Haldern Pop 2011: Saturday: Explosions in the Sky/ Suuns/ Low Anthem/ Hauschka/ My Brightest Diamond/ La Brass Banda/ Destroyer/ Dan Mangan/ Moss
Rees-Haldern, Germany
Article written by
Richard F - Aug 28, 2011
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Brass Banda
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Moss have one or two extremely catchy songs, and now and again their music moves away from its normal feel of polite, ordered restraint into an infectious, beat-laden roar. That’s when they’re good. There’s no doubt they have something that could make them really big (namely a great way with melody); maybe they need to inject that little bit of bravery to truly throw down something wild and disordered.
Some of the team went to see Steve Craddock make beautiful Byrds-style guitar music in the Spiegel Tent whilst spitting a lot. Craddock, that is, not us. The rest watched Destroyer play the Main Stage. We like some of this band’s music a lot, especially the brazen record from 2008, Trouble In Dreams but the latest LP, Kaputt, leaves us cold. It’s not that it’s bad music, it’s more that it seems to be endlessly (sometimes elegantly) trying to get to the point. So with the gig. When a track went up a gear or there was a goal to focus on, the band’s talent was there for all to see. When things got too reflective our attention wandered. Shame. More melancholy music, albeit music with a more sinister, purposeful melancholy was offered by some other Canadians, Timber Timbre. Despite two of the three members sitting down and one hiding out of sight, this was a fairly intense and enjoyable gig, and one we found difficult to move on from. Lots did, mind, an orderly queue to go and see James Blake started pretty much after the first number. The music was a slow burning gothic snarl, plodding effortlessly on through murky tales of murder, loneliness and mayhem. Imagine a sinister version of Lambchop and you’re just about there.
Another Canadian, Dan Mangan ran through a set of perfectly pleasant Americana / folk / singer songwriter numbers that again failed to take us to anywhere interesting. Fortunately some vim and vigour was provided by La Brass Banda, a bunch of German batty boys (their words, not ours) who like to play fast and fun work outs on their brass instruments. La Brass Banda played long and hard, going through a repertoire of reggae, klezmer and turbo folk numbers and a couple of strange, semi-classical knees ups, interspersed with lots of German jokes. A good laugh indeed. Back to the tent we sloped for Shana Worden, aka My Brightest Diamond. We like Shana’s music and we like Shana as a person, and we’d found out on talking to her the night before that she was nervous at the prospect of playing a load of new songs in her set. So, in a way we were that little bit nervous for her.
Oh fools of journalists, never fear for artistes…
My Brightest Diamond
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My Brightest Diamond put on a gig that was strange, quirky, ridiculously winsome and never short of brilliant. She has two major advantages. First, Shana Worden can make you believe in nearly everything she sings, even when it’s as gooey as songs about appreciating your loved ones, baking apples and folding laundry away. And, moreover, sung in a manner that could be vetoed from a Disney film on grounds of excessive sentimentality. Second, she can call on an astonishing range of moods, emotions and subject matter to hand. Whether it’s belting out a snarling cut from her first LP, or dancing round the stage wearing a huge round face mask, she is utterly convincing, however ridiculous or pretentious her muse might seem on paper.
Hauschka was high on our lists of “must-sees”, a genial, slightly monkish soul whose party piece is to play a prepared piano, altering the timbre by attaching ping pong balls to the strings in the body of the instrument. When he hits a key, out the balls pop and fall somewhere else in the piano’s framework. Or so it seems. Somehow this morphs (with the aid of a spectacularly brilliant rhythm section) into a wonderful mix of delicate, reflective piano runs and thumping mantras, Kraftwerk-style. One long piece became a beautifully serene cod-dub reggae work out, which, as the tempo built up in intensity, inspired knots and clumps of bedraggled and cagouled figures splashing about in the sodden fields, dancing along to the big screen. It was exhilarating. Back to the Main Stage for the Low Anthem who had sound issues. Actually they had issues full stop. They seemed to prefer huddling in a circle, holding on to their mandolins and banjos for dear life. This might be fine in a small venue but when there are upwards of 3000 people watching it can lead to a very depressing state of affairs. This lasted as long as it took Suuns to stalk onto the stage and crank out their noise. Now, we had a slight issue with Suuns. Whilst liking their latest LP in theory we have found it an album that has been quick to lose its charm, as it’s slightly anaemic and flat in parts. Live, however, the band is a completely different matter. What sounded diffident and weak on record sounded immense live. The beats fizzed and thumped, laying down an insistent Suicide-style groove. Vocals that had sounded reedy took on a new aspect, balancing out the crash of guitars and effects, and adding a sinister edge to the whole ambience.
Off to the main stage in a slightly deranged state to witness Explosions in the Sky who made a beautiful noise, chiming, peals of guitar and squalls of feedback ripped through the glowering curtain of mist and rain. The filthy weather suited the band; their outlook is one of Sturm und Drang, of invoking images of wild untamed nature. Listening to the rest of the gig round the roaring and spitting backstage campfire only heightened the primeval nature of their music. Weird that we saw bits of the gig only but felt happy that the decision to sit and yarn whilst using the gig noise as a soundtrack to flickering flame was the right one. Or not. Maybe that’s Haldern all over. Maybe that’s the essential, shape-shifting nature of this beautiful festival.
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