Tentatively, and with a few gaps for food/beer gardening/wandering around:
KATY PERRY(Sat, 1:45 pm, Memorial Stadium) Admit it: It's been fun watching Katy Perry flicker and falter in the moment (i.e., 2009) following her initial flash of fame, as Lady GaGa's off-the-rack club-kid pop overtakes Perry's lame (and formerly evangelical Christian) faux lesbiantics. Oh sure, she'll probably come back in 2010 or something (the supervillain always comes back one more time before the end)—and, yes, she deserves some credit for being able to write her own as well as other people's songs and for being an entertaining if entirely predictable loudmouth in interviews—but history will remember her as a footnote, no more important though a great deal more odious than that Jill Sobule character (whatever happened to her, anyway?). EG
MAYER HAWTHORNE & THE COUNTY(Sat, 4 pm, Fisher Green) Mayer Hawthorne's debut single for esteemed L.A. oddball hiphop label Stones Throw was pressed on red, heart-shaped vinyl—appropriate, given how much love drips from his blue-eyed soul songs. Not only romantic love won and lost, but a deep, abiding love for his hometown of Detroit's rich musical traditions, from J Dilla on back to classic Motown. You'll hear less of the former and more of the latter in Hawthorne's vintage-sounding arrangements and straight-faced, falsetto-reaching croon. Think Jim-era Jamie Lidell, only with less wicked wit and outlandish stage presence; instead, Hawthorne is just dapper and pro, backed by his slick-but-not-showy band the County. EG
THE WHORE MOANS PRESENT: THE BLACK ATOM!(Sat, 6:30 pm, EMP) Seattle's citizens have the opportunity to see the Whore Moans' sweaty and frenetic live show nearly every week—the hardworking band are constantly playing around town. But tonight's performance won't be your average Whore Moans gig. For Bumbershoot, the band have prepared a vaudevillian rock-and-roll spectacle they're calling the Black Atom! It'll be the Whore Moans turned up to 11, with the promise of girls, dancing, costumes, guest musicians, and plenty more surprises. MS
GANG GANG DANCE(Sat, 7 pm, Exhibition Hall) Although Gang Gang Dance have gradually sheared off some of their more abrasive textures, they're still working far left of center from the music-biz grid. These Brooklyn bohos have always had a predilection for strange rhythms, but with their latest album, Saint Dymphna, GGD bend grime, gothic dub, techno, and Madonna's "Holiday" to their own idiosyncratic will. This group's tweaking of the sonic pleasure principle strikes a subversive, usually unusual note. D. SEGAL
OS MUTANTES(Sat, 7:30 pm, Fisher Green) In 1964, the Brazilian Army led a right-wing coup against the government. Two years later, a psychedelic-rock band called Os Mutantes formed in São Paulo, took too much LSD, and composed the background music for Brazil's uneasy combination of tropical dream and military dictatorship. "The Mutants" played the sexiest rock of the '60s, blending Beach Boys pop with Hendrix soul and the stylistic kinkiness of Brazil's Tropicalia movement. (The voice of their original singer, Rita Lee, sounds like a dress falling onto a cool tile floor.) Most North Americans didn't discover them until well after their nasty, protracted breakup (which involved drugs, fights, and at least one coma, induced by a leap from a six-story window). In 1993, Kurt Cobain wrote Os Mutantes a letter, asking them to tour again. In 1999, David Byrne released a Mutantes compilation. The U.S. love affair with the Mutants continues. BK
TELEKINESIS(Sat, 8 pm, EMP) You only have to hear the first 10 seconds of the song "Tokyo," from Telekinesis's latest self-titled Merge release, for the whole song to get stuck in your head for a week. "I-I-I went to Tokyo! Only in my dreams, 'cause they're all I know!" All of Telekinesis's songs are just as memorable—bouncy drumming, hyper and fuzzy guitar. MS
DE LA SOUL(Sat, 9:30 pm, Fisher Green) A rap group that lasts two decades is a rarity; a rap group that endures that long without showing serious artistic decadence is even more rare. De La Soul may have peaked with their first three albums—3 Feet High and Rising, De La Soul Is Dead, and Buhloone Mindstate—but the D.A.I.S.Y. Age (RIP) icons haven't drastically tailed off in quality, as some other hiphop vets have done. Boasting a catalog bursting with smart party-igniters, De La Soul should pack their Bumbershoot set with socially conscious lyrics, swift vocal interplay, and some of the funkiest, funnest samples ever punched into an MPC. D. SEGAL
Build your own schedule and find previews of every single thing happening at the festival here. Also: more on Mayer Hawthorne, the Whore Moans, Gang Gang Dance, and De La Soul.
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