Matisyahu @ The Catalyst 10/20/09

Heavyweight Dub Champion started off the evening without any introduction.  Rather, the founder of the band, Grant McDonald Chambers who goes by “Resurrector”, showed up in a white wife-beater, touting the longest dreads you’ve ever seen and began slaving away at what appeared to be a synthesizer, drum machine, and sampler.  He literally almost blasted the audience away with booming rap and dub beats.  The young crowd was a bit unprepared for the loud, trance-like reggae vocals and underground dancehall which vibrated the walls, and most folks stood still in awe.

The Catalyst was packed to the brim by the time Matisyahu took the spotlight, and he opened with “Jerusalem” to roars of approval.  With his Peyos (curly sideburns), kipah (head covering), Tzitzis (tassles), and long straggly beard, Matisyahu looked like many other Orthodox Jews.  However, unlike most, Matisyahu is a pioneer of Jewish reggae, which he infuses masterfully with rock and hip hop. 

On stage, Matisyahu was extremely relaxed, creating a very easygoing and unpretentious atmosphere.  Guitarist Dave Holmes executed an epic solo while Matisyahu did the most adorable jig that can best be described as “the happy dance,” in which he hopped around and swayed his arms.    They played older material such as “We Will Walk”, and “Time of Your Song” as well as gems such as “One Day” from the new album Festival Light.  A rendition of the top 40 hit “King Without A Crown” was uproariously received, at which point a friend of his came and joined in on the happy dance.  Matisyahu also busted out astonishing beat boxing skills, and surprised the audience when he altered his reggae vocals to a deep accent-less rap voice. 

My favourite part of the evening was when Matisyahu’s kipah slipped while doing his jig and he had to take a short break from busting a groove to adjust it.   Not only are his lyrics inspiring, and his talent unbeatable, he’s just plain adorable.

Treasure Island Music Festival 2009

Everybody always asks, “what’s your favourite?” and “what’s the best?” so I figured: what better way to describe this year’s Treasure Island Music Festival in San Francisco than a superlative awards ceremony?  The two-day extravaganza was intense, wonderful, exhausting,  beautiful, warm, cold, and everything in between.  It featured a 30-foot live mural wall by Pacific Art Collective, carnival entertainment by The Gnogiurzauchshoff Brothers Traveling Widway of Curiosities and Delights, a pay-as-you-go poet, huge pink inflatable chairs called "Bushwaffles", and other endless sensory explosions.  The main event, however, was the music, so without further ado, the awards go to…

MOST IMPROVED: Passion Pit

The five college buds from Cambridge, Massachusetts just recently released their first full-length album Manners this spring, but they’ve been steadily gaining notoriety since 2007.  As a new band, they’ve had some kinks to work out, but unlike previous gigs, Saturday’s show went off gloriously.  I saw Passion Pit perform in February in Leeds, and although their talent was apparent, their performance was marred with technical difficulties and frustrations.  This time, thousands basked in the afternoon sunshine overlooking San Francisco’s pristine coastal skyline from the man-made Treasure Island, while simultaneously soaking in lead singer Michael Angelakos’ dreamy robot-angel voice harmonizing with the band’s signature buzzworthy-beats and electronic pop melodies.  The temperature and mood rose steadily as the crowd sang along to “Little Secret”, chanting “higher and higher and higher”, and many attendees did just that.

MOST FUN: Dan Deacon

Known for his dedication to small, intimate shows, it was unclear how the Baltimore native would handle an audience of this grandeur.  Deacon knocked it out of the park with his crazy electronic vocals, fifteen-man band, and off-the-wall energy.  Normally, Dan plays solo, but he managed to turn his menagerie of musicians into a well-organized choir as he quite literally conducted an orchestra.  In addition to dance-till-you-drop video-game beats that our parents would never understand, he was able to organize a dance contest (the number one rule: it had to be “Sassy as fuck the whole time!”), spread the sea of onlookers to surround one leader for a massive game of Simon Says, and create an absolutely brilliant several-hundred-foot-long round of London Bridge.  Recess and kickball, anyone?

MOST OBNOXIOUS: The Streets

Most Americans love a good English accent no matter what words accompany it, but Birmingham-born frontman Michael Skinner managed to crush all good feelings with his obscene performance.  Songs such as “Dry Your Eyes” were tedious, slow and boring, and even though they were out of place amongst a lineup full of indie and electropop, they would possibly have been bearable if Skinner hadn’t stopped all the time to make nonsensical and inappropriate comments about how everyone should be naked and how his bandmate was going to have sex later.  At one unbearably awkward moment, he had audience members turn to a stranger and say, “I love you.”  Gag me.

