mission freak!

Maybe it’s just me, but rock just doesn’t belong in a theater. My father would chalk it up to my youth, but I think it’s more than just my age that tells me there’s something physical about being in the audience, an active participant. So you’ll understand my disappointment when I found out my general admission ticket for Spoon (with the Walkmen and White Rabbits) in Davenport’s Capitol Theater, lead right to auditorium seating.

Spoon w/ The Walkmen and White Rabbits: Capitol Theater:

As I jotted down my musings about indie-rock as museum piece and chuckled at the small groups dancing frantically at the front corners of the auditorium, a small contingent of teens and twenty-somethings found their way down from the back rows to gather down by the orchestra pit. Then I began to wonder if it was not my youth, but my “maturity” that was an issue as I turned to my girlfriend and asked pointing to the ever growing throng of people gathering in the aisles, “Don’t you think that’s a fire hazard?”

Oh, inner-conflict. My desire to (re) affirm rock’s potency and my desire to not burn into a crunchy hipster, trapped under the treads of stampeding Converse, spent the better part of both the White Rabbits’ and the Walkmen’s sets butting heads.

Of course, none of this was aided by my general disinterest in the two opening bands. I have to admit, much to the chagrin of my fellow Mission Creekers, that I just can’t do the Walkmen. Lord knows I’ve tried. But having tried the band both amongst the huddled masses yearning to rock and seated politely staring at the ceiling, I couldn’t shake my bad vibes.

And maybe after the well-dressed, prim and properness of the Walkmen’s set, Britt Daniels’ (of Spoon) gnarly drawl and penchant for messy, dissonant solos seemed like my first Friday freshman year: YEAH, let’s party!

While the same consummate professionals that the Walkmen were and I’m sure White Rabbits will be, Spoon just felt a little more, well, grungy, for lack of a better word. I was reminded of guys like Paul Westerberg (The Replacements) with rough demeanors but still love a good pop song. Or like “Sunday Morning” by Velvet Underground, the sweetness of the melody belies the eerie lyrics or even the menace.

Spoon spent the better part of the evening tapping their freshest well, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. However, like any band with a deep catalog, the quartet from Austin, gave a thorough overview hitting at least two numbers from the almost forgotten (look to the blank faces of the crowd for proof) A Series of Sneaks.

Despite my eventual enjoyment at the hands of Spoon, I couldn’t shake my aversion to theater setting. Me and my driving companions huddled at the back door to listen to the encore and as soon as the house lights came up, we were on the streets.

I-80: USA:

Thanks to early doors and mercifully short sets from the openers, my Civic was on I-80 West, by 11:30. Yes, leaving me ample time to catch one of the many phenomenal headliners still waiting to take the stage in Iowa City.

MC/VL: The Yacht Club:

One of, if not the greatest surprise of the fest is this Minneapolis trio who were brought back to MC the showdown between the School of Flyentology and Mission Creek (i.e. the best dance party Iowa City will have all year). But I’ve already spent several hundred words on these guys…

The Hood Internet: The Yacht Club:

I was instructed by half of the Chicago mash-up duo, STV SLV (Steven Reidel) to say that “we sound like Pearl Jam.” If you can find the person who thinks that is the case, then you’ve truly found something more unique than a four leaf clover. But when The Hood Internet got things started, the crowd took cues from the dynamic boys from MC/LV, and turned every available inch of the Yacht Club into a dance floor (those benches on the side, tables, etc…) Actually, seeing a couple kids dancing on those benches against the west wall could remind someone of that time in the “Evenflo” video when Eddie Vedder starts climbing around into the balconies and shit (by the way, it’s about 3:30 in to the video).

The Yacht Club was soaked in sweat, and limbs were twisting in the air as I took a long pull off my bottle of beer: “Fuck fire codes.” This is what is supposed to happen when music is visceral, when you’re young. Those kids were supposed to be crowding the orchestra pit last night, the same way they were supposed to drink heavily and wake up in a strange bed after dancing the night away with new friend.