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Riot Fest 2023: 9/15-9/17

The Cure's Robert Smith

BY JORDAN MAINZER

So was this the biggest Riot Fest yet? Maybe in terms of headliners, but the festival still felt like the type to bring together bands new and old, paying just as much mind to presenting up-and-coming artists with a punk rock ethos as the legends who spearheaded those scenes to begin with. Here were our favorite sets.

Quasi's Sam Coomes

Quasi

The amount of sound that Sam Coomes and Janet Weiss got out of keyboard (plus affects), drums, and vocals was mesmerizing. Quasi, 10 albums deep, certainly showcased their latest opus, Breaking the Balls of History (Sub Pop), nailing the tempo changes of "Nowheresville" and warbling harmonics of "Riots & Jokes". But they also reminded you why they've been such a consistent force since the early 90's. Those unfamiliar with the band watched as Coomes unceasingly made his keyboard sound like a guitar on the clattering "The Rhino", or like a Peanuts-style barroom jaunt on "Unto Itself". Weiss, meanwhile, ever the impressive multi-tasker (watching her, you gain an appreciation for the difficulty of playing drums and harmonizing), rhythmically swung on the soulful "Back In Your Tree" and pummeled "Last Long Laugh". And yes, "Doomscrollers" was awesome.

Quasi's Janet Weiss

Yard Act's James Smith

Yard Act

Seeing a talk-singing band at a festival has its risks. What if the sound mix is off and the band overshadows the singer? And what if that singer is someone like Yard Act's James Smith, who delivers such beautifully acerbic words you don't want to miss? Not to worry at Riot Fest. You could hear him perfectly, his lyrical dexterousness and emcee-like flow shining on tracks like set opener "Rich" and "The Trapper's Pelts". But the band itself also provided breaks for Smith, embarking on extended jams during "Land of the Blind" and a full-blown disco breakdown on their latest single, "The Trench Coat Museum". Overall, what separates Yard Act from so many of their peers in the UK post-punk scene is a unique mix of cynicism and humanity, tightly wound compositions and inescapable boogie-downs. "The future is terrifying," remarked Smith before performing "100% Endurance", imploring the crowd to live in the moment. What normally might be forced seemed all the more genuine coming from him. Or, as the band might say, "It's hippy bullshit, but it's true."

Yard Act's Sam Shipstone

Screaming Females (from left to right: Marissa Paternoster, Jarrett Dougherty, Mike Abbate)

Screaming Females

With a mere 40 minutes to play, New Jersey heroes Screaming Females managed to fit in some of their hookiest songs with enough room to breathe in between them. The set contained plenty of intro jams, Marissa Paternoster's relentless shredding, Mike Abbate's brawny basslines, and Jarrett Dougherty's rich snares, from "Brass Bell" to "Wishing Well". And the band serenaded us with side 1 track 1 of their finest, Albini-produced hour, Ugly's "It All Means Nothing", sounding as crispy as ever.

The Breeders' Kim Deal and Josephine Wiggs

The Breeders

I find that the quality of experience of full album plays at a concert or festival are dependent on a few factors: whether the band are good instrumentalists, whether the songs are as effectively sequenced as a live set as they are a studio album, and the rarity of the material itself, in the band's recent history or as a past full album play. For The Breeders this year, 2 out of 3 ain't bad. While I would have pined at the opportunity to see them blast through Pod, you cannot deny the anthemic quality and musical significance of Last Splash, cementing the band in indie rock history and introducing to the world the quick learning of Kim Deal's sister Kelley. And to me, it doesn't matter that I saw the band perform Last Splash twice for the album's 20th anniversary back in 2013. It will never get old to hear Kim bark "Check / check / check / One, two" into a harmonica mic, anticipating Jim Macpherson's introductory click-clack and Josephine Wiggs' all-timer of a sinewy bass line. Throughout their set, The Breeders demonstrated what I believe they've always done best, even better than the Pixies or Nirvana, creating an interplay between the gentle and the raw and the distorted. Oh, and they did have time for a few more at the end, including "Iris". Here's to the Pod 40th anniversary set at Riot Fest 2030.

