After a week home, I’m going to document my week at Cornerstone Festival, mostly for my own archival purposes. This is built on posts on the cornerstonefestival.com blog with a little more details and commentary here.
Day 2 was a pretty big day for me. So far, the festival has been mostly about discovering bands that I’ve never heard of and that’s pretty cool, but I was ready to see some of my favorites like The Violet Burning, Anberlin, and Over the Rhine on Thursday.
However, the afternoon was usurped by some more new bands that I’ve never heard of and wow, was I impressed. We started off the day at the New Band Stage to see The Divine Soldiers. Unfortunately, they showed up late and only had time for two songs, but it was enough for some fun hip-hop with lush female background vocals. Too bad they couldn’t have played some more. After that, Tifah took the stage and I was taken by surprise by their intense but relaxed sound that reminded me a little of one of my favorites, Over the Rhine, though not exactly like them. A violin and electric guitars accompanied bass and drums with piano to produce a big sound. They even did a cover of Radiohead’s “Karma Police” which was totally different than the original, but impressive all on it’s own.
Micheal Pritzl performed a solo set at the Gallery stage before his set with The Violet Burning tonight. Pritzl took requests from the audience and even ribbed some of his friends like Doug Van Pelt of HM Magazine and John Thompson who watched on from the crowd. After that show, the band Paper Route played and I couldn’t get over how many different instruments each band member could play. They swapped guitars for keyboards and then for shakers and all sorts of stuff and took me by surprise.
The big news of the evening came when I learned that Relient K’s bus blew up. No really, as in burned to the ground on the way to Illinois. I hope everyone is okay. That was unfortunate for us because it totally changed the Main Stage schedule. That was good for Jonezetta, who gained a Main Stage slot and from what I hear rocked it out, that was bad for me because it pushed Anberlin into the headline slot and therefore in conflict with Leigh Nash. Bummer.
The power cut out during the middle of the Violets set, but it didn’t dampen the energy on stage. They still managed to bring enough rock to satisfy my rock n’ roll craving. After getting a great spot (and taking some of my favorite photos yet!) of The Violet Burning at the Gallery tent, I decided I’d best bunker down for the evening there. I wanted to run down to the Main Stage to see Anberlin, but that would probably mean giving up this prime real estate. Plus, it would also mean missing Ric Hordinski with Leigh Nash which was a combination that intrigued me to no end. So I stayed put.
The performances in between did far more than pass the time. Ric took the stage with his band Monk and jammed it out with his three-piece band. Hordinski’s bemused facial expressions are priceless and he has no fear of abusing his guitar as he runs the strings across the tent poll, slaps them with a guitar cord and in general, bangs the strings about as hard as he can. The bass player hopped around and bounced on his feet while the drummer was just as active. Rosie Thomas followed and I’ll admit that I’m only familiar with her work by way of Sufjan Stevens, but her squeaky voice is quickly replaced by beautiful singing. Her songs are beautiful and her stage banter is cute in an awkward way. Her alter-ego, Sheila, even made a guest appearance at the end of the show.
Monk proved to be a great backup band for Leigh Nash. I enjoyed her show last year where she was only accompanied by an acoustic guitar, but this show had a lot more depth to it. Michelle Thompson of The Wayside shared the stage to sing background for a couple of songs as Leigh Nash once again charmed us with her sweet vocals and banter about her son.
Over the Rhine is probably one of the big reasons I go to Cornerstone this, so this night was pretty much the apex of the festival for me. Thankfully, it wasn’t all downhill from there. Karin Bergquist and Linford Detweiler have become standards for this midnight slot at the Gallery tent and year after year they prove why they deserve it. The four-piece band with Mickey Grimm and Jake Bradley debuted many songs from their upcoming album The Trumpet Child. Grimm got halfway into an amazing drum solo when the power cut out again at the Gallery stage, but it didn’t deter the drummer as he frantically continued. In no time the power was back on and he never missed a beat. Good times.
I have to say that the ladies really brought their “A” game today. Between all the vocalists and instrumentalists in The Divine Soliders, Tifah, Rosie Thomas, Leigh Nash, and Over the Rhine, there was much talent to balance out the overwhelming testosterone in rock and roll here at Cornerstone and the festival is so much the better for it.