Radiohead Rule Outside Lands (+10 Songs They Didn't Play)

I considered holding off on writing about Radiohead's set on Friday night until after the first Outside Lands Music Festival ended on Sunday night, but the fact of the matter is that there is nothing that can top that single performance. Yes, the promoters of Outside Lands have some serious traffic congestion and concert layout issues to address in Golden Gate Park if they want to hold a festival like this ever again, seeing as how they tried to have narrow avenues for 10-20 thousand people to move quickly from band to band (many resorted to knocking down fences and walking through the park). Yes, the sound went out completely, twice during Radiohead's set (in the middle of "Airbag" and "All I Need"), but the performance was still flawless. I've waited years to see Radiohead live, and when the Outside Lands lineup was announced in the spring I was waiting on pins and needles until Friday night. I saw only a masterful performance, I can ignore any small glitches or hiccups along the way.

My dad and I frequently talk about the merits of music from his generation compared to mine. To be honest, I find that people claiming there was no good music after a certain calendar year to be completely and total idiots. Someone that says nothing after 1969 or 1979 was worth anything in music can be silenced with the idea that nothing good in music came after 1900, or after orchestra and symphony music stopped being the biggest music "scene." Those time limiting arguments are useless, what remains is that there are important musicians and bands for every generation. However you want to put it, band like the Rolling Stones, Beatles, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin and the like are creative forces that outlive their time period. When I end up in a conversation about what band from my generation will live on, I always end up thinking of Radiohead.

There are bands that I personally like better than Radiohead, and there are albums and songs I connect to better than Radiohead's catalogue, and by that extension like better, but no other band in my experience has been more consistently incredible than the five men from Oxfordshire. They've mastered the art of deconstructing who they are as a band and building something new and fantastic every time. When I hear bands release new material they wrote in old recording sessions, I usually think it's of lesser quality. Where Radiohead is concerned, they hone songs over multiple album recording sessions, preparing it until it's just right in their minds, and then put it on a record where it fits right in as though its brand new.

The band might not play Pablo Honey live much anymore, and its pretty much their only album that rests below the stratosphere as far as quality is concerned, but I just can't name any other band that hasn't made a bad album. You can debate personal favorites all you want, but Radiohead is the most consistent band in the world right now. They are this generation's Beatles, thankfully without the mania.

It's at this point that I realize I haven't even talked about their set yet. They played a lot off of In Rainbows, which had only the small drawback of them not getting to play many songs off Hail to the Thief. Otherwise, they played a pretty perfect set. After the show on our ride back, I made a playlist of songs they didn't play in their set that I'd like to hear, and it was exactly the length of their set. There are no other bands of our time that can double a set list and maintain their quality in the way Radiohead can. It's astounding. Songs sprinkled in from their entire discography and were met by roars of applause at every turn. While their albums are so disparate, they seem to come together and complement each other perfectly when mixed together in a live set.


Their light show on this tour is just incredible. They performed surrounded in what seemed like a prison cell of fluorescent lights that turned all different colors throughout the set. When rain imagery was necessary, little blue light streaked down the bulbs to imitate rain, during "Fake Plastic Trees" they turned green, during "The National Anthem" they turned red, white, and blue. The set was an all-engrossing experience for sight and sound. The two giant screens on either side of the stage were fixed camera perspectives from places like their piano, the bass drum, Thom Yorke's microphone, and gave an other-worldly feel to the performance.

They mixed songs that bled into each other perfectly, hitting loud highs with "Airbag" or "Bodysnatchers" and diving low with thumping beats on "Videotape" "Idioteque" and "Everything in Its Right Place." It was especially wonderful to hear "Talk Show Host," one of my personal favorites from the Romeo + Juliet soundtrack. I was more and more excited every time a song started and I recognized that I was actually seeing the band play it live with sensory overload courtesy of the lights. I've been to concerts and loved them before, but this was one time where the experience of the live setting outweighed the daunting quality of the music itself.

