Primavera Sound 2012 Wrap Up

San Miguel stage, photo by Dani Cantó

Published on thebomberjacket.com

The Parc del Forúm is an excellent location for Primavera Sound, because the Spanish heat gets intense, particularly in the front row crowds, but there’s always a cool sea breeze that hits you just at the right moment. The three main festival days were full of a lot of excellent performances and I even had the chance to catch some of the shows at other sites. For example, Yann Tiersen played on Sunday at the Arc de Triomf with the crowd in the rain and lightning behind them.

I also had the opportunity to hang out with a lot of the Spanish bands and labels that I’ve been interviewing as there were some booths set up for labels from all over Europe. I spent some time with Beach Beach and a really nice guy from their label La Castanya. The band’s live set was excellent as well, and I was bummed that I didn’t get to see another buddy of THE BOMBER JACKET, Picore. Overall, the festival went down well, filled with a lot of really nice people and memorable moments. A bunch of them are listed below.

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Primavera Sound 2012 Wishlist

Published on thebomberjacket.com

Barcelona’s Primavera Sound is one of the best indie music festivals that Europe has to offer (if not the best). They’re able to gather some of the most interesting and talented international acts out there, as well as showcase lesser-known bands, particularly Spanish ones. It takes place in the Parc del Forum, a breathtaking stone park that is right on the Mediterranean Sea and is studded with trees (that you can even pick berries from) and modernist architecture. Bands play with the backdrop of sailboats and Barcelona’s signature cinderblock cubes (or cindercubes) that jut out of the water in every direction.

I went to Primavera Sound last year and crossed a bunch of names off my list of bands to see before I die. Among them were Sufjan Stevens, Animal Collective, Deerhunter, The National, M. Ward and Belle & Sebastian. The festival unofficially started yesterday, and officially starts tomorrow (May 30). This year has just as many heavy hitters, including Neutral Milk Hotel’s Jeff Mangum, but I’ll get to that.

Watch a teaser below.

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Lotus Plaza and the Liberation of Yellow Balloons

Published on thebomberjacket.com.

You stand out in the open of a plaza that’s shaped like a lotus, looking at your shoes as you let go of a handfull of yellow balloons. It’s a gray day. So much of a gray day that the sky actually seems to be green. As the bunch of rubber, helium and ribbon transcends the first layer of the earth’s atmosphere, it quickly becomes a small yellow dot in the dusty troposphere. Whenever you see this you can’t help but wonder, what does a balloon feel like when it’s let go into the sky? You can stare at it for as long as it’s visible, but you never see it pop. No matter how many times you see it, the image still sticks with you eerily, just like Spooky Action at a Distance.

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Mango Nebula 2011 Quilt :: Most Listened to Records of the Year Collage

See also the Mango Nebula 2010 Quilt

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Atlas Sound :: Logos

Atlas Sound is the name Bradford Cox has used since he started playing music, the band from which his most lauded project was spawned. Logos haunts itself so well that it will make you forget that deer hunting exists. Cox gets some help from Noah Lennox, aka Panda Bear of Animal Collective, and Lætitia Sadier of Stereolab. The pieces blend together and burn like a pit of fire in Cox’s sunken chest.

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