First Annual Mountain Oasis Festival Successfully Takes Moogfest's Reins

When Asheville heard that our semi-beloved Moogfest would not be taking place this October, we were admittedly not devastated, but never ones to forget the promise of a good party, we collectively wondered: so what's taking its place then? Enter Mountain Oasis Electronic Music Summit, the newborn festival that has successfully greased the path for Moogfest to quietly step out to fulfill its greater life purpose in the springtime. After just a three-year run of the always-a-little-weird (not entirely cool weird) Moogfest, the much more clear-headed Mountain Oasis seems to be just the thing to satisfy Asheville's now desperate need for a pre-Halloween/end of festival season festival fix. 

Photo by AVL's own J Smilanic

The festival ran Fri Oct 25-Sun Oct 27, but having just spent a massive four days in Austin the previous weekend, I only bought a ticket for Saturday night. Also, I was really only intent on seeing electronic music pioneer Gary Numan and Nine Inch Nails, because, well, I didn't think I cared enough for Friday and Sunday's headliners and wasn't familiar with any of the non-headlining acts.

Fifteen minutes late, I calmly walked (cuz I got reprimanded for running) onto the US Cellular Center floor to find a sparse but mostly interested crowd swaying and nodding to Gary Numan. Dressed in a dark graphic tee and black jeans, the legend floated around the smoky stage, strangling the microphone, his trademark yowl slicing through the thick atmosphere. A setlist dominated by his most recent album Splinter, I was surprised at how heavy and, dare I say, gothic his sound has become--no easy tinky synth sounds of old--but the depth of it felt very, very good in my body.

Gary Numan on Saturday night. Photo by someone at NPR

I, probably like 99.99% of the crowd, only really knew his 1979 breakout hit "Cars," but it's Gary goddamn Numan, one of the first musicians to bring electronics to the pop scene, one of the major influences on Trent Reznor and Depeche Mode (and vice versa) and thereby every single electronic artist since. He may have completely fallen off the radar over the last 30 years, but when that man is in town, you go see his fucking show.

And all 12 of us were lucky to be there.

Later that night I spoke to him outside one of his tour buses, his black eyeliner bleeding down his aged but familiar face. Lovely guy. We rapped for a couple minutes before one of his crew pulled him away to do an interview on the bus, and my blood bubbled on medium-high heat with envy.

Nine Inch Nails, touring their first album in five years, was obviously a big draw as headliner (I still made it into the venue and wherever I wanted in the crowd with relative ease). T-Rez is apparently at the top of his game, several years sober and looking damn good, all buff and shit. His new album Hesitation Marks shows he's not as angry as he always famously was, which is fine, but he still delivers his classic material with convincing outrage. My favorite moment was the catharsis of shout-singing "Head Like a Hole." Yerrrrssss.

Saturday night had a very tough, gloomy feel, but in plowing through the darkness, my heart became light.

So I found myself at the festival again on Sunday. I remember PANTyRAiD being ridiculous but having sweet dancers and Disclosure generally blowing my mind, but it was the weekend's closer that fractured us only to glue us all together again in perfect symmetry. Yes of course it was fucking Pretty Lights.

Now I've always felt sort of pffft about Pretty Lights via stereo system, but I am often surrounded by people who are real serious about him, and I was curious to see what all the hullabaloo was about. While under normal circumstances I would never consider standing in the back balcony, that's where my crew was, and WOW! I stood corrected. The sound was fantastic, the view of the madness below (and all around) unparalleled.

Pretty Lights really were...
Photo by J Smilanic

Derek Smith (aka Pretty Lights) and his tight live band threw down with an energy I can't even imagine summoning eight days a week like they do. To me, obviously, it was fresh, a magnetic whirlpool into which the crowd was immediately swept. Best light show I've ever seen. The man himself was noticeably intoxicated, but it only amusingly affected his speech, not his groove. As for my groove? I managed to bust any and all of my moves in that small foot space between seat rows. Success.

A little humbled, a lot awed, and apparently just now recovered from it, I bless the forehead of the newly christened, bouncing baby Mountain Oasis. Let Asheville nurture it, and it will grow.



     

Well Color Me Happy, Look at All These Touring Bands

It's been a few weeks since I last blogged, so I want to give y'all an idea of what's going on over here.

Firstly, Depeche Mode is a good month into their Delta Machine World Tour, and they appear to be in great shape. European audiences are leaving arenas triumphantly teary-eyed, and the photos I've seen of these performances look delightful. I'm really digging the stage design by Anton Corbijn (as usual). Their setlist had found a comfortable, unchanging rhythm over the last couple weeks, but I predicted they would be pulling out some surprises for the two London shows this week. Sho nuf, they did. Check out the May 29 setlist here, which includes the long-beloved "Behind the Wheel" and "World In My Eyes," among others. This pleases me. I'm confident that by the time they get to me in September the setlist will be as titillatingly unpredictable as Martin Gore's preferred gender for the night.

In other news, Trent Reznor has been a busy beaver this year, not only releasing an album with his new band How to Destroy Angels, but he's also been recording a new Nine Inch Nails album, the first since '08, which he's kept under wraps but says is now complete. Looks like he'll be combining HTDA and NIN tours this year, which as of yet includes only five US dates. But wouldn't ya know it, Asheville is one of them! The first ever Mountain Oasis Electronic Music Summit this October, which will boot Moogfest to next spring, is being headlined by Nine Inch Nails (along with Bassnectar and Pretty Lights); How to Destroy Angels are also in the lineup. This is a major pull for the newborn festival. After their appearances in AVL, the Reznor machine heads to New Orleans to throw down at Voodoo Fest.

Since their album release in March, Thom Yorke's new band Atoms for Peace has tinkered with a few shows and DJ sets on both sides of the Atlantic, but this July they'll embark on a proper little 24-date tour. They've got just six US dates on tap between a heavy European and Japanese rotation. The closest show to me will be a seven hour drive to Fairfax, VA (random?), but I might just go if they don't add anything closer. I've never seen Radiohead or any Thom Yorke incarnations live, and I simply don't want to wait much longer.

Nothing new on the Radiohead front. Word is still that they'll be heading into the studio this fall (there is a break between AFP shows from the end of July to the end of September) to begin work on their ninth album. Seriously can't wait for more news on that.

As for a personal report, I haven't been to many shows lately, but I did see Bob Dylan last month here in Asheville! I never properly reviewed it, but I will tell you I was pleasantly surprised. Everyone was saying he's so old and not giving any fucks and all that, but he put on a good show. I drifted in and out of engagement because I didn't recognize the majority of his setlist (and I was a bit wobbly from whiskey), but he did play a few classics, and he did rock it and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. The man's a legend, you ungrateful little shits.

K LOVE YOU BYE!

Next time: Reflections on Slash's autobiography, groupiedom, and I sit down to consciously listen to the Rolling Stones for the first time in my life. No, really.