013 in San Francisco.

UPDATE 8/20: Hats off to Rolling Stone‘s Jason Newman, who actually took the time for some investigative journalism to follow up with the Rata publishers. They said that “It was a joke,” and Rolling Stone got a hold of Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker, who replied, “This is a joke, right?” Now, Pablo Ruiz is considering legal action thanks to the music media noise machine that spread the non-story on Monday.

Rolling Stone reported, “Ruiz told ESPN Radio that he would be interested in performing with the band when they play BUE Fest in Buenos Aries on November 24th.” So, maybe Tame Impala and Ruiz can join together for “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards” > “Océano” > “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”, have a laugh and move on. Read our original On The Media report below:

Music blogs overshadow Tame Impala’s mini tour announcement with borderline slander.

Consequence of Sound, arguably the best U.S. music blog over the past couple of years, ran a story today reporting that another blog from South America has accused Tame Impala of plagiarism. Pitchfork picked up the story an hour later, and like a pack of flies on shit, many other music outlets followed suit from there, pointing to the CoS story.

Suddenly the headline is: Tame Impala are accused of stealing “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”. In an age when headlines matter more than content, accusations like this stick in the hearts and minds of consumers longer than one news cycle.

So, who really made this accusation? CoS points to the “Chilean news site” Rata, a small music blog from Chile. Online media entities are the ones accusing here, not an individual, an artist or a record label. This source article seems to be satirical in nature, much like The Onion. The article claims “the discovery happened at a gathering where musicologists analyzed songs from different eras, and made this conclusion.” The video then, also made by Rata, offers “proof”:

Apparently those familiar with former pop star Pablo Ruiz have been joking about this similarity for a while now, but one could also argue that Pablo Ruiz plagiarized Ritchie Valens’ “La Bamba”. That doesn’t make it true just because someone said it or put it on the Internet.

I mean, come on, there’s evidence of Kevin Parker’s first demo of “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards” as he’s working through the songwriting process here:

All of this is a bit of a low blow considering Tame Impala announced a tour today, which visits New York, California and South America, including a stop at BUE Fest in Buenos Aires, Argentina. So, perhaps this is all a tie-in to promote the tour, but that sure would be testing the notion that “all publicity is good publicity.”

This is also a classic example of the echo chamber that is the music news industry at this point in time. One outlet reports, everyone else regurgitates the same thing with a link to the “source”, deferring journalistic integrity to the news breaker, all to get the article up ASAP before the East Coast finishes the work day. And so it goes …

Here’s hoping Tame Impala arrive in November at the Fox Theater in Oakland ready to road test some new material.

Filed Under: Featured, On The Media Tagged With: Consequence of Sound, On the Media, Pablo Ruiz, pitchfork, Plagiarism, Rata, Tame Impala

First City Festival returns to Monterey for second edition

August 18, 2014 by Molly Kish 2 Comments

Photos by Marc Fong // Written by Molly Kish //

First City Festival //
Monterey County Fairgrounds – Monterey, CA
August 23rd-24th, 2014 //

Goldenvoice’s second annual First City Festival returns to the idyllic Monterey County Fairgrounds this weekend with two full days of music, performance art, crafts and more. Following up a successful inaugural year, the beautiful 22-acre setting hosts three outdoor music performance areas and a vaudeville stage, the Unique USA Marketplace, a curated vinyl record Beat Swap Meet and a full-scale carnival.

Enter our contest below for a chance to win free tickets!

With such a fantastic roster of both well-known and buzz-worthy acts, we recommend you get to the fairgrounds early to really take in all that the festival has to offer. Beyond local vendors, artisan food and alcohol selections and a county fair’s worth of carnival rides and games, here are the toughest decisions we’ll be making after considering the musical talent on the bill this weekend.

CONFLICTS

Saturday:

Tokyo Police Club vs. Midlake (4-5:15 p.m.)

Wrapping up the final leg of their summer tour, Tokyo Police Club will get the crowd rowdy in this late afternoon slot, pulling bounce-along favorites from their garage-pop discography to go along with new tracks from their latest album Forcefield, which was released this past March. In contrast, folk-rock veterans Midlake will be making their West Coast festival debut this year sans lead singer Tim Smith. The band has been promoting its latest album Antiphon — and first release on ATO Records — with the new lineup to create a “rebooted progressive rock” sound. In following suit with their most recent string of performances, Midlake very well could break out some acoustic material, too.

