As of two years ago, Chicago didn’t have one rock festival to call their own. Now, along with Pitchfork and Lollapalooza, there are three. Right after Bonnaroo, Timothy and I drove north to sling some cream at the second Intonation Music Festival. This years festival was curated by
VICE so there was a good helping of bands from the label , including the two headliners, The Streets and Bloc Party. They filled in the rest of the bill with an eclectic mix that included Dead Prez, Blue Cheer, Constatines, Roky Erickson, Robert Pollard, Lady Sovereign, and more.
The eastern half of the country was in the midst of being plagued by rain and storms all around Intonation. Somehow the brunt of it all avoided Union Park for most of Saturday and Sunday. It was a near perfect weekend with over 10,000 attendees getting their fill of live music all day and night. There were two stages a few hundred yards apart and as soon as one artist would finish their set, the next would, near instantly, light up the other.
Guitar Center jumped on board to buy all the ice cream for Wakarusa, Bonnaroo, and Intonation. We picked up some cream at Pars Ice Cream then headed over to the park which was only a few miles away. Since there wasn’t a set spot for us, we were able to make our own. We chose right behind the Virtue Stage under some trees. The crowd was a bit thin backstage but we managed to sling over 1000 treats throughout the weekend. The crew was only three deep with Timothy handling all the photography and Larissa helping out with the reviews. This meant there wasn’t going to be much time for me to catch some music. I set my goal low and stated I just wanted to see The Streets, Roky Erickson, and some of the Constatines set. Success!
I used to want to throw my own festival because I thought there weren’t enough of ’em. After going to so many good one’s this year, like Intonation, I can’t really imagine doing a better job, so I’ll leave all the hard work to the production people and I’ll stick to doing what I’m best at, slingin’ the cream and livin’ the dream.
Thanks again to Guitar Center for helping us out. Thanks to all the bands and everyone else who made Intonation possible. We’re looking forward to next year.
Annie
For those of you not familiar with Annie, she is a tow-headed fairy from another planet that sings dance music about “being sixteen, falling in love, and having fun.” This Scandinavian pop princess got the crowd dancing with their eyes closed with “Chewing Gum.” Though her music lost a lot of the bells and whistles present on Anniemal, the live performance was more haunting, less flash-in-the-pan pop. Throughout her set I couldn’t help hoping her next album would be of her reading fairytales to tiny, enraptured children.
Later in the night I bumped into Annie buying a hot dog at a foodstand. I can only assume it was for one of her less-than-ethereal bandmates.
Bloc Party
If Jon Brion is the sparkling peridot in the Intonation Fest crown, Bloc Party is the big honkin’ canary diamond surrounded by tiny little rubies and sapphires. Things I didn’t know about Bloc Party before their set: they are passionate as all get-out, not whiny and overproduced as they are on CD. Also, anyone within a twenty-mile radius of them will love them fiercely, including a tiny British lad sitting on the side of the stage, who sang along with their every word.
When the band launched into “This Modern Love,” night and rain were already falling, blue globe lights from cell phones waving, everyone was dancing, the press pit overrun with fans and friends and drunk kids hanging onto each other for dear life, fans stretching out behind us, melting into the edges of night and Union Park. And at the height of this movie moment, where everyone present was just happy, I think the rest of Chicago must have heard our resounding call: What are you holding out for?
Blue Cheer
Another name for these old school, grizzled rockers might be Tomato Red Tan or Strawberry Skin. Apparently, the last time these dudes played in Chicago they got arrested for possession and had to spend the night in jail. And they never used sunscreen again. All kinds were attracted to this group, but the most passionate were scraggly-haired Blue Cheer diehards screaming “Fuck yesssss!” after every word the lead singer said. My favorite utterance: “We’re locked up in rock and roll and there ain’t no way out.”
(ed. They rocked, why rehash psych-rock when you can get it from the originals?)
Robert Pollard
I think I own more GBV albums than any other band. The problem with a band, and it’s frontman, being so prolific, is that you reach a point where you don’t have time to listen to everything so they end up getting cut off. Unfortunately that’s what I’ve done with all Bob Pollard‘s solo works. (anyone gone any Freedom Cruise?)
