Roskilde – Whoever does the music programming for the Roskilde Festival really must be commended. Having already seen acts as diverse as Portishead, Kylesa and Shangaan Electro, the remaining days proved to be equally eclectic and perhaps even better.
Things started out on an interesting note with post-punk/industrial/metal pioneers Kiling Joke. Clad in a camouflage jumpsuit and often lumbering across the stage like Frankenstein’s monster, singer Jaz Coleman took on the role of an angry prophet of doom. His between song banter consisted of a series of Howard Beale-esque rantings like “the European Union is in trouble,” “there are no more fish in the ocean,” and more cryptically, “soon, they’ll attack the supermarkets.” Each of these rantings segued perfectly into the title of the next song and worked to create a perfect mood to match their music. In fact, Coleman seemed a little miffed when bassist Martin “Youth” Glover asked the crowd if they were having a good time between songs as if it were breaking the angry comspiracy theorist mood he was trying to create.
One of the most impressive acts I saw was Dutch art-punkers The Ex. I had known the band by reputation and heard a bit of their music, but was not quite prepared for it to be quite as good as it was. Known for their love of collaboration, the group was performing on this occasion with Italian jazz trumpeter Roy Paci, who played on their most recent album Catch My Shoe. For a band that’s been going for 32 years (though admittedly not with all of it’s original members), these guys had an incredible amount of energy, jumping and flailing about the stage with the energy and enthusiasm of teenagers. Also delivering an energetic set was Swedish electronic act Little Dragon. Dancing, posing, and twirling (yes, twirling) across the stage, singer Yukimi Nagano is a totally engaging, charismatic frotwoman. I expect to hear more from this band in the future.
One of the more unique acts of the festival was Congotronics Vs. Rockers. It was essentially a massive jam session made up of 19 musicians from six different bands – Konono No. 1, Kasai Allstars, Deerhoof, Wildbird and Peacedrums, Skeletons, and Juana Molina – all of whom had participated in the Tradi-Mods Vs. Rockers CD compilation. It was really pretty impressive to see that many musicians from various musical backgrounds playing together and they all seemed to be having a lot of fun up there. Of course, as would be expected with that many musicians, the logistics of organizing it all didn’t go 100% smoothly as it seemed that certain instruments were not always as prominent in the mix as they should be. Still, this was one of the highlights of the entire festival, and well worth skipping out on most of The Strokes’ mainstage set. Luckily, Julian Casablancas and company frontloaded their set with a lot of hits and I walked away after about half an hour satisfied that I had seen enough.
Due to the abundance of mud, I decided to stay at the Odeon stage after Congotronics Vs. Rockers to check out old school death metallers Autopsy. The metal faithful were out in full force, eager to hear something heavy and brutal at 1:00am, and Autopsy did not let them down. I enjoyed their set, but not being overly familiar with their stuff, I felt that I had had enough after 4 or 5 songs. I do have to comment, however, on the fact that guitarist Danny Coralles seemed to be wearing trackpants on stage. Sure, he offset this by wearing studded gauntlets onstage, thus upping the metal quotient, but to quote from Seinfeld, when you wear sweatpants, you’re telling the world, “I give up.” I know death metal has never been the most glamorous of genres, but come on, put a pair of jeans on. Or at least some shorts. Shorts would be better.
By Sunday, lack of sleep had gotten the best of me and so a conscious decision was made to see less bands and take it easy. California punk legends Bad Religion were on my list of must sees and put on a pretty solid set full of songs from throughout their 32 year career. “This is a song from the 20th Century … back when we were good,” joked vocalist Greg Graffin and as with all good jokes, there was a good bit of truth to it. This is not to say that their newer material is bad, but the older songs certainly got a bigger reaction from the crowd.
Also getting a big reaction from the crowd was Janelle Monae. With a great band, a great voice, and a top notch stage show, it’s hard to fault anything she does. She even managed to incorporate covers of Stevie Wonder and The Jackson Five into her set. Yet despite all this and despite the fact that a guest spot from Big Boi on “Tightrope” was pretty much inevitable (although according to this Pitchfork review, he didn’t make an appearance), I just wasn’t really feeling it. What I needed instead was to close out the festival with something a little more intimate from an equally impressive performer – Justin Townes Earle. While his stage show couldn’t compete with Monae’s in terms of spectacle, Earle is a talented guitarist and songwriter as well as an accomplished storyteller. Accompanied only by another guitarist, Earle made it feel like a performance in a small club rather than a side stage at a massive festival. He closed things off with a cover of The Replacements’ “Can’t Hardly Wait.” The song was a perfect reflection of how I felt at that moment. Roskilde was great, but after 4 days of music, mud and little sleep, I could hardly wait to get out of there and get some rest.