Majestic Link Detour Link

FONTANA
(1:00 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
The bassist looks like a young Mike Mills, the drummer like A Northern Soul-era Richard Ashcroft, and the singer's waistline somehow rivals that of Fatima on "America's Next Top Model." That, and they kick out caterwaul garage jams that would make Mudhoney's Mark Arm weep with jealousy. All that, and a candy-corn vest.

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THE SILENT YEARS
(1:40 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
You don't have to be in Radiohead to be ambitious. Just ask the Silent Years, who have been making a name for themselves by endlessly touring, recording, eating, sleeping, drinking, laughing, loving, and scarf wearing. Just make sure you don't eat too many hot dogs and spend their set on the shitter, because their mix of Broken Social Scene-ish rock carries enough weight to fill that gut of yours.

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THE WORD PLAY
(2:20 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
Let's see... horn-rimmed glasses? Check. Ash-gray peacoats over American Apparel hoodies? Check. Hair methodically swooped to the side? Quadruple check. The makings of emo's next big thing? Nope. Not in the case of suburban Detroiters the Word Play, who instead come correct with herky-jerky dynamics and unexpected melodies that recall early Modest Mouse -- if they lived in the suburbs instead of the trailer park, that is.

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THE MAHONIES
(3:00 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
On their undisputed 15-second Internet smash (1,697 plays to date on MySpace), Detroit's the Mahonies ask that age old question: "Where the fuck are my keys?" The answer? The Mahonies probably stole them and are now driving around in your car, rocking old tapes on SST and Touch and Go before they drive it off a cliff. That's where, dood.

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THE DECKS
(3:40 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
When the Decks started out, they were simply those over-enthusiastic kids bouncing around at the front of the stage, singing along to every word of your own band's songs. Now a band themselves, the Detroit quartet is cranking out gem after gem of late 70s-style punk while you're at home in the basement smoking pot, working on that supposed "masterpiece," and silently acknowledging that it will never see the light of day. You are old. This is the youth gone wild.
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THE POP PROJECT
(4:20 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
Not many bands can count Steely Dan, Luther Vandross, Panic at the Disco, the Beach Boys, and Aphex Twin amongst their influences. Not many bands should. But not many bands are as blissfully eclectic as the Pop Project. The word "pop," after all, is in their name. Your pop project before the fest? Turn "TRL" on mute and rock some "Reelin' in the Years," because that's what they'd do.

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.SERENITY COURT
(5:00 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
Besides painting, riding bikes, and making stained glass depictions of David Bowie, the three ladies of Serenity Court craft clean, slinky songs that remind us of all those great Throwing Muses and Belly records we ordered from Columbia House for 1 cent back in 1995. Yes, that's a good thing.

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KIDDO (5:40 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
Things move fast these days. But, Detroit-by-way-of-Cleveland sock-poppers Kiddo yearn for a slower, simpler time. A time when families would sit down together, eat a TV dinner, and watch "Howdy Doody" on the boob tube. When a coonskin cap was acceptable headwear. When a couple of chords and a saccharine melody was enough to woo the girl of your dreams. This is Kiddo, and they want to make out with you. That's what they want to do. Ooh wee ooh wee ooh.

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GREAT LAKES MYTH SOCIETY
(6:20 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.) You simply cannot host a festival in Michigan without including Great Lakes Myth Society. This is a band that just oozes the Mitten, with elegantly produced pop jingles that hearken back to a time when folks lit their homes by candle light and churned their own downloads right there on the homestead.

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THE FRUSTRATIONS
7:00 pm, Day Party @ C.A.I.D.)
Spend your time chewing glass, drinking gasoline, and snorting ants? Well get ready to shit a brick, because the Frustrations are your new favorite band. Unhinged and (probably) unhappy, they are the type of punks that wore Jesus Lizard and Flipper T-shirts to school while you were embarrassingly rocking Stussy and Marithé et François Girbaud.

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THE GOLDEN DOGS
(8:15 pm, Majestic)
On tour with Sloan, Toronto's Golden Dogs are going to warm up the night with their spastic power pop. You may not know 'em now, but if the sticky hooks of "Life on the Line" aren't bopping around in your head post-show, you probably don't have ears. Or a brain.

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.SEX GHOST!
(8:30 pm, Magic Stick)
Sex Ghost sound like a video game. But we're not talking that new-fangled Wii shit. We're talking TurboGrafx-16 or Sega Game Gear. Altered Beast, mothafucka!

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COPPER THIEVES
(9:00 pm, Garden Bowl)
It's a regular indie rock meeting of the minds, and you're all invited. New Grenada's John Nelson, ex-NG drummer Andy "Boy" Roy, and Kiddo/Child Bite multi-instrumentalist Christian Doble relive their high school days and play the kind of powerful rawk that can only come from three guys who know the names to every Love Battery LP.

