John Roderick, main man behind the Long Winters, can be quite a witty writer, as anyone who has heard any of his lyrics can attest to. So the people over at MSNBC.com pulled a good move by hiring Roderick to cover Bonnaroo for them. He has some great insights. Before I give you some snappy quotes of his, let's handle the basics. Roderick likes: the White Stripes, Feist, the Decemberists, Elvis Perkins, Fountains of Wayne (?), Regina Spektor, Gogol Bordello, Manu Chao, the Roots, and Gillian Welch. Roderick doesn't like: Jeff Tweedy's "woe is me" mythologizing, Wolfmother (emerging throughout the blog-o-sphere as Worst of the Fest), the Police reunion, Ween's jokiness, Ben Harper's smoothness, the Hold Steady, and Paolo Nutini.
You can head here to read everything Roderick had to say. And you can follow on after the jump for some of his funnier quotes. Do yourself a favor and get all the way down to Roderick's hilarious take on Nutini.
On Tweedy: "Jeff Tweedy made a feature-length film about how much he hated to be on camera (and so did Radiohead, come to think of it), and people lapped it up like clotted cream. Barf."
On Feist: "Like a PJ Harvey who's not so mad at boys."
On Wolfmother: "Were these guys serious? They sounded EXACTLY like a young Black Sabbath, same Ozzy vocals, same half-step modulations and even clunkier Toni Iommi solos."
On the Flaming Lips: "Surprisingly, I noticed for the first time how much Wayne Coyne's voice sounds like Jerry Garcia's. It can't be a coincidence."
On the Police: "I don't think they like each other any better."
On Ween: "For years they seemed like an elaborate prank, like eventually they'''d say, 'Ha! We were just kidding the whole time. We'''re actually Yale cultural studies majors trying to determine how ludicrous a band could be and still have a following, and we'''ve determined that there is no limit. Thanks for participating.'''"
On Franz Ferdinand: "They'll be relevant when the New York hipsters have moved on to glam rock, or Canadian jazz-klezmer, or whatever crapola ends up being chic next year."
On Ben Harper: "The comparison to Lenny Kravitz was inescapable, because Lenny also had a great first record and devolved over the years into a walking Abercrombie and Fitch ad. Oh well."
On the Hold Steady: "Although their live show is undeniably full of energy, full of engagement, and full of whimsy, their music is full of s--t."
On Gogol Bordello: "The show was like a revival meeting in the Church of Dante, except Mephistopheles looked like Borat goofing off playing an overturned bucket."
Best Quote of All (on Paolo Nutini): "Over the course of four songs I couldn't figure out if I was watching Perry Farrell interpret the music of Leon Redbone, or Soul Asylum making fun of Peter Cetera. Either way it wasn't pretty."