Lollapalooza 2010: Day Three

MUTEMATH stole the daytime. The New Orleans quartet gave their all during a furious, diverse mid-afternoon set, putting them as strong contender for show of the weekend. While a vast majority of attendees waited 20 minutes for Erykah Badu and her blond Mohawk to actually get on the stage, MUTEMATH tore through several tracks off Armistice, showcasing their ability to morph sounds, styles and feels from song to song.

It seems lately that bands stick of a couple of steady routines during live sets, rather than changing arrangements and instrumentation. But MUTEMATH didn’t stay in one place throughout, changing forms and styles as they went. MUTEMATH’s set was a reminder of how strong a live show can be when the band is as intensely energized as the audience. With Greg Hill adding screaming tweaks to his guitar, bassist Roy Mitchell-Cárdenas maintaining low end while sounding like a whole other melody instrument at the same time, drummer Darren King unleashing whipcrack beats and singer/keyboardist Paul Meany coloring the fray with his earnest pained vocals, the band’s set gave me chills.

During Spotlight, Meany jumped off the stage and disappeared for a minute before swiftly appearing from the back of the stage. Maybe he went to the future, which is where MUTEMATH probably came from.  That was after he showed the crowd that the keytar could be used well for rock, and not just to make fun of the 80s.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM8ir-TFF2M&hd=1[/youtube]

MGMT, what happened? I’m all for bands experimenting (again one of the reasons why MUTEMATH stuck out so much), but MGMT’s new material is the sonic version of a little brother wearing his older brother’s clothes just to prove that he can be cool, even though the clothes don’t fit. The now-expanded band’s psychedelic-tinged rock has a decent spine to it all, but I couldn’t help notice how listless people seemed during their set. Sure, handfuls of folks pumped fists and sang along, but for the tightly packed attendance, the energy was missing. The new direction may not totally be a lost cause, but a) they don’t need to completely turn away from the dance-vibe that made them known and b) the new sound needs something to spice it up.

Crossing the park to the south end I heard Wolfmother still trying to rip off every arena band from the 1970s as their set closed before Cypress Hill started. You guessed it, Cypress still smokes weed, still raps about weed, still talks about weed in between rapping about weed. Nineties nostalgia was in the air at Lolla’s south end on Sunday, and Cypress delivered their hits including Insane in the Brain and Hits from the Bong among a couple others. An interesting musical moment came when they cycled through a sample from the end of Suite: Judy Blue Eyes while their percussionist went off for a while. Otherwise, their set was good for a few moments of reminiscence…wait, did that actually happen?

Screw all the people who said Chris Cornell couldn’t hit those screaming high notes. Doubly screw all the people who said Soundgarden reuniting was contrived and pointless. You know who you are. The band’s second show in 12 years was fiery, mean and on point (they did play at the Vic Thursday night).  Their set spanned heavy hitters from Badmotorfinger such as Jesus Christ Pose and later less hard and more melodic numbers like Burden in My Hand. They were able to shift sonic palettes without losing any luster. Did they play anything new? No, and that certainly fueled the criticism into motives behind the reunion. But so what? These songs still kick ass and so does this band.

Guitarist Kim Thayil’s snaky warbling textures combined with his shredding power was a sound to behold. Bassist Ben Shepherd added a broad and powerful low end of sound to the songs, while drummer Matt Cameron showed a fierce hunger I have never seen in him while supporting Pearl Jam.  Cornell screamed with fury while stomping around the stage, and even jumped into the crowd to sing with attendees during Outshined. While the future is unknown as to whether they will record again, it is clear they can perform the hell of their great songs.

So far only Time Out Chicago is to blame for the unfounded rumor that David Bowie would appear with the Arcade Fire during their set. Oh well, the Lollapalooza epic rumor is becoming a bit of a tradition.

But that didn’t stop the army of Arcade Fire from performing with sheer spirited energy. As Win Butler and crew stood in a line, belting their songs and become more soaked with sweat, those gathered returned the feeling by jumping and yelling along. While I only caught the end, it is so vividly clear how much this band surrenders themselves to their music. The band encored with the epic yelling of Wake Up, with tens of thousands of people doing their best choir support for the song’s signature wordless main vocals. Yet another great moment of chills during the fest.

Lollapalooza added a lot of great things this year: More space, better food and faster routes to sprint end to end to catch more music. While a lot of people looked down at the lineup compared to years past, I left this festival pleasantly surprised by bands I wrote off years ago (The Strokes) and found groups I was not too familiar with that I will now dive into (Metric, Yeasayer).

But most importantly, Mavis Staples showed that earnest, real music sang with feeling trumps a gigantic stage show every time.

Until next year…

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