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ACL Fest review: Fitz and the Tantrums
(Laura Skelding AMERICAN-STATESMAN)The going was a bit rough at the beginning of Fitz and the Tantrums’ 5 p.m. set at the Honda stage. The tinny mix wasn’t doing the band any favors, burying both the creative horn charts and the stirring organ. Fortunately, the sound improved, and singers Michael Fitzpatrick and Noelle Scaggs were basically not going to rest until they had the entire crowd dancing and letting loose. The group’s neo-soul style has an element of irony, and Fitzpatrick seems to have worked backward from Britain’s the Style Council to find R&B nirvana, but Scaggs is a natural, like a Tina Turner cousin signed to Motown. You know when she was seven years old, the middle-schoolers were copying her dance moves. Both expressed heartfeld appreciation for Austin audiences, and Fitzpatrick proclaimed that the band would not be where it was without its SXSW exposure.
The Tantrums covered the Raconteur’s “Steady As She Goes” with aplomb. but really grabbed the crowd with the title track of their full-length debut, “Pickin’ Up the Pieces,” featuring arranger James King on flute. The group had fans singing along lustily to a clever cover of Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams,” and finally established dominance with the irresistible, singalong original “MoneyGrabber.” A certain amount of time-travel may be required to fully appreciate the band’s appeal, but when Scaggs and Fitzpatrick commanded the audience to get low down, and Fitzpatrick called out vioators — “I know you guys think you got a hall pass!” — the average height of their fans was suddenly about 3-feet-tall, and the exhortation to get crazy had a host of fans erupting skyward into a happy paroxysm of silly dance moves.
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Permalink | Comments (4) | Categories: ACL 2011
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By Trudy
September 18, 2011 12:23 AM | Link to this
Tinny mix here…god-awful sound for Celo and much of Stevie’s set. ACL is supposed toset the highest standard of musical production. Big disappointments on a day that held such prospect to be amazing. We come to a music festival to HEAR the music C-3.
By Cynthia
September 18, 2011 10:04 AM | Link to this
We were really disappointed in the lack of sound quality, especially at the Bud Light Stage…Unless you were right in front of the stage, next to the stage or right behind, most likely you didn’t get to hear much of the set, this after spending $97 each on one day tickets and staking out a piece of turf for hours…If you actually want to HEAR the music, I suggest checking out the stages that have the best sound- we had no probs hearing the music at the AMD, Austin Ventures, BMI, or Google + stages. Meanwhile over at Stevie Wonder-land we were all yelling, TURN IT UP! TURN IT UP! And not in a happy “party-on” good way either.
By El Stone
September 18, 2011 10:48 AM | Link to this
Fitz blew up the house at their La Zona Rosa aftershow. I can’t believe how much energy they still had after their 5 pm show earlier that day.
By Kevan
September 19, 2011 1:48 AM | Link to this
Fitz was one of the top shows of the entire festival. Truly amazing energy coming from the lead singers.