Frequency – Day Two & Three.

It’s Sunday and we’re back from St. Pölten and this time also back from Frequency festival – and we had an awesome time there. But I’ll start from the beginning…

Friday started with a little dissapointment: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club had canceled. But, this things happen, what can you do. Next stop on our list were the Klaxons but they didn’t really hit us. But – great thing when you are on a festival – there is always another band playing on another stage in walking distance so we tried our luck with Yeasayer. And they were a lot of fun – really good and fun music to watch and to dance to.

And then the first main act of the day entered the stage: LCD Soundsystem. To my shame I have to admit, that I’ve never heard about them before – and I cannot thank Sebastian enough for introducing me to this great project! They rocked the festival crowed extremely and I still catch myself singing “Pow pow pow pow pow…”. James Murphy is amazing and his live band is superb! Can’t wait to see them hopefully soon again!

Then our evening held a very difficult decision for us: Massive Attack OR Tocotronic? Sebastian wanted to see Massive Attack – I wanted to see both. But as very very old and faithful Tocotronic fan I also couldn’t bare the thought to not go to see them. But my beloved partner in crime and knight in shining armor agreed to go with me and see Tocotronic – although I knew his heart burnt a little bit. But: Tocotronic was great!

I’ve seen them several times and for the first time I saw them playing “Bitte gebt mir meinen Verstand zurück” sung by Mr. Arne Zank! And this really made it worthwile! And there were more big hits like “Let there be Rock”, “Imitationen”, “Mein Ruin”, “Drüben auf dem Hügel”, “Die Idee ist gut doch die Welt noch nicht so weit” (von Dirk als “modern classic” passend betitelt), “Jungs hier kommt der Masterplan” and a lot more that culminated in “Freiburg”.  Dirk was wearing his Buffy T-Shirt and was a little bit more of a diva then I remembered from last time – but I love them! It’s like scrolling an old photo album for me… I was perfectly happy.

Well… for day three there was only one band left for us: Element of Crime. The last time we both had seen them was 2006 in Wattenscheid, Germany – almost exactly 4 years ago. It’s a little bit frightening how time flies. Anyway – they played a great concert, only some of the festival crowd were extremely annoying  during this wonderful evening.

But that’s the same old story with festivals – there are always people who give a crap for the band that’s playing up there. And if it is a loud act like LCD Soundsystem or Muse it doesn’t matter how much they moan and scream. But if it is a more quiet act like Element Of Crime – the rest of the audience is having a hard time. But they shut up eventually and Mr. Sven Regener and his partners in crime made a perfect last festival act for us.

And Mr. Sven Regener said: “So ist das. Und macht keinen Scheiß.”

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Frequency – More about day one.

Although we had some problems finding our way through the festival crowd, we arrived right on time for my personal main act: Mumford & Sons.

I got introduced to their music by my beloved friend Elisabeth on a short trip to Munich earlier this year – she had filed them in her Youtube playlist under “Happy Peppi” and I fell in love instantly.

Nevertheless – they were there and I was happy as a puppy. They played “Little Lion Man”, “Thisle & Weeds”, “Roll Away Your Stone”, some more songs from their LP and a new one during which Marcus Mumford played the drums! Sadly they only had about 45 min to play – I, and I think also the rest of the crowed could have listened to them longer.

They started their show with a lovely “Servus” and left with “Dankeschön” and everybody seemed totally touched by them. Everywhere you heard people talking about how great they were – I think that’s quite rare at feativals.

By the way: This was their first concert in Austria – can’t wait to see them soon again!!

The next thing to do of course was to go incognito in the festival crowd so I invested in awesome red sunglasses that make me extremely cool, yet a bit shortsighted…

Next act for us on the Race Stage: Gogol Bordello, a New York City Gipsy-Punk band that rocked the festival crowd extremly! They seem to consist of pure energy and the members of this quite big band are in constant movement. We really loved them – we just couldn’t decide if the lead singer looked more like Frank Zappa or Vincent Gallo…

Then Sebastian decided to watch Skunk Anansi but that isn’t really my cup of tea so I went with Nadja & Adam to see La Roux…

I know some of her music videos and I’m always fascinated by her androgynous style and the cool smooth pictures that go so well eith her music. But live… well… every song sounded the same for me and her strange story about how the day almost ended to be a nightmare because she forgot all her hair products wasn’t really helping.

But – we knew the evening held more for us and we waited unpationately for Muse!

I heard a lot about their live shows and I also have seen some great live acts – but I have never, NEVER ever seen something like that!

They had amazing visuals, a great light show, they had a laser show, smoke coming out everywhere and giant eyeball balloons that floated above the crowed. I can’t really describe it in detail – buy a ticket and see for yourself!

Very happy and very tired we fell asleep yesterday and I can’t wait to see what’s coming up for us today!

Later more…

Frequency – Day one.

First of all – a short note to myself: If you plan to have three marvellous festival days, plan to get up early to have enough time to get ready for your trip then I can only give you one advise: DON’T GET LOST IN BERMUDA DREIECK THE DAY BEFORE!

For all of those who think I got shipwrecked yesterday: No. I just had a great evening in one of the pubs located in the area in Viennas first district called Bermuda Dreieck. And even though I didn’t drown in stormy waters, I had a death-near experience this morning.

But, my beloved partner in crime took care of everything, including his hungover, grumpy and sick girlfriend and magically got us to the train. So – here we are! Me, still promising to NEVER EVER drink alcohol again, he smiling and reading a comic novel and two beloved friends already waiting in St. Pölten for us.

First stop is my parent’s and next stop are the awesome Mumford & Sons!

Later more…