After spending a few days in the woods and deserts of California, I cruised back towards the coast to catch the 8th annual Treasure Island Festival this past weekend in San Francisco. It was my first time attending the fest, and I have to say I was quite impressed. The lay out was super chill/friendly, it was small in space, but had tons to do other then catch shows, with a section completely dedicated to arts and crafts, and games. They also had a silent disco, which is always a good time to get good and weird! The one tricky part, was that there were only two stages, so music was going back and forth throughout the entire day, and as the day went on, the stages got more n more crowded. As a result, you had to plan around some acts to be able to go enjoy the activities that were provided, but hey that’s part of the whole experience! All and all, this festival was a rad time! Oh and the view of San Francisco was just beyond beautiful!
The festival started off over at the Bridge stage (Main) with an awesome local band “Painted Palms.” They were as good as their band name, with a cross between psychedelic and electronic rock, these dudes ripped! Even though it was an early set, they definitely had a solid local fan base, which you got to love and respect.
Up next over at the Tunnel stage aka the sunset stage was the dark and trippy beats of Tobacco. I stumbled into them at Psych Fest and I wasn’t about to miss this one. Front man Thomas Fec was looking pretty sketchy on stage, with his hood up and big shades on, but it went perfectly along with their set. It reminded me of a soundtrack straight out of a horror movie, or the bad trip I had at Bonnaroo in 2008. I think it may have been a little too “weird” for an early set in San Francisco, but they killed it!
Next, I rushed over to catch MØ, and was surprised by the size of her fan base. Some chick looked at me before the set and said, “are you in love with her as much as I am?” Even though I had yet to hear any of her work, I said “yeah, obvi”, because Andy was raving about her to me prior to the festival. But now, I totally understand the following they are developing. Karen Ørsted has to be one the baddest chicks in the game these days. Rocking all black with a black eye patch (due to injury?), I’m pretty sure she had everyone falling for her every word, and her dance moves were top notch. At one point when she was really grooving, I’m pretty sure she looked right at me and gave a quick nod of approval of my moves, as I was really getting into it at that point. It made me think that we could really tear it up together at a wedding or something.
After MØ’s crazy set, I waited in line for about an hour to take a piss, porta potty’s were p clean though!
Next to hit the main stage, were the crazy cats from the UK, Jungle. I first heard of these guys from this older indie legend I ran into at a Foxygen show a few months back, and he was just raving about them. I remember him saying, “Jungle.. album name Jungle.. you gotta check it out Ty!” He named it his album of the year, so I put big star next their name for a must see show, and boy I sure was happy I did. The lead singer was rocking a SF Giant’s jersey, so he had the crowds love even before he began shredding.
I decided to skip over Zedd to cruise around to get some lifestyle/sunset photos, and a few other reasons we won’t get into, but it left me catching the end of St. Lucia where everyone was dancing. Born in South Africa, and transplanted to Brooklyn these guys are one of the best inide pop groups around.
Stay tuned for Day 2 pics and recap, including sets by The Growlers, White Denim and Alt-J.