It took a while to get to Golden Gate Park, even longer to get situated for Radiohead, and even longer to get back out of the park to our car after the show. It was a completely overpriced ticket considering how poorly handled the festival seemed to be by the promoters, and the layout of the fields was far too small for the number of people that needed to move freely around the park. But in light of the two hours dropped on the Bay Area by Radiohead, none of those complaints matter, I'm nothing but ecstatically happy about that performance. I now will be able to say I have seen the greatest band of my generation, and I'll do it with a huge smile of my face remembering just how great it was.


Set List:
15 Step
Reckoner
Airbag
There There
All I Need
Nude
Talk Show Host
National Anthem
The Gloaming
Videotape
Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
Idioteque
Karma Police
Jigsaw Falling Into Place
Just
Exit Music (For A Film)
Bodysnatchers
Encore:
Pyramid Song
You and Whose Army?
Paranoid Android
Fake Plastic Trees
Everything In Its Right Place



And just for kicks, here are the 10 best songs they didn't play on Friday night:

"The Bends" - They played some straight up rockers off of In Rainbows, but before they went down the rabbit hole, this was as hard rock as they got for me.

"My Iron Lung" - I waited and waited for this song's intro to begin in the dark, but it never came.

"Electioneering" - One of my favorites from OK Computer.

"Kid A" - Oh how I wanted to hear those little intro piano sounds, followed by miraculous electric blips and Yorke's tweaked out vocal track.

"2+2=5" - The first Radiohead track I really remember knowing was them, as well as the first album I purchased. It's a longtime personal favorite, and the 1984 reference and feel of the entirely of HtTT strikes a chord with me.

"Sit Down, Stand Up" - They didn't really have time for a lot of HtTT material, but man would it have been cool to see.

"Backdrifts" - The beginning swooshing electronic sounds could've gone with another track from the album, "The Gloaming." To me they sort of play as the good/evil electronic sounds on the album, with "Gloaming" sounding menacing but "Backdrifts" inviting.

"Go To Sleep" - It could've worked right in to the part in their set with "Karma Police" and "Jigsaw" because they had the acoustic guitar going.

"Where I End and You Begin" - I love this album so much, it's a pity they didn't play more of it, but when you have so much great material there's no way they could play everything.

"House of Cards" - The only song from In Rainbows I wanted to hear that they didn't play.

Honorable Mention: "Creep" - You know they're not playing it, but why not put it down at the bottom of the wishlist?


Well, there you have it. Radiohead in San Francisco. I guess I'll just have to desperately try to see them again in hopes of hearing some of these 10.

Live: Conor Oberst & the Mystic Valley Band @ Amoeba Records

Bright Eyes is one of those bands that I feel most of its fans don't understand. If you looked at the fanbase for the Conor Oberst moniker, it's mostly teen girls, but if was to describe Oberst's song writing, the one phrase that always comes to mind is "beyond his years." The music never really fit the age that followed it; I always figured that the girls were locked onto his appearance and hadn't really understood his music. Critics maligned Oberst for his youth following, and for never following through on his "next Bob Dylan" tag they stuck on him when he emerged from Saddle Creek at 13.


In 2005 Obherst released two albums of material on the same day, offering two directions his career could go. Down one road was Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, featuring collaborations with Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner, electronic meddling, and a more youthful record. Essentially it was the album-length equivalent of the experimenting Oberst did on "Lover I Don't Have to Love" from his previous record, which had earned him legions of young, lovelorn fans just beginning to grip the "emo" label. Down the other road was the Emmylou Harris backed I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning, a folksy, mature record that just felt right for Oberst. Not to say Digital Ash didn't have it moments, but it was clear that Oberst had finally found the clear direction he needed on IWAIM. Tracks like "Train Under Water," "We Are Nowhere and It's Now," and my personal favorite "Road To Joy" sounded like a contemporary of Harris, not a twenty-something.


On his follow-up Cassadaga Oberst attempted the growing up he needed, and fell just a bit short. He had shifted to more folk-rock, but the youth-courting hit "Four Winds" hung on the album like "First Day of My Life" did on Wide Awake, both good songs, but both carrying the lingering tag of young singer/songwriter.

Now Oberst is on the verge of the release of his first "solo" album in years (technically Bright Eyes is a solo band, but the shift from moniker to his actual name carries some weight). He's gone soft, gone quiet, retained the midwestern sensibilities, and hopefully has completed the shift to being seen as an adult songwriter. He may be embracing the Dylan comparisons a little bit, but it was an unfair connection to draw from the start - Oberst does the electric rock and acoustic folk in about equal numbers, but he has a more personal and less universal aura about him. That's just my opinion though.

