A Bowl Of Roses: Arroyo Seco Weekend 2018 – Review & Photos

Words by: Eric Podolsky

Images by: Steph Port

Arroyo Seco Weekend :: 06.23-24.18
Brookside At The Rose Bowl :: Pasadena, CA

View Steph’s gallery below Eric’s review.

Now in its second year, Goldenvoice’s Arroyo Seco Weekend has successfully filled a gap in the increasingly crowded festival market with a lineup consisting of honest-to-god bands making real music. This carefully crafted, eclectic weekend was clearly aimed at the discerning music connoisseur who is disillusioned by the Top 40 lineups that festivals like Coachella and Bonnaroo have embraced. Eschewing EDM and hip-hop acts completely, Arroyo Seco instead proved that real rock and soul music is still alive and well, and that there is still a large audience hungry for honest, hand-crafted music.

The festival took place on a golf course next to the unused Rose Bowl Stadium, which made for an extremely pleasant festival experience with ample grass, ponds, shade trees and mountains in the distance. Though it skewed older, the audience was extremely eclectic in age and race, with everyone focused squarely on the music to an extent that you don’t find at larger festivals. With attendance at around 25K per day, the golf course setting spread people out nicely, though stages weren’t too far apart that you were exhausted from walking at the end of the day. Bathroom and food lines weren’t an issue, there were no real crowd bottlenecks anywhere, and things never got too crowded. In short, Goldenvoice has been doing this for a while and has this shit down.

But it was the music that was the focus of the weekend for everyone, and this lineup was the best I’ve experienced in ages — Sunday was especially incredible, and was possibly the best consecutive run of music I’ve ever experienced in a festival: The Revolution > Violent Femmes > Fantastic Negrito > Alanis Morissette > Gary Clark, Jr. > Irma Thomas > Robert Plant > Aaron Neville . As for Saturday, you know things are good when Neil Young & The Promise of The Real don’t even make it into the top three sets of the day. As usual, “Uncle Neil” (as called by Jack White) didn’t give a fuck — he had no setlist or plan for the evening, and despite some technical difficulties that threw things off a bit, he swung from the hip and tore through a punishing set that resembled Crazy Horse in song selection and ferocious, fuzzed-out, grungy jams. Songs like “Like An Inca,” “Cortez The Killer,” “Fuckin’ Up” and “Rockin’ In The Free World” were played loose and given the space to breathe, often sprawling out past the 20-minute mark. Overall, this was a deeply satisfying weekend of music that gave me renewed faith in the festival circuit.

Saturday Highlights

Kamasi Washington delivers a gigantic, rock-star afternoon set.

When first looking at the set schedule for the weekend, it was a pleasant surprise to see Kamasi Washington playing the big main stage. This is a jazz ensemble through and through, and to see this heartfelt, improv-based, deeply spiritual music presented on a massive stage like this in front of thousands was a glorious and moving experience. The way Kamasi’s star has risen in the last year or two is remarkable and gives hope for a genre long given up on by the commercial market.

Kamasi and his band of heavyweight musicians have made jazz cool again thanks to their huge sound, deeply soulful and triumphant delivery, incredible musicianship, and optimistic message. With a ferocious rhythm section consisting of bassist Miles Mosley and a duel drum attack from Robert Miller and Ronald Bruner Jr. propelling the set forward, the music ebbed and flowed and soared to massive heights that were made more epic on this huge stage. The triumphant set climaxed with a larger-than-life, polyrhythmic duel drum solo that blew people’s mind and gave me faith once again in the power of the drum solo.

I was somewhat disappointed that Kamasi didn’t jam with free jazz godfather Pharoah Sanders, who had just played a set on the smaller Willow Stage to a much smaller crowd — this band owes a whole lot to Sanders and what he did for spiritual jazz nearly 50 years ago, and the scene was ripe for a cross-generational jam. That point aside, this was truly heavy music that set a very high bar for the weekend.

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The Pretenders remind us that they’re as vital as ever.

This was a set that took me completely off guard. The music of the Pretenders and the distinctive voice of Chrissie Hynde is so ubiquitous and ingrained in pop culture at this point that it’s hard to anticipate the effect of seeing her perform in person. Coming into this set with no expectations, the experience was powerful. With Hynde’s voice the primary focus, the band was top-notch in their delivery of everything from punk-laced new wave and jangly guitar rock, to blazing rockabilly.

Now 66, Hynde has completely retained her distinctive voice, still pristine and full of deep emotion. As the only other living original member of the Pretenders, drummer Martin Chambers hit it hard and gave all the songs extra spark as the band worked their way through hit after hit. The jangly guitar melody of “Back On The Chain Gang” hit just right, “Don’t Get Me Wrong” chugged along with a warm, peppy smile and “My City Was Gone,” an ode to Hynde’s depressed hometown of Akron, Ohio, featured a subtle Trump jab. Hynde rounded the set out by giving her all to the ballad “I’ll Stand By You,” picking up her guitar to drive home the last chorus with a bang. Hynde is a true rock legend and she made sure everyone knew it, killing the unsuspecting crowd with a well-rounded, powerful set of hits and rockers.

