DaveO

Armed with a semi-planned out schedule and a list of bands I absolutely could not miss, this past weekend I took to Golden Gate Park in San Francisco for my first Outside Lands with 60,000 other fans of live music. From what I have heard, getting to the park was not as difficult as in years past thanks in part to a paid shuttle being run all day from SF’s Civic Center straight to the festival grounds. Enough with the background, let’s get right into it.

Friday, August 12th

The first set I was able to catch was Phantogram who performed at Sutro Stage (the best stage of the festival, sunken down a little, a great place to catch a sunset act), whose material from their album Eyelid Moves translates very well to the live stage. In my biggest regret of the weekend, I opted out of seeing Foster The People to go check out the original lineup of The Meters. Unfortunately, The Meters spent a lot of time complaining about the gear they were provided, with guitarist Leo Nocentelli having the most issues. I don’t know if it was the trouble hearing or not, but the quartet seemed pretty confused and shockingly sloppy throughout their set – not what you expect from the godfathers of New Orleans. MGMT then delivered a tight set on the mainstage that included a cover of English Glory’s Broken Arrows. Their performance of the epic 11+ minute Siberian Breaks impressed me. The omission of their hit Kids from the setlist kept us all in hopes that somehow that it would be incorporated into one of Phish’s two sets, but it was not to be.

Phish delivered two safe sets filled with choice cover selections (this blogger’s first time seeing Frank Zappa’s Peaches en Regalia in 115+ shows), repertoire staples and a welcome performance of the band’s newest original, Steam, which segued nicely out of Velvet Underground’s Rock and Roll. One thing is for sure, Phish playing inside Golden Gate Park is a welcome upgrade over the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View.

READ ON for more of Dave’s Outside Lands 2011 Journal…

Having only lived in San Francisco since November of last year, this weekend will be my first time at the Outside Lands festival which enters its fourth year at Golden Gate Park. Back to a full three days this year, it seems like you can’t turn anywhere in SF or on the internet without friends discussing the festival, sharing a personalized schedule on Facebook or seeing any number of organizations running ticket giveaways.

For some, the festivities begin as early as tonight as Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! play a club show at The Independent. Tickets were previously only available to those who had purchased festival tickets but it was announced yesterday that this and a couple other late night shows were also publicly available. Also, on Thursday, in what is certain to be the hippest of festival pre-shows, Best Coast plays at the Academy of Arts and Sciences. Those unfamiliar with the Thursday night Nightlife at the Academy series, just think of a science museum/aquarium, but instead of all the little brats running around screaming, they are replaced with a plethora of bars – it’s awesome and they do it every Thursday.

The festival proper kicks off at noon on Friday. If you’ve got an iPhone or an Android, you should download the free Outside Lands mobile app that gives you stage schedules and a map, and Facebook wants you try out their new Messenger application as a way to keep in contact with friends onsite. If you live anywhere near Civic Center, or can get there easily, consider taking the shuttle running for the first time this year.

READ ON for more of Dave’s Outside Lands 2011 Preview…

With its five famous verses and a chorus that just begs to be sung along to, The Weight is one of the best known songs by The Band and was released on their 1968 debut album Music From Big Pink. For all the information you ever could possibly want to know, check out this link.

The Contestants:

Artist: Aretha Franklin
Album: Soul Folk in Action
The Skinny: Leading off this week is definitely one of the best covers of The Weight and the first of this week’s contestants to feature the late Duane Allman on guitar. Also the first of a few really incredible soul/gospel arrangements.

[audio:https://glidemag.wpengine.com/hiddentrack/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/arethaweight.mp3]

READ ON for more covers of The Weight by The Band…

As I struggled to pick a topic that I found both topical and though-provoking I had the following thought: Does anyone write songs about August? The answer of course is

[Originally Published: 7/1/08] In celebration of our Independence Day I have selected the Star Spangled Banner as our cover of choice this week. Those not familiar with the history of our nation’s National Anthem should click the link above and learn how a poem from 1814 was set to the tune of a popular drinking song and became our Nation’s #1 theme song.

I’m not going to have a vote this week (wouldn’t everyone vote for Hendrix?), so I guess this is more of a B List than a Cover Wars. There have been a lot of amazing performances of the Star Spangled Banner and I have compiled a variety of videos selecting some of my favorites (while giving preferential treatment to the artists most frequently covered here on Hidden Track) but also including a few mainstream artists as well.

Marvin Gaye (1983 NBA All Star Game):

READ ON after the jump for many more performances of the Anthem….

Some of the best Cover Wars are Bob Dylan tunes, one of my personal favorites was The Wicked Messenger. Released on the 1965 album Bringing It All Back Home, mystery has always surrounded the identity of Baby Blue. It’s been recorded a lot, we’ll cap it at eight renditions – have a listen.

The Contestants:

Artist: The 13th Floor Elevators
Album: Easter Everywhere
The Skinny: Leading off this week is the band situated in between 10,000 Maniacs and 10-20s in my iTunes collection and their psychedelic interpretation from a critically acclaimed studio album from 1967.

[audio:https://glidemag.wpengine.com/hiddentrack/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/13thblue.mp3]

READ ON for more covers of Bob Dylan’s It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue

[Originally Published: January 26, 2010]

Harvest Moon is the title track from a 1992 Neil Young album. Released a full twenty years after Young’s album Harvest, a number of supporting musicians appear on both albums. Many things can influence my choice of songs for Cover Wars each week and one of them is other music blogs.

Snarky Indie Blog Pitchfork had a post last Thursday where they pointed out that both Kevin Barnes and Ben Gibbard had both contributed covers of Harvest Moon for charity releases. P4K theorized…

Neil Young: Having a moment! One possible explanation for the two simultaneous covers: The recent release of Young’s archival live album Dreamin’ Man, which collects live versions of every song from Young’s Harvest Moon album.

Well if they checked YouTube, they would have realized that both artists performed the song 3+ years ago. Pitchfork, I give you a 3.6 for doing your Internet research.

The Contestants:

Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie): As was mentioned in the intro, Gibbard recently contributed a cover of Harvest Moon to GIVE Seattle 2009. Proceeds from this compilation go to Food Banks and Art Corps in Seattle. Gibbard performed this tune frequently on his 2007 solo tour.

READ ON for the rest of this week’s contestants…

We don’t do a lot of Cover Wars features of songs originally sung by female lead singers, we’ll have to change that starting this week with Landslide, a track from the 1975 self-titled Fleetwood Mac album. I’d tell you more about the song, but you should just hear it straight from Stevie Nicks, you’ll get a guest appearance from her in the second video featured in the “Glee” entry.

The Contestants:

Artist: Dixie Chicks
Album: Home
The Skinny:

The Dixie Chicks recorded this cover in 2002 on their album Home and the deluxe edition also features a Sheryl Crow remix.

[audio:https://glidemag.wpengine.com/hiddentrack/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/dixieslide.mp3]

READ ON for more covers of Fleetwood Mac’s Landslide…

Maybe you’ve heard, Phish Summer Tour kicks off tonight in Bethel, NY and the venue is situated extremely close to Max Yasgur’s 600 acre farm, the site of the original