MOST FREAKY: Brazilian Girls

The music took the backseat at this show, as frontlady and lead vocalist Sabina Sciubba literally strutted her stuff.  Dressed in skintight black lace from eye to toe, little was left to the imagination.  She also donned a huge padded red heart with an armhole over her chest and a little heart tail that she retained throughout their fifty minute set, despite the obvious physical hindrance.  Continuing merrily along in their "weird-for-the-sake-of-being-weird" method, the Brazilian Girls shocked the fifteen-year-olds and mildly surprised the rest of us with repetitive lyrics like "Pussy Pussy Pussy Marijuana".  After the initial stupor wore off, listeners enjoyed both a chilled-out vibe, internationally inspired by the likes of dubstep and reggae, as well as an awe-inspiring cant-stop-won't-stop hyperactive solo by keyboardist Didi Gutman.

MOST EPIC: MSTRKRFT

Canadian duo AI-P and Jesse F. Keeler are certainly masters of their musical craft.  High expectations surrounded their performance, but they were met and exceeded as the day faded into darkness and thousands melded into a sea of rhythmically pulsing human waves.  "I hope you like house music 'cause we're gonna play some fucking house music," they chimed.  The pair saturated our ears with pounding beats, plateaus, and intense releases, making it impossible not to dance harder than ever.  Most notable renditions include the remix of John Legend's "Heartbreaker", a long snippet of Queen's supreme hit "Bohemian Rhapsody", and an all-consuming execution of Benny Benassi's "Satisfaction" which boasted the most exaggerated, unanticipated buildup and then sweet, heavenly, orgasmic release in quite possibly the history of house music.  Satisfying indeed.

MOST DISAPPOINTING: Girl Talk

Arguably one of the most anticipated, the Pittsburgh native mashup superstar let us down.  Perhaps it was the misfortune of playing directly after MSTRKRFT, or perchance it was performing on the more modest Tunnel Stage rather than the Bridge Stage, or maybe he just wasn't on top of his game.  Whatever the reason may be, Girl Talk's set did not live up to his performance at previous shows.  He chose to play slower mashups this time, and while the inclusion of a Black Sabbath song was impressive, most people were in the mood to dance and were unable to do so.  Additionally, the sound level was  too quiet for comfort, and although the lucky few dancing on stage seemed to be having a party, folks who were positioned ten feet or more from the stage were excluded from the festivities.

MOST ANTICIPATED: MGMT

Day one ended smoothly with a stellar set by MGMT, which surprised many who doubted their live abilities.  Original members Andrew Vanwyngarden and Ben Goldwasser, who met at college in Connecticut in 2002, integrated with a full a band swimmingly and informed us that because this would be their last show for a while, they'd be playing the entirety of their wildly popular Oracular Spectacular.  This news was met with a wave of energy and a buzz of excitement, and they boys stunned us all with a truly organic and raw version of their 2005 album.  The cherry on top of the sundae was an intense guitar solo during "Electric Feel" and the crowd melded together to sing and sway along to the magical mystical melodies of the band who is shaping up to musically personify our generation.

MOST UNDERRATED: Grizzly Bear

I didn't know or care who Grizzly Bear was before, but I definitely do now.   Harmonic dream-like melodies produced with harps, infused with booming pulses that traverse your body and transport you into the future lifted me off my bum and towards the stage like a moth to a flame.  Day two was brutally cold, but the honeyed voices of these four angels warmed our souls and invited us to partake in what can only be described as musical heaven.  Some of the vocals reminded me of Devendra Banhart's, but the vibe was a lot less pretentious.  Like a creepy choir, we sang along to "Lullabye," chanting "chin up, cheer up, chin up, cheer up" to a strange atmospheric lullaby as the title suggested.

MOST MAGICAL: Beirut

From the moment I heard Beirut's Gulag Orkestar two years ago, I knew it was love.  Strangely enough, though, I had never sought out images of the band or frontman Zach Condon, so when the 23-year-old American appeared on stage, I was surprised to find that he was not actually a god, but in fact, a mere man.  His form may have been that of a mortal, but the tunes were like sweet ambrosia.  The set began with "Nantes" and we all swooned as Condon's rich, forlorn voice carried over their signature French-inspired horns and folk-gypsy accordion.  We were treated to favorites such as "A Sunday Smile" as well as new material from March of the Zapotec which was made in and inspired by a trip to Oaxaca.  All of their songs seem to be about smiling, and there was no shortage of those during this set.

