Hi everyone, welcome back to Crow’s Nest. I’m avoiding my usual 2+ week gap with issues as I feel bad for not getting everything I wanted in to last week’s issue. Almost certainly made the right choice with that but definitely had some points I wanted to get to. That’s life.
Also got a selection of music from the past week below. Not as many as a typical issue, more like a Top 5? If you like this format more let me know and maybe I’ll tweak future issues.
Anyway, I had meant to write this last week. And the week before, before work got in the way. And last year after attending for the first time, and having such a great time I felt I should let people know about it. But life got in the way last time and the opportunity I felt I had slipped through my fingers, so to speak. I dislike feeling as though not writing about and only disseminating it through word-of-mouth was the appropriate move to gatekeep it from more casual attendees who might lessen the quality of future experiences, to the extent I’m capable of such a thing, but it felt like the right thing to do.
What am I talking about? Making Time, a dance music festival that takes place at Fort Mifflin in Philadelphia. Yes, really: a 5-stage, 3-day festival that takes place on the grounds of a Revolutionary War-era fort next to the Philadelphia airport. It’s a bit different than your typical festival environs, and that’s part of its charm. The culmination of local promoter Dave P.’s decades-long “TRANSCENDENTAL plan” of bringing high-quality club and electronic music to Philadelphia, the fest is very obviously a labor of love for Dave and his collaborators and partners. Prices outside the bar are low compared to similar offerings elsewhere, and little advertising or sponsored content is present on the festival grounds. I wouldn’t say Making Time is anti-capitalist in that regard, but it’s much more pleasant than everything being saturated with sponsors. The lineup both years I’ve attended is drool-worthy for heads who follow underground electronic music closely; I bought a ticket of trust before the lineup was announced this year, and spent the morning after the lineup was announced trying not to squeal with excitement poring over who all would be performing.
Of course, a small crew running such a complex operation is not without its issues. Several announced acts were unceremoniously dropped from the lineup and schedule in the lead-up to the event, including Avalon Emerson & the Charm day-of. Quick communication occurred through Dave P.’s Instagram, and I’m not on the platform, so I missed, for example, that Azu Tiwaline and DJ Plead’s live set got moved to an indoor stage last minute. Overall, I didn’t exactly have a peak-time moment over the course of the 3 days that really made me feel like it was an exceptional choice to go. Perhaps the novelty wore off from the first time? Such moments can be quite elusive even when everything goes right, though, and it’s hard to fault anyone but me for that. I don’t regret going, and I am strongly considering returning, but it does make the experience feel a bit lesser than the previous trip.
The biggest issue throughout the weekend was the weather: Tropical Storm Ophelia brought a lot of rain and wind to Philly during the weekend, prompting a 5-hour delay to opening on Saturday and causing the grounds to turn into a muddy mess. That part sucked, though admittedly the early Saturday afternoon schedule was a weak point, and thankfully the schedule was packed enough that it didn’t ruin the day. The outdoor stages were tented this year, which cut off some of the exceptional light show the Klip Collective put on, but that was undoubtedly for the best. Other bars shifted and whole chunks of Fort Mifflin got roped off to try to preserve some of the grounds. Everyone from Dave to the staffers to the artists to attendees seemed to take a ‘well, let’s roll with it’ attitude towards things which helped. I certainly didn’t take time off work to fly to another city to hang in a hotel and browse high street shops; sometimes you just gotta watch your step then hose off your Docs in the hotel shower at the end of the day.
Due to my flight time and traffic, I didn’t get to Fort Mifflin in time for Haliu Mergia, so my first act on Friday (around 6 PM) was Lena Willikens and Vladimir Ivkovic. Their slowly-paced, semi-haunted set was a good warmup to brace for the weekend to come as winds picked up and one got the sense this weekend wasn’t going to be all good vibes and open ecstasy. I then settled in for Scottish duo Optimo, whose leftfield synth-pop selections should be familiar to longtime Crow’s Nest readers, alongside a cheeky drop of AC/DC’s ‘Highway to Hell’ late in the set. Headlining Friday was Overmono’s live A/V show. I’ve enjoyed their work since they emerged with the Arla EPs, but their set didn’t really captivate me. A couple of white Brits going hard to their own sample-heavy music isn’t a great look; the repurposement was so apparent, and while it is a legitimate artistic practice, it doesn’t sit well with me when presented like that. I bounced around a bit and decided to head inside the fort for Objekt once I heard them doing something with ‘Functions on the Low’. Objekt’s set, along with Helena Hauff closing out the main stage, made for a solid night of dancing in my book.
