Críticas

Sat 17 Oct – Treasure Island Music Festival

We got to the island early by taking the 108 from the Transbay Terminal, unlike those tools taking shuttles. Before we went in my friends transferred all their weed and flasks into tampon boxes. This worked, but one of them had their pepper spray confiscated.

None of us cared for any of the opening acts, so we got face-painted and ate churros and watched movies in the Kinostan tent for a couple hours. Murs was cool but occasionally contradictory. He encouraged us to take pills at sunset, but then told us not to leave on a stretcher. He bragged about not rapping about murder, then had to apologize after ending one of his songs with the lyric "Bitch, I'll kill you." Bizarrely, he thanked Spike Jonze (not present) for making Where the Wild Things Are.

We camped out for Passion Pit, who were not as cool as all my drunk and high friends seemed to think, but it was pretty dancy stuff. The schedule's description of their music said they were "Brian Wilson"-esque. That is stupid.

I left P. Pit early to get to the tunnel stage, where Dan Deacon rocked the fuck out, with his band! Apparently it was the first time this tour he'd gotten the ensemble together. THIS was a show: Deacon makes you wonder why more performers don't break down the barrier between the stage and the audience. He had us form a circle for an interpretive dance contest, twice, and then crafted the audience into two great tunnels, weaving from the stage to the ferris wheel. It was good shit.

After his set most of my friends were napping off the pot brownies they'd eaten. I went to listen to The Streets for a bit. The main dude was pissed (in both senses) and failing to get girls in the front row to strip for him. He kept saying "San Frandisco" as if he was the first person to come up with that joke. He's a tool.

The next two acts, Brazilian Girls and DJ Krush, made me realize that you have to be retarded to appreciate most of Treasure Island's Saturday line-up. The lyrics to the first Brazilian Girls tune went something like "Are you going to have a good time? Tonight! Are you going to have a good time! Tonight!" During the instrumental break, the singer walked to the edge of the stage and asked: "Are you going to have a good time, tonight!" Everyone responded, yes! We are going to have a good time tonight. When they started up their last number, the "Pussy Marijuana" song people in my house keep blasting, I knew for sure that I was woefully unretarded for this kind of shit.

I think during MC Conrad and MSTRKRFT we were all just sitting around the cove and wishing that we weren't there. Or at least I was. Maybe my friends were sitting around feeling like they'd gotten their money's worth. MSTRKRFT ended their set by playing Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody - not making it their own in any way, just playing it. People went nuts.

Girl Talk brought me out of my vicodin-induced moping. Depending on who you talk to, Girl Talk is either a mash-up wizard, or the first guy to figure out you can make tons of money by selling the shit you put together in Ableton when you're bored. But this guy throws a party: tons of fans are brought on-stage, TP-ing devices decorate the stage and the crowd, and giant inflatable snakes wriggle across the audience, until assholes pop them with their keys. It wasn't Dan Deacon's kindergarten party but at least it had a party in mind.

Finally, the headliner: MGMT was pretty tight. I'd seen them before in Mountain View, before they got big worldwide. Back then I thought they sucked, but now that I've been adequately conditioned I realize how much they rock. Since it was apparently their last show of the tour, they decided to play their first album from front to back. I assume, though, given that they only have one album, this was not terribly unusual.

The album is frontloaded with the hits, so people started leaving as soon as Kids ended. Then people left in droves before the encore. By the time they finished up the encore of new songs, none of which were particularly memorable, my friends and I were the only people left on the island.

We tried to be clever again and take the 108 back to SF. DON'T TRY THAT, it causes nothing but grief. It turns out the best escape route is the one they set up with the shuttles, so get ready to be a fuckin' tool if you ever go.

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Woke up at 11 the next morning and didn't make it to the island until around 1:30. Kinda bummed I missed Sleepy Sun, cuz everyone was buzzing about them all day. Thao Nguyen is the female Jack Johnson.

We watched Spiral Stairs until it got too depressing to watch Spiral Stairs, and went to the Kino tent to watch the Dan Deacon movie, which consisted of slow-motion acid-filtered clips from Arnold Schwarzenneger films. This was more or less what I expected a Dan Deacon movie to be.

Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes were way more fun than I expected. I don't know what I expected, actually. These Paraguayans were unbelievably, unbelievably cute. The hippie dude who was their lead singer, likely Edward Sharpe himself, had some just heartwarming moments with the female singer, a blonde wearing a trenchcoat and pixie haircut. They played folky jams and I wanted to marry all of them.

Next was the main event, for me anyway: Grizzly Bear. Grizzly Bear is some talented motherfuckers. They played ten songs, three from Yellow House, and were nothing short of magical. They do not miss a beat, these guys. It was windiest during their set, and the sun would occasionally poke through the clouds onto the stage and light up all their instruments, and theirs was the only music that felt deserving of these accidents.

Beirut sucked, they only played one song.

I don't listen to The Decemberists, but I'd read that they've been playing their latest album, a rock opera, in full at all of their stops. I was hoping this wouldn't be the case at a festival but they are some committed fools. I had no idea what was happening story-wise, but the visuals were pretty, and they had some surprisingly grungey bits in there. It at least made me want to torrent that album.

And lastly, The Flaming Lips. Nothing short of spectacular. The band came out onto the stage from a giant pulsating vagina; Coyne rolled out in his hamster ball onto the audience; dancing snow monsters and sea monsters and confetti cannons and balloons and strobe lights and crowd surfing. It made me feel really good about everything.

I don't know if I needed to go to the Saturday show, but Sunday was pretty exceptional, at least when Beirut wasn't playing. Grizzly Bear rocks the shit, and the Flaming Lips are not to be missed.