The last two weeks have been brutal. Between medical appointments and snow days, time has conspired to keep me away from blogging. I was snowed in at home on Wednesday, when my personal device received a missive from the Lords of Moogfest. As you may recall, December 19th had the first 31 artists announced and the headliners were Kraftwerk, Giorgio Moroder, Laurie Anderson, and Nile Rogers. Not bad, but not what I was hoping for. I had secured a ticket for myself, but Laurie Anderson playing meant that my wife needed one as well as we could scratch the expense of traveling to Charleston next summer to see her at the Spoleto Festival, as we had been planning. Anything to avoid Charleston, South Carolina! Several Duran Duran records later, we were set for tickets, and now, another salvo of artists have joined the initial 31. Details below.

MOOGFEST LINEUP 2014 | Asheville, NC | April 23-27, 2014

phase 1

1. Adult √
2. Art Department
3. Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks
4. Bottin
5. 
Chic
6. Daedalus
7. Dan Deacon
8. 
Darkstar
9. 
Erika
10. Escort
11. Laurie Anderson √
12. 
Gaslamp Killer
13. 
Green Velvet
14. 
Kaytranada
15. Kraftwerk √
16. Lapalux
17. LE1f
18. Les Sins
19. 
Mark Farina
20. 
Nick Monaco
21. Giorgio Moroder
22. NRP (No Regular Play)
23. 
RJD2
24. Sasha
25. Shigeto
26. Mike Simonetti
27. Slow Hands
28. Soul Clap
29. TOKiMONSTA
30. Two Fresh
31. Wolf Eyes

phase 2

1. Audion
2. Bernie Worrell Orchestra √
3. Black Dice
4. Blondes
5. Body Games
6. Bombassic
7. Brett Rock
8. Com Truise
9. Crystal Ark
10. Earthtone Soundsystem
11. Eaters
12. Jimmy Edgar
13. Ejecta
14. Factory Floor 
15. Flying Lotus
16. Dillon Francis
17. Louie Fresco
18. Kri & Amos Gaynes
19. Heads On Sticks
20. Hello Hugo
21. Hieroglyphic Being
22. Holly Herndon
23. Mike Huckaby
24. In Plain Sight
25. Jellyrox
26. Keith Kemp
27. Machinedrum Vapor City Live
28. Megafortress
29. Metro Area
30. M.I.A
31. Nitin
32. North Americans
33. Patten
34. Pet Shop Boys √
35. Publicist
36. Razor & Blade
37. Riff Raff
38. RBTS Win
39. Thugf*cker
40. Tiga
41. Tin Foil Hat
42. Eric Volta
43. Volt Per Octaves
44. Noah Wall
45. YACHT

Bernie Worrell Orchestra is a delight for these eyes to see on the list! There must be something in the water here, because it seems like I see Bernie in Asheville every few years or so… much to my delight! I just saw him play with Steve Kimock at The Grey Eagle the night I arrived back from D.C. after seeing the Simple Minds show I caught there in September. Since I was very tired after a long drive that day, I could only make his first set, but it was hot jazzfunk improv and I left with some regret. Here’s my chance for more music, which flows from the man’s fingertips like electricity. If I had been asked who should be playing at Moogfest, I would have mentioned Bernie, since he’s a hard-core Moog man who is a genius. End of discussion. His metallic fuchsia Moog was a sight to behold in concert the last time I saw him. He is certain to be one of the most talented persons playing at the festival.

Great Caesar’s Ghost! One would think that with the roster top loaded with talent like Kraftwerk and Giorgio Moroder, the promoters might have saved Britain’s standard bearers of synthpop Pet Shop Boys for another year! But with their recent “Electric” album turning heads aplenty, I can’t think of a better time to have them there. I’ve only seen PSB once, but it was their first concert in America on the inaugural night of the “Performance” tour in Miami, Florida. Ironically, this year has seen me selling off all of my dozens of PSB CD singles to afford tickets to events like… Moogfest. I was tired of the dance remixes, but playing them before selling them off gave me new appreciation for the band’s stellar B-sides. Their songwriting skills are at the head of the class, whatever I make of their dance mixes. So I bought “Alternative” and am planning on buying “Electric” at the least, and perhaps the rest of their long players I’ve sat out since 1995!

In the last year or so, I’ve read nothing but praise for Factory Floor from the minds of The Quietus, and since I hold their opinions in reasonably high regard [most of the time], I should investigate this band since I’d hate to carry regrets of missing a hot band’s rare appearance in the sticks where I live. There’s always the ghost of Ultravox ca. 1980 haunting me on that score, and I’d hate to add FF to the shortlist of Monastic regrets! It’s time to check out their sound after reading countless words of endorsement. Since guitarist Nik Colk Void has recorded an album with Chris + Cosey [which I also need to hear] her CV already looks impeccable to me.

So that’s round two. Worrell and PSB are very solid additions that I will definitely check out live, and Factory Floor get the tentative nod. The rest of the acts don’t even register a single ping with me. I have literally only heard the names M.I.A. and RBTS Win in passing. The other 40 names are ciphers to an old hack like me. So maybe I’ll need to construct a spreadsheet and hit itunes to see if I’m missing anything. I’ll report back my findings at a later time. I think that I’ll probably investigate Nile Rogers and Giorgio Moroder live, just for the principle of it, so their names are in red now on the list above.

I can’t fail to notice that when the initial lineup of 31 was released, Moogfest claimed that over 70 slots were yet to be filled in the five day schedule. Phase two was another 45 names, leaving 25 remaining to be announced. I’ll be rubbing that prayer cloth extra vigorously to see if John Foxx + The Maths, Heaven 17, or Ryuichi Sakamoto might be among the last batch of additions yet to be announced. Or dare I say… Visage? Stay tuned.

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