Last week, a seemingly algorithmically generated festival for fans of indie rock from the mid-to-late-2000s was announced for Saturday, May 4 in Long Beach, California. Its title, Just Like Heaven, seemed like a polite acknowledgement of the band that every band on the bill is influenced by. At the top of the lineup were Phoenix, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, MGMT, and Beach House, and just underneath, Passion Pit (10th anniversary show for their Manners album, baby! The one with “Sleepyhead”!), Grizzly Bear, Miike Snow [shudder], and a mostly reunited Rapture. There’s all sorts of stuff going on down-bill too—so many gems that it’s difficult to keep track. I joked about what The Faint could have going on that weekend that was so important, but in fact I’d just forgotten they were on the poster. Seeing the words “Ra Ra Riot” on the last line was the final trigger, calling up scenes from college radio station meetings like an acid flashback.
But get this: Just Like Heaven sold out within a week after it was announced. There is a huge demand for this sub-variety of nostalgia, apparently. The organizers promptly added a second day (May 3), featuring the same lineup as the first day with one very crucial exception: Right next to Ra Ra Riot on that last line, they’ve added (you guessed it) Louis XIV. It’s a provocative gambit, one which I choose to interpret as a fun, high-concept joke. The buzzsaw-guitar-wielding San Diego cock-rock group is the only act that’s set to play just one day of the festival. Are the organizers smart enough to realize that people mostly just loved to hate Louis XIV, and added them as a post-ironic garnish for the second wave of ticket buyers? Or does Louis XIV actually have something else going on that Saturday? If so, what?
See the updated, Louis-XIV-ified poster below. Let your high school buddy who still hasn’t recovered from how bad We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank was know: Tickets are available on a sliding scale between $2002 and $2011. Just kidding—early bird passes are $99.
