Yesterday (June 15), I noticed a woman checking the time with a sundial, and former SPIN.com Artist of the Day Sam Champion played a raucous set of Pavement sound-a-likes, clever throwbacks with nothing throwaway. “No nothing gets better, nothing gets better than this,” sings lead singer Noah Chernin on “Company Dance, ” and Jason Carraro, 28, seems to agree.
Carraro, who came down to Bonnaroo from Guelph, Ont., said that Sam Champion was a highlight because they met his criterion for the ideal band, which involves “four or five guys on the stage just sweating it out. ” Later, in the This Tent, the man to my immediate front right wore a shirt that says, “THE HUGGERNAUT,” and the man to my immediate front left dropped his bag during Hot Chip’s “Over and Over” to dance. The crowd enthusiastically sang along with the band’s threats during “The Warning,” and songs from the group’s forthcoming album even get people moving. Oh, and that guy’s bag — it remained stationed on the ground for the rest the show.
The Roots began their set with “Game Theory” and later toyed around with songs by a lot of other artists. ?uestlove played drums and sang The Police’s “Roxanne” while wearing an “Absolut Classics” shirt, while the band also plays bits of Biz Markie’s “Just a Friend,” Salt-n-Pepa’s “Push It” and some James Brown material in case you thought that the Roots were losing touch with their, well, you know. ALEX DIMITROPOULOS