Best Coast vs. Tanlines (5:20-6:30 p.m.)

In this Day 1 pop throwdown, which team are you on? This is a crucial decision, setting up what inevitably will be the mood you will choose to embrace going into the remainder of the evening. Will you be shuffling a pair of dance shoes or gazing listlessly at them covered in the rodeo’s dust? If you’re feeling the need to bust a move, Tanlines has got you covered. Bringing their infectious, experimental dance music to the festival side stage, this Brooklyn-based duo will have the audience on fire. Call and response with calypso-infused pop, Tanlines’ Jesse Cohen and Eric Emm provide the perfect combo of guitars, vocals and various percussion instruments to invigorate an early-evening crowd before it readies itself for a big evening ahead. If you anticipate the evening’s headliner Beck to have a more melancholy setlist and feel like taking a breather from the crowds, carnival and other stimulus surrounding the first day of the festival, let Best Coast lead singer and guitarist Bethany Constantino’s croon lull you into a mellow mindset. Performing on the main stage, this also could be a good power move, setting yourself up for a spot front and center for the rest of the evening performances.

Sunday:

Future Islands vs. Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. (4-5:15 p.m.)

This is arguably the worst conflict of the weekend for the rage-faced dance enthusiast with quite possibly two of the most similar acts billed consecutively on the lineup. Both bands play to the overly enthusiastic crowd member demographic, and although mildly different in style, each evoke such passion and excitement with their respective fan bases that they would be equally disappointing acts to miss out on. H ailing from Detroit, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. is the electric duo of Joshua Epstein and Daniel Zott who bring a soulful blend of funk, pop and cross-genre songwriting to the stage. Their stage presence and range as a pair of performers is something that not only speaks to the crowd, but also calls for participation and will no doubt get the early-evening audience active by moving their weary feet. Future Islands, on the other hand, are the wild-card act on not only this bill, but just about any festival roster. Gaining mainstream fame with their incredible electro-rock body of work and after this past year’s impressionistic performance on the “Late Show With David Letterman”, lead singer Sam Herring danced his way into the hearts and curiosities of a nation. Beyond Herring’s guttural howls and spastic stage presence, the band has had great success playing festivals worldwide in executing some of the most memorable sets. Those who show up should be excited to be a part of a performance that everyone around them will remember as a special moment in their lifetime of concert experiences. Whether the crowd sits idly dumbfounded or actually commits to losing itself in the music, this set is sure to be a highlight of the festival and is one we look forward to catching.

Create your custom schedule here!

ATTRACTIONS

Beat Swap Meet:

A traveling record swap meet, Beat Swap Meet features dozens of invited record collectors and dealers from all over the U.S. and beyond. They’ll be selling everything from blues to funk to hip-hop to jazz to metal to punk to reggae to rock to soul, with World 12’s and 45’s on vinyl.

Monterey Carnival:

You will have full access to rides and games with your purchase of a festival ticket.

Unique USA Marketplace:

Take some time to visit this marketplace where furniture, art and fashion designers sell goods, all of them made in the U.S.

GENERAL INFO

With the gates opening at noon and set times starting as early as 1 p.m., we recommend getting there with ample time to park and jump in what undoubtedly will be a line wrapping around the fairgrounds’ perimeter.

Parking is available with shuttles to the fairgrounds at the neighboring Monterey Peninsula College, located at 980 Fremont Street, Monterey, CA 93940.

Other options include parking around the neighborhoods surrounding the venue and walking a short distance to the festival location. The locals are generally friendly and accommodating, but be sure not to block anyone’s driveway. There will also be a free bike and skateboard valet near the festival’s front entrance.

If you have any issues with your tickets, you should contact Front Gate Tickets at 888-512-SHOW or on their website. We also recommend taking a peek at the festival’s list of “Dos and Don’ts” before you arrive.

To win a pair of tickets to the festival, enter below. You must like Showbams on Facebook and follow Showbams on Twitter to be eligible to win.

Submit your full name and email address.
Contest ends Tuesday, August 19th at 3 p.m. Winners will be picked at random & notified by email. Your email will be kept private — we will share your email with no one.

