Saturday 29/07/06 Day 1 @ Pitchfork Music Festival, Union Park, Chicago

Lucifer must have heard there was a festival with Pitchfork in its name, for Hell hath belched up the apropos clime.  Heat index of 106.  El train rails expand in advance of another disaster.  High above, a sun that kills 60,000 a year is rubbing his solar prominence mitts together in glee in the hopes that he offs at least 20,000 today.  People who abhor the very thought of wearing hats are wearing hats today.  Count your correspondent among them. Our floppy royal blue Hunter S. New Radicals hat squares up against a baseball cap (for shame) that reads Olde English Malt Liquor.  Flip a coin.  Today the blue flop hat, tomorrow, Olde English.  

“Welcome to SweatFest ’06,” cries Miss Alex White of Hot Machines.  

Comprised of lead singer Jered Gummere of The Ponys and throaty local chanteuse White, Hot Machines is the closest Chicago comes to having a supergroup. That is, until next weekend’s Lollapalooza, where Billy Corgan (still bald), shall emerge from his spiderhole of reclusion to team up with Peter “The Glory of Love” Cetera for a one-off duet of 'Disarm'.  Hot Machines have a song called 'Can’t Feel' that starts out just like Ringo Starr barnburner 'It Don’t Come Easy', that is, until Miss White comes along to rip her vocal chords on the chorus.  Leaving a stronger impression on the local front, Chicago’s Chin Up Chin Up have an irresistible sound that’s certain to make an impact beyond the bounds of Cook County, perhaps as far as Spain, where, for a brief time years ago, Gigwise contributed album reviews to a glossy expatriate monthly.  Today, after years of email communication, I finally meet, face-to-face, the editor, who has since parted ways with the magazine. And I will ask our editor the question we have wanted to ask for years now:  

Whatever happened to that payment you promised? Years have passed. I have come to collect.

Debt payable in pesetas, euros, dollars, or beer.  Skin, if you wish.  A shag or a snog if you’re fit. This peccadillo, you see, it dwarfs Everest now.  

Meeting the editor of the expat rag that never paid me. All to come.

For now, there’s Man Man. Man Man is not math rock. Man Man is a math formula.

Boredoms + Tom Waits = Man Man. 

Under the war paint and the colorful feathers, the singer could be Dave Grohl. 

Man Man is a monster. Man Man is a fiend. Tomorrow, on the green line to Ashland, the kids wearing shorts with too many pockets will say they thought Man Man were all special needs.  “Those guys in the white, man. They were retarded!”  This guy in the white (jeans), he’s retarded as well. Man Man is on fire.  And we need a drink.

In the back of the Biz 3 tent, I am hovering over the Scion table, thinking of nicking a Scion T-shirt when, from out of the shadows, steps Me'shell Ndegeocello (in yellow) to confront me with a question.

“Who do you work for?”

Voila, Gestapo. Easy, Me’shell.

“Gigwise.”

“Gigwise? That’s not related to Streetwise, is it?”

The 312 beer shoots out my nose for laughter. In equating Gigwise with Streetwise, Faith – that’s her name – has just walked away with the joke of the weekend. Streetwise, for the uninformed, is a Chicago newspaper that is distributed by streetpeople on streetcorners. 

So to answer your question, Faith – yes, Gigwise and Streetwise are simpatico. Gig is merely the UK branch.  Derelicts on the dole do the job abroad. I myself am a homeless derelict. On assignment.

“Pretty snazzy dresser for a derelict. I knew you weren’t from around here.”

Blinding white jeans, navy blue top – our yachting ensemble has found a fan. Faith, you’ve got taste. Let’s have a photo.

“You going to Lollapalooza?” asks her cohort, Jennifer.

“Yes,” I answer, “in the same outfit.  All three days.”

“I’ll be working the VIP booth.”

“Then be sure and get Gigwise a beer.”

From the Biz 3 tent to the press tent, where a photographer stands changing lenses.

“You were at Bonnaroo, weren’t you?  Yeah, I remember that Tigers cap. Not from Michigan are you?”

Turns out our photographer grew up ten miles from the hometown of Gigwise. Things are looking up. Let’s ruin the mood. Let’s call the old editor.

John’s too young to have white in his beard. Last of the altruistic photo pit guard dogs, pre-Band of Horses, he lets me use his mobile.  Magnanimity!  Wait, we’ve got a live voice on the other end.  Editor’s in transit.  Will be here in two hours.  What do you look like?  I look like a rich ****ing asshole on a yacht.  White pants, blue top. No blue. Why do you keep saying green?  What about you?  What’s that? Cowboy boots?  Blue cowboy boots?  There won’t be many wearing them, right.  Got it.  Later.

Handing the mobile back to John and entering the Connector stage photo pit only to spot Charlie from Seattle.  He’s doing a year-long project where all he does is go to festivals.  And he’s got the scoop as to why one of these Horses just quit the band.

“Yeah, he just opened up a bar in Seattle. That’s what he wanted to do.”

“Good plan. Hey, speaking of bars, there are two red coolers full of 312 in the Biz tent backstage.”

“No shit?  How much?”

“Free.”

Charlie looks to his photographer.

“Where’s the Biz tent?”

Welcome to the Biz tent. Our mini-Ibiza. Not their scene. Seattle absconds. Can’t stand the techno. Can’t stand the Mountain Goats. The 3-song shutterbug rule’s in effect but we’re out at the start of song two. Fortuitous, for who do we encounter once back in the masses but Mr. Eddie Argos himself?

“Are you gonna be in the press tent later?”

“Yeah,” says Eddie, “we wanna catch a bit of Destroyer, and, of course, we’ve gotta play, but after that, we’ll be there.”

Quick, what do Dan Bejar and the first single off The Stills’ new album have in common? Give up? They’re both called Destroyer! They’re also both Canadian, which brings us to our second point: what’s with this whole Canadian fixation on destruction? Aren’t us yanks doing enough destruction for y’all already?  Bejar bears a passing resemblance to bygone soft rock guru Dan Folgerberg but he sings like a conjurer of magic spells. Picture a hirsute Harry Potter twenty years down the road and voila, I give you Destroyer. His song 'European Oils' runs just under five minutes. Speaking of oil, according to Jerry Hirsch of the Los Angeles Times, Exxon’s making $45 million an hour. So by the time Dan’s done warbling like a grizzled wizard about 'European Oils', Exxon’s made $3.75 million.  Suddenly, this destructive bent in Canadian musicians is beginning to make sense.

We split our time between Destroyer and Ghislain Poirier, IDM laptop demigod. In the Biz tent at Poirier, we stand, nodding to the beat as a girl in tight jeans and a face made of rubber dances next to us, grinning. She’s not grinning at Poirier. She’s grinning at us (gurning, more like it).

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

Still gurning. Now what?  This is weird. Kind of creepy, even.     

Ready, Art Brut?

“Have you seen them before?” I ask the delightful sprite to my right in the photo pit.

“Yeah,” she smiles, “once.”

That accent – here you go, Faith. Here’s someone who’s not from around these parts.

“Where are you from?”

“Australia.”