This is not your older sister’s Forecastle. That’s obvious from the get go. Cops roaming the grounds. Security checks. Wrist bands. No stools allowed.
You know the festival you heard about a decade ago. Tyler Park. Forty or fifty kids hanging out, waiting for the guys to get the sound hooked up, so you could your BFF’s boyfriend’s band play. A booth by the fountain, advocating recycling. Another selling homemade braided bracelets.
Forecastle is now B.A.D. Forecastle is Nationwide.
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An old school guy, I’m still skeptical of bands where one of the members is playing a MacBook. (Even you, David Byrne.)
Thus, I don’t spend much time at the Music Academy Ocean Stage, which is all techno electronica. Salva, I assume, was the performer when I first walked by. It was all bass-laden cacophony to me. Dementia inducing “music.”
I did stop and listen to a bit of GRiZ later one, and found him much more engaging. There was some melody that creeped out from behind the pounding thrump now and again. And, the kid actually pulled out a saxophone and played along with his computer.
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Between the wash of tunes by The Pass at FPK’s Port Stage, the guy next to me, another chaperone aged attendee, whispered in my ear: “They used to give Flock of Seagulls so much shit. And here they live on.”
At one point, the band’s lead guitarist brought out some special guests. “Scott and Sara and Jmme and Burroooo . . . everybody in Louisville knows who they are.”
Hmmm. I didn’t. Wonder if I mentioned Cosmo’s name, anybody in the crowd would have known whom I was talking about?
Anyway, the conjoined groups did a zesty version of Prince’s “When Doves Fly.”
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While the decades have seen many pretenders to Jimi Hendrix’s throne, not so many have gone the route of Sly & the Family Stone.
Brooklyn born Pimps of Joytime do. And the do it well.
Most funky indeed, this band. And, delightfully interracial and intergender, like, you know, Sly & the Family Stone.
Here’s my favorite image of their set. While funkin’ it up on the big stage, most folks were finding the groove and swaying. Except for one gang by the sound board, who were playing . . . chess.
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Last year, relatively unknown Houndmouth from New Albany played the smallest stage, one that doesn’t even exist this time around.
Yesterday they rocked the Mast Stage.
What is so damn enjoyable about this quartet is they leave holes in the music. Most groups these days feel the need to fill the sound spectrum and overwhelm. That Houndmouth understands less is more is one of the reasons, I suppose, that they’ve rocketed into the national consciousness. (And, they’re off to Europe in the fall after touring to hither and yon in the States this summer.)
Shane Cody has obviously listened to a lot of Levon Helm. Behind the kit, he even turns his head to sing into the mic in the same manner as The Band’s drummer.
I really enjoyed the group’s cover of “I Shall Be Released.” During which Cody came out front, playing guitar and singing, while Katie Toupin moved from keys to bass, Zak Appleby took her place behind the electric piano and guitarist Matt Myers played drums.
These Hoosiers sense of Americana is palpable and welcome these days when their contemporaries feel compelled to fill the every nook and crannie with sound.
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Old Crow Medicine Show just knows how to rollick.
Their performance was spirited and well received from the first uptempo note.
Alabama High Test indeed.
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The festival grounds are a bit more open and better designed than last time around.
I loved the ping pong table in front of the Valu Market stand. Valu Market?
There was one fashion trend I spotted that still has me a bit vexed. I saw any number of young women wearing a faux fur animal skin around their necks. Strange. Especially since it was on the warmish side in the sun during the afternoon.
I liked that, unlike last year, one could actually purchase a cola beverage. But not as readily as one could buy bourbon, the presence of which was everywhere on the grounds.
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I think the rule that doesn’t allow anybody to bring in a little portable sitting stool is S T U P I D. I understand banning lawn chairs, which tend to clutter up the place. But small stools, like I said, banning them is S T U P I D.
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The Culture Maven’s Tip of the Weekend is Bombino, a mesmerizing guitar player, who is a Tuareg tribesman.
He plays at 2:00 on Sunday on the Mast Stage.