2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

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suskind
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by suskind »

I gather this was the first show since the South American gigs last year.. August? I agree the setlist looks pretty awful, but I wonder if some kind of a warm up show would have made a difference. Would have loved it if they were to do some gigs of their own while they're at it in the states.

Also wondering about NO BARRIE at the Scream set. :(
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by plastic37 »

Heavy Tourism
toomilk
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by toomilk »

Elevators were pretty great. Didn't play for too long. Tommy and Roky were out of it. Fried. But the energy was good and they played the classics. Young guitarist was basically the band leader. They played Slip Inside This House, much to my surprise, but didn't get too far through it.

All I can say is that they were better than Spiritualized!

Follakzoid was the only magical set I saw.

Overall, I feel like this festival is dead. It's more about these radio-friendly bands now and music industry people will be interested in it next year. Probably will go the way of Coachella and SXSW: a music festival that has little to do with music and more about being "hip." It's sad really.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by toomilk »

Oh, and what pissed me off is that Spiritualized, Primal Scream, and The Jesus and Mary Chain aren't relevant bands anymore. They're going through the motions and I found them profoundly uninspiring. I know a lot of you feel the same way. It's horrible.

But maybe I'm just in a shitty mood and tired from this weekend. I dunno.

/rant
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by TheWarmth »

I disagree about Primal Scream. I love More Light and every time I've seen them they've been killer. I guess the last time was when they toured Beautiful Future. That gig absolutely destroyed, despite the fact that Beautiful Future isn't one of their stronger releases.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by spzretent »

I am going to say Spiritualized are still very much relevant to me. Whether it is bands they inspire to what goes on within this message board or their new releases and subsequent tours.
Maybe Jason will catch wind of what has been said here about the Austin show and perhaps it will make him stop and think about what the fans want to see. I'd be pissed off if I went to the trouble and expense to see that show and that was the set list but it is his band and maybe that is all they were comfortable playing. I am pretty sure the emphasis has been on recording the new album and not rehearsing for sporadic live shows.
I would say Primal Scream are still relevant whether you like them or not in my estimation. Any band that has not broken up and had a come back tour ie: The Mary Chain, Stone Roses, Ride, Slowdive, MBV etc . At least MBV put out a new record. I think it is crazy that Ride & Slowdive generate way more buzz now than they did the first time around. I know people here love them but this buzz is ten times the size it was in the 90's.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by mojo filters »

toomilk wrote:Oh, and what pissed me off is that Spiritualized, Primal Scream, and The Jesus and Mary Chain aren't relevant bands anymore. They're going through the motions and I found them profoundly uninspiring. I know a lot of you feel the same way. It's horrible.

But maybe I'm just in a shitty mood and tired from this weekend. I dunno.

/rant
I get your point regarding the festival headliners, but at least Spz and the Scream are still creatively active. JAMC look like a parody of themselves these days, the antithesis of the band that recorded Psychocandy. The fact they don't seem to acknowledge the irony of touring that album on the shameless nostalgia cash-in circuit has lost them some respect in my eyes ... they could help themselves by touring Honey's Dead - though I'd want it done well!
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toomilk
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by toomilk »

I hope you're right about Spz's emphasis. I would understand J not wanting to put a straight-forward crowd pleasing set, but this performance was simply bad. I suspect the set list was even cut short by the sound problems and the fact that they started 15 minutes late. After WWJ, he said 'thank you' into the mic and put his guitar down, much to the surprise of the other band members. So maybe he was aware of the quality of the set?

For train-spotters: he used two Jazzmasters, before reverting back to his usual red Thinline Telecaster near the end of the set. He ignored the guitar tech who tried to give him a Jazzmaster back after the next song, instead manually changing the tuning of his guitar between songs. This basically destroyed any momentum they may have salvaged from the beginning of the set.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by thesevensteves »

saw them at west terminal saturday night and have mixed feelings as well. i drove down from kentucky on a whim saturday to catch the gig thanks to this beautiful goddamn message board. 6hrs in the car didnt seem worth it for a late afternoon festival appearance, but a club show? with no opener? fuck yes. last time i saw them was in columbus in 2013 and thought that was a great gig. save doggen, it was a new crew from the last time. set list was the same as toomilk reported earlier, but addiing Come Together and Take Your Time to close. vibe felt strange to me, hard to explain but they started kinda flat, picked up momentum until Soul On Fire (i dunno) and back to life at the end. no encore and it wasn't a curfew issue. heard that most of the 'backing tracks" for a new album have been recorded but "who knows" on a liberal release date thought. as mentioned earlier, the backup singers at various moments had their phones out taking pictures? kinda fucked and distracting, but stoked for them, they were tripping out, i know that. the show was really good but never really pushed it like every other live experience i've had with them. i haven't heard about sunday's outdoor show.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by toomilk »

That end would have been great at the fest, sound and electronics permitting. Definitely a weird vibe. Especially from Stella. He is an great bass player and a fan of James Jamerson who usually adds more than what is on the recordings, but he seemed to sit there looking at Jason. Maybe J is the new Mark E Smith?
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by runcible »

toomilk wrote:Oh, and what pissed me off is that Spiritualized, Primal Scream, and The Jesus and Mary Chain aren't relevant bands anymore. They're going through the motions and I found them profoundly uninspiring. I know a lot of you feel the same way. It's horrible.

