Pitchfork

Crowd photo by Terje Sørgjerd

Welcome to Day 2 of Jason Crock's Roskilde diary. For Day 1 (Thursday), click here. For Brandon Stosuy's Friday diary click here. For Brandon Stosuy's Thursday diary, click here. For Brandon Stosuy's Wednesday diary click here.

I don't mind the mud. As the rain let up on Friday, it slowed down everyone's progress, but it was almost fun, like trudging through the snow somehow. I don't mind the sinkholes along the way, as (knock on wood) my boots are still holding up fine. I don't mind that every tree or wall or odd patch of sawdust has become a men's bathroom, and the festival organizers have gone so far as to put those troughs outside along the walls in some spots (which routes the urine...right back into the ground?) I don't mind hearing "undskyld!" about one million times (sounds like "Oon scoot," which is fun for about two minutes), least of all from the otherwise-cheerful security guards who constantly change their minds over which routes the concert-goers can or cannot take, inevitably sending us through more mud. I don't even mind the drunks, or their personal boxes of wine that make everyone look like oversize toddlers merrily clutching adult Hi-C.

But the beer-tossing thing. The need to turn a half-empty cup of beer into a projectile. Water, I can sort of understand, though security are regularly passing out cups of water around the front of the stages (kudos and thanks). In smaller American venues, we've been observing a certain custom with our beer, and it's a little crazy, I know, but here goes: we fucking drink it. Thing is, when you throw the last few gulps of your beer like it was the dregs from a coffee pot (maybe there's something about Tuborg I don't know), you can't drink it anymore. It seems obvious, and yet: now your beer, along with your nasty tuberculosis-having backwash, is in someone's hair, eyes, and clothes, when instead it could be in your stomach and making you even more charming than you already are after your third at 14:00. Food for thought.

Stones Throw Showcase [Cosmopol Stage; 2 p.m.]

I arrive late during the label's three-hour set, but catch a good chunk of Guilty Simpson's set with DJ Percee P. There's not a lot of crowd-baiting or histrionics from the two, just a whole lot of lyricism and hard, yet laid-back Detroit beats, and mentioning J. Dilla about every fourth word. A roar goes through the crowd for a sample of James Brown's "It's a Man's Man's Man's World", over which Guilty raps praises for his father's tough love. Behind them, a series of projection screens display the words, "Our Music Is Mental", a quote attributed to those wise sages Bel Biv Devoe.

Peanut Butter Wolf closes with a DJ/video set, weaving together stone classics from Nas, A Tribe Called Quest, and Gang Starr with interludes from "Fresh Prince" and rapper-laden Sprite commercials. The audience perked up considerably, and maybe a DJ just has an easier time of getting a crowd going, but then again, maybe Peanut Butter Wolf's version of real hip-hop is a little warmer and a little realer for having some self-effacing laughs thrown in.

Roky Erickson and the Explosives [Odeon Stage; 6 p.m.]

Photo by Jason Crock

Call me cynical, but after just two minutes of Erickson being late, I got nervous. There's risk taking someone like Erickson out of retirement, causing the general jitters over whether he'd be up to it or not, or more than that, the rubbernecking impulse of a crowd wanting to see an old, less-than-stable man be forced grimacing through a living jukebox of his own hits.

Thankfully, Erickson was neither. I would have liked his accompanists in the Explosives to be a little rougher around the edges, especially his guitarist who would have sounded more at home in Dire Straits, but Erickson himself looked confident and happy as he played these songs like he'd be doing so for years. If they sounded a little clean at the start, it was because they were saving it all for the finale: with just the tap of a cymbal, the crowd exploded, knowing they were getting "You're Gonna Miss Me", and Erickson even reached back into his throat for a screech all the way from the 60s. The crowd begged for more, but for me, that was plenty.

Beastie Boys [Orange Stage; 7:30 p.m.]


So they're getting on in years. So they haven't made a great record in almost a decade. So MCA is looking a little haggard, grimacing more and more like he's Danny Glover (as if he wasn't copping to gray hairs since like 94). The Beastie Boys come out dressed like G-men from the Prohibition era ("I bought this from a waiter," Mike D would say later), I hear the bassline to "Gratitude", and I'm not even in Denmark anymore-- I'm playing basketball in my driveway on a schoolnight, arguing with Bob D. over the merits of Check Your Head, a new tape he just snuck into my dad's boombox.

