Treasure Island Music Festival Day 2 Review

What a location for a music festival! Two well-planned stages sandwiched an amazing and not-so-common view of San Francisco. Boats crowded in the water just offshore in an attempt to get a glimpse of the festivities.

Sunday on Treasure Island was indie rock central.

To combat the “dead air” between sets on the main “Bridge” stage, the performers on the “Tunnel” stage (a.k.a. the smaller stage) would start their mini sets just as the main stage quieted. This allowed for nine and a half hours of non-stop music. Also, with the small stage being used all night, smaller bands were allowed prime evening time to perform with the biggies.

The festival was well planned out. It was really difficult to believe that it was the first year of the event. Upscale chartered buses brought festival attendees from the AT&T park parking lot to the main gate of the event. At the end of the night there were dozens and dozens of buses waiting to get everyone back to their cars as quickly as possible.

The only downside of the entire event was that it was PACKED by sundown. The layout of the event would have been perfect if it’d been doubled in size. I’m thinking that the organizers planned it out so spectators would float back and forth between stages and bands, but due to the large crowd, it got pretty difficult to be able to check out every band.

To get things started, Snocap (one of the event sponsors) had LA band, The Weather Underground, play a short set on the Tunnel Stage. Aside from the singer’s amazing croon, the band was very derivative and sounded like a dime-a-dozen LA indie rock band.

Au Revoir Simone was up next. The Brooklyn trio was very excited to be there, and didn’t play cool for the crowd. The cutely-dressed girls kept thanking the audience for coming out to see them. They mentioned that they’d flown in that morning to play the event and that some of their keyboards were slightly off from the travel. The keyboards were a bit piercing, but the trio’s energy was there and the crowd seemed to be enjoying it.

While the main stage was being prepared for the Two Gallants, Northwest favorites, the Trainwreck Riders, entertained the slowly growing crowd. Their raw rock sound was a nice primer for the Two Gallants.

Up until this point, many festival attendees were acclimating themselves to the unusual surroundings and checked out festival booths. There was everything from a free photo booth to a hair-cutting booth. (I swear, I’m not lying, people were getting new hipster dos at a rock festival).

When the Two Gallants took the stage, it felt like the festival really got going. I expected a lot from this twosome and they really didn’t let me down. Despite the enormity of the stage they were on, the uber skinny rockers from Pacific Heights produced enough sound to fill up the empty space and woo the audience. The finger plucking, bluesy indie rockers have won a following by incessantly performing (almost 200 shows in 2006) and proving their talent on the live stage. They played a few new songs off of their forthcoming self-titled full length and I’m happy to hear they’ve only improved their distinct sound. The general consensus seemed to be that the gallant duo won the award for best band of the daytime hours and perhaps, the entire day.

A round of drinks and the growing crowd prevented me from seeing Street to Nowhere, so up next was Portland’s own, M. Ward, and his backing band (including not one, but two drum sets!). His raspy yet sultry croon mellowed the crowd out during his 45 minute set. Some complained that the performance was a bit dull, but for the most part, M. Ward’s brand of soulful post-war music was well-received.

By now the audience was really filling in and the seven-dollar Heinekens were flowing.

Sea Wolf a.k.a. Alex Church and his band continued the more organic indie rock vibe started by the Trainwreck Riders. The 25-minute set was highly praised by many attendees and they might have tied the Devil Makes Three as the best Tunnel Stage performers.

The buzz constantly surrounding Clap Your Hands Say Yeah set my expectations for their set pretty high. I hate to admit it, but the band that made the huge splash in the industry for selling so many records independently did not do anything for me whatsoever. I think I took in maybe half a song before I couldn’t help but tune them out. It could have been just a personal dislike for the singers out of tune vocals, but I had a really difficult time listening to them.

I was pretty surprised to see Built to Spill billed third down for the festival. Over the band’s 15 years together, they’ve become one of the most frequently listed influences among indie rock musicians today (including headliners, Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brook). The rockers brought out some of their old gems including fan favorite, “Car” and won over a new generation of Built to Spill fans.

I missed out on the last two Tunnel Stage performers, Film School and Earlimart because of the large crowd, but found a prime VIP bleacher seat for Spoon. I don’t know if I’m the best person to review Spoon because I think that pretty much anything Britt Daniels touches is great. Their set was catchy as usual and it was great to see the packed crowd move around a bit. Both Spoon and headliners, Modest Mouse, got festival attendees shaking their angsty arses more than any other act. Among the thousands of Sunday’s attendees, I’d say 75% were hipstered out and having a hard time fighting the urge to shake a little toosh.

As the audience waited for the headliners to take stage, you could hear echoes of two words emanating from the audience: Johnny and Marr. Modest Marr, eh-hem, I mean, Modest Mouse hit the stage with wild screams coming from the crowd and after two failsafe songs, Johnny Marr said a warm hello and wooed every Treasure Island attendee there.

The three words that come to mind to describe the first year of the Treasure Island Music Festival have to be: A Big Success. The planning was impeccable, the line-up was pleasing and there couldn’t have been a better bay area location for such an event. When can I buy next year’s pass?