Fader

There were so many different rooms at the Levi's®/FADER Fort this year that we almost went to the bathroom on Mick Jones in a dark closet by accident. He didn't know where he was. We didn't know where we were. Mistakes were made. Crises were averted. One room where no mistakes were made was the Rock The Vote room where artists rolled through to have their pictures and videos taken in support of voter registration. Kelly Fogel took snaps of FADER friends David Banner, Bun B, N.E.R.D., Spank Rock, Santogold, Wale, Saul Williams and many more including THE HANSONS. This is how we do it. Check the pics after the jump and watch PSAs from Naeem and Santi here, representing Philly, and Pittsburgh's Wiz Khalifa here, urging their fellow Pennsylvanians to make a CHANGE. more...

FADER 51 cover co-star Santogold brought her paramilitary dancers and Diplo to the Levi's®/FADER Fort this year, wore blindingly patterned tights the whole time and barely broke a sweat performing "LES Artistes," but we distinctly remember being incredibly sweaty and our pants were made of loose cotton. What gives?

Every blue moon, two parents pass on their awesome musical genes to all of their children. The Jacksons. The Shaggs. Pretty Ricky. And, now, The Macklovitch Brothers: two musical forces who you might know better as DJ A-Trak and Chromeo's Dave 1. We explored their brotherly come-up in this on-the-fly interview outside the Levi's®/FADER Fort in Austin. And they divulge all their DNA secrets!

No, Lykke, we don't mind if you do a blues. We don't mind if you blow down the Levi's®/FADER Fort with your megaphone or if your drummer beats it to death with a cotton mallet. Other things we do not mind about Lykke Li: peace sign necklace, kazoo necklace, tiny bun, hand-on-hip sass, pained pleas, Swedish pale, tiny croon. Please do this forever in our houses, in our offices, follow us around like a muse and serenade us as though somehow we deserve something that good.

Certain former FADER editors, both present and absent at the Levi's®/FADER Fort this year, have been known to express an admirable, untainted, undying love for The Stills. The present one even yelled in between songs that she wished the absent one was there to see this. This was dudes shredding songs from Logic Will Break Your Heart, Without Feathers and their upcoming debut on Arts & Crafts, and we can't really blame these former editors or anyone else for being in love. In the above video, they slam through "Being There," a song supposedly from said debut, even though it will not come out until late summer, so who knows. If it does, it will be good.

You may have already read about David Banner's heroic performance at the Levi's®/FADER Fort on Saturday but we're doing everyone else one better by putting up video of Mister Mississippi destroying "Suicide Doors" with a full band, including Mannie Fresh on DJ duties. Beer gets drank, beer gets spit, photographers get ridden like donkeys and Pimp C gets a moment of silence. It was probably the best thing we witnessed or thought about witnessing all week.

One in the afternoon on Saturday at the Levi's®/FADER Fort is now Dri-o'clock. Purple paisley is now what we are wearing. Gigantic sunglasses are still the move. Dri, woozy woozemaker, stood in the sun while we stood in the sun and cooed at us and we, with our lesser voices and worse charm, did our best to match her tender paeans.

We have returned from our triumphant stay at the Levi's®/FADER Fort in Austin, but we still have tons of video and other stuffs to put up, beginning with this video of These New Puritans performing at the space. Possibly the least British of all the British bands we've seen lately, they could definitely start hanging out in cold American cities, wearing black and smoking inside (where it's illegal but they don't fucking care because they are cool). Oh, to be ingenues. Well, the lady Puritan is. The guys, they're hitting drums a lot and looking finely tailored. We need nothing else.

Because we can't book every great band at the Levi's®/FADER Fort, and because our friends at RCRD LBL have set up shop in their Rec Room located inside the Fort itself, we're going to post up links every morning to their previous day's content, which consists of streams and downloads of a bunch of bands hustling down here in Austin. After the jump, get acquainted or reacquainted. more...

As referenced earlier, don't let the pristine Neptunes megajams fool you—N.E.R.D. want you to rock n roll. And put your hands up. And scream. And not give a fuck. And get back into drum n bass. We followed instructions as they wrapped up our second day at the Levi's®/FADER Fort. Chad sang. Pharrell danced real HARD and Shay had some nice Locs on. And dudes have the craziest dual drummers since the Grateful Dead.

For the most part, the Levi's®/FADER Fort goes off without a hitch and all of our big plans come to fruition. Every once in awhile though, something doesn't quite work out, like Evan Dando of the Lemonheads losing his voice and foiling our Dandocam plans (Don't steal our ideas.) Luckily, instead we got a little extra batch of jams from Pretty Titty and Fourcolorzack, playing air keys and songs about the sun.

