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| Photo: Jason Stoff |
Day one of the new, bigger and better LouFest went by in a
flash. If you ask the promoters of
the festival, they will tell you that in addition to bigger acts and a much
bigger footprint, what they were most excited about was the way the days have
been programmed. The day played through like a well thought out mixtape. Like Space Capone leading straight into
Fitz & The Tantrums and Jim James stripping his sound down at the end of
his set and segueing perfectly into Wilco to end the opening the day.
For the first time, it’s impossible to see all the bands
playing – and that can be a good thing and a bad thing of course. It gives festival goers options, not
into one band? Don’t worry,
there’s someone who you maybe haven’t seen blowing minds on the other
stage. But the Main Stage still
features it’s acts unopposed, so the biggest bands can still demand all of your
attention.
The day started with St. Louis favorites Kentucky Knife
Fight playing the cozy BMI Stage, the smallest – but most comfortable – stage
of the three. Under the shade of
two large trees, the band tore up their opening set, bringing more heat that
the noon-day St. Louis sun.
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| Kentucky Knife Fight's Jason Holler and Jason Koenig Photo: Jason Stoff |
Those two trees made the BMI a popular place (as did its
easy access to the Schlafly “Brewtopia”) and the stage was loaded with great
bands, like Chicago’s Wild Belles and a duo of Nashville bands, the afore
mentioned Space Capone and their friends Modoc, both of whom seemed genuinely
excited to be playing St. Louis for the first time. These were also
the first real conflicts of the day, with Robert DeLong on the Forest Park
Stage at the same time as Modoc and Ra Ra Riot going against Space Capone.
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| Space Capone Photo: Jason Stoff |
The funk started around 3:30 on the BMI stage with the Disco
of Space Capone, but Fitz & The Tantrums kicked it up another notch on the
Bud Light Stage an hour later.
This is what festivals are about.
The middle of the day, the crowd having swelled to it’s full potential
and everyone inside the fences dancing, singing and moving together to that
power pop soul that Micheal Fitzpatrick and his Tantrums do so well.
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| Michael Fitzpatrick Photo: Jason Stoff |
Toro y Moi on the Forest Park stage drew most of the crowd
away from the main stage and served as the perfect appetizer to the National.
The National may just be the perfect band at sunset. And it was also the first sign that LouFest has grown quite a
bit. In the past years, The
National would be the exact band that would be closing out the festival and
here they were, playing in the daylight hours.
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| The National's Matt Berninger Photo: Jarred Gastrich |
Once the sun went down and light sprinkle came from the
clouds, finally cooling everyone off, Jim James took to the Forest Park stage
and promptly showed everyone why he is one of the last true rock stars around
today. With his trademark Flying V
set on a stand at the front of the stage, seemingly yearning for a rock god to
crack out a power chord, James wowed the crowd with the material from his
latest solo effort.
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| Jim James Photo: Jason Stoff |
And just as a St. Louis band had started off the day,
another “almost, kinda, sorta, really is” St. Louis band, Wilco closed it
out. Sometimes it’s said that Jeff
Tweedy avoids St. Louis or doesn’t like playing here. It’s said that maybe he runs from his past sometimes. That was certainly not the case at
LouFest. His area roots were well
apparent. From the setlist with
St. Louis-heavy songs like the Uncle Tupelo-era “New Madrid” to “Casino Queen”
and the ubiquitous “Heavy Metal Drummer”, Tweedy wasn’t shying away at all from
his past. The most poignant moment
of the day, and probably the whole weekend was when Tweedy dedicated “Born
Alone” to St. Louis’ own Bob Reuter and to his own brother, who passed away
just days before the festival. It
was clearly a tough week for Tweedy and he used the music, as so many do, as
catharsis.
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| Jeff Tweedy Photo: Jason Stoff |
It all ended too soon, maybe one day LouFest can convince
the city that going past 10pm on a weekend is perfectly reasonable.
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