CONTEST CLOSED.

Filed Under: Featured, Festivals Tagged With: Best Coast, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr., First City Festival, Future Islands, Goldenvoice, Midlake, Monterey County Fairgrounds, Tanlines, Tokyo Police Club

ANTEMASQUE sell out GAMH with Le Butcherettes

August 18, 2014 by Scotland Miller 1 Comment

Photos by Pedro Paredes // Written by Scotland Miller //

ANTEMASQUE with Le Butcherettes //
Great American Music Hall – San Francisco
August 12th, 2014 //

The harsh aftermath that are the days following Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival was soothed by a special sold-out Tuesday at the Great American Music Hall. Two bands that are sure to draw crowds wherever they go, ANTEMASQUE and Le Butcherettes, delivered a power-packed night of music complete with dropped jaws and torn vocal chords.

On support of their new album entitled Cry Is for the Flies, Le Butcherettes is fronted by vocalist/guitarist/keyboardist Teri Gender Bender and drummer Lia Braswel, with production support from Omar Rodriguez-Lopez. They are billed as a garage-punk band from Mexico and rely heavily on the simplistic formula that is “screw you, I’m gonna play what I want.”

This tactic of sonic shock rock is accompanied by Gender Bender’s politically-charged lyrics and her onstage antics, which included a bloodied kitchen apron, a broomstick crucifixion, a deep-throat of the microphone and a bit of crotch-first crowd surfing. To put it lightly, this girl is an eye-catcher on stage and will certainly make you a fan after a live performance. She even hit the bass player in the face with her shoe from across the stage! The energy that emanates from this group is shocking and undoubtedly best appreciated live.

A new project called ANTEMASQUE emerged earlier this year from longtime friends and familiar duo Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala, formerly of The Mars Volta and At the Drive-In. They are also joined by fellow TMV drummer David Elitch, as well as efforts from the Red Hot Chili Peppers legend Flea. Originally intended to release only a few singles in April of this year (“4AM”, “Hangin’ in the Lurch” and “People Forget”), the project evolved into the digital release of a 10-track self-titled album (read our review here) released in July with a subsequent quick two-week tour, finishing up with two shows in Los Angeles. They put a progressive spin on blues rock and punk music in a way that feels very new, which admittedly is a holy grail in the music industry. Fans of The Mars Volta shouldn’t be disappointed with this new material, but instead should recognize the new direction of these talented musicians.

At the exact moment of conclusion of Le Butcherettes’ opening set, the crowd immediately elbowed their way closer to the tiny stage at The Great American. A giant mass of cookie-cutter faces with stretched earlobes, flannel over shirts, IPA T-shirts, corduroy jackets, fedoras and beards all pushed forward to get a closer look at their heroes. It’s amazing the ferocity that such artists can evoke in their fans. It was refreshing to see. Not only was the reception of this performance accepted with nothing but screams of elation, but every single lyric for every song was also spouted by the vast majority of the audience. This might not be much of a notable occurrence, if it weren’t for the fact that most of this music has only been available to the public for a matter of about five or six weeks.

The setlist consisted of about an hour of material not quite encompassing the entirety of their self-titled release. The energy level achieved by the opening act never let up. Some of the highlighted performances came during a vibrantly charged rendition of “Hangin’ in the Lurch,” and a ripping guitar solo and jam session during “Providence.” There were a few moments of story time where Cedric explained how his grandmother was responsible for his being allowed to sing as a kid, and a quick comment about how ANTEMASQUE as a band were able to defy the music reviewers and make some music that was “all proggy prog prog” and didn’t have “a bunch of crazy time changes,” but these moments were offset by the pure magic that this pairing of musicians produced.

The sounds of ANTEMASQUE are different enough from that of their previous works, which sets this project apart from being just another time waster. Music fans will surely enjoy this act if they are ever lucky enough to see it in person.

Filed Under: Featured, Live Music Reviews Tagged With: Antemasque, Great American Music Hall, Le Butcherettes

WIN TICKETS: The Donkeys at The Chapel 8/16 (SAT)

August 15, 2014 by The Bam Team Leave a Comment

Enter to win a pair of free tickets to this show below.