Photo 1 by Thomas Kjær; photo 2 by Terje Sørgjerd

They plowed through old favorites like "Brass Monkey", "So What'cha Want", and "Root Down", and the DJ dropped change-ups mid-stream during every last one of them, at one point throwing in the beat to "Get Your Freak On", just to prove they can still rap-- which, evidenced by their double-time flow on "Super Disco Breakin'" they very much can. They dropped in punk tracks like "Tough Guy" at a moment's notice, and damn near a third of the set was instrumental, but so what; one of them was the deathless "Sabrosa". There was a moment of screeching feedback during another Ill Communication instrumental, "Lighten Up", followed by a breakdown in sound that left them effectively miming the track for the crowd over the monitors, and even that looked kind of cool. If it's always like this, they should tour until they need walkers to get on stage. The fucking Who are still playing festivals (including this one), and I'm supposed to act ungrateful and cynical about the Beastie Boys?

Dizzee Rascal [Cosmopol Stage; 9 p.m.]


Sometimes you jump up, sometimes you throw up that one most impudent of fingers, and sometimes you dance. At Dizzee Rascal's set, you did all three, as he and his hypeman would not be sated until the crowd at the Cosmopol tent were eating out of their hands during their lean, aggressive hour-long set. He asked us to jump, we jumped. He asked us to make some noise, we did, and flipped the bird to the other side of the tent when they made more noise. Before launching into "Da Feelin'", he asked the crowd, "Did you know you could have a good time to drum'n'bass?" We knew.

Photos by Jason Crock

But something funny happened when they played "Pussy'ole", which, apparently, isn't "Pussy'ole" anymore. I saw the video for the song in question that edited out the offending word entirely, which sounded half as taunting but still kept the song's "Old Skool" vibe (and title). But now, they're not even playing it live, electing to perform the edited version instead. I understood the choice with the video, that's for a mass audience, and I want to give him the benefit of the doubt since he just murdered the crowd at Roskilde, but I can't remember seeing an artist so eager to censor themselves. Why bother in the first place, then? What's your next single going to be, Dizzee, "Lick my Lolly?"

CSS [Odeon Stage; 10 p.m.]




Queens of the Stone Age [Orange Stage; 10:30 p.m.]





Photos 1 and 2 by Terje Sørgjerd; photo 3 by Thomas Kjær

Queens of the Stone Age are a funny act for an outdoor festival. No doubt they can rock, and live, they're always a lumbering bass-heavy beast. But they've always been more a finesse act on record, and their sludge-rock is full of subtle smirks, sidetracks, and unpredictability. Those quirks get pushed aside in concert, and despite asking us to dance "like we're gonna get laid tonight" during the bludgeoning opener "Feel Good Hit of the Summer", singer Josh Homme, one of the funniest dudes in rock, was free of banter or surprises through most of the set. They leaned on jagged new songs like "Sick, Sick, Sick" and "Battery Acid" as well as near-epic "Song for the Deaf", and the harder stuff was hard as hell, but the quieter, weirder songs like "Into the Hollow" cut through the crowd that much more. When it came time for the hits from Songs for the Deaf like "Go With the Flow", that's when the band finally seemed to hit their stride. A shame the set was about to end.

Peter Bjorn and John [Odeon Stage; 12 a.m.]

Photo by Jason Crock

As I trudged through the slop to the Odeon stage, I thought to myself... do people really like Peter Bjorn and John? I mean, "Young Folks", it's got whistling, it's a gust of warm wind up your pant leg on a bad day, sure. And now you hear it on the radio...in the cafe...at the boutique your girlfriend dragged you into on a Saturday...at the bar...over the PA at the venue in between bands...over the loudspeaker at the bank when you're at the ATM. The band just fell ass-backwards into the pop song of the year, and now it's everywhere, right? Of course, I'd forgotten they're from just over the fjord-- ok, the Oresund Sea, but how often do I get to say "fjord"-- and it turns out they're completely huge. So huge the tent is packed before they go on. So huge the theme from "Young Folks" getting plucked on sitar to precede the band gets a roar of recognition. So huge they can bring on Jamie from Klaxons to sing Victoria Bergsman's part and create the festival's epicenter of hype, and they won't even close with it. They play more songs after that. Who would do such a thing?