Preview: Siren Music Festival 2009
Andrew, our Senior Youth Correspondent, is heading to Coney Island for the ninth annual Siren Music Festival on Saturday. It's a free, all-ages, all-day event sponsored by The Village Voice. Through the years the festival has featured bands such as Guided By Voices, Sleater-Kinney, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Modest Mouse, Death Cab for Cutie, Spoon, and M.I.A. And now...Andrew's preview:
Siren Fest
July 18, 2009
Coney Island, NY
Here's the line up. I'm guessing the organizers put the bands in some kind of descending "importance" or "popularity" order:
BUILT TO SPILL
SPANK ROCK
THE RAVEONETTES
FRIGHTENED RABBIT
A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS
GRAND DUCHY
MONOTONIX
THEE OH SEES
FUTURE OF THE LEFT
JAPANDROIDS
MICACHU & THE SHAPES
TINY MASTERS OF TODAY
BEAR HANDS
THE BLUE VAN
In order of my priority: Built to Spill, A Place to Bury Strangers, Frightened Rabbit, Future of the Left, Japandroids, Monotonix. I have no interest in ravens or the Raveonettes.
Unfortunately, they split the bands between two stages. I'll be too busy with beers and oysters (apparently they're big at Siren) to be dashing between stages, so I will inevitably cast my lot with the Built to Spill stage (aka Main Stage) which is WIN for also hosting Frightened Rabbit and Japandroids but is FAIL since I will most likely miss A Place to Bury Strangers and Future of the Left, two groups I'm keen to see. I'm not the biggest fan of festivals (stampedes, dust storms, etc) but we'll see how many acts I can manage to catch. In the meantime, let me know if there are any bands I should take special care to see or, possibly more useful advice, avoid at all costs.
Yahoo
6 comments:
Built to Spill is a yawner. Sorry. Emma Peel and I were actually discussing this in the car on Sunday. To me, their music is youthful and inspired, but their onstage performance is quite the opposite.
Stay true to your indie rock core, SYC Andrew, and stick with the Stillwell Stage.
especially if you've never seen Monotonix.
The must see bands are Monotonix, Future of the Left, and Frightened Rabbit. It's definitely worth bouncing between stages to see them.
I agree w/ Potsy on Built To Spill. We saw them at the 9:30 Club and it was so-so.
Add my voice to the BTS = meh live chorus. Seen them a bunch of times over the years, and can't say I've been psyched about any of the shows since like 1999 or so.
One word of warning -- switching between stages at Siren is never an easy endeavor. You're packed like sardines in front of each stage, and movement of any kind is hard.
I do recommend getting there early enough to jump on the Cyclone, though.
i'll be there shooting a video on the boardwalk with future of the left, should be exciting!
also, thee oh sees are very much worth checking out. it's too bad that the four bands i most want to see -- micachu, thee oh sees, japandroids, FOTL -- are all playing back to back on different stages, mostly while i'll be working. too bad, because i really don't see enough bands.
Part of youth is learning and exploring - developing on our own. Let SYCA do his own thing (and apparently make his own mistakes - I love The Raveonettes!)
Post a Comment