Photo: Josh Cox
The Sears Tower looms ominous over Union Park. News of the plot to blow it up still resonates fresh in our heads; the story was leaked just one day earlier. How can we cope with the devastating inevitable destruction of our skyline?
By drinking a whole lot of Sparks.
What’s Sparks? Says the website, “Sparks, is a ready-to-drink that contains 6.0% alcohol by volume with the addition of active ingredients caffeine, taurine and natural herbs guarana…” Six percent? Bah. They got a new one now. Sparks Plus. Mosey up to the booth and say, “Gimme the black one.” The black one’s seven percent. There’s also a Sparks Light now, but you don’t care about that. Now chug it down. What do you think? Battery acid, right? Well, look at the tin, dimwit. See the plus and the minus? C’mon, like you really wanted to shell out an extra dollar for a 312 beer that’ll only put you to sleep. Three more of these Sparks things and you’re gonna be going all Chris Martin on us, crooning, “I saw sparks” from that first Coldplay album. And when’d that thing come out, 2000? Sparks isn’t even close to being six years old. Chris Martin, you really are a visionary.
Vice is the sponsor of this festival and, over on the Virtue stage, their latest signings, Favourite Sons, are mic-checking to Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” in a desperate and misguided bid for instantaneous credibility. Gnarls Barkley? Dude, they’re like, so last month. Let’s get closer. Try out our laminate in the photo pit. Success.
If Charlie Brown and the Aphex Twin had a baby, he’d look something like the singer in Favourite Sons. Wonder why Vice signed them; they sound just like The Strokes. Hey, is there a New Rock Revolution revival going on and nobody told me? It’s 2001 all over again, gang. ‘Hang on Girl’ does have a winning guitar line, so it’s not all bad.
Now, if you’re gonna be a lesbian in a rock and roll band, you’d better be hot. And if you’re not hot, well, you’d better have some kickin tunes. Sometimes, even that’s not enough. Just look at T.A.T.U. Erase Errata, you fail on both fronts. Miserably.
90 Day Men, let me tell you about 90 Day Men and how they kept me out of jail. It’s New Year’s Eve, 2002. Gigwise is at Chicago’s Empty Bottle, waiting for Har Mar Superstar to get his fat ass on stage before midnight hits. Well, he’s taking a long time, too long, to soundcheck his iPod. Impatience boils over into rage. Gigwise starts throwing ice cubes at Har Mar. Har Mar, like any good combatant, fights back. He wields his microphone at our head with lethal precision, knocking us on our noggin with a Happy New Year. That’s not enough, though. He orders our presence removed from the vicinity. And who comes along to whisk us away to safety but Robert Lowe, lynchpin of the Empty Bottle, and singer in 90 Day Men. Benevolent bouncer Rob doesn’t even throw us out of the place, he just tells us to stay in the room with the pool tables, which we do, watching the show from the doorway, gnashing our teeth when the porky in the Y-fronts does his roll-around-on-stage-like-pig-in-slop routine.
Back to today. Devin the Dude. Best in show. Don’t know what they’re doing in Houston to keep producing R&B juggernauts like this guy and Beyonce, but whatever it is, keep it up. You’re a making Texas less a festering hellhole and that’s a good thing. “Doobie Ashtray” and “Anythang” are flat-out brilliant, but the whole thing gets transcendent when Devin pulls his abridged cover of James Taylor’s “Handyman” (???!?!?!?) from out of fucking nowhere. And how about this guy’s banter? “Don’t revoke your ‘old school’ cards, y’all, those things are gonna come back in fashion someday.”
Sorry, Jose Gonzalez, but you’re putting us to sleep. Who scheduled this guy after Devin the Dude? We stay for half a song before it’s back to the Sparks vendor. Now they’re giving away these tiny light-up keychains. Some of them even work.
Chromeo, here we go. Or do we? Sluggish start. They say they got a kick drum problem. Kick drum problem? C’mon, you’re Chromeo. Push a button or something. Do it all on playback. The kick drum’s not the half of it. The slap bass on “Needy Girl” is as inaudible as Beck’s guitar was during “E-Pro” last weekend at Bonnaroo. Unforgivable. Fortunately, the whole set is salvaged by two things: the purple Nike hightops Dave-1 is wearing and Chromeo’s cover of “Your Love” by The Outfield, last belted out by Gigwise at a Romanian wedding in Chicago this past winter.
High on Fire is doing it for the metalheads, but it’s all a prelude to The Stills. Fresh from the Sparks vendor, we are on our way to the Vice stage for the best band of the day, only to be distracted by the figure lounging between two elms just behind the baseball diamond. By God, it’s Mike Skinner, in shorts, blue ones, trying to hide between two trees and eating what, at first glance, appears to be a kebab (what else?), but, after further scrutiny, turns out to be a pulled pork sandwich. Look at him, sitting there like Dizzee Rascal on an imaginary hammock. Let’s go have a word with The Streets.
“Hi, we’re from Gigwise. How’s it feel to be back in Chicago?”
“No interviews, mate.”
“Any acts you’re keen on seeing today?”
Skinner wipes his mouth, grabs his mobile, and acts like he’s talking to someone when we know there is no one on the other end.
The whole thing is over in under a minute. One more question, Mr. Skinner. Why do you venture out into the people, only to try and hide in broad daylight wearing preposterous shorts and eating a pulled pork sandwich and then turn down all requests for an interview (and be a dick about it)? It’s not like there’s a press conference at this thing. We got three words for you, Skinner.