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Jack White shreds it, takes no prisoners.

Maybe Jack White felt extra inspired with Neil Young up next, as White came out guns blazing on Saturday night. Opening with a barrage of heavy feedback fuzz chaos that led into the wound-up, jerky “Over And Over And Over,” White proceeded to shred his way through a heavy set of eclectic tunes, cutting through the band’s sound with his distinctively razor-sharp guitar licks. The breathless, urgent riffage kept coming as he mixed up the set with solo tunes, (“Lazaretto”), The White Stripes tunes (“Hotel Yorba,” “Black Math”) and side project tunes (“Cut Like a Buffalo” and “Steady As She Goes” were particularly rowdy). Things switched up with the new tune “Ice Station Zebra,” which had White rapping like Beck over some grungy grooves. And though there were plenty of sing-along hits, White wasn’t afraid to get weird — even “Seven Nation Army” featured a psychedelic synth breakdown, making for a satisfyingly heavy, well-rounded set.

Sunday Highlights

Robert Plant & The Sensational Space Shifters get mystical, take us around the world and back.

In a day jam-packed with fantastic music, this one was special. Robert Plant took the stage on Sunday evening in a great mood, and proceeded to channel the spirits and usher in the sunset with a set that mixed classic Led Zeppelin with tunes that honored folk traditions around the world, from the Mississippi Delta to Ireland and North Africa. Screaming out the gate with “The Lemon Song” in full-blown Zep blues mode, the band took us on a journey that included the swampy, T-Bone Burnett-style slow burn groove of new songs like “Turn It Up.” Adept at mixing world-music traditions into familiar songs, the band started “Goin’ To California” with an African-scale mandolin intro, which practically melted the crowd into a warm puddle of love. Their take on “Gallows Pole” was urgent, soulful, and full of dread, taking you to the deep south of Lead Belly.

Plant’s incredible band knows how to tap into an ancient feeling by channeling deep musical traditions. This is especially true in his new songs, which successfully fuse world rhythms and folk instrumentation (fiddle and banjo) with modern grooves, and the result is music that feels both timeless and current. A highlight was a majestic, ghostly “Babe, I’m Gonna Leave You” that featured a huge and grandiose acoustic guitar excursion from Liam “Skin” Tyson before Plant’s trademark banshee wail climaxed the tune like only he can. This was mystical music of the highest order — it’s a wonder Plant wasn’t given the headliner slot for the day.

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Violent Femmes keep it loose and rowdy.

Violent Femmes have always been a singular band that’s hard to pin down. A stripped-down, acoustic act with a whiny lead singer, a punk aesthetic, and sing-along pop choruses, the Femmes’ quirky, DIY aesthetic is infectiously endearing, and it took seeing them live for me to really “get it.” Defined by the distinctive voice of singer/guitarist Gordon Gano and the chunky, distinctive acoustic bass guitar playing of Brian Ritchie, the band threw down a loud, rowdy, fun set on the Main Stage in the hot midday sun. And did I mention it was loud? Ritchie’s monster bass playing was a blast to experience as the band barreled its way through classics like “Blister In The Sun” and “Kiss Off,” while their “drummer” chugged along playing only a snare and sometimes a Weber grill.

“American Music” got everyone going, but it was the ridiculous inclusion of a nine-foot contrabass sax doubling the bass line that set the tone of the set. Ritchie busting out the vibes for “Gone Baby Gone” was icing on the cake for me. The band’s bratty edge was endearingly amateurish yet tight and musically on-point, and the goofy nature of the music was infectious for everyone. This one left me with a huge smile on my face.

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Aaron Neville melts hearts at the Willow Stage.

Experiencing the golden voice of Aaron Neville live was something I’ve been chasing for a while, and this was a bucket-list set for me for that reason. Wearing a tie-dye shirt in honor of his recently deceased brother and bandmate, saxophonist Charles Neville (whose absence loomed heavy on the set), the 77-year old legend and his sympathetic band kept things hushed and gentle for a rapt and attentive crowd that hung on every note.

The man’s angelic voice is certainly singular — no one has or will sound like Aaron Neville, whose pure and earnest romanticism is from another era, one when an R&B or doo-wop ballad meant something meaningful to many people. Neville started the set with R&B classics like “Chain Gang” and “Stand By Me,” followed by a Bob Marley medley of “Three Little Birds” and “Stir It Up,” but things got heavy with a pained, gorgeous take of Leonard Cohen’s “Bird On The Wire” that was just fucking angelic. There is a tinge of sadness in his otherworldly, silky delivery that breaks hearts, and his flowing take on both “A Change Is Gonna Come” and “Tell It Like It Is” showcased this to full effect. Even overplayed staples like “Down By The Riverside” and “When The Saints Go Marching In” were given new life with his gorgeous, clean vibrato.

Having this joyous set on the bill was proof that Arroyo Seco cares about truly good music, and when combined with a great set by Irma Thomas (another NOLA legend), it made for a fantastically well-rounded festival experience.

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