Turnstile's Brendan Yates

Turnstile

Talk about dynamics! If most hardcore bands rely on intense cacophony, the Baltimore band's crossover appeal comes in the form of not even their hooks but their melodies. In between ferocious versions of "MYSTERY", "BLACKOUT", and other game changers from Turnstile's breakout record GLOW ON, they traded fist-pumps for dance-offs, drum solos, ballads ("ALIEN LOVE CALL"), and moments of ambience and quiet. At the center of it all is lead vocalist Brendan Yates and his unique timbre, at once forceful and gorgeous on back catalog highlights like "Real Thing". Turnstile is one of a kind; when they thank you for letting them be themselves, it's not just a sly Sly reference. They mean it.

Turnstile touring member Meg Mills (left) and bassist "Freaky" Franz Lyons (right)

From left to right: Foo Fighters' Rami Jaffee, Dave Grohl, Josh Freese

Foo Fighters

In previewing Dave Grohl and company's headlining set, I suggested folks "catch Foo Fighters performing songs from their best album since The Colour and the Shape." Taking the stage after Turnstile ended, they shockingly proceeded to play absolutely nothing from But Here We Are. Okay, according to setlist.fm, both "Rescued" and "Glass" were on the setlist, but not performed. Grohl, perhaps taking a page from his one-time mop-topped bandmate, is the ultimate showman, preferring to elongate songs from silence to build to climax (opener "All My Life", church-organ-hue-to-full-band "Times Like These"), tell stories (the one you've heard about 13-year-old Grohl going to see Naked Raygun and Rights of the Accused at the Cubby Bear with his cousin), and launch into a medley of covers when introducing his band ("Sabotage", "Blitzkrieg Bop", "Whip It", an impressively loud version of Nine Inch Nails' "March of the Pigs"). Yes, some of the spontaneous moments were probably gimmicks. Even though the camera panned to fans in Metallica and Black Sabbath t-shirts when Grohl stuffed riffs from "Enter Sandman" and "Paranoid" in "No Son of Mine", as if he was doing the covers for the people in the t-shirts, past and future setlists show evidence of the same exact shtick. But when a crowd member shouted out a request for Wasting Light deep cut "White Limo"--not done consistently for at least the past couple album cycles--the band, including new drummer Josh Freese, absolutely nailed it. Grohl is also, thankfully, self-aware, noting before playing the maudlin "My Hero" that, "The good thing about a Foo Fighters show is if you don't know the song, just look at the minivan driver next to you. They'll know what to do." Yet, his unavoidable role as leader of the band for the common person doesn't prevent him from being earnest. The set's best moment came when the band played There Is Nothing Left To Lose's "Aurora", the first song Grohl wrote with the late Taylor Hawkins, the drummer's favorite Foo Fighters song. It ascended to a guttural scream, a quick moment of catharsis before some true professionals went back to work.

Jehnny Beth

The Savages frontwoman seems to be just getting started as a solo artist. After releasing the underrated To Love Is To Live in 2020 and a collaboration with Primal Scream's Bobby Gillespie in 2021, Beth gave Riot Fest a collection of heady, yet horny industrial tunes. Her presence captivated onlookers above the skittering beat and deep bass of "Heroine" and the propulsive techno of "We Will Sin Together". She entered the crowd multiple times throughout the set, establishing a warm camaraderie much different than the pure intensity of Savages. And her voice, as ever, was on point, rising above backing tracks and her band (including guitarist/keyboardist Johnny Hostile) with her belt and quintessential yelps. And if Foo Fighters gave us a taste of NIN the night prior, Beth performed her cover of "Closer" in its entirety, a song whose salacious subject matter fits right in with Beth's ethos. To get a taste of what she and her band sounded like (including two new songs played at Riot Fest), check out the just released LIVE EP (20L07 Music).

Viagra Boys

The self-described "Sweden's third worst band" essentially distilled all of the best moments from their show at The Salt Shed earlier this year into a tight 45 minutes of bangers. They started off with mostly highlights from their most recent album Cave World, the stars of the show as usual mostly shirtless singer Sebastian Murphy, guitarist-saxophonist Oscar Carls (donning a white shirt with the word "GOGO" in bold black print), and Tor Sjödén's breakneck timekeeping. As the set went on, even if you were familiar with their routine as I was, it never got old, from the disco breakdown of "Ain't Nice" to Carls' bleating intro to "ADD" and gyrations during "Research Chemicals". Perhaps new this time was Murphy's push-ups during "Sports", noises dripping like molasses out of his mouth and into the microphone on the floor. If a full concert reveals Viagra Boys in all of their fascinating contradictions, a festival exemplifies their id, a group of stellar musicians at their most absurdly sleazy and stunningly surreal.

