• Best Surprise: I wasn’t expecting the Breeders to be
quite so fucking awesome. I’d heard mixed reviews of their Coachella
performance, I’m not so excited about the new album, and I’ve only ever
been a casual Breeders fan. So I was a bit blown away by the band’s set
on Saturday night. They managed to play some soft, dreamy slowcore
while running their guitars through enough amplification and distortion
to still sound sludgy and electric. Kim Deal’s voice is perfectly
preserved. Not to be all hung up on the hits, but “Cannonball” in
particular was just nasty as hell, the chorus all delayed distortion,
vocal fuzz, guitars careening almost out of whack. Most impressive was
how easily the band shifted from composed quiet to massive aural
assault—I know, I know, loud/quiet/loud, whatever. It still
kills. (R.E.M. were also every bit as monumental and dramatic and
moving as you’d hope for from a band that have been living onstage for
so long; Michael Stipe’s every look and gesture was both perfectly
practiced but not overbearingly contrived, a neat trick.)
• Best Fulfillment of High Expectations: Honestly, a lot
of bands hit high marks—Built to Spill are dependably amazing;
M.I.A. made up for missing last year’s fest with a pretty stunning set;
Modest Mouse played some old jams—but the most giddy, satisfying
set came from Battles on Monday evening. To borrow from a friend: The
band really do speak their own language, both in terms of
incomprehensible elf vocals and in terms of their tightly shifting
fourth-dimensional instrumental rock; for much of their set, they
seemed content just speaking to each other even if it went over
everyone else’s heads. But the epic, unfurling “Tonto” and the mad,
marching stomp of “Atlas” were understandable and crowd-pleasing
enough, inspiring chanting-along and swirling pockets of dancing. The
only intelligible words: a loop of the word “Battles” on the opening
song, and the minimal between-song banter of “Oh
boy,
Sasquatch.”
• Coolest Festival Attendee: The kid who exited the
stage doing “the worm” after M.I.A.’s crowd-participation party.
• Locals Done Good: Seattle transplants Say Hi surprised
and impressed with their cute, breezy power pop. The Moondoggies
sounded perfect in the pastoral festival setting. The Cops were loud
and raucous and funny and probably drunk. But no Seattle band was as
funny or drunk as Truckasauras. Between bass-booming Nintendo megajams,
abetted by a bottle of Maker’s, the group’s Adam Swan shouted at the
crowd, his little brother, the sun, and repeatedly expressed his
disbelief that the Truck were even there at the Gorge. It was pretty unbelievable.
• Best/Worst Pavement Joke Made by Stephen Malkmus:
“This is the best weather I’ve ever seen at Sasquatch! I wasn’t here
yesterday, though. I hear yesterday it was raining sideways. Crooked,
crooked rain.” 