Jillian Mapes

Fiona Apple at Governors Ball on Sunday. Check out our gallery of pictures from the festival.

This weekend, Governors Ball took over Randall's Island for the latest installment of "Can New York City Host Its Own Major Music Festival?" Founders Entertainment, organizers of the second annual fest (that's what All Points West said, too), decided to go the "diverse" route, but at least they were nice enough to not get too mix-and-match, splitting up the lineup roughly day-by-day. Saturday could have been called the dance-y day, or the spring break day; its lineup included Passion Pit, Chromeo, Kid Cudi, Major Lazer, Santigold and Duck Sauce. Sunday, meanwhile, was a bit of a late '90s alt-rock time warp, with Beck, Fiona Apple, Modest Mouse and Built to Spill headlining amidst guitar-based indie bands from this era.

Sunday was visibly more well-attended—but does that mean it "won" the weekend? Taste is subjective—that much we can all agree on—so if you're a rave kid, you'd probably say Saturday won, whereas pretty much everyone else would say Sunday won (Beck's first NYC show in four years!). Since music festivals are often about the overall experience anyway, Sound of the City decided to measure the other ways that festival can satisfy—or annoy—attendees, using a 10-point rating system to score certain intangibles head-to-head (as well as a few bonus categories). Like golf, the goal is to have the lowest score in order to win. Which day emerged victorious? The answer below.

More »

If you think the opinions of critics and passionate fans of rock and rap and pop and country mean nothing to the Grammy Awards, being a dance-music fan widens the gap that much more. Essentially, if you're allergic to bottle service and/or newbs with glow sticks, you're better off crying into your pitch-shifter. The bulk of this year's Best Dance Recording roster is out to party like it's 1999—specifically, that year's Ministry of Sound compilations, only dumbed further down. Yet that's notable in itself—part of a shift exemplified last December, when I this Top 40 back-announcement: "I heard that overseas three years ago. That's how far ahead of the curve Europe is when it comes to dance music." That pronouncement is this category—which has six nominees instead of five—in a nutshell.

More »

Duck Sauce, mid-interview. All photos by Chris Klassen.

When A-Trak (Alain Macklovitch) and Armand Van Helden teamed up as Duck Sauce for last year's dance hit, "aNYway", we were surprised, then pleased, then completely addicted. The production duo shares roots in old-school hip-hop and club-friendly, sample-based dance production, but come from entirely different worlds. To give an idea: In 1997, a fifteen-year-old A-Trak was busy winning the world DMC Championship. He would spend that year, and the rest of his teens, known as one of the youngest, most talented scratch performers to ever exist. 1997 was also the year that Armand released his Greatest Hits compilation (on infamous house label, Strictly Rhythms) and Sampleslaya--a party breakbeat album. His next single, "U Don't Know Me", dropped later in the year and went to the #2 spot on Billboard pop charts.

Since then, A-Trak has gone from scratch champion to Kanye's DJ to Fool's Gold label-founder and production guru. Armand has continued to put out hit records-- most recently, 2006's "My My My" peaked at #2 on Billboard's dance charts, and 2007's "I Want Your Soul" did the same. With the wave of disco revival that has been sweeping through dance music in the last few years, it was only a matter of time until these two met. The result of that meeting? The birth of Duck Sauce, creators of delightfully nonsensical and catchy club bangers. The pair's second single--debuting a year after their first go-- had quite a buzz before it even came out. This probably had something to do with the title--"Barbra Streisand"--but it also had a lot to do with the fact that the song turned out to be insanely catchy. The star-studded video--featuring Kanye, Pharrell, Questlove, and Ezra Koenig--didn't hurt either. We caught up with the A-Trak and Armand yesterday (the day of the single's official release) in Union Square to chat about the project.

More »