#spanishrevolution: Primavera, Some Remarks.

June 3, 2011, 0 comments

Spain’s youth, so the media kept telling us in the last couple of weeks, is rising up, rising against the country’s economic struggle with an unemployment rate of 21 percent and the highest jobless rate among young people in Europe. But whatever the phenotype of that outrage by the notoriously inert and anti-political Spanish youth might have been in particular, for what it’s worth they’d been hiding it well. Of course, the famous camp of protesters at Plaça de Catalunya still existed upon arrival in Barcelona on May 25, and cruel things were about to happen there two days later, but after all that conglomeration of tents hosted a mere 200 people, and in general one could hardly escape the feeling that other things were way more important among young Barcelonans during those few days in late May. Like the Champions League final, for instance. Or even Pulp’s reunion. Which brings us to Primavera Sound 2011.

I will abstain from posting a proper day-by-day review here, others have already failed trying (who are the Black Dogs anyway?), but the by far greatest European festival deserves at least a few remarks. So here we go, in no intended order:

First and foremost, once again it was an absolute delight to see that Primavera is focused on music, genuinely and exclusively. Any other aspect that might make a festival experience worthwhile for a certain type of person will not be found at Parc del Fòrum. This is a good thing, in case of doubt.

The music. For a start, this blog will never mention that certain group named Salem again. Like never ever. Their Thursday night appearance at the ATP stage was the most bizarr, most ridiculous live “performance” I have ever encountered in my whole life. It’s not only that John Holland can’t rap/sing/whatever that was supposed to be in any way, I got the feeling that he is completely aware of the fact that this whole thing about him having a music project had been a joke from the start, but things somehow have gotten out of hand and now he doesn’t really find the way out of it anymore. The Salem gig was a truly preposterous encounter with a buzz accident.

On the other end of the spectrum, as already mentioned earlier this week, the performance by Perfume Genius was the one moment of unconditional magic. You may go here to listen to two live recordings. And speaking about last year’s buzzbands, both Tennis and Cults knew surprisingly well how to please the anonymous masses of a festival crowd, something I hadn’t expected in the least.

James Blake and Matthew Dear both blew me away with their gigs, partly due to the fact that I’m always excited to see electronic musicians risk to expose their perfectly crafted arrangements to an actual live performance, an experiment that so much relies on backing musicians who flawlessly master both their instruments and the artist’s compositions. In both cases, it worked just perfectly.

As regards backing bands, a special kudos to Big Troubles who hadn’t gotten a lineup spot but who nonetheless took an essential part by serving as a live support for both their Ridgewood, New Jersey pals Ducktails and Julian Lynch, and they did so with grandeur.

Last, some magazines (especially from Germany) have complained about a general lack of passion and spirit among the bigger names of the line-up. We can’t judge on that, cause when Jarvis Cocker et al. tried to resurrect the nineties, we must’ve been somewhere else. But in general, for me it remains hard to grasp most of the big media’s approach to Primavera. Those magazines and websites invariably tend to treat those three days in late May as just another of the big European summer festivals, which in essence leads to an almost natural focus on the headlining bands. Bluntly, that’s a shame. Primavera has never been about that (though of course those bands are present, and of course they get booked so the mainstream audiences will come and leave their money in Barcelona – we are aware of the concept of cross-subsidization). It is the one forum in Europe for new and exciting, weird and experimental, leftfield pop music, more than any other creative gathering in Europe over the course of one year – and sometimes, just occasionally I wish the music media were aware of that, too.

What else remains? WFMU, the best radio station in the world, has recorded a couple of amazing sets at the festival, so head over here to listen to performances by Animal Collective, Ducktails, Julian Lynch, the Soft Moon, and others.

Below you’ll find a few photos taken at Primavera. A full set of photos from all three days is available at our Facebook page.

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti