Lowertown Music Festival!

I went to the Lowertown Music Fest on Saturday with some friends and had a great time.  It was a bit overwhelming, but the weather was perfect, and the music was nice.  Here's the breakdown, in order of appearance:

Koo Koo Kangaroo... was this humor hip hop duo wearing black sweatsuits trying to get the crowd going.  Their songs focused around such heavy subjects as PB&J, let me see your dinosaur, I'm drivin' the minivan, and others.  Although they had so much zeal in their performance and getting the crowd going, only a small percentage of the people there were actually playing along.  They did bring out a parachute though, which was pretty neat.  Everyone loves a rainbow parachute.

Frank Turner... is from Winchester, England, and is pretty cute.  He seemed like a cool guy and a good musician.  He mainly played fun, youthful songs on his acoustic guitar getting the not-yet-leg-cramp-ridden crowd going.  He even asked for a volunteer to play harmonica solo for him, and a girl named Rachel from Australia got to come up and do it.  It was nice that she was the one, because while she was up there, it was clear she knew all the words to all his songs.  He kept us singing along with him, yelling "I still believe," and other things.  At the end, we were to sing the chorus with him, all of us, as loud as we could, because he firmly believed that if everyone on that block sang together, something amazing happened, something philosophical, where there is no raised stage anymore, and we're all in it together.  It's a very nice thought, and so I sang and sang and sang. 

Peter Wolf Crier... I don't know much about them, unfortunately.  I enjoyed the performance though.

Tapes n Tapes... I'm afraid I only knew the radio hits for these guys, too.  Oh well.  They were a fun bunch.

Cloud Cult... over the past couple of years have really impressed me with everything they've done.  This was my second time seeing them, and it was great, as expected.  Aside from about ten minutes of technical difficulties after the first song, they were very smooth.  They have a new album due out in September (although it was for sale there, and from their website too, I believe,) and they played a handful of songs from that, but many of their older, so well loved ones.  They even did a Cloud Cult-ified cover of "Hey Mr. Tambourine Man."  They really owned the crowd, had and brought out a lot of energy.  During "Pretty Voice," while just near everyone sang along with the opening lines, Craig was visibly in awe, and said, "Wow, guys, that's great... Keep doing that."  And so we did.  I think a lot of people were there to see this band.  Definitely some great things from them.

Mason Jennings... is an amazing songwriter.  I overlooked him for so long, and it was just this year that I started getting into him.  I shouldn't have waited; his music is great. His performance was pretty much flawless. He played some of the songs from his last album, Blood of Man  (which I think is just great),  including some of my favorites from there, like "Pittsburgh," and "The Field," which pull tears from my eyes whenever I hear them. He played older songs as well, and everything was spot on.  There were a lot of hard-core fans singing all around, it was a nice atmosphere, as the sun slowly disappeared and left us in the bluish dim.  He played for a long while, and it was a great set.  He's a cool guy, and I hope to see him again.