Viagra Boys' Sebastian Murphy

PUP

Talk about a victory lap: Saturday at Riot Fest marked a year and a half since PUP's most recent studio full-length, THE UNRAVELING OF PUPTHEBAND (Rise), as well as their last show for a while as they take a touring break. It was also a good summation of a moment in time for the band. They were capable of displaying the cleaner sound and hooks of their more recent material, like the 60's pop harmonies of "Totally Fine". But they also resembled the band who can reliably rip your ass with the one-two life-affirming punch of "If This Tour Doesn't Kill You, I Will" and "DVP", and who can casually return back to their roots on a rare song played from their self-titled, "Reservoir". They're still the best Toronto rave-uppers this side of METZ.

From left to right: (PUP's Stefan Babcock & Nestor Chumak)

Crowd at PUP

Death Cab For Cutie

If I'm going by the same three rules I laid out when covering The Breeders, then Death Cab For Cutie performing Transatlanticism in full covers rules one (capable instrumentalists) and sort-of three (rarity of material). They don't often play many of the Transatlanticism deep cuts on a regular basis, which made hearing the album in full at golden hour worthwhile for diehards. But there was sort of a reason "Death of an Interior Decorator" didn't intoxicate the same way "The Sound of Settling" did, the latter with a wordless chorus unfamiliar crowd members learned on the spot. Death Cab didn't meet rule two: The band's breakout album is top-heavy and slow-paced, not nearly as fun of a live experience as Last Splash or The Postal Service's Give Up. At the same time, in a vacuum, each song performance contained its own thrills, whether the guitar distortion and crescendos of "The New Year" and the album's title track, the squeaky chair sway of "Lightness", or the driving keyboards of "We Looked Like Giants". Especially as compared to Death Cab's later material, though, the band here was less riotous, more contemplative.

Queens of the Stone Age

As they walked out to Peggy Lee's "Smile", I couldn't help but think that Queens of the Stone Age was, as recently as early this year, one of the less likely bands to emerge under the lights at Riot Fest. Since 2017's Villains, Josh Homme had kicked a photographer in the face during a concert and faced a deserved public chiding, been embroiled in a bitter divorce with ex-wife Brody Dalle, and been diagnosed with and successfully fought cancer. It's understandable that he wasn't even sure he wanted to record the band's latest album In Times New Roman... (Matador) given the ups and downs, but it came out, and here was the band. The record is pretty much what you'd expect, with the band's quintessentially swaggering riffs and thudding beats, Homme's spooky, warbling falsetto, goofy portmanteaus, and lyrical head-scratchers. (See: "Voyeurism-jism may cause blurry visions on opener "Obscenery".) During their sub-headlining set, QOTSA performed the appropriate tracks from their new record. Fatalistic worldview be damned, "Negative Space" sported siren-like guitars to match its buzzing rhythm section. Instead of "Paper Machete", whose titular object is certainly a metaphor for the purportedly "all bark, no bite" Dalle, the band opted for "Emotion Sickness". Homme repeated the refrain, "Baby don't care for me," referring to his divorce but in a large festival setting ambiguous enough to conjure a singalong from anyone who has ever been a part of a decaying relationship. And then there was the slow funk psychedelia of "Carnavoyeur", on which Homme sings, "Accept, enjoy the view / When there's nothing I can do / I smile," maybe the reason they walked out to Peggy Lee, continuing to bare their teeth when life tries to get them down.

Mr. Bungle's Mike Patton

Mr. Bungle

Given that Faith No More and Mr. Bungle cancelled tour dates in 2021 due to Mike Patton's health--including that year's Riot Fest--Saturday night's Mr. Bungle set felt like a triumph. Walking out to an atonal version of Richard Strauss' "Also sprach Zarathustra, op. 30", the all-star lineup of a pig-tailed Patton, guitarists Trey Spruance and Scott Ian, bassist Trevor Dunn, and drummer Dave Lombardo went on to slay nonstop. Immediately notable, of course, was Patton's shapeshifting voice, emulating a digeridoo at one moment and forcibly chanting the next, screeching at warped speed in between. Though they played mostly from their excellent 2020 album The Raging Wrath Of The Easter Bunny Demo (Ipecac), it wouldn't have been a Mr. Bungle set without covers, from the fitting (Slayer's "Hell Awaits", Sepultura's "Territory"), to the unexpectedly beautiful (10cc's "I'm Not in Love", Spandau Ballet's "True"), to the nonsensical (the Pepto Bismol jingle). For the fans that had waited all day to get front row or even the casual listener, it was a performance well worth the wait.