But maybe I'm just in a shitty mood and tired from this weekend. I dunno.

/rant
I don't agree with this at all. We've all had moments where bands have failed to make the mark we expect. My experience of this was on the 1997 LAGWAFIS tour where I felt the London show - a gig I'd been beside myself with excitement about - was a complete non-event. Poor delivery and I thought they were shoddy as hell. I was devastated. Not everyone thought so but I became completely disillusioned with Spiritualized for months. I felt let down and kind of betrayed which I know is an over reaction but that music was so important to me the show I'd just seen felt like I'd reached the end and I was really unhappy. Then I saw another show they did in Bradford about 6 months later and I was absolutely blown away and returned to the fold.

Seeing one poor show is hardly evidence enough to now dismiss a band who have been so important to you. I think your line about being in a shitty mood says it all. The best Spz show I've seen in the last 20 years or so was the last one at Holmfirth which I thought was absolutely magnificent. yet James T - someone with an opinion I trust - hated it, later admitting he hadn't felt that great anyway.

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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by angelsighs »

I agree with runcible. It;s gutting when a band you love and invest a lot in, play a shitty gig. but I don't think it's as simple as suddenly a band becomes not relevant (i'm not even 100% sure what 'relevant' means in terms of music). bands have bad periods, good periods, good gigs, bad gigs, it's more of a slippery thing.

shame you found the festival not 100% satisfying Kevin.. I agree it can get annoying when the young hipsters get hold of a festival and it loses something :) but crowd notwithstanding.. c'mon the lineup for this fest is still outstanding. would love to hear reports about other bands that played over the weekend.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by Huxley123 »

Great great festival, had a blast so many top acts, DIIV, Black Ryder, The Myrrors, Mary Chain, Black Angels were the highlights for me and considering Primal Scream were missing barry cadogan on guitar and the backing singers they nailed a great festival set, converted a lot of people around us who didn't know much of them and by the end had the crowd dancing.


What can you say about Spiritualized though?! ok they were suffering a few sound and level problems but I agree with what others have said, that setlist was fucking atrocious, honestly the worst I've ever seen, totally killed the vibe, honestly don't have a clue what he could've been thinking...So so poor.

Was he going for a soundscape esque low key show? Whatever, it was terrible beyond words, really gutted, wish they'd have played a coachella-esque set again
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by simonkeeping »

Just seen the line-up for the ATP stage at Primavera sound.

THURSDAY 28TH MAY

7:00pm - Yasmine Hamden

8:50pm - Thurston Moore Band

10:50pm - Spiritualized

1:00am - Sunn O)))

4:20am - Richie Hawtin

Surely they're going to have to bring the noise if they're playing before Sunn O)))

Incidentally, did anyone who went to Austin see The Oh See play? They really need to get booked up by someone in the UK soon, its been ages since they've been over here..
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by beingewert »

Alright, this is my first post to this board. That said, I can't believe how fickle and nit-picky everyone is. It was my 4th time seeing them at Levitation and, yes, it took them the customary 3 songs to find their level, which was certainly annoying. Having done this for so long they should be able to get that together earlier, but I thought the set was great. Sure, there are songs I would've liked to hear more than others, but hell, there's a reason fans don't make the setlist. Here it comes was beautiful, I weeped openly during x-rated and couldn't handle walking with jesus. despite everyone's thoughts about the setlist I felt he was more connected with the festival crowd then any other spiritualized festival show i've seen. i totally understand being critical, but everyone on here seems unsatiated because they didn't play the songs they personally wanted to hear. whatever happened about giving yourself over the moment and not demanding what you prematurely expected. i'm not trying to be a jerk or anything, but I'm just aghast at all the professed spiritualized fans acting so petulant.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by toomilk »

beingewert wrote:Alright, this is my first post to this board. That said, I can't believe how fickle and nit-picky everyone is. It was my 4th time seeing them at Levitation and, yes, it took them the customary 3 songs to find their level, which was certainly annoying. Having done this for so long they should be able to get that together earlier, but I thought the set was great. Sure, there are songs I would've liked to hear more than others, but hell, there's a reason fans don't make the setlist. Here it comes was beautiful, I weeped openly during x-rated and couldn't handle walking with jesus. despite everyone's thoughts about the setlist I felt he was more connected with the festival crowd then any other spiritualized festival show i've seen. i totally understand being critical, but everyone on here seems unsatiated because they didn't play the songs they personally wanted to hear. whatever happened about giving yourself over the moment and not demanding what you prematurely expected. i'm not trying to be a jerk or anything, but I'm just aghast at all the professed spiritualized fans acting so petulant.
It was a pretty bad setlist, especially given the festival setting. At no point during that set was he or anyone else in the band connected with the crowd. I'm sorry, but were you at the same show as me? It's hard to give yourself over to the moment when the band probably doesn't even want to be there. That's what it seemed like to me! No one here was demanding anything. No one said they didn't play their favorite song. I was there to enjoy a show and not much else. That didn't happen.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by spzretent »

