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Thursday, June 8, 2017
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
ARTS

Boston Calling: a festival representing
a diverse adoration of music and comedy

By DOM POLSINELLI

Summer Senior Arts Editor

Walking into new music festivals

can be scary. It can also be adventur-
ous. In the case of Boston Calling, it
was a combination of the two. Trav-
eling from the “Harvard of the West”
(the University) to the actual Har-
vard, I packed up my bags and pre-
pared to survive a few days in foreign
territory.

After surviving a rather rough

“Emo Night” at the Sinclair in Cam-
bridge the night before (I literally
almost lost my voice when “Came
Out Swinging” came on), I made
my way to Harvard’s Athletic Com-
plex around midday on Friday to see
Vundabar open the festival.

My friends and I made our way

to some barricade spots as fans
sprinted into the festival to join the
crowd. It was quite a culture shock
to see Vundabar — who I recently
saw perform in the basement of local
DIY space, Lincoln House — take the
comparatively massive stage in front
of exponentially more people. Yet, the
band didn’t disappoint in the drasti-
cally different setting, maintaining
the charisma, charm and humor that
marked their performance in Ann
Arbor. With their set full of rock-
ing jams, Boston Calling was off to a
great start, clearly noted in the smil-
ing faces of those walking away from
the stage.

Later that day — staying true to

my brand by staying with the rock
acts — I caught Car Seat Headrest’s
set, consisting of their typically long

songs and a Devo cover. The band
pleased the hefty crowd by sticking
to fan favorites like “Drunk Drivers/
Killer Whales” and “Destroyed by
Hippie Powers,” and during “Fill in
the Blank,” the entire crowd enthu-
siastically echoed the chorus, “You
have no right to be depressed / you
haven’t tried hard enough to like it.”
Frontman Will Toledo crooned every
note well enough to distract from the
band’s rather bland indie rock, trans-
forming their boring recorded tunes
into fun-filled sing-alongs live.

Next up was Mac Demarco, whose

usual dreamy set was smoothly
accentuated with material off his
recent album This Old Dog. The crowd
sang and swayed as Mac smoked and
grooved, at one point even pulling a
fan onstage to dance due to the fan’s
“I skipped my prom today” sign. Dur-
ing his hour long set, I watched Mac
Demarco sing, crowd surf and be
showered with packs of cigarettes
from his adoring fans to the delight
of the crowd. Neither stunning nor
stagnant, Mac delivered a neutral,
pleasant set to the festival goers.

Unfortunately, my time listening to

Bon Iver’s gorgeous set was cut short
by the drunken (and incredibly loud)
masses piling up to the neighboring
stage to prepare for Chance The Rap-
per. Chance, however, made up for
this misfortune by riding — yes, I said
riding — out on a motorcycle. Despite
his Coloring Book-heavy set (I’m par-
tial to Acid Rap, but I digress), he has
an infectious stage presence. To no
surprise, Francis (of Francis and the
Lights) came out to perform “May I

Have This Dance,” and his synchro-
nized choreography with Chance
was a fantastic highlight to polish off
the first day of the festival.

Saturday was a much more relaxed

day in the lineup, although I started
my
festival
activities
watching

Detroit’s very own hip-hop phenom
Danny Brown in a rowdy crowd. The
pit exploded in a hilarious mix of frat
bros in Vineyard Vines and punk kids
in band tees, all jamming to Brown’s
infectious brand of rap. The crowd
responded in full force when Brown
began the deep cut (and arguably his
best song) “Ain’t it Funny” from his
most recent record Atrocity Exhibi-
tion as deep bass and piercing notes
pulsated over the attendees.

An hour later, I decided to check

out the “Comedy Arena” of the festi-
val, located inside Harvard’s hockey
rink. I watched a string of comedians
deliver some funny bits, leading up
to Hannibal Buress’s time on stage.
Phoebe Robinson had the crowd
either cracking up or appalled with a
story about vomiting during a sexual
encounter. Unfortunately, most of the
crowd was more concerned with
sitting down and chatting indoors
than the comedy itself, but Buress
produced some hysterical segments,
especially one concerning the plan-
ning of his own funeral.