Weak become heroes.
The Stills erase all negativity in an instant. A limp American flag droops in the distance. Perfect backdrop for when they do “Lola Stars & Stripes.” When we first heard new album, Without Feathers, we were put off, but, in time, we have come to appreciate it for what The Stills are trying to do: change, which is more than can be said for acts like The Streets. And this is from a band with a song called “Changes Are No Good.” Take notes, Skinner.
Really don’t care to see Roky Erickson, and, besides, we’ve got three tickets with Sparks Plus written all over them so let’s head on over to the vendor and – hey, who’s that tapping me on my back?
Why, it’s Mike Skinner, and he has just delivered a devastating roundhouse to the jaw of Gigwise!
Not really. Why, it’s the girl with whom we used to work in the skyscraper downtown. What’s new, toots?
“I was supposed to work the VIP entrance but they stuck me at the exit.”
So, any sightings of your friend-turned-nemesis, the one who had to get her dress cleaned after a backstage rendezvous with Bloc Party?
“You on MySpace at all, Gigwise?”
Absolutely fucking not.
“Well, turns out she’s got the guitarist from Bloc Party in her Top 8. Somehow, I doubt he’s got her in her Top 8, or, for that matter, Top 50.”
Diss!
“Well, I gotta go now. My boyfriend’s picking me up.”
Double diss!!
Yes, I’d like a Sparks, hold the ice. Make it snappy. Let’s see what the Boredoms are up to.
Boredoms are so nuts they don’t even care if their baby goes deaf. Yeah, the kid’s got headphones on and everything, but, with four fucking drumkits pounding and your dad screaming like his toenails are being removed, is that really gonna help? We first saw them live twelve long years ago. Glad to see not a 
sliver of the fury has diminished.
Ghostface closes out the Virtue stage. We just have one question: why? All these Ws thrown up in the air – this could just as easily be mistaken for a Bush pep rally than a show of support for the Wu Tang Clan. Then comes the kicker. Officious meathead dipshit head of security ex-cop jackass on a power trip struts over to kick us out of the photo pit when we’re wearing a goddam laminate that reads PHOTO in all caps, boldface. His justification?
“You’re just watching the show.”
Up yours, I did the same fucking thing for every other act who played today and I’ll do the same tomorrow. So why don’t you go drink a thirty pack of Old Style and watch the Cubs season go down in flames and when winter hits, do the same thing with the Bears, you unbelievable cretin.
Over at the Vice stage, the main stage, the real stage, no one gives two shit that all us photogs are in the photo pit for the entirely of the Lady Sovereign set, but, before she takes the stage, we’ve a little alteration right behind us.
This whiny twat in specs is bitching to security that the guy behind him pushed his 
way to the front. “And we’ve been here for two hours.” Bear in mind, the offending presence is BEHIND him. It’s not like he’s blocking the kid’s view or anything. Security would’ve just let it go like they always do (and should – hey, these things happen, kids), but he sees he has an audience so he has to indulge so he opens up with fat Chicago mouth and out comes his thick Chicago accent.
“I can give youse two choices, buster. You either go to the back of the crowd or I ‘trow your ass outta here, got it?”
Stalemate, the kid ain’t moving. Security steps over the guardrail to escort the offender to the exits. Weak.
“Thanks, man,” says the goon behind the speccy twat who started it all.
Gigwise notices that Speccy Whiner is still wearing his Bonnaroo wristband, one week after the fact. That alone makes us want to tear his throat out. Instead, we tell it like it is. “Hey dork,” we say, “you were at Bonnaroo. Didn’t they do the same thing during Beck? Didn’t they do the same thing during Radiohead? It’s a festival. They push to the front. That’s what they do. Deal with it. Here’s two tickets. Buy yourself a diaper.”
Lady Sovereign comes off as the female Damian, spawn of Satan – mother is a jackyl, father is the Devil. Wouldn’t want to get in an argument with this one. The happy hardcore finale of “Public Warning” sounds like Germans in Nuremberg on a World Cup hooligan shit-kicking stampede. She tries to go all Art Brut on us, though, having a flunkie of hers paint a canvas whist she performs. Of course, some dumb bird in the crowd pipes up. “Can I buy your painting?” “How much?” “How much are you asking?” “Five hundred.” “Dollars?” No slag, 500 pesos. “How about 300?” “We’ll talk.” God, this is embarrassing. Onto the headliner - The Streets.
Okay, Skinner, now I know why you were so aloof there under the elms. It’s cos you were focusing, right? Had to be. Following a so-so set starter of “Pranging Out,” Skinner unleashes the back catalogue goldmine: “Don’t Mug Yourself,” into which he tosses a brief cover of “I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor.” “Let’s Push Things Forward” follows with its sixty-second cover: “Don’t Cha” by those ever so charming Pussycat Dolls. Of course, after this initial blitzkrieg, the whole thing goes out the window, so to speak when The Streets tread into the wading pool of sappy ballads: “It’s Too Late,” “Could Well Be In,” “Never Went to Church” – they’re all in a row and the energy flags, never to be recovered. Add to that, Skinner’s vexing fixation, all show long, with a goon in the front who is wearing a green T-shirt. “You, in the green T-shirt. When I jump, you jump. Real high like, so they see it in the back. Ready? One…two…three.”
Never a better time than now to take the Green Line el train home.
