By Anthony Bromberg
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Friday night at Royce Hall, a colorful, spectacular light show was one of the few connecting elements between the music acts that were there to perform for the All Tomorrow’s Parties festival.
The acts included a giant band from the '70s CBGB scene, the frontman of grunge’s weakest successful act, a collective of quirky musicians, a nervous female singer-songwriter and the new act from the '90s seminal indie-rock band Pavement’s leader.
Bringing all of these acts together was an interesting concept that provided a fun if schizophrenic night for the audience. The show worked best as an introduction to a variety of acts who may not be the easiest to discover through mainstream avenues. Unfortunately, Royce Hall was not the best venue that most of these acts could have been seen in. The inventive lighting added an element of creativity to the atmosphere and was especially effective for the collective noisemaking group that included Sonic Youth member Kim Gordon. As a venue for the entire show, though, Royce was too stodgy and not intimate enough a place in which to ideally see most of these acts. The crowd was receptive to the music nonetheless, and some members, not put off by the formal tone of the building, managed to add the aroma of a certain leaf that is almost always associated with rock concerts.
The least interesting act of the night was easily Eddie Vedder. As the most popular mainstream name on the bill he was a crowd favorite, but his performance was lackluster. He played a ukelele for most of the set, bringing out an electric guitar on only a couple of tracks. He didn’t play any Pearl Jam hits, or what would have seemed the obvious choice for a solo set - his cover of the Beatles’ classic "You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away." He did sing well though, through his uninspired lyrics, and provided a topic of conversation coming onto the stage with an atrocious mohawk.
The night’s other traditional singer-songwriter, Cat Power, was much more successful in creating a connection between her music and the audience. Her soft, passionate vocals, were only enhanced by the fact that she acted endearingly nervous, often clearing her throat midway through a song and mumbling half to herself and half to the audience.
Seventies band Television was hit and miss, the audience going crazy whenever they played a song off their landmark album, "Marquee Moon," the highlight of the set being the title track, which closed the set. They only played two songs from it, however, and their set was bogged down by long periods of tuning between what seemed like every song.
The combination of Ikue Mori, Kim Gordon, Jim O’Rourke and DJ Olive made use of Royce’s stage flawlessly. Their noisescape included a little turntable magic, Mori programming a laptop, and O’Rourke and Gordon doing unbelievable things with their bass and guitar respectively. They played two extended songs for their entire set, but with the dynamic sounds they evoked from their instruments managed to keep the jams attention-grabbing.
Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks headlined the night, but a lot of the audience strangely filed out after Television’s set. Malkmus didn’t seem to mind though, giving the best traditional rock show set of the night. Playing largely new songs, with a few selections off his 2001 self-titled album, Malkmus was funny, energetic, and sounded really good. Impressive for a set that didn’t get started till around midnight. Closing out the night, the Jicks left the audience ready for the next night’s festivities.