“No Pussy Blues”… famous words by Nick Cave and the bad seeds  GRINDERMAN. Grinderman by far is THE best act yet at Roskilde this year. Radiohead are great and all but that’s because they are Radiohead… Nick Cave on the other hand was F to the fantastic, fabulous & f*cking awesome. From the second they started till the second they left the stage, I was just in….awe. The man is intense. Next to Cave you have Warren Ellis – also from the Bad Seeds. He’s also in Dirty Three (they came to Malaysia last year sometime!)… this man is intense as well. I know, I am lacking words to describe the concert I just saw. Could it be because I nearly ran all the way from the Orange stage to the media center to “blog” this while it’s still fresh in my head and my blood is running but my vocabulary usage isn’t?

 Grinderman are a fairly “new” band. They’ve been together as a collective since 2006 but all the members were from (Nick Cave and) the Bad Seeds. Cave nicknames this Grinderman project as the “mini seeds”.  I was amazed at the interaction with all the band members. It was a look of love and hate. The kind of look you’d give your partner when in deep conversation – of the serious kind.

I sat down on the grass with a good view of the big screen the whole time. My feet feel like they’re about to fall off but when the possibilities of an encore came around, I jumped to my feet and ran as close to the stage as possible. And what do you know, an encore! And not a Grinderman song either cause Nick said they didn’t have enough songs for an encore…. But what happened to their first single  – also the name of their album – Dig , Lazarus, Dig!?

 Moving on to other acts I managed to catch on Day 2:-

Gnarls Barkley – they put on a good show and sound good but half way through their set – I just fell asleep believe it or not. It wasn’t them but me – I was just so tired from standing in the hot sun for too long.

Kings of Leon – were quite the eye candy to make up for the sun burning you up a live. They played things cool while looking hot and they put on a pretty good show to boot. Not the kind of greatness displayed by Grinderman but the kind of fervor one would have through their “eyes”… at least that’s what Caleb the lead vocalist told us through his eyes. You know, “smiling with the eyes”… Totally fierce. Of the songs I know and remembered, they played California Waiting, Red Morning Light, Four Kicks, The Bucket, Fans, Charmer and this one beautiful song from their latest album – I forgot what the name is… These guys have loads of potential to be bigger rockstars than they are. They are great musicians, they are fairly young (I say that cause I am older than 90% of the band..haha) and they have the looks…. On a side note – I could’ve sworn I walked by them yesterday! I heard a bunch of guys speaking in American-English and this would make me look as 99% of everyone here speaks everything but English. So as I was walking, I looked their way and for a brief second made eye contact – but walked on. Like I said, maybe it was them, maybe not…. But I would like to think the former!

Last but not least, I finally saw Santogold. The set was hella short! She was scheduled to come on at 2030 but for the first 20 minutes, there was her DJ with his laptop on stage playing a various mix of music, from beats to the Smiths to even the Police… before Ms. Gold hit the stage, two of her dancers smartly dressed in short sleeved white shirts and black bottoms came on and stood still – unless moved by the music. She launched into her hits like Creator and L.E.S. Artistes… and it was a full on party at the Cosmopol where she was performing! But the show ended prematurely. It was like she performed all her songs from her debut album… EXCEPT for her latest single Lights Out. I was  actually looking forward to hearing that perform live…. But Radiohead never played Just like I was hoping they would (and did at previous summer fests…) Again you win some, you lose some…and I still haven’t found my phone  

No pictures for this post. The next post however will only be photos as I’ve done much of the writing in this post… By the way, I’m missing Goldfrapp right now. As much as I would have liked to see them, it’s just too cold to walk to the other side… plus I want to wake up early to beat the crowd at the showers and catch the Ting Tings at 1230!

The Streets are about to approach the stage now and if it’s not a full on sardine can by the Orange Stage, I’m gonna stick around to check them out. Then again, if it is packed, the warmth from other people might help me keep warm.

