Thank you to the bands, volunteers, RefugePDX, and our fans for a great festival!
Magic Johnson, Rob Walmart, Fist Fite, and Benoit Poulard
Just finished up four great sets that made up the heart of today’s bill. Things started off outside with Magic Johnson’s multilingual thrashy punk. All high energy and shouted interplay.
After that, the Rob Walmart van rolled up blasting a post-apocalyptic mish mash of hip-hop, techno, world beats, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Like much of the most interesting parts of the Portland music scene, Rob Walmart excels at creating an anarchic atmosphere, a world where all the adults and authority figures have vanished and the kids are making up the rules as they go, sometimes ending up with something more pure and vivacious and soemtimes wandering into brutish meaninglessness. You know, like in that one Souh Park episode.
Once the van pulled away, Fist Fite took the stage to finish the outside block. Their electroclash and duel basses got the hot and sweaty crowd moving around for a bit before heading inside.
Sometimes the sets with visuals are the best ones to listen to with your eyes closed. A
certain kind of ambient video projection is less trying to provide compelling accompainment to it’s music than to simply get you to forget that the sources of the sounds exist — to give you an excuse to drif off into whatever internal landscape you can find. Such was the case with Benoit Poulard’s mellow set of enveloping pump organ drones, otherwordly noises, and acoustic guitar. At least for me, the invitation to space out was much appreciated and the resulting journey was therapeutic and resorative.
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