popwreckoning

Can a band be raw and polished? I had never really thought about it until I saw White Rabbits at their Kansas City stop. Their sound had such strong, uninhibited emotions that it came off with raw garage-rock-band sound. But at the same time everything from vocals to percussion, were precise and perfectly timed, giving the show an overall sheen of quality and talent.

The night jumped between selections from It’s Frightening and a new album (to hopefully be released soon). The older songs got the crowd on its feet, while the newbies kept the curiosity alive.

“The Salesman (Tramp Life)” with its light and airy notes, started a gentle groove in the audience. One wouldn’t think this song would translate well to the stage, due to the fact that in general it’s a rather simplistic song. But between the melodic repetitions and hints of harmonies, this ended up being a great energy build for the evening.

Stepping back a few decades to an 80s folk/rock flavor was “They Done Wrong / We Done Wrong”. Guitars managed to squeeze an acoustic sentiment out of an electric model and when combined with a slap-beat from the drums, made this one intriguing to watch and soothing to hear.

Mixed in between a few new songs, [which unfortunately came to us without titles] was “Lionesse”. If the Rabbits can combine raw and polish, then it’s a not a stretch for them to combine dance-y with eerie. The beginning of this song is set so low on the bass notes that when met with whispering lyrics, goosebumps start to form. However eventually, we were able to see one of the main elements that makes the White Rabbits who they are – percussion. The entire night there wer two drummers on stage, but there were those select songs where each drummer played a significant role. This was one of those songs.

While main rhythm was kept on the kit, a handful of marching drums were given quite a beating. So much was going on stage that you didn’t know whether to dance or just stand there in amazement.

“Percussion Gun” was the entire reason I started listening to the Rabbits and it was apparent that this was the same for most of the audience. When the opening drum beats came bursting off the stage, cheers erupted. Soft and polished lyrics were set on top of distorted guitar strums and beats so quick Matthew Clark seriously had to be crazy in order to keep up. Again we were back to a base of minimal frill music, but there’s something about this band that never lets their sound come off as anything but amazing.

A short encore indulged the crowd with a couple more songs. Ending everything off with “Rudie Fails” a sound similar to that of how they started the evening. There was just enough of an up-tempo to keep the heads nodding and sashaying hips moving. The white keys really stood out as a main player with their cleverly placed chords.

A smaller venue was the perfect setting for a White Rabbits set. The amount of things happening on one stage at one time requires a setting for complete concentration. Not to mention the fact that the intimate approach just made the evening that much more entertaining.  And to top it off, the introduction of new music was a fantastic Christmas present.

Half of PodWreck ventured to Austin City Limits to get a few interviews. White Rabbits was one of them. The audio sucks, but the interview is interesting. The band talks about FIFA, Columbia, Mo., and their cats/dogs.

It’s that time of year again.

What time, you ask?

Time for Kansas City’s 96.5 The Buzz’s Halloweenie Roast.

Spooktacular!

Enjoy nine bands at the Beaumont, and partake in the Freaks Tattoo Costume Contest to get your goulish Halloween spirits in full swing before the 31st.

The show is all ages and doors are at 5 p.m on Wednesday, October, 28.

Four local bands will play inside while this crazy line-up rocks it hard outside:

Start out the evening by giving a listen to frenzied NY punk indie-rockers, White Rabbits. Listen to what the Rabbits have to offer by listening to It’s Frightening on iTunes.

Take in the cool, smooth blues and soul of the Austin-based group Black Joe Lewis (& the Honeybears). I predict that these fellas will get the crowd moving to their gritty, swing tunes. Seriously. You can’t sit still during a tune like “Bitch, I Love You.”

Next up are Sune Rose Wagner and Sharin Foo of The Raveonettes. The Everly Brothers, Cramps, Bowie (the list goes on) inspired musicians should deliver a set full of fun songs and awesome melodies. Expect to hear new tunes from their album In And Out Of Control (out Oct. 6).

