FYF Review (Amir)

It's hard to say exactly how I felt about FYF. I came into the festival via what felt like hours of extra traffic on the 5 north, which also resulted in me missing a band which I was quite excited for (Let's Wrestle, from the UK, check it out). I got to the festival grounds around 1, and I already saw the hideous will-call line which wrecked the fest for me last year. The FYF staff had said that the problem would be resolved this year, but words are cheap. Thankfully I had my ticket sent to me, but my heart goes out to all the poor souls standing in the hot sun missing bands they paid good money to see. All the negativity aside, I'm in a pretty good mood. As I sit here sipping on my iced coffee and listening to Panda Bear's "Person Pitch", I will attempt to piece together a fair review of the event.

I walked in while Orange County's own, The Growlers, were some songs into their set. You know the guy who listens to a band from early on, sees the not yet well known act as a secret they know of, and loves every bit of it? I'm not gonna be that guy today. Yes the Growlers have gotten pretty big, touring, signed to Dead Oceans, playing FYF. Yes, their sound has changed to a more controlled and well mixed groove. But, they still had it. The band was more mature, but not boring. They played mostly old material, and threw in a new song every now and then. Seeing them was quite nostalgic, and a good way to start my day at the fest.

After getting a beer and witnessing how boring Vetiver was, I proceeded to go see Screaming Females. I had no idea what this band was about, at all, other than guessing a girl was involved. When I got to the stage, I witnessed one of the most badass, raunchy, and down right savage girls I've ever seen. I don't know her name, and I'm too lazy to get up and get the WiFi password, so I'm just gonna call her Kelly. Kelly was on guitar and vocals, and she had a bassist, and a drummer backing her up. She proceeded to scream, shred, scream, sing, shred more, scream more, and make you realize that you're not as badass as you think. It reminded me of a noisier less poppy Dinosaur Jr. The songs were well crafted, her band was on it, and the guitar solos were surreal. Davila 666 was going on, so I had to leave Kelly's set early, but what I witnessed convinced me she was the best female guitarist I've ever seen.

Davila 666 were dust, circle pits, Puerto Rican, catchy, punk, and more dust. These guys had natural charisma, and knew how to get people moving, effortlessly. I don't remember the set all that well, because I was busy dodging the inconvenient cirle pitters and avoiding swallowing more and more dust, but as a whole I remember it sounding good. They're a band to watch at some hole in the wall venue, or a house party, so naturally the music suffered a bit from being on such a large stage, mic'd up, and far less personal than most of your garage shows.

After Davila, I was just killing time waiting for my personal highlight of the day, back to back sets of Thee Oh Sees and Titus Andronicus. Thee Oh Sees played on the small stage, and packed it with people ready to throw down. After the usual introduction, "We're Thee Oh Sees from San Francisco", they reved up into a new song. It was a good song, but I felt like they should have started off with a crowd favorite to get everyone going early on. People got more and more into it until the song was over, and then.... "Enemy Destruct". Once we all heard that starting riff, we knew what was about to go down. They played it harder and faster than on record, and with the sun beating down on us all, dust covering the small amount of air surrounding your body, we all lost it. Dance, dance, dance, all through the rest of the set, which included "Ghost In The Trees", "Tidal Wave", and more that I can't recall. The second half of the set was their new "jam" song. Following the tradition of songs like "Quadrospazzed", "Warm Slime", and "Ruby Go Home", they played this beast out, and mutilated it. I remember distinctly towards the middle of the song, I realized I was in the zone, where you're sorta forgetting how much time had just past, what you were doing, and where you were. I'd go in and out of this state, snapping out of it just to realize how savage this song was really getting. But maybe I was just getting close to passing out and I'm over romanticizing it. When their set was over I came to this realization, John Dwyer is a hypnotist, the band is his office, and his guitar is the pendulum.

Here is a video of them busting out "Meat Step Lively" as recorded by Ali Jafari of ControlAltDelight:

I then jogged across the field (realizing how out of shape I am in the process) to the furthest stage, trying to not miss any of Titus. I got there just in time, but I was in the back of the crowd. I tried inching forward but I was quickly reminded of the trauma my body had just suffered, so I decided to keep it easy here. Titus appropriately kicked their set off with the opener of their new album. But the mix was off, the vocals were too loud, while Pat Stickel's guitar was too low, so when you got to the instrumental movements of the song, you couldn't really hear the guitar which should be front and center. They played only material from their new album, and played it well. To be honest, I got what I wanted to see out of this band... Pat Stickels passionately singing his songs, which at times resemble poetic speeches contained in a melody. I remember him screaming "After all of these years, it's still us against them, it's still us against them", as he turned towards the skyscrapers in downtown LA in utter frustration... and I had one of those moments again. I really think Titus should have played later in the day, considering their huge amount of success in the last year with their critically acclaimed album "The Monitor", and the overall nature of the music....but it's okay <3

So its around 4 something now, the sun is still burning us all, phone lines are jammed due the sheer amount of people here, the festival grounds are running out of food, and whats left of the food has about a 2 hour line in front of it. The place was clusterfucked, in every way. This is where my day took a huge turn, probably due to my breakfast of flaming hot cheetos and lack of will to wait in line for 2 hours to replenish myself. We found some shade close to the stage Wavves was playing at, and killed about an hour and a half. I'm not into Wavves, and his set made me like him even less. It was generic, post post everything pop punk. Yea I wasn't in  he crowd so I can't give a real review of the set, but I could hear it, and I was glad to be sitting far away.

Ariel Pink went on after Wavves. I'm not huge on Pink either, but I wanted to at least check out a couple songs. It was a solid performance, but lacked energy. My friends who like Pink said they thought it was an amazing set, so take that for what you will, but my opinion still stands. His live performance was identical to the new album to me, and his lack of energy killed it. In other news, people seem to remember the purse he was wearing throughout the entire performance more than the set itself. There is much serious debate and speculation as to what sort of purse it was, and what it contained. Leading theories include lofi recording equipment, and drugs. Here is a link to the official report

I am starving at this point, and there is serious talk about leaving to go eat, which meant missing Sleep and Panda Bear... so my story ends early. The last band I was was The Mountain Goats. John Darnielle took the huge stage and large crowd, and transported us all into an intimate room and sang songs to each of us. He's got the singer/songwriter gene; Dylan had it, Neil Young had it, Jeff Mangum had it. It's the ability to just stand there, play songs on your guitar, sing, and make people care about what you're saying. Make them feel what you feel, make them laugh, cry,and  reminisce, with the uttermost goal of relishing the human experience. He sang songs about broken hearts, growing up with angst and confusion, broken houses and families, and all other things everyone goes through at one point or another. He let everyone know of his admiration for Sleep, which was to go on right after, and cracked jokes about 4lokos. The set was revitalizing, and a perfect note for me to leave on. Also note that the lines for food were still as long as ever.

I'll sum this thing up very simply and to the point: there was a good collection of acts, and they played well, but the lack of good management led to a very uncomfortable day. From the long willcall line, to the ridiculous wait time to get the bare necessities of water and food. So FYF staff, here is a cry from me to you, PLEASE hire more people for this event, it's only going to get more popular and crowded. Also, get the Kogi BBQ taco truck to come (I haven't tried it yet)...

<3, Amir