I was working the truck the whole time during their set so I didn’t get to really see/hear what was going on. When I took a much needed bathroom break I started singing to myself “Game of Pricks.” Right when I walked out of the field house, sure enough that’s what they broke into, the only GBV song during the whole set. Now that’s some crazy coincidence considering there are a gazillion GBV tracks and a near gazillion good ones they coulda played.
Boredoms
At every festival, there is sure to be one band you just don’t “get.” In high school it was Insane Clown Posse. And here, at Intonation, it’s the
Boredoms: a manic, squealing Japanese noise band that everybody who’s everybody seems to love to pieces, especially tiny hipster girls. I tried hard to go along for the ride (by downing a Sparks Black as soon as they started playing) but I just couldn’t get into the crazy screaming and endless set.
Two awesome things about this band: the lead screamer had amazing dreads and everyone’s drums were set up in a circle. And someone in the band must have brought along some family, because a tiny baby crawled around on the side of the stage during the set. That baby is going to be a total badass when she grows up. And deaf.
(ed. Like nothing I had ever seen or heard before. An insanely tight barrage of drums that filled the void from the lack of drugs I was on)
Constatines
At a festival known for its stylish, stylized guests, Constantines are a surprising and refreshing departure from the average indie rocker. Plain-clothes guys that specialize in tight performances of aching, unpredictable rock songs you’d play after a breakup, right after crying your eyes out and just before running the heartbreaker off the road.
The lead singer, a scrappy, skinny everyman with Scott Walker’s sadness tells his tales of woe while his fellow bandmates just seem happy to be part of the party. And to throw things at the audience, like drumsticks and, YES, more tambourines!
(ed. Ran from the truck to catch a couple songs. One of the only bands I got to see on the far stage. Larissa’s got it right, the Constatines are some good rock ‘n roll.)
Dead Prez
Even though I had to watch the truck, I still feel like an idiot for missing Dead Prez. Especially after watching Dave Chappelle’s Block Party a couple nights ago and seeing them tear things up. I think Timothy said it was his favorite set of the day, I’ll have to fact check that fo sho though. The Coup is my favorite Hip Hop group and numerous people have told me that Dead Prez is the east coast version of politicized rap. Welp, guess I’ll have to hope to catch them down the road.
Ghostface
“Throw your W’s in the air!” The best part of this set wasn’t Ghostface’s powerful performance, his rhymes, or his co-stars. Nor was it his humorous praise for the Chicago White Sox and our other hometown sports teams.
No, I think the highlight of his set would be when he called about 50 girls onstage (including the BBC America Cheerleaders, in all their Vice Do, American-Apparel Glory) and grinded on each and every last one of them, laughing the entire time.
High on Fire
High on Fire was the first band I caught at this year’s Intonation Fest. Heavy. Hard. Rock. Not exactly my cup of tea, but anyone who can get a crowd of overheated, dressed-to-the-nines hipsters clapping their hands and thrashing their heads enthusiastically at three in the afternoon has something going on in the charisma department. That, and the lead singer had a tattoo of a wolf gnashing its teeth dangerously close to his right nipple. This guy is fearless.
Jon Brion
In the tiara that is the Intonation Music Fest, Jon Brion is one of the featured gemstones. A pop prodigy, this guy took and played any requests from the audience when he wasn’t sassing them out or shocking them with surprise guests, like the drummer from Wilco. Watching his set was like watching a circus act, as he juggled guitar, drums, and piano loops to create the perfect musical backdrop for his sweet, spot-on, and heartfelt vocals.
He even pulled some genuine rock star antics, like pushing over his piano. Then picking it back up. My favorite Jon Brion line of the night is when he asked the audience: “Do you want to hear a song about a crackhead that drank for two weeks and then fell asleep? Yes you do!”
Rhymefest
Dude is all about the Chi-town and “rap witha message.” So why do my friends talk so much smack about his recordings? Who knows. As mentioned, I’m a music goon, and haven’t heard much Rhymefest outside of his collaborations with Kanye West. What I do know is this guy is hilarious and heartfelt, and really enjoys interacting with his audience.
