TEN thousand festival goers were greeted with a sunny day as music fans bounced, danced and dipped in Auckland’s Silo Park for Laneway 2014.
Despite losing headline acts James Blake and Lorde to the Grammys, the event sold out as crowds flocked to hear the mixture of electronic, hip hop, and indie acts.
Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Mysterex Stage 3:05pm
After cramming into a shuttle with seven other festival goers I arrived just in time for San Francisco based Unknown Mortal Orchestra. The excellent Ruben Nielson showed just why his compositions have had such high critical acclaim, grooving through most of his 2013 album II on patterns laid down by drummer Riley Geare and bass player Jake Portrait. A mixture of psychedelic and lo fi funk, Unknown Mortal Orchestra can be very reminiscent of a 60s-psych sound. This was displayed most vividly in tracks like From The Sun or So Good At Being In Trouble where Ruben could display his immense guitar skills, as well as luring in the crowd into sing along. They played their original hit ffunny ffriends, creating a nostalgic trip for fans and band alike.
Earl Sweatshirt, Hey Seuss Stage, 3:50pm
Laneways was Earl Sweatshirt’s first time to New Zealand after he missed the 2011 Oddfuture showcase at the PowerStation. He was at the time in a juvenile detention camp in Samoa, sent there by his parents who were shocked at the violent themes of his debut album Earl. The performance was touted to be a highlight of the festival after his second album, Doris, received high praise throughout the blogging world. It was unfortunate then that sound issues plagued the set. Earl’s DJ, Taco, spent the first half hour of the set screaming at the technicians to turn up the sound. The crowd cared little though as moshpits formed almost immediately in front of Earl and hype man Domo Genesis. He played a diverse range of his tracks including parts of his self titled album, Earl. Hearing songs such as Pigions and Earl live was fantastic for older Odd Future fans, especially after rumours that he no longer played them live having turned away from the hyper violent imagery of the first album. The sound issues were quickly forgotten as ‘Hive’ had everyone in the crowd jumping, and by the time he finished on Drop from the original Odd Future mixtape he had everyone enthusiastically moshing at the front.
XXYYXX, Cactus Stage, 4:30pm
At 19 years old Marcel Everrett has had an incredible rise to fame with music that he has described as “doing drugs on a freeway… underwater.” It is a wholly accurate depiction, as his music is often experimental with eclectic drum patterns and synths. He played many of the songs from his album XXYYXX such as DMT, Closer and Witching Hour and the crowd… half danced. I had a feeling that many festival goers were not wholly familiar with the music with a nearby attendee asking, ‘where are the drops?’ Often his songs border on chillwave and without the standard build up and progression of other electronic acts many didn’t know how to react. He went out playing a remix of Lil B’s I’m Praying for a Brick, crowd participation despite his best efforts was pretty minimal with only a half dozen singing along. Maybe New Zealanders aren’t ready for chillwave.
Run the Jewels, Cactus Stage, 5:45pm
Hip hop duo El P and Killer Mike have quickly become one of the world most sought after hip hop acts since coming together to form Run the Jewels. Both respected MC’s in their own right, together they are a truly formidable force, each rapper perfectly versing through 36” Chain, Banana Clipper as well as Christmas Miracle. The crowd knew a surprising amount of the lyrics, loving every second of the performance as El P easily interacted with and pumped the crowd. They seemed genuinely enthused to play at Silo Park, their first performance in New Zealand. Run the Jewels is a hell of a party, even Hodgy Beats and Taco came to join the fun on stage to cheers from the audience. Both El P and Killer Mike played some of their earlier solo hits, the crowd joining in on the chorus of El P’s The Full Retard (so you should pump this sh**, like they do in the future). Killer Mike turned to thank the crowd for making the duo an ‘actual hip hop group’, successfully able to perform in any corner of the world. With El P’s futuristic synth layered production and two world class MC’s, Run the Jewels are undoubtedly one of the strongest up and coming forces in the hip hop soundscape at the moment.
Danny Brown, Cactus Stage, 7pm
Danny Brown has been making waves in the hip hop world since the detroit native dropped XXX, and his rise since then has been meteoric with his latest album Old regarded as one of the best releases of 2013. He came as one of the most highly anticipated acts of Laneway and this was reflected in the crowd. I found this out fairly quickly after being caught in the moshpits, which left the sole of my shoe hanging by just a few threads. His set was as wild as his hair with Dope Song, Dip, Smoking and Drinking all creating bruise inducing mosh pits. Danny’s collaboration with Canadian producer Purity Ring also proved to be a crowd favourite, many members of the audience singing along to 25 Bucks as they were swept along in the motion of the crowd. It was a good performance, but after the enthusiasm shown by Run the Jewels Danny Brown only seemed to be going through the motions. He ended by pulling a few signature poses with his tongue poking out from his missing middle teeth, before quickly disappearing back stage.
Jamie xx, Cactus Stage, 8:15pm
Jamie xx is one half of the minimalistic duo the xx, a superstar group, as well as having created an absolutely stellar collection of his own remix’s. It was hard not to hold high expectations for his performance, but in the end I found his set disappointing. He showed little enthusiasm throughout his set. Even when playing upbeat house hits like Beat For or Sunset it felt like he was playing in a club rather than a stage, interacting minimally with the crowd. This didn’t stop people enjoying the music, which was a welcome drop in energy after the frenetic Danny Brown. His remix of Nosaj Thing’s Fog went down well with the crowd, but it was disappointing that he didn’t drop any of his tracks with Gil Scott-Heron. Overall, it was a lacklustre set from Jamie xx.
Chrvches, Hey Seuss Stage, 8:50pm
I often find it difficult to drum up enthusiasm for synth pop, so it came as a pleasant surprise how much I was enjoying the Glaswegian trio’s performance. That is right up until an equipment malfunction forced them to stop half way through their single Gun. Singer Lauren Mayberry exchanged quips about Lord of the Rings with the crowd but was forced to retire back stage while the audio technicians fixed the synthesisers. After five minutes they returned, firing through the singles of their 2013 album The Bones of What You Believe with Recover, Share and Lies to a delighted crowd. The trio made an impressive stadium sound, Lauren’s voice carrying over the crystalline synths and drum pads of the band to create a larger than life sound. Although the sound issues were (again) a disappointment, Chvrches showed their class in quickly bringing the crowd around after returning to the stage.
