July 7, 2019

Day One, Two, & Three Gallery: https://jamsplus.smugmug.com/TonyVasquezPhotography/Solid-Sound-Festival-2019/

The last day of Solid Sound Festival at MASS MoCA started off with heavy rain causing the first half the day to be relocated into the museum gallery space. Despite the shuffling locations and jammed packed interior spaces the music continued pretty much without much delay. The MASS MoCA staff and crews handle the less than ideal situation quite well.

Rough Francis got the music going by blasting the gallery space with their high energy sound. Lakou Mizik over in Building 5 got the large audience dancing to the soulful energy.

Sunday’s lineup followed suit with past Solid Sounds as it was full of Wilco’s side projects. Kicking things off in the Hunter Center Nels Cline & Julian Lage perform Room For Interpretation as they accompanied the short films of Stan Brakhage + Charles & Ray Eames. Wilco keyboardist Mikael Jorgensen and James Thomas played together as Quindar. John Stiratt and Pat Sansone of Wilco performed a special show of their project The Autumn Defense with the accompaniment of string arrangements for the first time live. CUP which showcased Nels Cline and his wife Yuka C Honda collaboration as the couple explored soundscapes together.

Wrapping up the festival was Jeff Tweedy and his friends. The band’s lineup included his son Spencer Tweedy, Liam Kazar, and James Elkington. The setlist was a mix of Tweedy’s recent solo projects, older Tweedy material, and a few covers. Several artists from the weekend joined Jeff during the closing set. His bandmates from Wilco, OHMME, Scott McCaughey, his son Sammy Tweedy all helped out. Also making a surprise appearance was Amelia Meath of Sylvan Esso as the two sang “You & I.” The threat of rain held off until nearly the end of his set. As Tweedy was singing “Let’s Go Rain” he said out to the crowd “Look at that stupid rainbow. I don’t believe in stuff like that.” He then told Jeremy Roth his lighting guy to remind him to give him a raise as that was pretty impressive referring to the rainbow. For the final number of the festival, everyone joined Tweedy on stage to perform The Band’s “I Shall Be Released,” which was the perfect ending to the weekend.