81 Monday, August 9, 2010 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Going gaga for Lolla Chicago celebrates the geeks and the greats at Lollapalooza By MIKE KUNTZ Daily Music Editor With each year, the giant outdoor music festival held in Chicago's scenic Grant Park has continually outdone itself, bringing together the Gagas and the Green Days of yesterday and today. Complete with two headlining stages at the northernmost and southernmost ends of the park, the festival also has four lesser stages, aseparate kids' stage and the perennial Perry's tent, where DJs spin from the moment the festival opens until the end of the night. Surrounded on all sides by Chicago's looming, picturesque skyline, T-shirt vendors and religious crazies (whose "Rock and roll will damn your soul" placard almost made the weekend all on its own), the festival boasts three days of music from hundreds of per- formers, local food vendors, non-profit and political advocacy groups, quirky sponsors and plenty of free water and accessible restroom facilities through- out the park. It seems like the stages and the sto- ries get bigger and better every year - if the first two days of Lollapalooza are any indication for the future of grand- scale outdoor music festivals, I like where we're headed. Friday afternoons at Lolla are typi- cally worse attended than the rest " F0 Mention This AD S /And Receives n biOff. Now is the perfect time to prep with one of the A notions leaders in et spreparation. AT SmallClasses ° Expert Instructors SR-Free Extra Help The AT (Princeton -Review of the weekend, no thanks to the demands of the working week and the Man's efforts to keep us all down. Unfortunate, then, that hip-hop heat- seeker B.o.B. was doomed to one of the earliest slots in the day - a brutal 11:30 a.m. post at one of the festival's larger stages. An early highlight was Mavis Staples, the legendary soul singer of Staples Singers fame who recently teamed up with Jeff Tweedy (from "The Wilco Band!" as Staples intro- duced him) to write and record a new album of gospel-tinged soul. Tweedy appeared onstage twice, softly strum- ming an acoustic guitar stage right as the 71-year-old Mavis let loose on clas- sics ranging from "I'll Take You There" to The Band's "The Weight." On the other side of the festival, The Walkmen had just finished a set of raw, garage-rocking Britpop led by Hamil- ton Leithauser's signature throat-tear- ing drawl. New tracks from the band's upcoming album, Lisbon, were well received, and older tracks like "In The New Year" sounded almost like mod- ern classics. At Perry's, Stones Throw Records founder and artist Peanut Butter Wolf (aka Chris Manak) was spinning a set of hip-hop classics, ranging from Snoop and the Beastie Boys to Wu- Tang and MF Doom. Deftly scratching and mashing the records and accom- panying video simultaneously, Manak brought some ntasteful old-school fla- vor to the rave-ready crowd. Then there was Devo. Emerging in silver space-age costumes, the band played tracks from its new album before breaking into the New Wave classics and donning those signature Energy Domes, now in turquoise. Frontman Mark Mothersbaugh was as undeniable as ever, his nerdy charisma unflappable. Back on the northern side of the fes- tival, Dirty Projectors was creating its own brand of musical geekery, rooted instead in complex polyrhythms, melodies, arrangements and lyrics about Gatorade. One of the strongest and most hypnotic performances of the weekend, the Brooklyn six-piece played a pitch-perfect set, with lead singers Dave Longstreth and Amber Coffman stretching their ranges with shiver-inducing results. Headliner Lady Gaga, who spared no expense in creating the "Monster Ball" of her current tour, emerged to tens of thousands of screaming teenag- ers and 20-somethings on a stage that looked more like a Broadway produc- See LOLLA, Page 10 Any1 urbs ca about:L class h boring white fi to-dayc school, simple a count a drive and en Fire res escape,, more on for thos Butler's entrapr slow bi the cou know. The I The Su So indie it burns. Suburbs' on fire By MIKE KUNTZ Like The National, Arcade Fire has a Daily Music Editor knack for catharsis and is able to cre- ate complete moods within its songs. kid who grew up in the sub- Whether triumphant or terrifying, in tell you what they're all emotions dictate the entire album. upper-middle- "The Suburbs" is a slow-burner omes, usually * ** driven by a piano and some dizzy- with a pale ing strings, opening the album with ence; the day- Arcade Fire a bounce but hinting at the darkness cycle of sleep, ahead. Segueing into the radio-ready The Suburbs repeat; the stomp "Ready to Start," it's immedi- pleasures of Merge ately clear that the band is back in full try club and force, with dense textures, blacklit -in movie. All the darkness guitar lines and lucid synth textures. inui associated with Arcade "City With No Children" is asteady ides there - the longing for chime of ringing guitars and hand the holding out for something claps that recalls the better tracks ice you finally leave. And even of Funeral, recapturing the freedom e who grew up in a city, Win of "Wake Up" and the possibility of earnest take on suburban "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" with aent, fleeting youth and the ease. "Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond it steady Walmartization of Mountains)" is just as revelatory but intryside tells all there is to with even more New Wave flair, pro- pelled by a four-on-the-floor back- band describes its new album, beat and Rdgine Chassagne's best burbs, as a mix between Debbie Harry. Depeche Mode and Neil Young, and it's dead on: Taking cues evenhand- edly from new-wave electronica and classic folk troubador-ism, Butler and company find a rare, agreeable middle ground between a synthesizer and an acoustic guitar. It's something other acts could never pull off as tastefully and inventively. Equal parts epic and reflective, The Suburbs's 16 tracks never falter or lose momentum, and by the time the title track gets its reprise at the album's close, it feels like finishing a really satisfying book or film - loose ends tied, characters reunited and conflicts resolved. As dark as this album gets, it never loses its sunny feel - its melodic ease and chiming guitars could com- pete with Best Coast's sun-drenched debut. The band uses its production to full effect, but always with an expert ear to let melody and feeling reign. Arcade Fire's sprawling success. Even with its use of older tricks and aesthetics, Arcade Fire never sounds like a total throwback - it's as 2010 as it is 1981, and probably more. The Suburbs is the sermon Neon Bible tried to be, only never as preachy, and it's all the more affecting for it. No one can write songs about "the kids" that sound as all-encompassing and urgent as Win Butler and company - their directness hits home regard- less of your age or where you grew up. Urban sprawl aside, if the suburbs sound anything like this, here's your reason to get out of the city.