MOST MESMERIZING: Yo La Tengo

As the sun set on day two, Yo La Tengo graced the stage and induced quite a trance with their undulating rock melodies.  The whole set blurred together to form what seemed like one immense experimental pop-rock adventure, that fit the mood perfectly.  To the left of the stage, the fifty-foot ferris wheel oscillated and emitted color patterns guaranteed to entertain the sober and intoxicated alike.  Skyward, gulls danced overhead and the combination of trippy visuals and sound made for a unique sensory experience.

MOST INSPIRING VISUALS: Decemberists

I was never a huge fan of frontman Colin Meloy's whiny high-pitched voice, but the Decemberists startled me with their performance Sunday night.  They played songs from their fifth and most recent album Hazards of Love, which features a lot less of Meloy's unsavory vocals and a lot more surreal experimentation, including female vocals inspired by classic rock goddesses such as Janis Joplin.  Just as impressive as their sound this evening were the visuals that accompanied their presence on the huge screen behind them, including beautiful slow motion videos of underwater organisms spewing matter, exploding mushrooms, strange flower growths, and adorable dancing raccoons.

MOST OVER-THE-TOP: Flaming Lips

After a complete rearrangement of the stage that took 45 minutes, the Flaming Lips were ready to burst on stage, and burst they did.  Literally.  They descended individually through doors in the middle of the jumbotron, amidst smoke and flashy lights in a fashion solely reserved for the most revered rock stars.  Every person in attendance was up on the lawn for the grand finale, so if you were one of the lucky select who could see the stage, you were saturated by at least a dozen massive bursts of confetti, people in panda costumes on stage, and an extreme closeup of frontman Wayne Coyne's nose and eyes throughout the set.  There were 8 foot balloons that spewed confetti once popped and a song dedication to Obama.  After more than an hour of pure glory, the band was running out of time and so rushed off stage to "give us the illusion of an encore," which featured the most extended and epic version of "Do You Realize" in existence.  Bravo.

Sugar Ray @ The Catalyst 9/16/09

Mark McGrath takes center stage.

SANTA CRUZ - Arriving before the main event at a live gig is always a gamble. Apparently everyone decided to play it safe and wait to show up until Sugar Ray was on stage, because opening act Aimee Allen sang to a crowd you could count on two hands. Her lonely soulful voice was as sad as her numerous pleas for bar patrons to stand up and move closer. But, try as she might, she could not guilt us all into scooting forward. Decked out in a plaid shirt and studded belt, her slightly ska sound inspired one viewer to draw a comparison to Gwen Stefani. Her voice carried well over accompanying acoustic guitar, and the reggae and dubstep influences would have been well-received had their been more than 8 people present. Perhaps her single in the newly released horror film “Sorority Row” will bring her the spotlight she so desperately desires.

By the time Huntington Beach’s quartet the Dirty Heads made their way on stage, there were finally enough people present to call it a show instead of a band practice. Crowd-goers bobbed and swayed to an infusion of reggae, hip-hop,and Sublime-inspired ska punk. For a while, I was convinced that the band’s lead vocalist, Jared Watson, was actually “Jay” of “Jay and Silent Bob”, and while he did give off the same stoner vibe, there was no man-gina display; only organically rhythmic beats with that familiar laid-back So Cal surfer ambiance.

When Sugar Ray took the spotlight everybody was ready to dance, and Mark McGrath blasted onto the scene in classic black wayfarers and a swagger that let you know you were in for a real spectacle. “It feels like its time for a No. 1 song from 1999!” he shouted before busting out the catchy pop tune ‘Every Morning’ – the collective earworm for the better end of the millennia.

McGrath, at 41, is as sexy as ever, exclaming that he “even got [his] hair highlighted again!” for the tour – one which he obviously knows isn’t going to be on the cover of Rolling Stone again. There’s something to be said about not taking yourself seriously, and Sugar Ray knows this: their newly released album is called Music for Cougars. It’s been 21 years since the band formed and McGrath is still joking; in an interview with Rolling Stone by Steven Appleford, he says, “We're certainly not the most talented guys, and I can barely sing, but how about two thumbs up for just having fun?”

Indeed, it was less about high-quality tunes and more about entertainment, something McGrath knows a lot about after hosting Extra for 4 years.

The crowd this evening was a glorious mix of old and young, and as always, the Catalyst provided the perfect setting for a show.  Small enough to provide a sense of intimacy with the artist, big enough to allow ample space for dancing, and the option to sit or stand made for an ideal situation.  The stage is so close you could literally touch Mark as he belted out his catchy pop tunes.



