6 Thursday, July 26, 2018 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com ARTS Cloudy, ominous weather wel- comed me to Pitchfork Music Fes- tival this year, and bracing myself for the worst I strapped up in a raincoat and boots for the first day of the fest. But what was originally daunting proved simply unreliable. The weather circled through cloud, rain and shine all weekend while artists dealt with wet equipment and herds of fans waiting patiently in the rain to see them. But this erratic weather didn’t do much to dissuade fans. If anything, the rain that poured down onto us during the Tame Impala set Friday night simply made their backlit bodies and light show all the more spec- tacular as beads of water could be seen streaming through the lights. A festival dominated by female- fronted bands and artists, Pitchfork stands out from more mainstream festivals in its emphasis on female and queer artists, especially this year. The diversity of the artists, genre, and its celebration of small- er names alongside bigger ones is what makes this festival unique; it’s relative tameness and inclusiveness of an older, less wreckless crowd is what makes it still exciting and bearable by day three. In the last year the festival improved upon its layout and welcomed more women than ever before, and despite last minute cancellations from artists such as Earl Sweatshirt, the festival carried on day after day as thou- sands gathered in Union Park to celebrate music, drink excessively and participate in the hedonistic rituals that accompany music and those who value it more than their own life. Courtney Barnett Steve Hyden claimed in his recent novel that Courtney Barnett is the best rock song writer of our decade. Her lyrics and unsympa- thetic electric guitar deliver what the Sex Pistols or the Rolling Stones did for a previous generation except with one noticeable difference: She’s a woman. And that makes her even fiercer. In an all black outfit accented by her blood red guitar, Barnett greeted her adoring crowd with the song “Hopefulessness” which is off her recent release Tell Me How You Really Feel. And immediately, her crowd went into a concentrated state of head-banging until the set concluded more than an hour later. It was as if I was standing on the precipice of a mosh pit the entire set; eagerly wanting to break out into a push and pull with other attendees, I held back. For while Barnett’s songs reach towards punk rock, they often hold back just a little bit and show restraint. This can be particularly heard on songs like “Charity” and “Small Poppies,” but becomes less clear on more aggressive songs like “Elevator Operator” and “Pedes- trian at Best.” And perhaps this is what made the performance so thrilling. There was an element of unknown over what was going to happen next, whether the crowd would burst into a mosh pit of con- tinue banging their heads along, holding back with every bit of strength so to fully take in the rock god Barnett has established herself to be. Blood Orange Seconds into Blood Orange’s set on Saturday, I gasped. The famil- iar notes of Sky Ferierra’s “Every- thing is Embarrassing” echoed through the field as Dev Hynes, Blood Orange’s lead singer, walked on stage and immediately dove into the 2012 hit he co-wrote with the punk rocker. From this, the set only grew exponentially better. Deliv- ering familiar tracks like “Best to You” as well as hints of new music from their upcoming album Negro Swan, Hynes and his accompanying band put on one of the best perfor- mances of the weekend, drawing in a rapturous crowd and greet- ing cheering fans with sly smiles and matched energy. Closing with two of his biggest hits, “You’re Not Good Enough” and “E.V.P.” Hynes captivated the huge crowd that had gathered around the Green Stage, the largest stage at the festival. Japanese Breakfast Along with Blood Orange, Japa- nese Breakfast was my favorite per- formance of the weekend. Between their after show Saturday night at Thalia Hall in Chicago and the Sun- day afternoon performance on the Blue Stage, Michelle Zauner cap- tured my heart. For while Psycho- pomp and Soft Sounds from Another Planet are gorgeous albums in their own right, hearing the songs performed live and watching as Zauner delivers them with fierce energy and enthusiasm not easily located in the recordings is a com- pletely different thing. Yielding her electric guitar and egging on her fellow bandmates, Zauner pushed through hits such as “In Heaven,” “Everybody Wants to Love You,” and “Boyish” and left me in a dis- traught state — I