Tomorrow – Day 3, along with the Ting Tings, I hope to catch the Tokyo Police Club, Joan As Police Woman, and then there’s a major dilemma whether to catch The Dillinger Escape Plan, Neil Young OR My Bloody Valentine, I also want to see Liars and of course….The Chemical Brothers. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned about music festivals like this is that you don’t get to see all the performers you plan on seeing. Simply because show times conflict, it’s way to uncomfortable for vertically challenged people like me to make it close to the stage for non-screen venues so end up going elsewhere, and in most of my cases, too tired to make the walk and dodge crazy drunk people enroute to the venue.

Did I mention that the whole festival has been marked? A term I’m using loosely in comparison to when a dog pisses to mark his spot…. It’s amazing to see people just pissing everywhere! Guys and girls. Avoid walls and corners… it’s probably been pissed on.

This Programme belongs to Me

 The restricted media camp was quite full when I got there. I set up my tent however in record time (or at least what I think would be record time for a first timer). I was suppose to meet with these 2 American people (Colleen & Mark from Texas) I met at the train station but they wouldn’t let me out through to the regular camp sites before actual start time at 5 p.m. I spent some solo time walking around, sitting around and in general, mucking around….. up until I had to do a phone cross over with Navsta @ Traxx FM – Travel N’ Music….the station’s new tagline is what my life is all about right now. 

My Tent - aka a freaking oven during the day

Thursday’s line-up had about 18 performers performing on 6 different stages. I only managed to catch 3 acts:- Clutch, the Gossip and last but definitely not least, Radiohead. I did try to see MGMT but word of advice for vertically challenged Asians while going to western based music festivals – be prepared to see nothing. Unless of course you’re a professional stilt walker, or can fly. Thank goodness for big screens at the larger stages.

Click on thumbnails below to see some pictures from Day 1 of the Roskilde Festival 08 

Unfortunately the Odeon stage (where Clutch, MGMT and the Gossip played last night) did NOT have a screen. Getting to the stage early is your best bet… and when I took my own advice – I was upfront during the Gossip and got some pretty good shots of Beth Ditto prancing around in a silk mumu, flashing her wonderfully thick – cellulite legs every so often. 20 minutes into their set I had to dash off to the Orange stage where Radiohead was about to start.

   

Writing about Radiohead deserves its own paragraph (and probably because it’s not grammatically correct or something like that.) Anyway, they took stage right at 10 p.m. – initiated by the Greenwood brothers licks and chops (?) and of course Thom Yorke’s lingering croon. They played a great deal off their In Rainbows album and towards the middle-end of their set, through in some older tracks like Karma Police, Paranoid Android, My Iron Lung and a few others I can’t quite think of now. I was waiting for them to play JUST though as I had heard they played it during their other festival appearances this summer. Nearly 1.5 hours and Just was just missing. In all though, a magnificent performance with little chit chat in between songs…. Just perhaps Thom Yorke dedicating their next song to everyone at the festival who had done bad drugs…..

Picture of the Big Screen next to the stage during Radiohead

Only non-screen view I could see of anyone from the band

  

 In all, I trekked back to my campsite in the cold with a smile on my face – a combination of relief after using the toilet and finally seeing Radiohead – 15 years after I missed a club gig of theirs in Mexico…. I learned my lesson and made sure I was not intoxicated this time around…

Today there will be performances by Kate Nash, Gnarls Barkley, Band of Horses, Santogold, Mogwai, Cocorosie, Grinderman, Goldfrapp, the Streets…just to name a few….where do I begin?

I don’t want to write a whole lot because I’m working on a full post later – but I just wanted to let you all know that it’s been real great here at the Roskilde Festival. Fabulous weather, interesting people, colourful scenery and of course MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC! In short, today I saw a little bit of Clutch, a little bit of the Gossip and last but definetely not least, RADIOHEAD….I also lost my phone during their set. I guess you win some and you lose some. Losing the phone definetely sucks though.

Lots of great photos and a full update coming soon!