To round out the music for the eve-

ning, I opted to go see The 1975 (one
of my favorite bands to hate) over The
xx due to the fact that I saw them ear-
lier this month. To my dismay, The
1975 deliver in performance, and the
crowd around me lacked the stereo-
typical intensity (or better yet, insan-
ity) of the band’s fans to my delight.
They carried a lovely ambiance —
even during their dull music — and
they had the crowd jumping to the
beat during their best hits like “Sex”
and “The Sound.”

Sunday was the most taxing day

for the punk and rock fans — especial-
ly while trying to weave through the
crowds of metalheads only attend-
ing Sunday for the almighty Tool.
The Hotelier and PUP opened up the
last day of the festival, and both gave
fantastic
performances
consider-

ing their usual concert dwellings are
intimate clubs. The Hotelier — whose
lengthy tracks are far better experi-
enced when they have more than 30
minutes to impress — made their way
through a mix of their old and new

material to the delight of the notice-
ably punker crowd before giving way
to PUP.

PUP absolutely crushed their set,

slamming through 10 songs in barely
over half an hour. The crowd in the
pit threw each other and surfed over
bodies embodying the frenzy of the
band’s tunes. Others smiled and sang
along to the anthemic punk rock, and
I couldn’t find a single member of the
audience who wasn’t loving the per-
formance.

In an interview, the band and I

talked about what it means to move
from basements and clubs to festi-
val stages and playing festivals with
diverse artists and crowds.

“Festivals are a different beast for

sure. You get to play to a lot more peo-
ple than you normally would, and you
kind of get to play to a bunch of people
who don’t know you — so that’s cool.
There’s definitely a sort of spark that
comes with playing in a dirty, packed
basement. It’s just a different show.
It’s a different vibe… It’s kind of nice
to get to do both,” said Stefan Bab-
cock, guitarist and lead singer of the
group.

According to Babcock, the crowds

have been showing them the passion
they’ve grown to expect from their
basement roots as they’ve acclimated
to the big stages at summer festivals.

“It’s cool. It’s been surprisingly

rad… as things have progressed for
us, they’ve become more and more
fun. So we’ve definitely warmed up
to the sort of festival atmosphere,” he
said.

The band also talked about the

welcome diversity of artists seen at

a festival, especially one as rounded
as Boston Calling. The band clearly
pulls influence and inspiration from a
wide range of acts spanning multiple
genres.

“Selfishly, I feel like festivals are

fun because you get to see a lot of
bands that you otherwise would be
paying a lot of money to see. There’s a
big collection of stuff that goes across
genres,” said guitarist Steve Slad-
kowski.

The band listed Weezer, Hotelier,

Tool and Run The Jewels as some of
the artists they were most excited
about seeing that day, and they
even mentioned looking forward to
Hannibal Buress’s continued com-
edy performance later in the day.

After seeing Mitski, Run The

Jewels and even a bit of the almighty
Tool (whose rather aggressive use
of the word “snowflake” was off-
putting at the least), I concluded
that Boston Calling is the perfect
festival for niche fans. Those who
love music for the sake of it, looking
beyond mainstream consumption.
Standing in a crowd wholeheart-
edly singing along with Mitski to
“Your Best American Girl” and then
immediately witnessing the smiles
in the pit during Run The Jewels
felt like a testament to a crowd that
existed beyond needing an excuse
to drink and dance — they attended
the festival to check out prolific up-
and-coming geniuses like PUP per-
form alongside established musical
giants like Chance and Tool. If any-
thing, Boston Calling is a festival
constructed from the ground up for
the adoration of music.

COURTESY OF REBECCA KAVALER

The 1975 performing “Sex”

COURTESY OF REBECCA KAVALER

Chance the Rapper celebrating during his set

FESTIVAL RECAP