

Saturday night's headlining performance by the National was one that why also really looking forward to. The group delivered in spades, playing a set that focused on material from their most recent release, 2007's Boxer. Live versions of "Fake Empire", "Mistaken for Strangers", "Squalor Victoria" and "Start A War" reminded me just how solid of a record Boxer was. The highlight of the set for me was a new song called "Blood Buzz Ohio" which I'm a fan of not only because it's a great tune, but also because of its references to my home state. The main set was capped off with an energetic and loose rendition of "Mr. November", buoyed by Matt Berninger's stage antics and screamed vocals. The band was just as good as I expected they would be live, putting on a show that proved them more than worthy of their headlining spot.

I had to sacrafice seeing the Walkmen and Grizzly Bear in order to get a prime spot for the Flaming Lips, but once the screen lit up and the confetti started to flow, it felt like the right decision. The Lips entered the stage in a way that looked like it was ripped straight out of a Spinal Tap show: they were birthed onto the stage by a giant glowing lady-part. Wayne really took the 'Write the Night' setlist to heart, making sure that the band played some songs that they didn't usually play. One of these was "Bad Days", which got my hopes up about a possible performance of "This Here Giraffe" although that ultimately didn't transpire. Another was a beautiful song from the Fearless Freaks soundtrack called "Enthusiam for Life", a song which Wayne said the band would likely never perform again. The group also made some time to debut a few songs from their forthcoming double album entitled Embryonic. The tracks they played sounds pretty weird and spacy, even for a band like the Lips, but pretty cool nonetheless. The rest of the set was pretty standard live Lips fare, but fun as hell. Had Wayne been a little less verbose, the band might have been able to squeeze in a few more songs, but everyone seemed to eat up his constant compliments to the crowd and the fest. Hearing ten of thousands of people sing along to "Do You Realize??" was a moment that I won't soon forget. My thoughts on the fest? Totally worth it, and I'll be back sometime soon.
No comments:
Post a Comment