Overnight brought the rain and, consequently, the delay on opening for Saturday. Getting the updated scheduled en route, the first act I really enjoyed on Saturday was Kate NV. I caught her earlier this year at Sleeping Village, but since then she’s gotten even better. One of her songs ended when the bass from her buildup tripped a circuit for the stages’ AV system. Annoying, but you have to remember that the stage is in a fort casemate that was instrumental in holding off the British and allowing the Continental Army to regroup for the winter at Valley Forge 246 years ago. That it can even host a couple hundred people, a club soundsystem and corresponding light show with only some technical issues is an impressive accomplishment. Not that her previous work doesn’t rule, but Kate’s next album is gonna be incredible. I believe I then headed out and spent an hour or so taking in DJ Nobu; my memory’s a bit hazy outside of the highlights at this point.
Back inside the fort, Solar & Mozghan were my next highlight. They weren’t on my radar until I went through the fest’s playlist. The former has been a Bay Area techno producer who’s been at it for decades, the latter a relative newcomer. Together, the pair bridge the gap between deep knowledge and contemporary stylings that brings about something phenomenal between them. It’s also a type of pairing that doesn’t get much attention outside of those in the know, which is a great kinda-hidden gem at a festival like this, but unfortunate in that they may languish more outside said sphere than they deserve. Batu closed out my Saturday with a solid hour which, while not as adventurous as the all night booking at Podlasie I caught him at last week, was never not good enough to contemplate heading out from.
Sunday started on time but the rain continued, and if Saturday’s mud was worse than Riot Fest, the additional grounds reorganization and further foot traffic and beyond made it clear everyone was trying their best but that there was no way around the mud. The ground was more solid under the tents, and a couple hours of Maurice Fulton’s post-disco thump was the first great set from the final day. While it was tranquil to start at the main stage, the ferocious, gabber-like feminist assault from the independent duo Pelada in the casemate felt more cathartic to me than Laraaji or Mary Lattimore and Julianna Barwick. It wasn’t that only women and female-identifying persons could truly appreciate Peleda’s militancy, but I found it amusing that every person who couldn’t handle their rage appeared to be a dude.
To the extent I hadn’t been before, I really started feeling the wear of 3 days of dance and mud at this point, so I largely stuck to the outdoor side stage. Anz provided a solid mix of classic cuts mixed with contemporary work, including her own tunes. HAAi brought a more militant, minimal-hard style that’s more in vogue but can wear on you after a while; a lightly-edited ‘Everything In Its Right Place’ drop during her set was a good touch.
The final set I caught on Sunday was from local producer Josh Wink, billed as ‘Josh Wink's "TRANSCENDENTAL State of Consciousness" (A TRANSCENDENTAL Journey into 90's RAVE)’. Crow’s Nest readers know I am deeply skeptical of nostalgia and particularly 90s rave nostalgia, but I felt the opportunity to take it in was worth seeing out. Given the changes that have occurred in dance music since its supposed peak, a specialist set from an originator was an intriguing proposition. The one-bar loops, acid lines, sci-fi voice samples optimistic about technology and the future, the striving for utopianism, all of it was a refreshing change of pace from contemporary dance music. It didn’t feel hard or competitive in the ways social media can make dance music feel these days. Unlike Riot Fest’s predatory commercial feeling towards nostalgia and bringing out older acts, Josh Wink’s set didn’t feel tied to a calendar anniversary or an attempt to get fence-sitters to buy tickets; rather, it felt way more like the appropriate thing to do, to give a local legend their flowers while they’re still around, reintroduce them to new audiences, bridge the gap between the past and present, and show people how it can be done. When I listen to older music from the 90s or so, I’m often struck by how some of the ideas encapsulated in them have died out from contemporary works, and how refreshing different drum patterns or even a focus on melody over texture and intensity can stand the test of time. Looking to the past as a way to improve the future remains an underrated activity, and making a little time to do so is well worth the endeavor, like the weekend as a whole.