For the album Oberst went down to Mexico, recording with the Mystic Valley Band, and that's exactly who showed up with him when he played an in-store gig at Ameoba Records in downtown San Francisco this past weekend. They tore through an 8-song set of exclusively solo material (with one Dylan cover, but come on, its Conor Oberst), and it was satisfying to see so many multi-ear-piercing-and-dye-job kids looking disappointed with the adult direction he's taken as a musician and a songwriter. I really hope this is the record to give him recognition as the almost 30-year-old man he is, and not stuck permanently stick him as a teenager who refused to grow up in his songs.

Take a look at the last song of his set, and check out the setlist below.



Setlist:
Moab
Cape Canaveral
NYC - Gone, Gone
Souled Out!!!
Get-Well-Cards
Smoke Signals (Non-album track)
Corrina, Corrina (Bob Dylan cover)
Lenders in the Temple

The Most Painful Conflicts at Lollapalooza 2008

I go to college in the Chicago area, but I'm home for the summer working, so I can't go to Lollapalooza this year. Oh well, I'll just go to Outside Lands here in the Bay Area and get my Radiohead live fix then.

However, my girlfriend will be working the lounge at the Hard Rock Hotel for Lollapalooza this weekend, apparently getting to schmooze with some big time bands. Consider me jealous. In honor of that, I figure I'd write a little bit about the festival.

With most of these big multi-day, multi-stage, gaggle-of-bands festivals, there are some conflicts between two or more awesome bands playing at the same time. Lolla08 is no exception, and here are the worst offenders for most difficult decisions.


FRIDAY - Bloc Party OR The Raconteurs OR Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Between 6:15 and 8:00pm

Bloc Party is perhaps my favorite live band, and one of my all-time favorites to listen to. Jack White is a great stage presence, and the last time the Raconteurs played Lollapalooza they had a fantastic set. Stephen Malkmus is coming off another great album and is an indie-rock legend.

So who should you see? My hand tips toward Bloc Party, because they're concert is the most fun I've ever had watching rock music, and one of the few times people have actually danced for a rock band's entire set. Plus, they're probably debuting some new material, which is always sick to watch live. Also, going by the schedules, you could watch both Bloc Party and Stephen Malkmus instead of just seeing The Raconteurs and being all the way on the other side of the festival, risking missing some of Radiohead's set which is on the same stage Bloc Party plays on. Play it safe and stick with Bloc & Malkmus.

SATURDAY - Broken Social Scene OR Battles OR Lupe Fiasco - 6:30 to 7:30pm

Do you see a supergroup from the Great White North? A math-rock powerhouse quartet? Or one of Chicago's Big Three rappers?

Broken Social Scene are always a pretty cool show, but some of their members are currently touring as Stars, so it's a little unclear whether its the whole brood or just whoever isn't off doing something else. That's the one problem about seeing the band live, they're unpredictable about members.

Lupe is known to give great hometown shows, and has been at the top of his game. He's one of the few rappers I can listen to, because I just don't really like the genre. I definitely enjoy his rapping a lot more than I do a huge amount of rap, though.

Battles is one of the best math-rock bands out there, and don't let the genre name turn you off to them. They're a tight, rhythmic, electric quartet full of high-energy tracks.

Who gets the nod this time? Well, BSS is missing members, so they get knocked down just a tad and are out. Between Lupe and Battles, I'm going to have to go with Lupe. Battles may be a better experience, but even with fellow Big Three Kanye West headlining Sunday night, Lupe is still performing to a hometown crowd that will make his performance so much more amped up.

SUNDAY - The National OR Girl Talk OR Flosstradamus OR Gnarls Barkley - Between 6:15 and 8:15pm

The National have been riding a buzz high after Boxer made a ton of top 10 lists for 2007, and with good reason. Gnarls Barkley had a legendary summer two years ago after the release of their debut, which culminated in a Lollapalooza performance. Girl Talk is the best ADD DJ around, and he's just put out what I think is his best record in Feed The Animals. Flosstradamus is spinning for two hours, and was such a surprise playing at Northwestern's Dillo Day that he made it up into this battle.