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SOLITARY STATES
(9:15 pm, Majestic Theatre)
Spend years dissecting the works of Elvis Costello, and discussing the finer points of Teenage Fanclub's Bandwagonesque half-drunk at the bar, and there's no way you can write a bad song. Seriously, can't be done. We've tried. Nobody's better at it 'round these here parts than indie-rock troubadour Eric Weir. Along with a crack band of skilled players, Weir lays down the sweet pop sounds like a honey bee pollinating it's favorite flower. Prepare to get stung.
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CHARLIE SLICK
(9:30 pm, Magic Stick)
Charlie Slick is to Gary Numan as Prince is to Beck, all electro weirdness and synthetic funk jams that'll have you poppin' and lockin' all night. So, if you come away from Rock City Festival with glitter in your hair and your ass straight shook, don't blame us. Blame him.

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THE NICE DEVICE
(10:00 pm, Garden Bowl)
After a brief hiatus, Alicia Gbur and Matt Lannoo are back to doing what they do best: co-fronting the Nice Device, one of Detroit's best kept post-punk secrets. This is the best news we've heard since Scott Weiland re-joined Stone Temple Pilots. (No, seriously.)

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MASON PROPER
(10:15 pm, Majestic Theatre)
With a cornucopia of influences that range from Enon to Neutral Milk Hotel, and a frontman that is more rubber-necked than Jim Carey, Ann Arbor's Mason Proper exist in that exciting middle ground where a band is exploding one minute and lowering you back to earth the next. Sort of like music's equivalent to Thai food.

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EAT SUGAR
(11:30 pm, Magic Stick)
Like Death From Above 1979 crashing hard into the dark scree of Suicide, Cincinnati's Eat Sugar are the result of four dudes who spend most of their days converting their vinyl to MP3's. It's where the past and future collide, and it's a rush.

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FOUR HOUR FRIENDS
(11:00 pm, Garden Bowl)
Ah, what a fitting name for a Detroit band. You meet somebody at the bar and knock back a few cold ones together. They're your best buddy for a few hours, and then they turn around and talk shit about you on their blog the next day. But, we've got faith in these Four Hour Friends, as their folksy laments lead us to believe that this is a band we can trust.

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FRIENDLY FOES
(11:15 pm, Majestic Theatre)
Superchunk... Supergrass... Superdrag... Superfriendz... supergroup? Thunderbirds are Now!'s Ryan Allen, Kiddo's Liz Wittman, and ex-Satin Peaches drumming beard Brad Elliott fire up their power-pop cylinders, tossing off catchy nuggets like it's their job. Which, it kind of is, unless you count their real jobs. The ones they actually make money at.

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F'KE BLOOD
(12:00 am, Garden Bowl)
They may call themselves F'Ke Blood, but there's no doubt that they're a real band. Made up of members from Godzuki, Silverghost, Tranzistors and many more, their spiky post-punk tunes are poised to tap your cerebellum like a hot poker. Welcome to New Detroit.

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MICK BASSETT & THE MARTHAS
(12:00 am, Garden Bowl)
It's okaaaaaaaaaaay to stretch ouuuuuuuuuut the vooooooooowells of youuuuur sooooooongs, when yooooooou haaaaave the chops to baaaaaaaack it uuuuuuuuuuuuuuup.

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SLOAN
(12:15 am, Majestic Theatre)
We can hear the thrones of devoted fans shouting now: "Slooooooooooooan! Sloooooooooan!" And at that moment we will sit back and watch one of the world's most badass rock combos play hit after hit of smart power-pop like they wrote the book on the damn thing. And when "Money City Maniacs" kicks in? Don't even try to tell us that there's a better band out there to headline this bad boy. Say it again: "Slooooooooooan! Slooooooooooan!"
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THE DEATH SET
(12:30 am, Magic Stick)
Ladies and germs, please prepare yourselves for the mothafuckin' Death Set. Watch and learn as their ADD-addled, Bad Brains-esque proto-punk smashes head-on into a whole mess of samples, ranging from Jay-Z to Wu-Tang Clan, to shit that we can't even pin down. Wham City? More like Jam City.

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DEAD BODIES
(1:00 am, Garden Bowl)
Drugs, man. Lots of 'em. Or at least that's what we can infer. Nobody can make music this hallucinogenic with a sober mind. But who knows. Maybe these dudes are just weird, listen to tons of psyche-rock, and lick the belly's of frogs for fun. Maybe we're the intoxicated ones. Could be the set of the fest, if anyone remembers being there.

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