MFNW 2014

Okay, to be honest and to get off to a good start by addressing the positive comments first, this isn't the worst festival lineup of 2014 so far, and Sunday in particular is pretty appealing (any single day that one can catch Spoon, tUnE-yArDs, The Antlers, Pink Mountaintops, and EMA can't be bad).  But the only band I'd really want to see on Saturday would be Future Islands, there's no Friday shows, and this MFNW lineup is a far, far cry from last year's.

Yes, the lineup for the stripped down, single-staged, miniaturized MFNW 2014 has finally been announced, and there are no Swans, no St. Vincent, no Courtney Barnett, no Sun Kil Moon.  No riding back and forth across the Burnside Bridge on the No. 20 bus getting from venue to venue.  No KEXP daytime shows at The Doug Fir.  No Mary's.  No reason to travel to Oregon for the festival.

Now, if I happened to live in Portland anyway, and if I had nothing else to do that weekend, then, yes, I probably would go.  But I'm not going to fly cross country to participate, especially when I've got this coming up right in my back yard:

And this later this summer:

But rather than mourn the demise of MFNW, I can console myself that I got to participate in the old format for three years before the plug finally got pulled.