beingewert wrote: but I'm just aghast at all the professed spiritualized fans acting so petulant.
First, welcome to the message board.
Secondly, your experience of that show is all that should matter to you. Period. I am glad to see you enjoyed it.
This is an internet message board and the fans of Spiritualized can be very passionate and opinionated. Dont let that intimidate you.
Your post was a breath of fresh air.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by mojo filters »

Didn't Yo La Tengo go one further and not just let fans pick the setlist, but also gave them a choice of seeing the band perform entire episodes of Seinfeld?

Personally I'd happily sacrifice half a gig or whatever to see Jason mix things up a bit...
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by davedecay »

It's not fickle if you stick with a band you love, yet are disappointed when they have a bad night.

Nit-picky, perhaps.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by runcible »

davedecay wrote:It's not fickle if you stick with a band you love, yet are disappointed when they have a bad night.
Spot on. But this went beyond that, saying that the said band was not 'relevant anymore'.

That's a tad more than a mere 'disappointed'. See my original response about the gig I saw on the LAGWAFIS tour.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by clewsr »

runcible wrote:
davedecay wrote:It's not fickle if you stick with a band you love, yet are disappointed when they have a bad night.
Spot on. But this went beyond that, saying that the said band was not 'relevant anymore'.

That's a tad more than a mere 'disappointed'. See my original response about the gig I saw on the LAGWAFIS tour.
Hard to know what 'relevant' means when it comes to Spiritualized..Of course Spriitualized is relevant to us here, and fans, but I'm not sure they have ever been 'relevant' to the music scene, - I'd say they operate parallel to it, rather than part of it. Most of the time in the nineties when I told people Spiritualized were my favorate band, people had not the slightest idea what I was talking about.

I think I remember my first post here was a very disappointed moan following a show in Manchester on the Amazing Grace tour. Didn't make myself popular I guess, But I don't see anything wrong with people expressing their opinions good or bad. I am really bemused by the set lists we've seen for the recent gigs. Apart from Here it comes I'd suggest dropping the entire rest of the set list in favour of a newer set. I do think Oh Baby and Rated X test most people's patience during an actual spriitualized show, I can't see the logic in playing them at festivals or support gigs. Certainly hoping for a radically fresher and different set list at the psych fest.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by simonkeeping »

I guess not having any new material to play makes things slightly odd (or not wanting to have it all over the internet before its released). I have to admit when I saw Toomilks post and saw the setlist I was slightly confused as to why they'd turn up to Austin and play those songs? I know spiritualized aren't a traditional festival crowd pleaser and Jason likes to do what he wants but psych fest was surely begging to have some strung out laser guided blues launched at it, and I mean launched, as in - smash the place to bits. The set as it stands would be great if it had alot more songs around it but alone it seems a bit, well not really the contrast of intense noise into hushed gospel journey you normally get at a Spiritualized show. I'm sure played its a great set but why not some more noise?

When the new album drops hopefully the set will start to evolve abit. I doubt it will in the meantime as he's not really one to mess around with a setlist mid tour.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by mc »

Alas, I probably wouldn't bother going to see Spiritualized if I knew in advance we'd get a setlist like that. I hope J's song selection is through necessity rather than choice; perhaps a lack of money for rehearsals means resorting to the easier, more practiced "standards", for example. Whatever the reasons, hopefully things will have changed in time for the next UK tour.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by clewsr »

simonkeeping wrote:I guess not having any new material to play makes things slightly odd (or not wanting to have it all over the internet before its released). I have to admit when I saw Toomilks post and saw the setlist I was slightly confused as to why they'd turn up to Austin and play those songs? I know spiritualized aren't a traditional festival crowd pleaser and Jason likes to do what he wants but psych fest was surely begging to have some strung out laser guided blues launched at it, and I mean launched, as in - smash the place to bits.
Likewise, I expected to hear of something special from that festival.

An abridged set of pretty much anything played in Holmeforth would have done that job. Its odd after playing songs from the next album and a healthy amount from the most recent album to change it back so much.
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Re: 2015 Austin Psych Fest Lineup (Levitation)

Post by spzretent »

My guess is the setlist may very well have been out of necessity. Jason is recording and I am sure that took most of his time leading up to jetting off for the US. Who knows how much time this band had to rehearse prior to Atlanta and Austin? It seems the setlist is evolving a bit moving forward.
I am hoping for something special in Leeds too. Ultimately it is all up to Jason.
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