It took some doing but we finagled this photo with FADER 52 coverstars BLK JKS, playing at the Levi's®/FADER Fort on Saturday, and Pharrell backstage last night after N.E.R.D.'s performance. And we made sure to yell "BLK JKS BLK JKS BLK JKS" at Pharrell and Chad as many times as possible in hopes that they will collaborate and make crazy rock.

Last night, still buzzed from the Lou Reed tribute, we got even more buzzier when Pharrell, Chad, Shay and Co. hit us with a set of new and old N.E.R.D. songs from the stage of the Levi's®/FADER Fort, kinda rockier than we expected and definitely giving off a Lollapalooza-when-it-was-relevant-vibe, and even leading us to think, Dudes are you going to release a double album with one half rock and the other half rap like Cypress Hill? Trust that we aren't hating though, the whole point was that shit jammed so hard that we jumped into the mix and rocked the fuck out well into the night. Also, props to Pharrell's bodyguard for having a bicycle with neon pink wheels. EPIC. Check back in a little bit for some video. more...

Blah blah blah blah and then Lou Reed played "Walk on the Wild Side" at the Levi's®/FADER Fort last night. Say what you will about Indie Spring Break in Austin and this week being an industry/hipster boondoggle, but you can't really argue with the awesomeness (as in awe-inspiring) spectacle of the Lou Reed tribute last night that climaxed with the man himself joining Moby (?) onstage with a full band to hammer out his classic jam, including a monumental guitar freakout and the white girls singing 'doot doo doot.' Trust us, we knew this was going to happen, were steeled for it, and still managed to lose our shit and yell LOOUUUUUU after he shuffled offstage.

His appearance came after almost 2 hours of tribute (while he sat stage right) by Yo La Tengo, Mark Kozelek (Red House Painters/Sun Kil Moon), Dr Dog, My Morning Jacket and Thurston Moore & the New Wave Bandits and others playing a Velvet Underground/Lou Reed song or two each. But, despite valiant efforts to do justice, they all kind of got sonned by the 66-year old who is literally morphing into the Yoda of punks, which he acknowledged before leaving the stage by raising his sinewy arms and saying, "I…love…punk…rock…and I was the first one." Probably so, and he still manages to be the coolest one too. And PS, old music dudes, do not attempt to tribute yourself. Only Lou is allowed to pull that shit.

Stay tuned for the video. more...

Because we can't book every great band at the Levi's®/FADER Fort, and because our friends at RCRD LBL have set up shop in their Rec Room located inside the Fort itself, we're going to post up links every morning to their previous day's content, which consists of streams and downloads of a bunch of bands hustling down here in Austin. After the jump, get acquainted or reacquainted. more...

Full disclosure: we know this dude is on the FADER label. But this was the first time we had seen him, and we were honestly pretty shocked. For young journalists such as ourselves, Saul Williams presented a unique quandary. How do we frame what we just witnessed at the Levi's®/Fader Fort? Is it a live review? It is a Stylee Friday? Is it an open plea for Con Ed to holler at Saul's deep deep live exuberonomy to solve their energy probs? Holy crapitude. This is what we know: Saul Williams and his band of live punk rockitude was one of the best things we've seen in the day and a half we've been here. He was throwing himself around the stage. He was scream-rapping about racial politics and construct, and his band grinded. He was wearing a tailored green jacket, two feathers, a swathe of blue paint on his face, and nice shoes. And when the band closed out their set with a cover of U2's "Sunday Bloody Sunday," it not only felt like it was their song, everyone sang along. And danced! We will never sleep on homeboy's live show again. more...

Not only do we watch musicians play music here at Levi's®/FADER Fort, but we also attempt to speak to them as if they were real live human beings. Case in point, the effortlessly star-striking Alison and Jamie of The Kills talked to us about recording, Paris, Texas and feeling mischievous. Also, surprise, they looked awesome.

It sorta seems like we're magnetically drawn to the concept of drummer/singers, pretty much every time we find out they exist. Is it because they wear those boy band wireless microphones? ABSOLUTELY! Luckily we got that with Grand Ole Party, here at ye olde Levi's®/FADER Fort who played a kinda epically restrained set, like they were just about to explode.

Why didn't anyone tell us Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band was playing the Levi's®/FADER Fort? Actually, wait, it was Birdmonster. Southern rock with Jersey boy flavor from California. We closed our ears and swore Clarence Clemons was jamming sweet sax in our ears. He wasn't, but wouldn't have that been rad? more...