The Donkeys with Extra Classic and The Hot Toddies //
The Chapel – San Francisco
August 16, 2014 (Saturday) //

San Diego’s The Donkeys will offer up their easy-listening brand of indie rock, surely performing many of the tracks off of their recent release Ride the Black Wave. San Francisco’s Extra Classic, fresh off the heals of releasing their new album Showcase, will put their crafty dub stylings on display. Opening up the evening will be Oakland’s The Hot Toddies. The trio’s surf-infused doo-wop pop has been winning over the hearts of punks and hipsters alike since 2005. If you’re looking for the right show to put a cap on your summer in SF, this very well may be the concert to attend. ~Andrew Pohl

Buy tickets if you know you want to go!

Enter to win if you can attend this show Saturday, August 16th at The Chapel in SF.

Submit your full name and email address below.
Contest ends Saturday, August 16th at Noon. Winners will be picked at random & notified by email. Your email will be kept private — we will share your email with no one.

Like Showbams on Facebook and follow Showbams on Twitter to be eligible to win.

CONTEST CLOSED.

Filed Under: Contests Tagged With: The Chapel, The Donkeys

WIN TICKETS: Built to Spill at Slim’s 8/17 (SUN)

August 15, 2014 by The Bam Team Leave a Comment

Written by Kevin Quandt //

Built to Spill with Slam Dunk and The Warm Hair //
Slim’s – San Francisco
August 17, 2014 //

Built to Spill love the West Coast. The Boise natives have always treated SF to a handful of shows practically every year for as long as I can remember, and their annual pilgrimage to Slim’s is rapidly approaching. Doug Martsch and associates will be spending three nights in the SOMA playing tracks off the bevy of impressive releases they have amassed over two decades.

This late-summer jaunt will feature the relatively new rhythm section consisting of drummer Steve Gere and bassist Jason Albertini. Having not released an LP in almost five years, attendees can expect the grand possibility of new tracks featured in this intimate club. Fans of guitar-driven rock have flocked to BTS shows over the years, as the combination of rawness and melody have placed them at the forefront independent alternative rock for quite some time. Slam Dunk and the Warm Hair will set the table for the evening before the main dish is served. Saturday’s show is sold out, and the remaining nights’ ticket allotment is moving quickly, so don’t sleep on this opportunity.

Buy tickets if you know you want to go!

Enter to win if you can attend this show Sunday, August 17th at Slim’s in SF.

Submit your full name and email address below.
Contest ends Friday, August 15th at 3 p.m. Winners will be picked at random & notified by email. Your email will be kept private — we will share your email with no one.

Like Showbams on Facebook and follow Showbams on Twitter to be eligible to win.

CONTEST CLOSED.

Filed Under: Contests Tagged With: Built To Spill, Slims

The best of Outside Lands 2014

August 15, 2014 by Molly Kish 3 Comments

Photos by Pedro Paredes, Benjamin Wallen and Marc Fong // Written by Molly Kish //

Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival //
Golden Gate Park – San Francisco
August 8th-10th, 2014 //

With so much to offer this seventh year of Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival, the celebration of music, food, art and everything in between was at an all-time high! Boasting a packed lineup of diverse performers, culinary innovators and artists, Golden Gate Park hosted a wonderland of possibilities. Here are our favorite features from this year’s extravaganza.

Read our daily recaps from Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
View artist photography by Pedro Paredes below.

TOP SETS FROM THE WEEKEND

With a lineup of more than 70 diverse performers, naming the best shows of the weekend is at best an exercise in personal point of view. With opinions running rampant on headliners, under cards and buzz-worthy acts, we instead choose to focus on what caught our attention as some of the most memorable performances of the weekend for better or worse.

How do your favorites match up with our top sets and moments from the weekend? Leave your comments, opinions and personal picks below!

