West Beach Fest review and ‘Séance’ arrives

By STEVE LIBOWITZ — Sept. 24, 2009

Might this have been the year that the West Beach Music Festival turned the corner? After a wet and wobbly start in October 2007 – when just a few hundred people showed up on a rainy Saturday for the one and only day of the first festival – Twiin Productions nevertheless expanded for 2008, booking three days of music from all over the map (both genre-wise and literally).

But for this third installment of the festival last weekend, the focus became clearer: a laser-like concentration on reggae, jam-rock bands and electronica, and the audience seems to have solidified too. While WBMF will never attract audiences accustomed to acoustic music, singer-songwriters or, say, jazz for that matter – save for a fine set by Jack Johnson-style funk-folk by Donavon Frankenreiter on Friday night, those genres are generally eschewed – the 2009 fest drew sizable crowds.

And as it grew larger each day – Sunday even sold out for single-day tickets – it also grew younger. A fairly mature set took in headliners Ozomatli, reunited with DJ Chali 2NA for this tour, and veteran roots reggae band Steel Pulse on Friday night, and it was also people plenty old enough to drive, vote, drink and maybe even run for president that populated Ben Harper’s closing set on the main stage on Saturday (although I imagine quite a few joined me in disappointment about Harper’s harder new direction with the Relentless7).

But it was the youngsters – who had danced incessantly all day and night to electronica in the Oasis tent to such acts as the wiry British DJ Bassnectar who pulsed up and down with as much energy as his frenetically mixed set on Saturday night – who pressed forward en masse for the double dose of teen ska-funk-rock from Pepper and Slightly Stoopid last Sunday. More surprising, some of the local bands, such as Santa Barbara-based reggae band Rebelution, drew equally rabid crowds on Sunday.

But that was also when the litany of complaints about the festival reached a fever pitch. Monday morning, I got a call on my cell phone from a Montecito resident who lives in Bonnymeade, several miles from the oceanfront, who said the music boomed in their neighborhood all weekend. And police reported similar complaints from as far away as Summerland. That was likely due both to a maddeningly persistent daytime fog bank bouncing the sound back to town as well as the main stage this year being angled directly toward the harbor, turned away from down the main part of West Beach, which in previous years had caused a ruckus with residents and hotel guests along the local neighborhood.

Police also said there was an increase in drug use this year, which was not surprising given the musical genres, the larger crowd, the warm weather and the overall party atmosphere. The marijuana issue also elicited an email from one of my friends on the other side of the smoke screen with a different sort of complaint: he wondered why the police were hassling all the pot smokers. Wasn’t grass supposed to be a low-priority crime?

But if the West Beach fest annoyed a lot of neighbors and other residents again this year, they also did a lot of things right. New this year were large flat screen TV monitors above the Bashment stage, so you could still see all the action from a distance (smaller monitors were installed in the VIP areas, too; thanks very much, since we could barely see the main stage from our vantage point). The transition between acts was smoother than ever, with barely five or so minutes between sets between the two stages, unlike the long lag times in previous years. The Oasis stage was moved to the opposite corner from the live music areas, so the booming beats of electronica didn’t overwhelm sounds from the stages, another complaint from last year. And best of all, kids 10 and under were admitted free, making this truly a family event, at least during the daytime.

It’s a gorgeous site, West Beach, for a music festival, unlike anything near Palm Springs or up in the dry lake bed in Nevada where Burning Man is held; ocean and mountain views abound, and the breeze from the channel cools the sun-heated sand. But whether such an urban spot is the right location remains up for debate.

Although most of the people actually at the festival expressed desires to see the event grow even larger, becoming perhaps even a mini-Coachella, people looking for a peaceful weekend at home had different thoughts.

“I hope this is the last year of that festival,” the Montecito caller told me,

* * * *

‘Séance’ arrives

It’s time. Sit down at the table. Hold hands. Close your eyes, and … Wait. That’s not right. The medium delivers the message on stage, not in the audience, as “Sceance on a Wet Afternoon,” Broadway composer Stephen (“Wicked,” “Godspell”) Schwartz’ first opera, has its world premiere performance tomorrow at the Granada. New York Opera star soprano Lauren Flanigan plays Myra, a “medium” frustrated with the lack of attention (and money) she’s receiving, while baritone Kim Josephson plays her husband Bill, whose love for her blinds him to the danger of her plans for a kidnapping, in Schwartz’ adaptation of the of the 1961 novel and 1964 movie.

Don’t miss this huge production, as the entire opera world is waiting to see what happens with this world premiere performance, a real coup for Opera Santa Barbara. Performances are 7:30 p.m. tomorrow and October 2, and 4:30 p.m. on October 4. Info at 899-2222/ www.granadasb.com or www.operasb.com.

Meanwhile, the original film screens tonight at the Lobero, where both Schwartz and the film’s director, Bryan Forbes, will be on hand to discuss the adaptation and answer questions afterwards. Call 963-0761.

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Chali 2na : 9/27/2009

I'm pretty sure he's an MC rather than a DJ.

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