Gnarls has had their time at the top, so I think they're not the top of the list here. The National have had enough buzz, but they're still really, really solid. Flosstradamus put on a great show at Northwestern, but they're playing for 2 hours, so you could just see them in passing the other groups.

My suggestion is to start at Gnarls for the opening tracks, then run over to Girl Talk's set, then head over to see the end of The National, hearing some Flosstradamus along the way. Sound like a plan?



So there you have it, my guide to conflicting sets at Lollapalooza 2008. I could've covered Wilco v. RATM or Kanye v. NIN, but it's pretty obvious you should see Rage and Kanye because one isn't touring and the other is in his hometown closing the festival; those aren't hard choices to make.

As a final gift, here's my playlist for the festival featuring many of the performers. Enjoy.

Finally a Festival for me...

I hate summer festival shows for the specific reason that I can never attend any of them. I used to go to BFD, a festival in Mountain View, CA. I went from 7th grade until my junior year of high school, and missed out on the tradition my senior year. I remember going specifically to see New Found Glory, one of my favorite bands in 7th grade, and I just kept going to the festival as an end-of-year habit. I did get introduced to Interpol, Death Cab For Cutie, and others at various festivals, and I got to see great sets by A.F.I., Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and others over the years.

All the other festivals have been too far away or at unfortunate times. Coachella is too far south in CA, and now I live in Evanston, IL when it happens. Bonaroo and Lollapalooza are both when I'm back in CA for the summer, and Bamboozle and Bamboozle Left are too far away at at weird times. Last year San Francisco got its own festival with some of my favorite indie bands, the Treasure Island Music Fesitval, which was the weekend I left for college so I couldn't go.


Finally it has just been announced that the Bay Area is getting another summer festival: Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival. This is just a Bay Area Festival, so we're probably going to get some lame, Bridge School Concert reject acts, right? WRONG, they landed just about the biggest band I've been waiting to see: Radiohead.

They've also got Tom Petty, Beck, Wilco, Ben Harper, Regina Spektor, and tiny little band Rupa & the April Fishes, who I saw back in September at a charity show for about thirty people. I'm about 90% sure that I'm going, because I desperately do not want to miss this chance to see Radiohead. I've been listening to a lot of their music lately, and I think I'm going to start trying to do retrospectives on bands, maybe starting with those boys from Oxfordshire.

Live: Rupa & the April Fishes

My sophomore year I began taking a black and white photography class. I had never really taken pictures as art before, but after only a few weeks I was so into it that by the end of the year I was turning my bathroom into a darkroom to develop my rolls of film. I haven't stopped using my old b&w film camera since, and I think I owe a lot of my passion for photography to my teacher that year. He was an undergrad at Northwestern, and his experience there discovering his love for photography got me somewhat interested in the school for the first time. He still takes great photos, a bunch of which can be found here.

But this story isn't about him; it's about his wife. Two years ago he married a former physician and now musician named Rupa, who fronts the band Rupa & the April Fishes. A couple nights ago I went to the opening of an exhibit of photos taken by my high school classmates about the issue of immigration, and Rupa & the April Fishes played a set at the end of the night. I'd heard good things about them, but I never imagined anything like what they played. While any person could easily say the band falls under the painfully general "world music" label, I found them to be more of a genre-bending group, incorporating jazz, latin, and indian styles into their songs. My favorites of the night were "La Cocinera" and "The Elephant", which created a perfect sonic image of a herd of elephants walking next to the crowd.

The picture above shows the entire band, with one guest on the far right. Rupa sings and plays a nylon string guitar, and she's backed by drums, trumpet, bass, cello, and accordian. She sings in French, Spanish, and English, which I think really added a bit of flair to the set because you didn't really know what you were going to get until she opened her mouth. I was only able to find a few samples of the band's work around for free, but these two songs come from the band's own site, where you can buy their debut CD. Give it a listen, it was a really interesting live set, and they're playing some dates up and down the coast of California in the coming weeks if you're in the area so check them out.



Rupa & the April Fishes - Un Americaine a Paris
Rupa & the April Fishes - C'est Moi