48 Hills music critic John-Paul Shiver reported live from the Noise Pop Festival. See his full coverage here.
What we didn’t mention in our previous review of Fake Your Own Death, the band that headlined one of Noise Pop’s Happy Hours at Bender’s Bar & Grill (this one co-presented by DoTheBay & San Franpsycho): The bar’s legendary Golden Tater Tots reigned supreme.
Noise Pop dug deep into the local scene this year, expanding their signature happy hours at the Mission rock bar to partner with Bay-based labels and media, also including Bright Antenna, White Crate, Text Me Records, and Cherub Dream. The crowds were diverse, the acts unique, and the Tater Tots excellent and inevitable. Those little guys immediately plunge one back into childhood. They even go with Bender’s tagline: Like your parents’ basement, and they’re always out of town…
This homey-ness was a perfect metaphor for the strengths, and weaknesses, of this year’s sprawling festival, its 32nd, that drew in 20,000 attendees over 11 days, with 60+ concerts featuring 100+ artists (according to official figures).
Noise Pop works best when local artists, orgs, venues, and scenes are featured up front, not just in supporting roles; it represents the Bay’s own most unique self. That went through my mind as Oakland’s Dani Offline had a coming-out party of sorts, delivering two dazzling sets in the Joe Henderson Lab at SF Jazz. For one night, that venue had a Bay feature who turned the star wattage up to eleven in that prestigious spot. Listen, I love that room and have bloviated about it possibly way too much. But for once, at least on that night, it felt like home turf, and the audience, mostly Oakland strong for sure, was celebrating its hero: an ingénue making a major splash in the Bay Area music ecosystem.
I had a similar glint run through my spine as I gazed at the enormity that is Grace Cathedral as St. Vincent tastefully added to the enormity of such a Gothic-type structure. Ripples of sound and shears of light danced and bounced in the ceiling’s ether, no matter if it was guitar-accompanied lullabies, bare bones-exposed poetic renderings of stadium anthems, or just cheeky comments. Anne Clark knew Grace Cathedral’s environment, one that lends itself to dramaturgy of the highest regard, would only embellish whatever setlist they chose.
Even the August Hall performance by UK “super-sampled band” Cymande, as the New York Times referred to these half-dozen musicians who came to England as children of the West Indies over 50 years ago, sent local record diggers, record shop merchants, and most importantly DJs—the Bay has a couple of ’em, ya know—into apoplectic shock and awe.
This reunited band went back out into the world with a killer new album, refusing to be denied, executing a show to the fullest, featuring a three-person horn line, two percussionists, guitar, keyboard, bass, and giant-hearted vocalist. Cymande set the record straight once and for all, making greying old men suddenly become un-self-consciously glee-ridden little boys at their first baseball game.
All of these Bay-specific scenarios made the festival noteworthy for the 415 or 510 musical enthusiasts.
I was reminded of a bit of wisdom imparted to me by none other than Seablite drummer-percussionist Andy Pastalaniec, who also fronts fantastic project Chime School, from a couple of years ago. While responding to the news of his band being selected to perform for Noise Pop in 2023, he kept it a hundred. “Noise Pop exists for touring bands of course, so despite the fact that you have to squint to see some of our band names on the poster, it’s cool to see us and some of our friends included.”
While that is a clipped quote, the sentiment is clear. But does it have to be that way?
I mean, as much as I’m excited to hear the Soccer Mommy shows were performed with a bit more compression than expected, and the Earl Sweatshirt performance included really rare and obscure songs while Earl himself seemed quite interested in talking about the Nosferatu film…. All of that is great. Compelling even. But does it hit you in your Homer Bay-area feels?
I know this much. When St. Vincent dropped the bomb that Tuck and Patti, the veteran jazz duo from the Bay Area, are her kinfolk Aunt and Uncle, I finally had the volition to ask two people sitting behind me in the choirboy section of Grace Cathedral to take their conversation about cancel culture and whatever Lululemon business they kept blathering back and forth about down the passageway, closer to God, so I could hear this.
Why?
‘Cause the show—that specific section, mind you—had Bay connections.
As I predicted, DāM-FunK kicking off the festival on February 20 at the California Academy of Sciences was the grown man move you like to see. He’s a professional in every respect. Especially playing vinyl records, too? It was also wonderful to have Yuka Yu, the Taiwan-born, Camden Town London-trained, Nor-Cal DJ, open. But why not book the obvious complementary act? Have the Bay Area Sweater Funk crew open the affair, and then have DāM-FunK, who’s quite familiar with the fellow vinyl enthusiasts, close it out.
Another perhaps misstep: Booking the Brooklyn electro-soul duo Bathe to open for Cymande. Listen, Bathe put on a wonderful set; it was just out of sync with the musical tone of the night. The crowd was polite but not necessarily engaged. Confused is the word that comes to mind. If anything, they’d been a perfect opener for Earl Sweatshirt. When I saw that booking, the first thing that came to mind was that somebody said, “We need somebody Black to fill that slot.”
At least, that’s what the booking communicated. They set Bathe up to fail, not succeed. So, who should have opened? I’ll tell you point blank: Oakland’s Combo Tezeta. With this Bay Area septet’s highly danceable blend of instrumental cumbias, chicha, and música tropical inspired by the psychedelic late ’60s and early ’70s in Peru, the venue would have been rocking as one, with no confusion as to what the musical vibe of the night was, from 8pm till Cymande shut it down.
It’s was awesome having Benders, Kilowatt, Bottom of The Hill, and the 4-Star Theater in the mix. Can we add Presido Theater as a venue next year in keeping with that Bay-Area oneness?
All of these suggestions do come from a place of love. Amid springtime music-fest mania, other festivals project exactly what they do.
Noise Pop should observe the times we are living in around the Bay. The indie bands of the ’90s moment need balance with everything else popping off. You have festival after festival dive-bombing in nine and ten months out of the year with far-reaching line-ups of talented performers from all over. With a slew of uprising talent, especially coming out of Oakland—young people disrupted by the pandemic who are now just starting to express themselves (hat-tip to KQED’s Nastia Voayanskaya for that sentiment)—Noise Pop, please harvest, support, nurture, and promote what is at your doorstep.
It’s the one thing nobody else in the country or the world has access to: Bay Area diversity in creativity. Harness this superpower. Or else, moving forward, you could just be considered another stop on the Soccer Mommy tour.
.
