Vinyl Notes

The 28th Annual Ragga Muffins Festival in Long Beach drew a smaller crowd – could be the economy, or not enough mainstream artists to draw the parade of hipsters, pretty people and meat-heads so prevalent three years ago. In keeping with the festival’s oft spoken of return to its roots, this year’s line-up was about uplifting your spirits, not just shaking your booty.

In our preview we touched on the contributions of Lee “Scratch” Perry and Tony Rebel. On Sunday we got a history lesson on Leroy Sibbles…given by Sibbles himself.  A legend by most standards, Sibbles is not attributed for his contributions to reggae (most notably his famed baseline popularized in “Pass the Dutchie”).

Well, we can give Sibbles credit for injecting the day with energy and establishing a collective desire for communion. As he repeated the refrain, “love is in air” we could see it was, as strangers danced together and refreshments were shared freely.

Sibbles set left the audience well primed for Pressure, a performer who may lack wrinkles but does not lack depth. It was obvious he enjoyed performing as much as the crowd was feeling him. When the crowd started singing his lyrics, Pressure couldn’t resist a smile and wink, reveling in their energy.

Great performances abounded, but this Bob Marley Day clearly belonged to Stephen Marley. The acoustic gig had an ethereal power, commanding the crowd’s attention from a seat in center stage. The crowd was enraptured and reverent, receiving his music like an offering. Festival goer Addison Alkire said it best, “this feels like church.” While Marley’s rendition of his father’s songs were true to form, his use of flute & sax imparted his own resonance.

At the end of the set Ziggy and Julian joined their brother onstage. The audience responded with exuberance, appreciative to have so many Marley’s back.

It wasn’t all roses though. Introduced as “the son of a legend”, it seemed the Marley name got Julian a better time slot than he merited. Tanya even speculated that dubious intro might be foreshadowing. The audience was not impressed with his lineage and zoned out after the second song, missing repetitive melodies and gratuitous face grabbing.

By contrast, up-and-comer E-Dee’s energetic exhibition would have benefited from better placement; his was the first set on Sunday. He delivered songs heavy on bass with danceable beats, but it was like trying to light a wet match. After the set E-Dee acknowledged his attempts to draw audience, saying “If you don’t get hype the audience won’t.”

Another notable, Etana, also had a lackluster response, though for entirely different reasons. She blamed inadequate time for failing to get her message across; we humbly submit our own hypothesis. The instrumentation overpowered her voice from the start. As time went the strain on her voice was evident, perhaps from the effort of singing over the music. Even so, we must bear witness, she sings with grace, free of superfluous vibrato. And onstage she is regal.

Onto non-musical details. There were fewer vendors this year, but that was not a bad thing. Gone were the mass produced Bob Marley onesies sold at a dozen booths. When asked about the improved quality of the cultural wares, festival organizer Barbara Barabino said, “I was tired of the crap too.” She went on to say that she prioritized vendor selection this year, personally inviting real artists to “bring it back.”

Despite lower attendance, the 28th Annual Ragga Muffins Festival was a success. Buju Banton, Saturday’s headliner, said he makes music “to uplift, educate and eradicate negativity from the minds of the people.” That charge may well be applied to the real purpose of reggae music. This weekend that promise was fulfilled.

I was a little early to the Troubadour to see Tim Fite perform so I thought I’d try to see if I could get an interview. One of the bouncers told me Tim was around somewhere so after looking around the showroom lazily, alone and bored with staring at the empty stage, I wondered into the bar-room to sit for a few minutes before the show started. Wouldn’t ya know it, my wandering around led me to a seat right next to Fite.

He had a calm, friendly demeanor and surprised me by remembering my name from the MySpace message I’d sent him. It was 20 minutes to showtime so I had to make the interview relatively quick.

When I started off thinking he’d grown up in Brooklyn Fite quickly corrected me. “I grew up in the sticks,” he said telling about the weekend trips to into the City; mom went to the art gallery, Fite & dad went to the record store. It was in these very record stores that Fite heard Cool DJ Red Alert’s song “Don’t Believe the Hype” and began his lifelong love affair with hip-hop.

While his first two albums are largely a blue grass, folk, country fusion, the third album was the one that won me over with its quirky satirical hip-hop style. “Hip-hop is the foundation of the music,” Fite explains. “It’s all sample and loop based; it’s how I think about what I’m making.”

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Last September, embarked on a social networking experiment by spending a weekend with people I’d met on Newsvine. This Vinemeet was the event that sort of solidified my theory that Newsvine was much more than just a social networking site but a place where virtual friendships become real. There have been several Vinemeets over the last year but this weekend I hopped on a plane (gasp!) to meet a few more practical strangers and reinforce the since of community and camaraderie on the ‘Vine.

While Columbus may not be the most happening town, one might be surprised to find out that it is the indie art capital of the world, a noteworthy designation as one of the highlights of the trip was a live performance by our host, a member of Flotation Walls. Friday night, approximately 10 Newsviners from across the country (mostly the eastern seaboard) gathered at Andyman’s Treehouse, most of us exhausted from a day of traveling, looking forward to a good show nonetheless.

The show took place in a tiny room with a huge tree in the middle (hence the name Andyman’s Treehouse and no elevated stage; suffice it to say, the show was intimate. Considering the amount of equipment Flotation Walls had to set up – keyboards, a synthesizer, saxophone, bass, drums, percussion, violin and three guitars – they moved quickly and got their set started with surprising speed. The set up was interesting to watch, everyone in their different zones, tuning, testing, listening to each other, completely in sync and comfortable with each other.

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Just when I had all but given up hope that underground hip hop is still alive, I see a glimmer of hope.

The thing is this: underground music is about the culture of the music. It’s great that there’s such a prominent indie rock blogging community; I’ve discovered some great music that way. When digging around though, the best I could find on hip hop was Hip Hop Ruckus which respectable for sure but way too busy, too mainstream and too inarticulate for my taste.

And then I found out that Aceyalone, Dilated Peoples and Alchemist were slated to do a joint tour and then saw an article on the A.V. Club blog about free hip hop mixed tapes. Yay! Maybe it’s not prominent, but obviously there’s a bit of underground love out there in the blogosphere.

I leave you with the most Aceyalone’s latest single from his album entitled Lightning Strikes.