Most Controversial Headliner: Kanye West
Most Explosive Dance Performance: Flume
Biggest Crowd of the Weekend: Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
Biggest Local Draw: Atmosphere
Best Rock Performance: Deer Tick
Best Hip Hop Performance: Run the Jewels
Breakout Artist of the Festival: Lucius

Best Crowd Engagement/Dance Moves: Cut Copy
Best Use of Stage Design/Props: The Flaming Lips
Heineken Haus MVP: Gorgon City
Loudest Sing Along: The Killers
Best Comedy/Improv Performance: Improvised Shakespeare Company (with guest Patrick Stewart)
Best Quote: “You’re gonna tell your kids about this!” -Kanye West

TOP TACTICS TO KEEP THE GROUP TOGETHER

A festival at maximum capacity can already be hard to navigate, especially with large groups of various paced members, and Outside Lands is no exception. With the innumerable obstacles present in the park’s terrain, even the most seasoned shepherd will at some point find difficulty in herding their festival flock.

This year, especially with the stricter rules regarding what attendees can bring in concerning poles, flags, hoops, etc., the Outside Lands crowd got creative with their tracking skills.

Innovative Beacons/Totems: No pole, no problem! Although the presence of PVC pipes still managed to make their way into the masses, people got pretty imaginative with their signage and “find us here” monuments. Ginormous balloons (even full bouquets of them by weekend’s end) soared hundreds of feet in the air, flocks of Flabongos bounced together above the crowd all weekend and cardboard cutouts of Hodor, crying Kim Kardashian and poop emojis received praise from the crowd. Even those with a history flag waving kept the tradition alive amidst the pole ban by finding the biggest stick within Maclaren Pass to wave their banner high.

Festival Wear: Fickle weather kept the costumed crowd members on their toes this past weekend, with temperatures fluctuating as quickly as a set change, Karl the Fog intermittently reared his mischievously muggy head. Outside Lands is an atypical festival in the sense that it fails to adhere to most counterparts’ “clothing optional” fashion guidelines, so attendees have to get creative in the Bay Area when it comes to group uniforms — and this crowd didn’t fail. Most effective use of costumes this year included creepily monochromatic “balloon people” with fully inflatable body suits and face masks, a storm trooper masked duo (made out of cereal boxes) donning a “show us your taun-tauns” sign and flocks of animal onesies.

TOP OUTSIDE LANDS FOOD MOMENTS

With almost as much excitement revolving around the fare of Outside Lands as the music and art portions of the festival, this year’s attendees were treated to an exorbitant amount of delicious options to satiate their palette. Marrying the festivals’ live entertainment with culinary prowess, a lot of the action took place on this year’s inaugural debut of the GastroMagic stage and surrounding food “lands”. Some of our favorites included:

Big Freedia’s and Brenda’s French Soul Food “Bounce Brunch”: This was where fans of Southern cooking and the transgender twerking sensation, the “Queen Diva” herself, were treated to an early Saturday afternoon, interactive mini set. Freedia took the stage with her co-ed twerk team and two members of Brenda’s French Soul Food, coerced the crowd to join her on stage and twerk for made-to-order beignets. Almost immediately, lines formed to strut in front of the audience for the piping-hot pastries, with the restaurant staff joining in on the fun, tapping their powdered sugar dispensers along to chants of “Shake for your beignets…”

Photo via Pop Sugar.

Bacon Bacon Lands flights: For the truly decadent, this year’s Bacon Lands covered all the delicious meat-candy bases. Most often seen floating throughout the park via the Bacon Bacon flights, the well-known Bay Area food truck offered a skewered sampling of three various types of cured fat, packaged as a between set “meat-sicle” snack comprised of everyone’s favorite part of our piggy friends. The aroma wafting from this “land” was hypnotic, coaxing weary festivalgoers rummaging through Maclaren Pass to the magical pork stand tucked away in the trees. Surpassing all of its other neighboring “lands”, this location easily had some of the most enthusiastic lines with patrons salivating for their chance at some greasy goodness on the go.

Macgyver Mini Bars: While we at Showbams do not condone attempting to smuggle in anything restricted by Outside Lands (or any festival for that matter), we have to acknowledge the attempts both successful and foiled. By the weekend’s end, security was a force to be reckoned with, but what seemed like an ocean of alcohol still made its way inside. Even in a setting that one can traverse the fairgrounds openly with some of the world’s best beer and wine while adorning a legal ID wristband, people got ingenious with their covert booze operations, tipping authorities off to some of the greatest sneaking-in secrets in the festival’s history.

