Treasure Island Music Festival, Day 2- The Six-Strings Come On Strong

(Photo: The silhouettes of Built To Spill's Doug Martsch (left) and Jim Roth (right), milking their amp wattage for all it was worth.)

So, Saturday (September 15) was potpourri day for the Treasure Island Music Festival. It was all fun and good, but something was missing-- kick-ass guitar. And as referenced in Saturday’s critique, plenty of amplified guitar noise reverberated across the festival grounds on Sunday, so much so that some if it definitely could have been used to make up for the lack of rock on Saturday. But like Saturday, that fact didn’t put much of a dent in the fact that the music was good.

Also like Saturday, the execution of the party was flawless; throughout both days, there was never more than a 20 minute wait between any two sets, as all the various crews for bands on one stage were able to use the space allotted for a given set that was simultaneously occurring on the other stage for their sound check. This isn’t rocket science, of course, but producers Noise Pop and APE got this practice down to a science in programming the proceedings, and thus the eardrums of the masses had no time to recuperate from earlier beatings (which was a good thing, in this case).

The second day of the festival, for your FP representative, started off with a walk into the gate of the grounds listening to the sound of a local band, the Trainwreck Riders, ending their set (you might have noticed that an interview w/ the Riders was conducted and published earlier on the FP site), and it was obvious from this particular get-go that a new, simpler, rougher sound would be served up today. Today would be the day for those in the tight jeans, worn-down All-Stars, and plaid, as opposed to the dreadlocked and macrobiotic of the previous day.

However, up-and-comers Two Gallants would provide a respite from fuzz early in the afternoon. With one of the most descriptive vocal styles that can be heard in the modern scene today, singer-guitarist Adam Stephens had the crowd transfixed as he belted it like an unaccounted-for Donner Party survivor, while still delivering the luscious fingerpicking that drew the fans to his band in the first place. Meanwhile, drummer Tyson Vogel beat the hell out of his spare drum set such that, put together with Stephens’ efforts, a hearty sound worthy of a Best Picture soundtrack placement emerged.

The distortion came back strong, though, with Built To Spill providing the most brutal set and balls-out guitar work of the day. It was like the early 90’s all over again, and that’s not being cliché-- it’s the damn truth. Songs like “You Were Right” were heavier on Sunday than they are on record, and so B.T.S.’s show sounded almost like an old batch of Smashing Pumpkin b-sides, without the overtly whiny vocals.

Built were then followed by Spoon, whose new record had recently debuted at number 10 on the Billboard Top 200. As a result of the achievement, the band was the most visibly enthusiastic of the whole bunch at Treasure Island, and they also sounded like bonafide popstars, putting out the cleanest sound of anyone at Treasure Island, with faves like “I Turn My Camera On” and “Don’t Make Me A Target” sounding exactly like they did coming out of speakers at home.

Finally came Modest Mouse and their irresistibly eccentric frontman, Isaac Brock. Apparently, he and four other members of the band had contracted the flu, so before the band launched into the first song, he felt compelled to offer his assessment of the situation--“I’m fucking freezing”-- and light up a cigarette. Apparently, he believed that lighting up a cig and screaming at the top of his lungs during the first song (“Bury Me With It”) would help his present circumstances, or perhaps he was just being a good showman. Whatever Brock’s intentions were, MM were a pretty good closer to the whole two-day shindig. They broke through the frontier just like any of the Saturday bands, while pumping out their consciousness through what might be described as the “most normal means”-- guitars, bass, drums, and organ, for the most part.

By the end of the two days, it was obvious that Noise Pop and APE were on the right track; the idea that there won’t be a Treasure Island Festival next year is incomprehensible now. As long as the two producers can balance out the allocation of styles on both days better, the Treasure Island Festival has the chance to eclipse even the Noise Pop Festival itself as the Bay Area’s signature event for all things hip.

-- By Ross Moody