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Sonar 2005 - A Review
An ever growing genre demands an ever growing festival. Sonar seems to expand every year and the plethora of acts crossing genres from electro punk to hip hop or even (dare i say it), the avant-guard jazz sounds of Jamie Liddel, the limits are endless.Musically, this year's sonar focussed on the live element. Artists including LCD Soundsystem, Le Tigre and Barcelona´s own Cycle, fusing together their own punk from Blondie to Gang of Four and twisting in an element of techno. Then you had Soulwax playing live and UK giants the Chemical Brothers still showing they can rock the crowd.
Split into two sections, 'Sonar by Day' and 'Sonar by Night', the festival is held at two different venues.
'Sonar by Day' is held at Barcelonas MACBA (Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona) and the CCCB both in outdoor and indoor spaces in Raval, a central district of Barcelona.
'Sonar by Night', however is held outside of town in a series of huge aircraft hangers, although there is still an outdoor space, fit for about 2,000 people, you get the gist.
Sonar by day is to me what Sonar is all about. Fantastic art installations, a record fair and slightly more left field music.
The MACBA and areas around it were transformed into a digital art space. One display that springs to mind was based on the ability to tap into surveillance systems using the Internet. On a series of screens it showed in real time what was happening on street corners around the world. Musically you had everything from the electro pop of hot chip to Matthew Herberts most experimental project, his Plat du Jour.
Plat Du Jour is a whirlwind tour of your average British kitchen. Using anything to do with food as either an instrument or sampled and twisted into beats and sound bites to create a rather tasty groove. The most sensory part of Herberts show was, however, stood to the left of the stage, a lady in full kitchen regalia cooked up a storm and the smell was wafted across the ravenous lunch time crowd.
Leon the drummer with Herbert explained that each tune also had a political element. For example, when playing a tune about breakfast he was playing an agent orange container. With Vietnam being one of the prime producers of coffee and agent orange being used extensively by the US in the Vietnam war the link is obvious. On a less serious note the concept was fun, innovative and sounded great.
Thursday also saw Spanish/ North American group Cycle take the stage in Sonar Village, the outdoor area. Putting on a fantastic show Cycle fused together an early B52´s electro punk sound with their female vocalist animating herself accross the stage, she can only described as Souxie Soux on Angel Dust, check them out.
Caroline Hervé, aka Miss Kittin, played her first of two sets at Sonar by day. She is somewhat worshiped in the electronic music scene, especially in Barcelona, so the tent was rammed. As usual, she delivered, although problems with “one of her ladies” (the left deck to you and I) prevented her from singing ‘Stock Exchange’. However we were treated to ‘Happy Violentine’ and tracks from ‘The First Album’ produced by The Hacker.
Then came the first episode of 'Sonar by Night', with bumper cars and all. The Chemical Brothers whacked out their sound twisting lyrical samples and block rockin beats to a pretty mental crowd. Playing in the largest room the light show helped as all we could see were two dots bobbing up and down.
I also had my first Jamie Liddle experience - what a talent! Sampling his voice live to create multi-layered tracks with a groove unto their own. This juxtaposed with his wartime jazz vocals worked a treat. Le Tigre were a different story, maybe from a different planet. Rocking out with their peachesesque sound was a bouncy fun ride. One of my female co-horts found the ultra feminism a bit much and I have to agree. Enjoyable nonetheless.
Fridays party finished with 2many DJ´s, as usual their meticulous mixing set the crowd going bonkers. From Vitalic to the Undertones, I could go on, these are two guys who know how to get a party going.
There were two primary highlights of 'Sonar by Day' on Saturday. The first being British act ¨Hot Chip¨. Hot Chip are basically 80´s synth pop for the noughties. Bobbingly funky grooves with quirky lyrics sung by a chap who resembles brains from The Thunderbirds with the rest of the band getting involved where necessary. A definite tip for the top.
The second highlight was Canadian artist Mocky. Joined by a full live band they really funked up Sonar Village. Mocky’s unique style of humorous party rapping worked magnificently with a live band, each of whom had their own persona. A girl straight outta the Merry Pranksters on keys and a revved up grinning Canadian on bass to a DJ whose hands were lit up, as if he was at the helm of the Millenium Falcon; you get the picture. Mocky rapped about monkeys and was joined by Jamie Liddle and they all acted like buffoons. What a joy to see at a festival renowned for its chin strokers and knob-twiddler's. Class.
And then came 'Sonar by Night' - the final chapter. We entered to witness James Murphy with his band The LCD Soundsystem, they boomed a sound out a lot harder than the album. Murphy was fully involved in percussion as well as his own punk vocal mayhem. Sod Daft Punk playing at my house I´d have them any day!
We then sauntered over to the tower blocks of London for the raw grime that is Mia. In true pirate radio style the DJ played the wax and Mia and her accomplice rapped it out, twas like Notting Hill in Catalunya… well sort of.
Then the Kittin was back, more rocking and the ladies were working, the preaching was fantastic and the congregation raved. The night ended with fellow Berlin resident and founder of the BPitch Control label Ellen Alien, Pure Berlin Techno at its finest. Hard rocking four by four beats mixed to perfection, at some points trancey (in a 5am good way), but definitely feet stompingly dancey.
So, Sonar as usual, opened me up to new music as well as letting me hear artists I have respected for sometime. Some of those I had never heard of before but just knew of. To quote Taylor, the bass player with Mocky ¨it’s a festival where your hear new things, that’s great to play at, and the beach is just up the road, to chill out. So if you wanna rock, you rock and if you wanna chill, you chill¨…chill, whats that? In my opinion, at Sonar you rock…mostly.
Sh*t Bob
written: July 2005
published: October 2005
Written: 11th Oct, 05
Read: 3574 times