The the 80s synth-pop rockers whose hairstyles were as memorable as their albums, A Flock of Seagulls, will be next on the bill.

Jet, the Australian loves who brought you “Are You Going To Be My Girl,” will be headlining the show outside. Catch up with these rockers by giving their album, Shaka Rock, a listen.

Buzz Halloweenie Roast: tickets

After having been asked to headline the Village Voice’s infamous Siren Festival at the historic Coney Island for several years, Built to Spill finally accepted the honor, following in the footsteps of some of indie rocks latest and greatest such as Ra Ra Riot, Broken Social Scene, Steven Malkmus and the Jicks, New York Dolls, M.I.A, Cursive, Popwreckoning favorites White Rabbits, TV on the Radio, and Death Cab for Cutie, to name a few. It’s generally speaking a who’s who of both up and comers as well as hard-hitting indie heavyweights and it’s FREE!

The last time I attended I was young 21 living in Williamsburg. It was the first year the festival took place. It was 100-plus degrees and by the end we were crispy, stuffed with zepolis, covered in beer and sand, and eventually everyone started to look like the side show freaks that Coney Island is famous for. That year we saw Peaches, Rainer Maria, Guided by Voices, and Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. It was quintessential New York, one of those amazing days where you keep pinching yourself, “Do I really live here?” But for some reason, I never returned to Coney Island or the Siren Festival after that. Truth, Coney Island was dirty, run down and kinda sad. A forgotten NYC treasure with a giant price tag and an expiration date that every New Yorker was aware of. Coney Island was finished…or so I thought. In terms of the festival and it’s stellar lineup each year, I always thought to myself, ‘Well, I can catch them at The Bowery….right?’

I had a change of heart this year. Lured by the opportunity to see Built to Spill under the shifting sky, by the beach, at the end of a perfect Summer Saturday, I returned to Coney Island nine years later, and now I’m left wondering why I waited so long. This years lineup included Built to Spill, The Raveonettes, Spank Rock, Frightened Rabbit, A Place to Bury Strangers, Grand Duchy, Monotonix, Thee Oh Sees, Future of the Left, Japandroids, Michachu & The Shapes, Tiny Masters of Today, Bear Hands, The Blue Van, Justine D., and Deadheat DJs.

Grand Duchy is Frank Black, a.k.a. Black Francis, a.k.a. lead singer of The Pixies, and if you don’t know that…well shame on you, go do your homework before continuing. Anywho, Black Francis and his wife Violet Clark are Grand Duchy and they played songs on the main stage from their debut album, Petits Fours. The hooky songs feature vocals from Clark paired with Francis’s trademark storming guitar riffs. Clark, in an artist statement, describes the music as a set of opposites: “eclectic and consistent, raw and cooked, smooth and rough, punky and pop, guitar and synth, he and she…Dinner and dessert.” Anything Francis does, in my opinion is genius. See Teenager of the Year as reference. Grand Duchy is another feather in his hat.

Built to Spill took the stage to play the last set, just as the sky was changing from day to eve and the Cyclone lights flickered on. The band that inspired Modest Mouse, Death Cab, and the ubiquitous Northwest Sound that followed, played for over two hours. They played everything you’d ever want to hear, giving the crowd just what they came for. Everyone knew every lyric. You almost didn’t belong if you didn’t. The first note of “Carry the Zero” dropped and the hardcores were high-fiving. Doug Martsch turned four-minute songs into eleven-minute epic guitar jams busting string after string as fireworks blossomed in the purple sky overhead and lovers clutched each other closer. It was ridiculously magical. People were literally turning to the stranger next to them with Cheshire cat grins. And again, nine years later, I’m asking, “Do I really live here?”

