Pitchfork Sunday

I was gonna make a joke about how this guy needs to mix in a cheeseburger, but word on the streets is that he has some sorta illness, so no poking fun. Fact of the matter is, Bradford Cox from Deerhunter is one of the skinniest humans I've ever seen in person. I confess, while I'm the proud owner of their album Cryptograms (which kicks ass, btw), I don't know much about the band personally. I did hear a freaky story about some blog posts Bradford had written (GO HERE for some scoop), but here nor there...Deerhunter blew me away Sunday. Being the 1st band of the day, I got a spot pretty close, so maybe that had something to do with it. But I thought they were better than anything we saw on Saturday.

Next was the Ponys. And the Aluminum Stage sound system sucked. But kudos to the Ponys, who played on, and never missed a beat. I love the Ponys. Highly recommend checking out their last album Turn the Lights Out from Matador.

Menomena was interesting. Junior Boys was sorta groovy for a moment. The Sea and Cake was OK, but blah. Jamie Lidell was ?? So this was the point of the day where we gorged on pulled pork sammies from Robinson's.

Next...Stephen Malkmus. I admit, I was pretty disappointed when I heard Malk was going to play a solo set, sans Jicks. That said...I enjoyed it.
No...the SM set definitely didn't RAWK, but something about hearing the songs stripped down got me all giddy. A week later, I can't recall the entire set list, but I believe he opened with "We Dance" from Wowee Zowee.

About halfway through, SM brought out Bob Nastanovich, and promptly went into "Trigger Cut." They also played "In the Mouth a Desert." This was cool.

Here's some vid of "Spit on a Stranger", which was played right before he brought out Bob N...


I believe we also got a Silver Jews song mixed in there..."Blue Arrangements." Yes...I'd have preferred to see Janet Weiss and a full band out there, but I was pleased anyhow.

No Neko, and no Dan Bejar, but the New Pornographers still put on one of the best performances of the weekend...


Sorry...we didn't stay around long for De La Soul. I'm pretty nostalgic when it comes to the brilliant Three Feet High and Rising, but 2 songs into their set we realized it just wasn't the same as back in da day.

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QUICK NOTE on a BURGH SHOW: John Doe, from X, is playing at Club Cafe...TOMORROW, as in MONDAY NIGHT!!! Early show starting at 7:00 at Club Cafe. Word from Chicago about the Knitters show this weekend was pretty positive...so get on out to Club Cafe.