Turntablist Craig "DJ Homicide" Bullock treated us to ridiculous classic fist-clinchers such as Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” and Guns N’ Roses “Sweet Child O’ Mine” to fill gaps between songs; a tried-and-true method for heightening the intensity level of any average evening thanks to top-of-your-lungs scream-alongs and drunken camaraderie that simply cannot be beat.

Highlights of the evening include seeing Mark’s softer side with a tender performance of “When Its Over,” which he wrote after his first broken heart at age 21, a few crotch grabs inspired by the late great King of Pop, a freestyle karaoke battle between fans which may or may not result in some new record deals for one talented party, and, most memorably, a cover of Kid Cudi’s “Day and Night”. A memorable night and an homage to the nineties, the finale was an extended version of the hit “Fly”, and the only thing that topped that was UCSC student Bryan Strauss’s belly, which read “Do Me Mark!”





Publication on UCSC's City On A Hill Press website pending editorial approval.

Reel Big Fish @ The Catalyst 9/13/09

MORE COWBELL.

That’s what the audience got as Las Vegas’ seven-man alternative/reggae band One Pin Short started off the evening at the Catalyst on September 13. They put on quite a show for a modest crowd, including not only plenty of cowbell, but also a daring spectacular by guitarist Jesse Magaña, who climbed atop the second tier patio to strum a solo. The band provided a surprisingly harmonious sound for the sheer number of members in it, and managed to get the sparse crowd clapping along to their punk/ska/rock melodies about peace and revolution.

Orange County natives Suburban Legends then graced the stage, and, as always, the crowd was temporarily stunned by what can best be described as a first grade sing-along and boy band infusion. Though their style may be childish, they are undoubtedly professionals. With choreographed moves you haven’t seen since the likes of N’sync and a level of energy normally only attainable by chugging 12 consecutive cans of Redbull, these boys really know how to work a crowd.

Drummer Derek Lee stopped to chat with City On A Hill Press before the show, and mentioned with much sadness that tonight was the last leg of the tour, which had made its way across the U.S. and Europe. They went all out for their last show, playing classics from their impressive 11-year-span that only the two fourteen-year-old girls in “Suburban Legends” t-shirts recognized, as well as an extremely well-received ska rendition of Little Mermaid’s ‘Under The Sea’. Though its safe to say that many members of the eclectic crowd there wouldn’t jam out to a Suburban Legends album alone at home, there was not a single soul who could help but chuckle and groove with the boys as they goofed around on stage. The younger and rowdier attendees even started a mosh-pit while the horns sounded and the rainbow lights flashed.

Reel Big Fish finally burst on stage after a bit of a lull, and they got the crowd going straight away with a spunky fast-paced version of Aha’s ‘Take On Me’. The crowd was all warmed up at this point, ready for anything, so there was a huge cheer when the familiar riff of Metallica’s ‘Enter Sandman’ crept into our ears. They played popular crowd favorites such as ‘Ban the Tube Top’ and ‘Don’t Start A Band’, and equally exciting covers like Van Morrison’s ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ and most notably, a hilarious adaptation of ‘Beauty School Dropout’ from Grease. The mosh pit grew steadily, and practically exploded with the onslaught of “Where Have You Been”, and a guest appearance by Suburban Legends guitarist (and roommate of RBF singer Aaron Barrett), Brian Wayne Klemm, which featured a wild guitar battle between the two men, and ended with Barrett jokingly schooling Klemm.

As the evening reached its pinnacle, they busted out the much-anticipated ‘Beer’, transporting all in attendance back into the nineties (perhaps Barrett never left, what with his impressive sideburns and Hawaiian floral button-up). And just when you thought it couldn’t get any more epic, they announced that they were “masters of all musical styles”, and proceeded to play multiple renditions of ‘You Don’t Know’ in a “punk-rock styling,” “bluegrass styling,” “disco styling,” “country western styling”, and “screamo styling”. They consoled the audience about the show’s imminent end with some words of wisdom: “bad news is we only have one song left, good news is you can’t get herpes twice.” They ended the night right with their most-famous song, ‘Sell-Out” and a taste of the classic rock gem ‘Rock You Like a Hurricane.’

An undeniably successful evening, if not simply for flashy dance moves, epic guitar battles, an unbeatable venue, and good old-fashioned ska, then for trumpeter Scott Klopfenstein’s adorable thigh-high blue sailor shorts and nerdy glasses. Oh, and of course the cowbell.

Suburban Legends pose for a photograph backstage before the show.

Suburban Legends frontman Vincent Walker calls for some audience participation.

Aaron Barrett of Reel Big Fish pulls a face on stage.

Scott Klopfenstein of Reel Big Fish.

Publication on UCSC's City On A Hill Press website pending editorial approval.