Mr. Bungle's Trevor Dunn

Mr. Bungle's Scott Ian

From left to right: Thursday's Tucker Rule, Geoff Rickly, Tim Payne

Thursday

With weather delaying the gate opening until just before 2 PM and all sets scheduled before then cancelled, perennial Riot Festers and New Jersey heroes Thursday played an abridged set that was the first of the day for many. Since they started right at 2, the crowd was, at first, very sparse. Geoff Rickly decided to give people time to filter in, the band starting with a slow song, cheekily, "Running From The Rain". From there, it was like the Thursday CliffsNotes: "Signals Over the Air", "Cross Out The Eyes", "Understanding in a Car Crash", the works. Ever the appreciative and charismatic frontperson, Rickly shouted out the cancelled bands, mentioned that none other than Gorilla Biscuits were going to let them do a song were they themselves cancelled, and called touring with headliners The Cure 20 years ago "one of the best experiences of our lives." By the time they finished with "War All The Time", the title track of an album celebrating its own two decades, the crowd was, thankfully, Thursday-sized.

Ride

"This is a song from Nowhere not about death," is how Ride vocalist and rhythm guitarist Mark Gardener introduced "Taste". It made me think: Even if you do pay attention to this band's lyrics, their songs have an inherently uplifting sound, and especially live. From the get-go, the legendary in-and-out Hammond organ riff from "Leave Them All Behind", the band enveloped the crowd in a tornado of noise, whether on melodic later material like "Future Love" and "Lannoy Point" or the stunning "Vapour Trail", which saw Andy Bell capture the spirit of the song's violin with his guitar. They closed with "Seagull", whose opening bass riff inspired various crowd members to bounce up and down, including yours truly, even after standing in line for three hours on day three of a massive festival.

Ride's Mark Gardener

Ride's Andy Bell

Gorilla Biscuits

During their set at Riot Fest, someone turned to me and mentioned they saw Gorilla Biscuits at Metro in the early 90s as a teenager. The person next to him replied, "I learned about them like I learned about all music: Tony Hawk Pro Skater." Such is the life of a classic hardcore band playing at a punk festival in 2023. Leave it to the New Yorkers to break the rules of full album plays, though. Though a horn section came out to call them on to the stage, just like "New Direction" opens, they interrupted their play-through of Start Today with a few songs from their self-titled debut as well as a cover of "Minor Threat". Anthony Civarelli was in top form, launching himself into the crowd from the start, never stopping in his communal energy.

Gorilla Biscuits' Anthony Civarelli

The Mars Volta

When you're a band whose best songs are double digit-minutes long, curating a one-hour set must be difficult. Thankfully, The Mars Volta can cram a wide array of ideas, genres, and tempos in just one song. "L'Via L'Viaquez" was chock full of retro metal guitar solos and salsa breakdowns, Cedric Bixler-Zavala wailing with the best of them. They even managed to sandwich a snippet of Can's "Vitamin C" into the beloved "Cicatriz ESP", contemporary prog rock legends paying homage to their krautrock forebears. Bonus points for Bixler-Zavala pausing to name his top 3 Chicago punk bands: The Vindictives, Trenchmouth, and 90 Day Men.

The Cure's Reeves Gabrels and Robert Smith

The Cure

Seeing The Cure live is one of those transcendent experiences like watching Nine Inch Nails close out last year's Riot Fest. I caught people weeping in the front row during "Pictures of You". The drawn-out instrumental intro to "Fascination Street" garnered just as much fanfare as "Push", "In Between Days", and "Just Like Heaven". Even an overplayed, cheesy song like "Friday I'm In Love" sounded longing and wistful. The band members' age may increase, but they sound exactly the same as when I saw them last decade, presumably as beautiful as ever. The three unreleased songs they've played, slow burns "Alone", the epic "Endsong", and ballad "And Nothing Is Forever", have become staples of their setlists since debuting last year. I knew The Cure's set would be a highlight, if not the highlight of the festival. What I didn't expect was for it to cause me to anxiously await the release of their first new album since 2008.

The Cure's Roger O'Donnell

The Cure

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