And when he rocked some Kanye-less cuts, he laughingly warned us: “Kanye ain’t gonna pop out of anywhere now. Don’t get excited.” Another plus to Rhymefest’s live performance: two zoot-suited bodyguards that stood center stage and never once cracked a smile during Rhymefest’s set.
Roky Erickson
Sometime in 1995 or 96 I was working at Fingerprints in Long Beach and happened to stumble upon an advance CD of Roky Erickson album on Trance Syndicate, All That May Do My Rhyme. About the same time I had been listening a lot of stuff from the sixties and seventies and all those cool bootleg compilations, like, Savage Kick, Pebbles, Songs We taught the Fuzztones, and stuff like that.
I dug the 13th Floor Elevators stuff a lot but I couldn’t stop listening to “Starry Eyes”, “Clear Night For Love”, and all the other tracks off All That May Do My Rhyme. In 2003 I moved to Austin to reopen the Hole in the Wall and one night, when the Texas Mavericks were on stage, Roky, and brother Sumner, came in. Since a good portion of the Mavericks backed Roky on All That May Do My Rhyme I had hoped he might stop by. When the front door opened, the band was mid song and everyone in the house starting applauding and cheering for Roky. I was in the office and instantly knew the man was in the house.
Roky didn’t play that night, nor during the three or so months I lived in Austin. It just so happened that his first show outside of Texas in 25 years was at this years Intonation Festival. I wish I could track down or remember his set list better. For the fans of Roky, they were in for a treat, for those unaware of his history, I wonder what they thought. My highlight was returning to check on the truck and telling whoever was standing by, “If he plays Starry Eyes, I’m outta here in a heartbeat”. Sure enough he did and I bopped my way through the audience with a permagrin on my face.
Thank you Roky
The Streets
The Streets, AKA Mike Skinner, have amassed quite a bit of acclaim in only a handful of years. For his US tour with Lady Sovereign he brought out a full live band to mix things up and keep ’em fresh. The Streets turned a lot of heads at Bonnaroo just the week before and once Mike saw Bessie, the ice cream truck backstage in Chicago he walked up, said “Hi” and asked if it was the same truck he had seen just a week before in Tennessee. Yup.
When slinging cream at festivals, things usually slow down by the time the headliner goes on. Once the band started groovin’ I went out with the audience and played along. Mr. Skinner did everything he could to make this performance a group effort. Where as most MC’s would be calling for everyone to get up, Mike kept trying to see how low everyone could go, which made for a pretty funny scene. “When You Wasn’t Famous”, off Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living is a funny take on how getting girls is easy, until you try to pull one who’s also famous. The band was tight and his sidekick/hypeman was spot on. Not sure how many bands actually take the time to update journals while on the road but there’s some pretty funny stories on The Streets Myspace page.
Thought about making a straight shot to NYC to sling some cream outside their Webster Hall show a couple nights later but Bessie wasn’t having it. Hope the make the rounds again soon.
The Stills
I must admit, when these cute-as-vintage-buttons lads took the stage, I didn’t expect too much from The Stills. Now I know that is because I am a music goon. This Montreal band has a soundtrack-for-summer sound, sings songs about lost loves and how “clear skies mean clear brains,” and are seemingly in love with Chicago. And Chicago isn’t playing hard to get: three pretty drunk girls standing in front of me sang along to every last one of their songs while downing beers and holding onto each others’ hair.
What I liked best about this band besides getting winked at by the lead singer and their generally fun sound wastheir hand percussion! These guys are not afraid to use their tambourines!
Lady Sovereign
Of all the badasses and shows of the night, the Ess-Oh-Vee was by far my favorite. Because her rhymes were random, hyperfast, and hilarious, and she was tiny, fierce, and refused to take her J-Lo-esque sunglasses off throughout her set. But it was a Vice-Curated affair, who can blame her? Plus anyone who calls themselves a “big midget,” and collaborates with Jay-Z while looking like she could be simply a sixth-grade trouble maker can do whatever she damn well pleases.
And so can her entourage. One of her crew painted a picture while Lady Sov raged on, and when he finished a cluster of rabid SOV fans tried to buy it off him. He refused, jokingly telling them he’d only do it for four hundred bucks. Not surprisingly, they agreed.
