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Howler on the Red Marquee Stage
The crowd gathered at Red Marquee Sunday afternoon didn’t seem particularly energized for anything. It’s a rough period – the afternoon of the last day of a music festival that has been surprisingly, oppressively hot. Summoning up energy for anything at 1:50 in the afternoon sounds like a herculean task. Minneapolis-band Howler had to perform to this crowd, and for the first few songs it didn’t look like the crowd, save for a few arm-wavers in the front, were having any of it. To Howler’s credit, though, they delivered a fast-moving set full of catchy hooks that ended up waking a good portion of the crowd up.
Howler played sun-soaked rock music, the sort of post-Strokes stuff that became the norm of underground scenes for the past decade. The group’s personal touch on it are snarky lyrics (which couldn’t really be heard at Red Marquee) and an appreciation for 1950’s American rock. Some tracks featured beach-pop elements (the appropriate-enough “Beach Sluts”) while others would have felt at home in a Leave It To Beaver-era diner (well, ignoring the lyrics, but it was hard to make those out Sunday). Lead-singer Jordan Gatesmith also came across as very affable, and his laid-back attitude made Howler’s ramshackle rock go down even easier. The crowd could still go for a nap, but Howler helped pick things up Sunday afternoon.
Photo by Julen Esteban-Pretel, see more photos here.
