Editor’s Note: Chances are, by now, we’re all aware that Boston Calling is happening this weekend across the sprawling Harvard Athletic Complex in Allston. But Vanyaland Music Editor, Boston Victoria Wasylak is filling us in on what’s happening inside the festival, covering the sights and sounds from the grounds to the stage and everything in between. As she covered Sunday’s Day 3 (May 29), a few of the live performances really stood out, and those are highlighted below. Be sure to check her report on the festival’s best selfie locations, and keep it locked to our continuing coverage throughout the weekend. — Michael Marotta
Oompa
You’d be hard-pressed to coerce a Boston crowd into chanting the name of a legendary Lakers player on the night of a major Celtics game, but Oompa (pictured up top) knows a thing or two about persuasion. By the end of the Boston rapper’s set on the Red Stage, she had the crowd singing along to her single “Lebron” as the fate of the C’s season dangled in limbo — which, given Boston-level sports devotion, is borderline miraculous.
“I would say shout out to Lebron, but the Celtics [play] in a few hours,” she said before the song, reminding everyone where her allegiance lies.
Of all the digital ink we’ve spilled regarding Oompa’s rise, one tidbit from an October 2021 interview stands out in particular. Oompa has her sights set on Los Angeles, she told us, after runnin’ out of patience (to quote one of her new singles) while hitting her head against the metaphorical ceiling of the Massachusetts music scene. Her final hurrah could have been her headlining set at The Paradise Rock Club last year. Could have been, except which stages are buzzier and more worthy of out-with-a-bang moments than the ones at Boston Calling?
Oompa’s Sunday set captured an artist on the precipice of a national takeoff, fueled by the positive psyche and meditational quality of her 2021 album Unbothered. For the penultimate song, she turned that mindwork outwards and convinced onlookers to join an homage to Lebron James. It might be the closest thing to wizardry we saw all weekend — and more importantly, it might just be one of the last times Boston can call Oompa one of our own.
Djo
Steve Harrington, is that you? If Joe Keery’s singing voice didn’t tip people off, then surely his easily-recognizable floppy locks alerted viewers that Djo is the project of the Stranger Things star and Newburyport native.
Keery and Co. proved he’s evolved past his days in Post Animal at the Season 4 hot take meetup Delta Airlines Blue Stage. But there was more to witness than just his show pony of an ’80s ‘do, which has earned the actor/artist umpteen memes and leagues of teen admirers via Netflix. Djo’s slow-burn psychedelia positioned Keery as the protagonist for once, as opposed to his years of being just one member in a cast of characters, be it on screen or in past musical projects. Emphasis on slow burn, which also applies to festivalgoers’ skin roasting under the first major rays of sun all weekend.
Japanese Breakfast
Japanese Breakfast did it. They delivered the one song, the one defining moment of a whole weekend, that summed up two years without live music. Two years without the sunburns, scalpers, and sticky beer-coated floors, sure, but also two years without the communal catharsis that comes with watching artists spill their soul until they’re out of encores.
That moment was called “Kokomo, IN,” and anything more than a passing thought about the tune’s newfound relevance could make you weep. “If ever you come back / Wherever you find your way to / And though it may not last / Just know that I’ll be here longing,” frontwoman Michelle Zauner cooed on the chorus.
Artists, industry professionals, and fans have spent countless months predicting when — or worse, if — large-scale live music could safely console us again. We have been waiting, wishing, and wondering how long this nightmare will prevail. When Boston Calling’s gates opened on Friday, it was a declaration: The wait is over. And the lyrics of “Kokomo, IN” solidified that sign.
The 2022 festival wristbands may bear a mark of trauma (they say 2020, if you haven’t realized yet), but wearing them this weekend was a symbol of patience, perseverance, and general faith that we’d be able to reach that moment: The day after all that aforementioned “longing,” when elbow-to-elbow live music would find its way back to us again.
Zauner has a lot to toot her own horn about these days — or in yesterday’s case, bang her own gong about, which she did during her set at the Delta Airlines Blue Stage. Her recent résumé boasts Grammy nominations, a New York Times bestselling memoir, and ample late night TV appearances. Now, she can add “signal a new era in music history” to that robust list. Frankly, it feels like the most significant feat of them all.
Glass Animals
Allow Glass Animals to shatter your perception that they’re only capable of vaporware-adjacent cheese. Perhaps you’ve heard “Heat Waves” a couple hundred times, the 2020 single that commenced a fever for the English band, fanned by over 1.5 billion streams and a “Best New Artist” Grammy nomination. Misleading award categories aside, the group has curated a menagerie of sounds over their 12-plus years together, and their set on the Green Stage was their chance to flex beyond their more generic Dreamland super-smash.
Case in point: The group began with “Life Itself,” a bring-you-to-your-knees diary entry of a loserly main character with percussion so powerful, you can’t help but groove to descriptions of their mundane life. Which, of course, pairs impeccably well with “I Don’t Wanna Talk (I Just Wanna Dance),” the band’s inward-looking disco.
New fans of Glass Animals might have been surprised when the group reached back to 2014 to play “Gooey,” but not as surprised as when frontman Dave Bayley called the set “practically a hometown show,” revealing his childhood ties to Worcester. (A note on festival fashion: As the band’s bespectacled leader, Bayley sprinted onstage in a Ivy-league-esque sweater vest like a Rivers Cuomo stunt double. Don’t worry about him overheating; he later removed it to reveal a white tee that simply read “TOILET PAPER.”)
But when the band did summon “Heat Waves,” it was admittedly festival fodder pulled straight from any concertgoer’s Dreamland. That tune is hooky, simple, and so ubiquitous that literally everyone knows enough words to sing along. You can’t call that kind of hype smoke and mirrors.