We've all heard the story about the fat kid who gets his hand stuck in the sweet jar because he's not willing to let go of any of the sweets. Well on Friday night I was that kid. The line up was epic and there were at least fifteen bands playing that I deemed totally unmissable but inevitably I had to miss some. So even with my handful of sweets I found myself pining after the sweets that were still in the jar.
Even though I saw some amazing things I still can't help thinking of all the bands I missed. The line up clashed horrendously, to the point where I thought the schedulers might have done it to deliberately torture me. At around 11pm Wilco, Les Savy Fav, Japandroids, Wire, Panda Bear were all clashing and overlapping all over the place. In the end I opted for Wire and Panda Bear as Person Pitch and Pink Flag are two of my favourite albums of all time. Wire delivered a pounding performance clad in 12 X U t-shirts but were reticent about playing the old stuff. Shouts of 'Start to Move!' and 'Three Girl Rhumba!' were met with 'We'll play what want' but what they wanted to play did not disappoint. Earlier in the evening I caught them doing an acapella number in the tiny acoustic tent. I lingered around because I wanted to tell them that this performance of Heartbeat is one greatest things I've ever seen on Youtube but then I bottled it and scuttled off to the next gig:
Panda Bear started out densely experimental and with my body full of beer I found him inaccessible. I had waited so long to see Panda Bear live and now here he was, and yet again, I had peaked too soon. With so many other gigs going on I headed off to find Les Savy Fav but by the time I got there it was game over. So I decided to return to the bean bags and regroup in time for Pixies.
A sea of people congregated in front of the San Miguel stage for the Pixies but as the band strode on stage I knew I was headed for disappointment. Yes - they sounded tight. Yes - the songs are amazing but no - they didn't rock my world. Watching them on the big screen (there was no way of getting anywhere near the stage) I could tell that their hearts weren't in it. They barely communicated with one another and there was a definite lack of passion. Black Francis's expression barely changed or registered an ounce of emotion during the entire set. I felt like I could have created a better Pixies experience for myself in my living room with a Doolittle record, a Surfer Rosa record, a bottle of tequila and ten of my closest friends. What's the point of a live performance if it doesn't bring anything new to the plate? Is it just so you can say, been there, done that bought t-shirt?
In the end, the unexpected highlight of Friday turned out to be Scout Niblett. I only own one of her albums and I confess that it never particularly grabbed me but when I stumbled upon her on the ATP stage I was completely blown away by her voice and her stage presence. She's 36 but on stage she looked about 21 and the strange mix of childlike innocence and womanly knowing made for a powerful combination. Laying haunting and ethereal vocals over metal and blues guitar riffs created a sound that was raw, dirty and beautiful all at the same time.
A valuable lesson was learned on Friday. Pace yourself. Stay off the Jager. And don't always pick the headliner. Luckily I implemented my new found knowledge on Saturday but more on that later...
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