Beyond hiding alcohol in legal food boxes, wrappers and the obvious camel back and thermos containers, many used the park’s topography to literally bury their liquor treasures. There were hollowed out loaves of bread, burrito wrapped liters, creepy nether-region containers and more. Some successful showoffs even boasted about it to local press and spattered social media with their accomplishments.

TOP “ONLY IN SF” OUTSIDE LANDS ATTRACTIONS

Digital Detox, Camp Grounded Analog Zone and Sober Lands: In an attempt to reunite the festivalgoer with the true concept of what a music festival essentially is/used to/should be, Outside Lands brings a truly “unique” experience to the forefront with its campaign to “disconnect to reconnect” with these three features. Attempting to remove attendees from the digital noise of the modern world and get back to a simpler, more organic festival experience, Digital Detox and Camp Grounded Analog Zone provide the opportunity to drink tea in a yurt while making arts and crafts, playing board games, meditating, face painting or writing love letters on a typewriter to leave on a missed connection board sans social media and telephones.

If you’re not a fan of partying with the inebriated masses, Sober Lands had you covered. With meetings scheduled throughout the day, the tent offered a place of solace for those looking to clear their head between smushing up against sweaty booze-soaked bodies all day amidst the craziness of the typical festival crowds.

Outsider Art and The Barbary: This year’s art program, curated by Jeben Berg and the legendary SF art publication Juxtapoz Magazine, brought an incredible roster of talent to the festival forefront. Between the live graffiti art, painting, theater and insane installations, the visual art at this year’s festival was better than ever before. From the individual wall panels lining the polo fields to Dennis Mcnett’s incredible sculpture piece, even Ranger Dave got in on the fun with his larger-than-life welcoming statue next to the North Side entrance/Sutro Stage.

Along with the stunning visuals, Dr. Flotsam’s Hell Brew Revue dominated the Barbary area, causing mischief throughout the McLaren Pass with his frolicking band of Carny Bastards. Very rarely could you make the mission through the woods without encountering a circus sideshow of random clowns playing “bowling for drunks”, whips cracking, roots revival hoe-downs and odd Nordic funeral processions clouding up the overpass. It wasn’t something most would consider having to navigate around at a sold-out music festival, but when in SF, one better come prepared for more than just cold weather and marathon-style walking.

Filed Under: Featured, Festivals Tagged With: GastroMagic, Outside Lands, Outside Lands 2014, Outside Lands Music Festival 2014

Outside Lands superjam features comedic guests, MC Hammer

August 14, 2014 by Marc Fong Leave a Comment

By Marc Fong //

Kool & the Gang with special guests //
The Independent – San Francisco
August 10th, 2014 //

Sunday night’s Kool & the Gang show at The Independent promised a slew of special guests, and most were of the comedic variety. Barbary Tent standouts from Outside Lands — Craig Robinson, along with the stars of Silicon Valley, Thomas Middleditch and T.J. Miller — helped get things going. Robinson got in on the musical action, and the Bay Area’s very own MC Hammer helped throw it down with Kool & the Gang.

Filed Under: Featured, Photos Tagged With: Craig Robinson, Kool & The Gang, MC Hammer, Outside Lands, Silicon Valley, T.J. Miller, The Independent, Thomas Middleditch

PHOTOS: Mikal Cronin at The Independent 8/7

August 13, 2014 by The Bam Team Leave a Comment

By Patrick Kelly //

Mikal Cronin with Bears Hands //
The Independent – San Francisco
August 7th, 2014 //

Mikal Cronin, the man and the four-piece band, did at The Independent last Thursday night as they always do: They stepped on the backdrop-less, unadorned stage, said hello and played as loud as the venue could stand.

While the show was only at half capacity, mercifully it was missing the half of the crowd, which usually accompanies Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival‘s late-night shows, that has no interest in the band they came to see. Everyone was into it, and everyone was rewarded; they played a slew of favorites –- “Apathy”, “Situation”, “Shout It Out”, “See It My Way”, “I’m Done Running From You”, an acoustic version of “Don’t Let Me Go” — and a couple of their deeper cuts.

After the band blew through much-appreciated solos, rechristened themselves as “Snakes!” (the exclamation point is important) and dropped the ol’ sad “this weekend’s shows are our last for a while”, the night was complete with a happy crowd, content on drifting toward a hazy festival weekend with a sweet-ass head start.