Lately I’ve been making my own hours and listening to mostly Big Star and Steely Dan. Anyone who’s spent any time around me in the last month or two can attest to this. Wake up late, make some strong coffee, cook up some fresh eggs and relax with Pretzel Logic or Radio City. Sounds like a fine time, right?
Well it took Japandroids to knock me out of this funk (no pun intended). I missed them earlier this year when pitchfork doled out the best new music and it wasn’t until Polyvinyl signed them and their record came across my desk that I figured I should listen. And I haven’t regretted it, and it hasn’t left my stereo since. As we enjoy what is one of those most mild and beautiful LA summers in recent memory it’s hard not to get 100% behind a line like "I don’t wanna worry about dying, I just want to worry about the sunshine girls." This works for me. I can understand it and the whole thing makes sense.
Without a doubt, this was the most pleasant weather the Siren Festival has ever seen. Maybe a weird thing to say up front, but here’s a festival that has a reputation for being held on the most miserably hot, humid day of the year, where you wish someone would squeegee you every half hour. So with temperatures in the mid-80s and low humidity, I’d almost say it was pleasant. For Sire it was close to perfect.
And so was the lineup, even if it was almost entirely white dudes with guitars. At least they were good ones. I got there just in time to see Micachu & the Shapes who were good but maybe not ready for such a big stage just yet. (Her tiny guitar looked even more minuscule here.) They were much better when I saw them at Death by Audio in March. Their album, produced by cut-and-paste master Matthew Herbert is kind of hard to replicate live, but they do a pretty good job of it thanks to an array of kitchen-sink percussion.
Do not go to Siren Fest hungover! This should be a rule that’s written on the post because it is a pretty awful feeling to stand in the sun on one of the warmest days of the year when you were drinking till 4am the previous night. Yeah, sometimes my decision making is not what it’s supposed to be at this point in my life, but I did my best to battle the hangover and my sudden aversion to the sun to see a few of the bands I had really wanted to see.
First on the list was Micachu & the Shapes, a band that wowed us when we saw them at Pianos and have woven their spell on us with their terrific debut album Jewellery. It’s a bit weird seeing this three piece band on an outdoor stage in the middle of the day, not because their music is out of place it actually fits pretty well in the Coney Island sun, but they are such tiny, pale people that it almost seemed they have never seen the sun and almost disappear on a large stage. Micah Levi did her best to keep us entertained by it kind of drifted by instead of taking us over in the expansive space.
How did you get together?
Brad: Me and JB, we met in Florida probably 8 or 9 years ago. And moved to New York approximately the same time…
JB: We both basically wanted to kick ass
Brad:...
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