FRIDAY

Greys, Benjamin Booker, Viet Cong, Speedy Ortiz, Swearin’, Perfect Pussy and secret guests: Spoon at The Horseshoe Tavern

This was the night that called out to me. This was the show that was most anticipated by everyone I met at the festival. With such a stacked bill and secret guests Spoon topping off the evening, what could possibly go wrong? Probably everything.

It became evident early on in the night that the ‘Shoe was having issues with their vocals. You couldn’t hear anything, especially as the night progressed. Given this, you would think the staff would swoop in and figure out the problem, but they didn’t. The Horseshoe staff themselves were all lovely people, but the NXNE staff they had on hand for the night running stage operations weren’t helpful.

This all culminated in the middle of Perfect Pussy’s set. The band was ripping through their new songs off 2014’s Say Yes to Love with the intensity and rawness of their first tape from 2013. In the middle of one of their last few songs, which in a Perfect Pussy set clocking in at 20 minutes is about half their set time, the bass rig provided by NXNE and used all night by the different bands caught on fire and stopped working. Bassist Greg Ambler tried to signal to the staff that the bass rig blew and nothing was coming out of his instrument yet no one came to the stage to lend a hand. In frustration, he smashed his bass on the stage upon leaving before the last song of the night “Advance Upon the Real,” which was to be performed by only Shaun Sutkus behind the noise spaceship and vocalist Meredith Graves. Sutkus and Graves made it through a good portion of the song before the crowd who arrived early for Spoon got out of hand. In the middle of the performance, screams from the crowd including “you fucking suck” and “get off the stage” erupted, only fueling Graves to continue to perform longer and harder than I’ve ever seen her do. She showed strength and fought against the assholes with her best weapon: her own voice. The NXNE staff asked Sutkus and Graves off the stage, so that they could start setting up for Spoon.

Needless to say, Spoon put on a great performance in a rare intimate setting, but after watching the frustration from some of my favorite up and coming bands all night with the terrible staff and sound quality, I clocked out and stopped paying attention to them a few songs in.

Regardless of sound issues and an unhelpful staff, each band of the night put on a stellar performance and worked with what they had. Benjamin Booker was a surprise to see on the bill, as his sound is quite different from the rest of the bands. It was a pleasant break from the loud rock bands, and his bluesy rock is the most genuine I have heard in a long time. (Take that Black Keys! Ha, get outta here who do you think you are) Viet Cong put out one of the best self-released tapes last year, and 2014 should be a huge year for the Calgary-based, ex-Women band. Their poppy melodies with crazy guitar work led to two broken guitar strings through their set. Both Greys and Speedy Ortiz played different set lists from previous nights’ performances, but they approached them with the same intensity, skill and downright perfection. Swearin’s vocals were particularly lost with the sound issues unfortunately, but the crowd there for Swearin’ couldn’t have cared less and danced their asses off.