1999 WRITE THE FUTURE ft. L脴REN – Gasoline
Clairo – Nomad
Smallpools – Be Kind, Rewind
Peel Dream Magazine – Lie in the Gutter
Ravyn Lenae – Dream Girl (ft. Ty Dolla $ign)
Winnetka Bowling League – This Is Life (ft. Medium Build & Dawes)
The weather was glorious for the first day of Pitchfork Music Festival 2024. That’s something to be grateful for. Strong performances, that’s another thing to be grateful for. New VIP “tower” viewing areas by the Red and Green stages blocking views from a distance? Not really grateful for those. I suppose if these sorts of inconveniences are what’s required for this festival to survive, then the pain and frustration are worth it. But enough about that mess, let’s talk about the messes that happened on stage. Okay, so there weren’t very many of them, but there was one critical one that made the day just a bit disappointing in my opinion. What was that mess and how did it all turn out in the end? That’s a mystery you’ll need to read onward to solve. Join me as I recap Friday at Pitchfork Music Festival, with all the requisite highs, lows, and in-betweens.
If you’ve been attending a music festival for two long days already, chances are by Sunday you’ll start feeling the wear on your body and mind. Self care is essential, especially in a situation like this. If you’re not well-rested and keeping cool, then you’re going to have a bad time. Might even end up in the medical tent. Stay hydrated, wear sunscreen, and if you’re feeling out of it, find a spot to relax for a bit. Thankfully the first half of Sunday’s lineup seems built for those in need of a slow start. Model/Actriz will probably throw a small wrench in those plans around 3:20, but you won’t need to worry about going hard and fast until two hours later when Grandmaster Flash and Mannequin Pussy face off. The lineup for today is kind of a random grab bag full of jazz and folk, but the rock and pop acts are likely to wrap up the weekend in a delightfully crazy way. Here’s a lengthy guide to help you figure out who to see and enjoy for the final day of this year’s Pitchfork Music Festival!
While one could argue that festival days are like children and should all be treated equally, I’ll be honest and confess to being a bit partial to Saturday’s lineup. In my opinion it’s stacked from start to finish, but everyone’s tastes are different and I totally understand if you disagree. Fans of noisy, energetic rock music will be buried in good stuff, and that includes the pair of cult bands from the ’90s closing out the Blue stage. And of all the conflicts to deal with this weekend, perhaps the hardest will be Water From Your Eyes vs. Wednesday. If you’re familiar with both acts, I wish you good luck splitting your time. But that’s pretty much the whole point of this preview guide – to help you make those tough decisions to the best of your ability. The more you know about the artists, the easier it will be to choose (…or in some cases, harder?). Join me past the jump, and I’ll attempt to carve some sense out of what promises to be an epic Saturday.
Friday at the 2024 Pitchfork Music Festival is set to be an interesting one! The shifts in tone and energy will likely be wild, but I might argue that’s a good sort of problem to have. For example, you get to go from formless, genreless experimentation one minute to heavy-hitting, aggressive rap the next. You can let yourself be awash in synths, or go for a jaunt with some alt-country textures. Spend a little time dancing, and a little time moshing. This day contains the first-ever Chicago performance from Jai Paul, which of course you shouldn’t miss. And we kick things off with two impressive local Chicago artists! I’ll have some thoughts on Friday’s headliner down below, which might be worth a read depending on your personal feelings about them. There are a couple of tough conflicts this first day, and I try my best to help you navigate through them. Click on past the jump to get the full preview guide for Friday!
Welcome once again to another year of coverage for Pitchfork Music Festival here on Faronheit! Every July, we spend one week diving into the various musical aspects of the Pitchfork Music Festival lineup. This comes in multiple forms. There’s the playlist featuring every artist on the lineup, which is what always kicks off the coverage so you can hear music from every artist performing and get a better sense of what you might like and who might be worth checking out over the course of the 3-day weekend. More on that in a minute. But other coverage will include day-by-day preview guides to give a little more context to the artists and schedule matchups that can cause some serious conflicts if you know and like multiple artists performing at the same time. Then we get into the daily recaps, which deliver a lot of the play-by-play looks at exactly what happened, what songs were performed, and what crazy thing that one artist did on stage. Whether you’re going and want to learn more about this year’s Pitchfork Music Festival itself, or aren’t able to attend but would love to hear about what’s happening in Union Park from July 19-21, this coverage will provide all of that and more.
As I previously mentioned, Pitchfork Music Festival week always starts with a playlist. Two songs from every single artist on the lineup. It’s arranged by date and set time, so for example Black Duck starts things off on Friday afternoon so they are first on the playlist, while Alanis Morissette closes out the weekend on Sunday so she’s last on the playlist. If you listen in order, you’ll journey through Friday, Saturday, and Sunday over the course of about five hours. Easy peasy. Jump into it, get familiar with a bunch of artists you haven’t heard before or have only heard a song or two from. A big part of this festival is discovery of great up-and-coming artists, so get started on that process right now with the playlist below. Sadly it’s only available through Spotify, so if you prefer a different streaming service you’re out of luck. But since most everyone I know has a Spotify account, hopefully it won’t be too much of a lift. Please enjoy, and come on back tomorrow for the start of the preview guides!
Here we are, halfway through 2024. Congratulations on making it this far. Where does the time go? Hell if I know. So there’s this tradition that right around the start of July every year, you get a playlist. 100 songs that function as sort of a capsule of the many great things released over the last 6 months. There are no rankings here, even if Spotify assigns numbers to each track in order. Rather, the way these are arranged is more by genre and vibe than anything else. Smooth transitions and similar-ish sounds abound so you don’t end up in some weird mish-mash of a rap song into a folk song into a dance song into a harder rock song. If you listen on shuffle (which I do recommend!) those sorts of shifts might happen regularly, but if you listen in order I can promise a lovely time from start to finish.
One of my favorite things about a playlist like this is it provides the opportunity to share a bunch of songs you might have missed during the first half of the year. If you’re curious about new music and enjoy a little adventure, this is the playlist for you! I can firmly promise you haven’t heard all 100 songs (yet, unless you listened before reading this), and there are plenty of baby indie artists that could use some love and a bit of discovery. There are also some big hitmakers should you enjoy Chappell Roan and Taylor Swift and Beyonce and Kendrick Lamar. One thing I might recommend is picking a song you know and then listening to two songs before and two songs after it. That’ll give you a little nudge around your comfort zone.
The only “rules” for this playlist are as follows: all songs must have been released within the first 6 months of 2024, and no artist gets more than one track in order to maximize the spread (featured artist spots are excluded from this rule). Simple enough! This playlist is available via Spotify and YouTube, because pretty much everyone can access one or the other. The individual songs will be linked on YouTube as well, in case you only want a taste. Please enjoy all 6 hours! Put it on when you’re hanging at the pool or working the grill. There will inevitably be songs I’ve missed, so hit me up on social media and let me know what I should be listening to!
beabadoobee – Coming Home
Frances Forever – Mr. Man (ft. Miya Folick)
Raveena – Junebug (ft. JPEGMAFIA)
Clothing – Still Point (ft. L’Rain)
Fax Gang & Parannoul – Lullaby For A Memory
GloRilla, Megan Thee Stallion, Cardi B – Wanna Be (Remix)
