Pavement closed the the Pitchfork Music Festival last night with a setlist seemingly determined by popular vote, a retrospective that touched on most every major single and fan favorite in the band's discography. The band's actual performance, though, wasn't nearly as groomed as that setlist. It was an agreeable shambles of false starts, missed cues and flubbed solos, all delivered without apology by a band that appeared to be having a great time. Well, most of them appeared to be, at leastStephen Malkmus was typically poker faced, playing the straight man to his backing players. Drummer/hype-man Bob Nastanovich carried particular weight. His shouted injections roused the crowd and covered for Malkmus, who began to lose his voice just several songs into the set. Nastanovich was in many respects a crowd surrogate, an excited super fan who yelled along with all his favorite parts, only on stage into a microphone instead of from the ground.
If there was a trend among the day's other headliners, it was that most seemed to exceed expectations. Beach House could have incited a mass slumber, but instead their set was as loud as it was lush, serene but not at all drowsy. Here We Go Magic's looping folk-rock can be cloyingly whimsical on record, but in concert it was rich and charming. Even Major Lazer, a techno-dancehall project from DJs Switch and Diplo largely out of the comfort zone of many Pitchfork listeners, delighted the crowd with their absurdist live show, a colorful display of ballerina dancers and Chinese dragons. And perhaps most unexpected was Neon Indian, who eschewed wishy-washy chillwave for beefy, infectiously fun dance-rock that made it tough to leave for rapper Big Boi's set at a competing stage.
Even the bill's biggest misstep was at least an interesting one. The abrasiveness, proudly tuneless noise band Lightning Bolt was curiously booked at the festival's main stage, almost comically sandwiched between two of the day's most delicate acts, Beach House and St. Vincent. Meanwhile the far more accessible Surfer Blood played the festival's small side stage, which was uncomfortably cramped even before Lightning Bolt's displaced victims arrived seeking refuge. Surfer Blood's set was another stunner, all big hooks and even bigger guitar riffs, but ultimately Lightning Bolt's was the more memorablepolarized commentary from revelers both awed and delighted by the group's confrontation show even briefly made the band a trending topic on Twitter.
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