Before the big name of the night—Vampire Weekend— hit the stage, it was Colin Meloy’s turn to add some folk to the festival.
Meloy is a Portland-based musician best known for his work in the indie band The Decemberists. He played a laid back evening solo set at Folk Fest. It started with the person introducing Meloy mispronouncing his last name. Meloy took that in stride. Later on in the set he jested towards a sound man, off stage, who was ignoring him. He then sang to him, instructing him to turn down the guitar volume in the monitors. What some musicians try to do on the sly, Meloy throws in full public view.
His musical styling fell safely into the acoustic singer-songwriter camp. He referred to himself jokingly as the token folk act for that evening of Folk Fest. He, like City and Colour the night before, picked out a Neil Young cover to tear through at the midway point of his performance. I didn’t recognize it but a few in the crowd did.
Meloy’s stripped down versions of The Decemberists tunes was a fine fit for the venue. Most of the crowd was sitting on the grass, or planted comfortably in lawn chairs. A few of us were shivering as the sun started to set. The atmosphere was closer to a campfire than an outdoor festival.
The best moment of the set was the Apology Song, about a bike that was entrusted to Meloy by his friend Steve and then stolen. The song was honest, funny, charming, catchy, and brought together all the elements of his set in a single song.
About half an hour after Meloy departed from the smaller stage, Vampire Weekend took over main stage. A four-piece indie rock group from New York, they have gained worldwide attention from three high-selling and well-reviewed albums. Folk Fest was their first appearance in Ottawa.
Vampire Weekend was dull. The whole performance seemed phoned in, rehearsed to death, and bland. There was little interaction between band members on stage. The singer had marginal interaction with the audience. There were no new songs to be heard or strange stories to be told. There was not a single risk taken during the entire performance.
The sound was good, the mixing was spot on, and the show moved along at a rapid pace. These are all technically good things. It is always great to see a band that sounds exactly like—or even slightly better than—their record. Still, this improvement in sound is credited more to great engineers, mixers and equipment at Folk Fest rather than Vampire Weekend itself. A casual fan of the band could have the same experience I did by putting their iPod on shuffle and playing it through good speakers with some friends. The live show brought nothing new to the table.
If you are a devoted fan of Vampire Weekend, then by all means see them. I would recommend it to you because the band delivers exactly what they promise on record. If you are not a diehard then take it or leave it. Vampire Weekend are a competent group, but a boring one.
They write catchy, pop-rock tunes about, well, nothing. If you want to forget about your troubles and shake it out for an evening then they will do the trick. I was, however, disappointed. I would much rather see a group, especially one with the talent they have, push themselves to take risks and make mistakes.
They would do well to leave perfection for the radio and instead bring experimentation or a bit of chaos into their shows. Vampire Weekend were good, but they could have been much, much better.