Often, getting back from a festival (and posting about it) is the end of the story. Not here though. Making Time and the mud damaged the grounds of Fort Mifflin extensively, and the fort’s a small enough nonprofit that a $10k+ restoration bill is beyond their means. Heading into the fort’s busy haunting season tours, such a problem can be of existential concern. Consequently, Dave P. quickly organized a benefit show and fundraiser for the grass, which had raised 80% of the goal by the time I received an email about it the next day. (Yes, I threw them a few bucks.)
There are many issues I can think of with such an ask, but it does speak highly of the community and partnership that enables such fundraising. Compare this with Riot Fest, where public park access and the use for private events by attendees largely outside the neighborhood is a constant source of tension. Douglass Park cannot host a fall soccer league because of the event-related closures and park damage, and RF spends a lot of time and effort at politics and image management to retain enough social capital to operate in the park. I find it hard to imagine, were RF not (likely) contractually obligated to help restore the parkland following any damage, that the same scenario were to occur in Chicago. That Fort Mifflin trusts Dave P. and the other partners to do the right thing with an eye towards future, hopefully less muddy events, speaks highly of all who are involved. May the next event be even more transcendent than the last.
A disorienting, intriguingly oddball post-punk record out of Leipzig via local label Trouble in Mind. Peculiar synth sounds throughout, plenty of tom-heavy chug over the riff-y power jangle I like from Francophone groups, there’s even a bit of B-52s/Stereolab vocal harmony going on if either of those groups had taken cues from lo-fi punk. I have no regrets about or intention not to wear this one out until it fully infests my brain.
I enjoyed Osaka when I visited it this summer. Probably should have spent more time there, and I still think about the boulevardier I got at a cocktail bar there. This archival punk reissue, by a band fronted by future award-winning novelist Machida Machizo from there, has been in heavy rotation since I first spun it. Full of first-wave (post-)punk energy, the B-side in particular brings a strong intensity that few bands even today can match, right on through the end pair of ‘Merry-Go-Round’ and ‘Gonna Crack’. The abrupt cutoff of the former has to be a production error, unfortunately, though it remains perfect noise for when modern times need to fight fire with fire in that regard.
Not the only band named Goat to drop an album last Friday, the Swedish psych weirdos have a full Bandcamp stream for their album while the Japanese group only has Boomkat snippets from what I can tell. Anyway, the Swedes here look to the past to move their sound forward, pulling strongly from 60s and 70s British psych in a manner I don’t recall on previous records. There’s also some progg influence from their fellow countrymen. Well worth a spin if you’re intrigued.
Normally Rupert Clervaux's compositions don't stick with me--they're a little too detailed and dense to be casually listenable. This collaboration with Dania is more restrained and thus manages to avoid feeling like you showed up to your literature class without doing the reading. Long, longform drone work with a strong feeling that’s either celestial or fully grounded in nature and the breath. I'm reminded of what I think is Julianna Barwick's early work, stretched out into a 2x LP with each piece taking up a full side. If I was into meditation this might be a good soundtrack for that, but it works well for other evening relaxation sessions.
Dutch trio comforter2—that’d be Meetsysteem, Tammo Hesselink & Marianne Noordzij—describes itself as “a band for club heads and a club act for band heads”. I’ve never heard of a band head before, but I’ll roll with it. The trio is more late-90s trip-hop than The Rapture’s secondcoming in that regard, especially as Noordzij sounds like a smoked-out Nina Cristante (bar italia) on the mic. They fold in other influences from electronica, indie dance and other waves of the band-meets-club idea. Honestly ‘bar italia buys a synthesizer and an arpeggiator and sells their guitars’ is not a bad descriptor overall of them. It definitely sags a bit and I’m not sure where I’d put them on a festival bill if I were booking them, but it makes for a solid listen nonetheless.
Ninja Tune continues its great work straddling between the mainstream and underground dance music circles with this single from nonbinary producers I. JORDAN and Planningtorock. I have no idea what the title stands for, but an infectiously joyous, slightly understated 2-versions single like this always is worth your time.
Alright, I’m calling that issue #59 of Crow’s Nest. As always, thank you for reading, and I hope you found something within that you enjoyed. There’s plenty more new music coming, and I’ll be back in a few weeks with the cream of the crop for those. Until next time.