Coney Island hasn’t changed much in nine years. It’s still run down, forgotten, and kinda sad, but that’s what you love about it. It buzzes with nostalgia for a time when everything was hustling and bustling, when honey roasted almonds were five cents on the boardwalk, when the skyline mattered, and people believed in two-headed snake babies and one hundred pound rats. To visit Coney Island is a suspension of disbelief. Seeing Built to Spill in this context is a somewhat of a similar act, so good it must be fiction.

Built to Spill: website | myspace
Siren Fest: website

Bonnaroo Day 1: Thursday, June 11…

Bonnaroo, or the Roo as some like to call it (although Colin Meloy will tell you that anytime anybody calls it that, a kitten dies), is unreal if you have never been to a camping music festival. The festival is just as much about what happens off the stage as what happens on it. In fact, sometimes what happens out in the crowd or the campgrounds is even more interesting than the music you hear on stage.

I’m not sure you can even properly prepare for something like this fest. After having checked the weather 800 times and all the lists of what to bring and what not to bring, I thought we would be more than prepared. We even left a day early to make sure we’d get a good campsite. However, Mother Nature had other plans for us. A hailstorm caused us to crash outside of St. Louis and we weren’t the only ones who had problems. Delta Spirit didn’t make it to Manchester in time and had to crash land outside of Dallas. Fortunately, the festival promoters, Big Hassle Media, and crew, were flexible and quickly helped find a new time and a stage for the band to play after their struggles to make it successfully to Tennessee. Unfortunately, for us PopWreckers, we couldn’t very well ask the festival to hold off on some of our favorite artists playing Thursday until we got there so we missed acts like Julia Nunes and White Rabbits. Not that arriving in Manchester in time for those acts meant anything. To claim a campsite and get into Centeroo, the main grounds for the festival, you still need to get there like 8 hours early. Also, there are several entrances, and somehow we beat some of our friends in after they had been sitting in line for hours. Granted, I would not be surprised if they weren’t accidentally behind a parked car somewhere and didn’t realize that it wasn’t moving for that reason. So that brings me to lessons 1 and 2:

Be patient. You will be waiting in a line of cars for hours just to get in for camping and you will see many give up and start walking into the grounds. It helps if you already have car snacks so you aren’t tempted by the overpriced vendors lining the streets.

Don’t pick up hitchhikers. People will try to hitch a ride with you into the campgrounds. Don’t let them. You don’t know what they’re carrying and they do search your cars before letting you in the campgrounds.
Now, I’ve never been camping in my entire life and here is where I made my other major mistake. I thought tents took like 5 minutes to set up, but after Joshua and I struggled with my family tent, an army guy took pity and tried to help, and I called my father who annoyingly asked if we had tried looking at the instructions, we finally gave up. Fortunately, our kind neighbors from Alabama took pity on us and loaned us a far easier tent to set up. The festival has people from all walks of life, but the one thing I can say that everybody I have met here have in common is that they are all super nice. Lesson 3:

Practice your tent or camper set up before you come. Trust me, it will save you from looking like an idiot later.

A camp somewhat set up, we were finally ready to venture into the actual festival portion. Walls of RVs and tents soon broke into new walls of port-a-potties and vendors selling everything from tie-dye to arepas (a delicious, but greasy, fried corn and cheese sort of patty). A giant ferris wheel served as our navigation point to an entrance where we saw our first real signs of drugs and the nastier side of the festival. A bad trip had a man seizing already by the entrance to the fest and security struggled to keep people moving past. So, lesson 4:

Drugs are bad. I know, I know, this is supposed to be stoner fest, but that shit was scary. So don’t do it. Seizing on day 1 does not look like fun. Also, you should not be surprised like the girl in front of me at the check-in was when security takes away your shrooms. This fest is actually trippy enough without the aid of drugs.

Security took awhile to get through, but so far that has only been an issue for Thursday. Once inside Centeroo, we learned that it wasn’t much different than the campsites with the exception that there were now stages. There were still walls of port-a-potties and vendors and people were camped out already at their favorite stages. We wandered for a bit and saw a lot of people throwing their hands up for Murs as we made our way over to This Tent for our first band: Hockey.

