Monolith daily schedule now up!

Check out the 2 day schedule for the Monolith Festival and tell me... any major conflicts breaking your heart? So far none of my favorites overlap that I can tell, but I need to give this schedule a full perusal.

Devotchka Halloween pre-sale

Denver darlings and Halloween fans Devotchka are slated to play two nights at the Boulder Theater October 30th and 31st. See below for pre-sale links, password = pumpkin.

DeVotchKa will return to the Boulder Theater for the Halloween 2009 Extravaganza on October 30th and 31st. We want to welcome our fans to a very special Fans First presale.

Tickets will go on sale Friday, August 7th at 10am. Online presale only. Public on-sale begins on Saturday, August 8th at 10am. Click below to buy your tickets. The password is pumpkin.

Click HERE for October 30 (18 & over)
Click HERE for October 31 (21 & over)

Everything Absent or Distorted: Cheyenne Frontier Days

It was not an official CFD stage but it was a Frontier Days-style party. Bonfire, fireworks, cowboys and EAoD.

The band sounded great in the warm air of the tennis courts. A short set, but a welcome venture to Cheyenne. Sadness here to learn that the band is breaking up. I was glad to see them while the getting was good and glad to leave the compound with no burns.

Tennis court stage:




The bonfire:


The compound:

Bon Iver, Fox Theater, Boulder on June 12th

When you drive 2+ hours from Laramie to a show, it's easy to be a little worried about seeing a "mellow" artist before hitting the road back home after midnight. The right combination of quiet pretty songs and a swig of Jameson at the show can mean a long ride north.

On his second date in the Front Range this weekend, Bon Iver led off on Sunday with the beautiful Flume and while I loved it, I worried about the mellow factor. No need for alarm as Justin Vernon and his band turned up the volume and re-arranged all the favorites from For Emma, Forever Ago in a way that no one could call "mellow". Creature Fear knocked the sold-out crowd's socks right off and we knew no one was falling asleep.

Even with the sweltering guitars, the lyrics from his indie torch song masterpiece proved more affecting that I anticipated. There are very few shows indeed where I tear up and feel truly heartsick over the music, but Sunday was one of those nights. Bon Iver's songs forgo cliche in favor of an emotional landscape that is muddy and slippery and true in some elemental way.

I knew I loved Skinny Love before the 3 person percussion was added, but I liked it loud in the live setting. And Blood Bank never really worked for me until this show and the Neil Young/ Crazy Horse encore treatment it received.

But getting back to those lyrics, man, they come at you when sung live to a hushed crowd. Re: Stacks topped my wishlist of songs to hear Sunday, and it topped my all-time list of amazing-gorgeous-powerful songs to hear live. Friends in the Pacific Northwest used to tell me about girls crying through Eliot Smith sets and I felt like one of those girls Sunday night. When it came time to sing along with Wolves (Act I and II), my quiet "what might have been lost" joined with what seemed like the rest of Boulder.

It took Bon Iver a long time to make it to the Rockies, let's hope he comes back. Soon.

Full Monolith lineup

Here it is, your lineup for Monolith Festival September 12-13th... who are you most excited to see at Red Rocks?

Saturday, September 12
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Girl Talk
Of Montreal
M. Ward
DOOM
The Walkmen
OK Go
Ida Maria
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
Frightened Rabbit
Thao with the Get Down Stay Down
Hollywood Holt + Million $ Mano
Starf*cker
Thunderheist
Woodhands
These United States
Cymbals Eat Guitars
The Antlers
Cotton Jones
Gregory Alan Isakov
Lydia
Generationals
Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros
The Answering Machine
Roadside Graves
Danielle Ate the Sandwich
Speakeasy Tiger
Autovaughn
Avi Buffalo
Wendy Darling
Boulder Acoustic Society
Caitlin Rose


Sunday, September 13
The Mars Volta
MSTRKRFT
Method Man & Redman
Phoenix
The Dandy Warhols
Chromeo
The Glitch Mob
Passion Pit
WALE
The Thermals
Harlem Shakes
Monotonix
The Grates
HEALTH
Deer Tick
The Twilight Sad
The Features
Spindrift
Savoy
Bad Veins
We Were Promised Jetpacks
Beats Antique
Tigercity
French Horn Rebellion
The Pirate Signal
Neon Indian
The Knew
A Shoreline Dream
The Royal Bangs
Red Wire Black Wire
Jim McTurnan & the Kids That Killed the Man
Rachel Goodrich

Plus! Cool Kids and a Chromeo DJ Set at the VIP parties.

Monolith headliners: Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Mars Volta

We knew about Karen O and company gracing the Red Rocks stage on September 12th, and now it sounds like Mars Volta will close out the Sunday show at Monolith.

Their antics at Sasquatch 2008 kept me entertained (see Cedric in the air in above photo), although I hope not to take a cymbal + stand to the head.

The Mars Volta, live video from Sasquatch 2008 from Dave Allen on Vimeo.

Monolith headliners?

I am beyond delighted to see Saturday headliners Yeah Yeah Yeahs at this year's Monolith Festival. Still waiting to hear about the Sunday headliners, but could it be these guys? A Denver show in the works per pitchfork... my fingers are crossed!