wasn’t sure if I wanted to dance or cry, so I did both at the same time. Closing with a cover of the Cranberries’ “Dreams” and the song “Machinist” off of their second studio album, Japa- nese Breakfast left the crowd in awe. Zauner is a bubble of happi- ness on stage. One wouldn’t know the grief that inspired and under- cuts Psychopomp and Soft Sounds unless they’ve read about their background elsewhere (one was written in the wake of her mother’s cancer diagnosis, and the next in the wake of her mother’s death). The juxtaposition of this heaviness with Zauner’s lighthearted deliv- ery is perhaps why I felt so struck by the band’s performances. In the end, it proves to be a catharsis not just for the crowd, but for Zauner too at each and every tour date. Noname Last September I was lucky enough to see Noname open for Ms. Lauryn Hill at the Royal Oak Music Theatre. At the time, it had only been a month since she released her debut studio album Telefone, and while it would grow to garner widespread praise from multiple critics, it only had a small follow- ing at the time. Six months later, she would come to Michigan once again, this time headlining her own show at the El Club with opener Ravyn Lenae. By this time, her stint as Lauryn Hill’s opener would become a verse in rapper Smino’s song “Amphetamine”: “Said I’m moving too fast, slow down, slow down / Opened up for Lauryn Hill, woah now, woah now.” In six months she had grown from a small Chicago rapper featured on Chance the Rapper’s Acid Rap to a woman being called the “musical reincarnation of Lauryn Hill.” And while her music does lend itself to this comparison, her stage pres- ence is much more reserved than the mother of modern hip hop. “I wanted to do one of my new songs, but then I smoked and forgot the lyrics,” the rapper said, after stop- ping her band two minutes into the first song. “Do you mind if I do it a cappella?” She’s irresistibly charm- ing, if untraditional in her delivery of her music. The set continued on in this vein, with her occasionally stopping to start a song again from the beginning or guiding the audi- ence in the harmonies for a song from her upcoming album Room 25. With 20 minutes left in her set, she brought out guest after guest from Ravyn Lenae to Saba to Smino and while they brought a boost of ener- gy to her reserved stage demeanor, she still remained the star. (Sandy) Alex G (Sandy) Alex G can be an ass- hole. A primary feature of his per- formances is often the antagonistic way he treats his crowd, asking for requests from his adoring audi- ences and then blowing them off to play a hardly recognizable deep cut. This performance was no excep- tion with the singer-songwriter barely addressing the crowd during his brutally short 45 minute set. But for some reason, I, and all the other fans gathered around the Blue Stage Sunday evening, still dwelled in every second he bestowed on us. Throwing out the melody to Weezer’s “Island in the Sun” dur- ing soundcheck and then blasting the Rascal Flatt’s cover of “Life is a Highway” before taking the stage with his band, (Sandy) Alex G went right into a rendition of “Kute” and “Forever” before even addressing the audience. Strangely enough, Alex G played several songs off of Beach Music, his 2015 studio release, and at one point Michelle Zauner joined him on stage to per- form the popular “Brite Boy,” a per- sonal favorite of mine that hasn’t made a setlist at his concert in quite a while. And unlike the reserve fans showed during Courtney Barnett’s set on Friday, when her crowd remained stationary despite her rock songs begging for a mosh pit to form, the second Alex screamed the first lyric to his aggressive, punk- heavy “Brick,” the crowd broke into a mosh pit, his dedicated fans throwing themselves at each other in a religious fervor, only stopping after a girl went down after get- ting elbowed in the nose. After a 15 song performance, the set ended suddenly with Alex G announcing that despite what he thought, there was no more time for another song. While the crowd bemoaned this and chanted “one more song!” Alex G fittingly approached the mic and screamed “Shut up, and thank you” before finally departing the stage. Ms. Lauryn Hill The most popular topic of dis- cussion Sunday evening was throwing out guesses as to how many minutes would pass before Ms. Lauryn Hill would finally take the stage. Twenty minutes? Thirty? Would she come at all? Pitchfork 2018: Striking performance, bad weather FESTIVAL REVIEW SEAN LANG/Michigan Daily NATALIE ZAK Daily Arts Writer Read more at MichiganDaily.com