Hockey was a band I didn’t know much about, but after watching their singer dance around with a sweatband singing tunes that would make fans of Hot Hot Heat, Head Automatica and Hellogoodbye go crazy for, I was hooked. Throw in a huge instrumental build up with extra drums and keys and you have a great set. Hockey even surprised by throwing in some jazzier elements and they are definitely one band I can’t wait to hear more from in the future.

We jumped from Hockey to catch the crew in Portugal. The Man over in That Tent. It was a bit of a walk, but considering these guys came all the way from Alaska, it was worth it. This band’s unique vocal blend that I almost want to compare to Zeppelin without actually saying they are Zeppelinesque. There’s a yowl quality and some crazy guitar riffs. They also had this really cool effect made from unplugging and replugging the guitar that almost made it sound like a strange accordion.

We quickly learned lesson 5:

Wear good shoes and be ready to walk. We spent most of Thursday navigating through the throngs of vendors and people going from This Tent to That Tent and wearing out really quickly.

We went from Portugal. The Man back to the hipster-loving Chairlift. The usual the threesome were sometimes joined by a fourth person giving them the freedom to have more backing vocals or more guitars. Once the singer let down her hair, the set really turned into a dance party as she sang popular tunes “Bruises” and “Evident Utensil.”

For those under the tent, the party was non-stop. For those not as lucky to be a part of this set, they were battling the greatest problem of having an outdoor festival: the weather. As foretold in the forecast, it was if all hell broke loose and rain just poured down on the grounds, quickly turning the sandy grass into a muddy mess. As I began sinking into the ground even under the comfort of the tent, I was forced into taking off my flip flops for fear I lose them and standing in the mud. I somehow worked my way up to the side stage area where the ground was a little more firm before watching my final act of the night. But lesson 6:

Pack a poncho. I know they’re a silly looking, but they are handy.

Crappy weather couldn’t keep spirits down and the hipsters (and the hippies) continued to dance when buzz band Passion Pit took the stage. This band owned the night as lead singer Michael Angelakos jumped between vocal ranges and got the audience singing along. Highlights of the set were “Live to Tell Tale” and my personal favorite “Sleepyhead,” which sounds like the Shins if they had tons of caffeine. Angelakos and the band claimed to be nervous in front of their largest crowd ever, but with how confident they sounded once performing, it was hard to believe that just moments before, Angelakos was nervously pacing backstage with a towel over his head.

Passion Pit Set List:
Better Things
Make Light
Let Your Love
I Got Your Number
Little Secrets
Live to Tell Tale
Fold in your Hands
Moth Swings
Sleepyhead
Smile Upon Me
The Reeling

In an attempt to beat the second wave of weather, we left after Passion Pit only to discover Bonnaroo at night. Immediately outside of the tent were large flames coming out of a strange mix of a seesaw wickerman. Further along, giant lightning bug decorations guided our way to the fountain in the festival’s center before a violin solo from the Zac Brown Band distracted us into watching another band for a few moments. After the guy finished flying across the strings we decided to jet as well, but alas. All these distractions proved to be big time stallers and we soon found ourselves trapped in another monsoon. This is when we learned our final lesson of the day. Lesson 7:

Know where your tent is located!!!

I can’t even begin to stress how important this lesson is. We thought we knew how to get to pink balloon 8, but they had lowered the balloons in the weather and we had left through a different exit and didn’t know any of the streets through the campsites. We could have taken one of the golf cart taxis, but didn’t know how to direct them to our camp. After wandering through mud, rain and tents we finally discovered our camp much later than we intended and crashed after our the crash course that was Bonnaroo Day 1.

And so ends our first day at Bonnaroo. Look for Day 2 and photo posts to be added soon!

Bonnaroo: website

Photos by: Joshua Hammond