NOS Alive 2024: Saturday – Festival Review

NOS Alive – Day Three
Lisbon, Portugal
11th – 13th July 2024

As NOS Alive wraps up its 2024 edition, Pearl Jam return to the festival named after one of their songs. But aside from their something-to-prove headline set, Nils van der Linden is also impressed by the likes of Black Honey, The Breeders, and Khruangbin.

The first edition of NOS Alive, held back in 2007, was headlined by Beastie Boys, Thursday’s standouts Smashing Pumpkins, and tonight’s top-billed Pearl Jam. The Seattle band’s appearance at the inaugural event was almost obligatory: the festival was named after one of their songs. So it’s only fitting that they play it again during their return to Passeio Marítimo de Algés.

But their fourth appearance at this riverside location just outside Lisbon’s city centre, almost didn’t happen; just a couple of weeks ago they cancelled three shows due to illness in the band, which Eddie Vedder has since compared to “a near-death experience”. 

“It was so sad and hard and painful and terrifying to have to cancel shows,” the singer tells the NOS Alive crowd in a speaking voice that’s still a little rough. “We appreciate your patience and, until the next time, we love you, we will remember tonight.”

Pearl Jam are not alone. Saturday at NOS Alive is going to be difficult to forget. It all begins on the main NOS Stage with locals Blasted Mechanism who dress up their electro-rock in Dune-meets-Mad Max cosplay. While their two MCs and hype man guitarist with a triple-necked instrument run and jump around like it’s not 30 degrees in the sun, Black Honey are getting real on the Heineken Stage. The horror movie-style opening narration of Faster Pussycat… Kill! Kill! plays over the PA before the band arrive to totally live up to the lines “Violence devours all it touches, its voracious appetite rarely fulfilled.

Yet violence doesn’t only destroy, it creates and moulds as well.” Izzy Bee Phillips doesn’t just sing and play her guitar with punk intensity; she snarls, smirks, curls her lip, stares down the audience, screams, and dances with abandon, all the while leading the band through intense songs like pummeling I Like The Way You Die, menacing Disinfect, and snappy Hello Today. Big-chorused Beaches and Heavy are more anthemic and recent cover of Wild Thing shows off their fun side, but it’s Rock Bottom (about “being fucking depressed”) and Up Against It (a “love letter to my other self”) that hit hardest.

Over on the NOS Alive main stage, The Breeders don’t pull their punches either. Still celebrating the 30th anniversary of Last Splash, their performance is stuffed with tracks from the 1993 LP played with all the raw unpredictability of new songs. Although they’ve been performing variations of this set for the past three weeks, it still sounds endearingly (and intentionally?) rough around the edges. Saints (with its fit for purpose line “Summer is ready when you are”) is all sneer; Invisible Man thrashes and jangles; Cannonball is still all about that bass line and the alternatingly sweet and distorted vocals; and Divine Hammer sounds thrilling enough to have been written yesterday. Singer-guitarist Kim Deal’s conversation with her sister and the audience is similarly off the cuff. “Have we played this festival before?” she asks apropos of nothing at one point; when Kelley Deal nails her lead vocal on a ragged I Just Wanna Get Along and Kim deadpans “Good job”, it’s hard to know whether she’s being genuine or sarcastic.

And, while fussing with her guitar pedals again, Deal introduces Disobedience less than confidently, almost rolling her eyes when announcing: “We’re going to play a new song. It’s going to go great.”  It genuinely does, as do the likes of jaunty Drivin’ On 9 and twangy surf guitar of No Aloha (perfect for a festival set on a riverside), loud-quiet-loud groover Safari, bright Doe, assertive Wait In The Car, and pogoing Huffer. Deal barely stops grinning during the set and is clearly having a total blast, even when she ends with the song she’s probably played most in her life: Pixies’ Gigantic. Her enthusiasm is so contagious, it’s hard not to jump and smile along while belting out “Gigantic, gigantic, gigantic/ A big big love”.

Sum 41 are a slicker (but far more predictable) proposition. Coming onto the NOS Alive main stage to the sounds of AC/DC’s TNT, the Canadians have pulled out most of the vintage stadium rock tropes for their farewell tour. Pyro, confetti, smoke, sparklers, giant confetti-filled balloons, massive inflatable devil head, seeing which part of the audience can sing loudest, a crowd-pleasing cover version (We Will Rock You played in double time). There’s even a drum solo. All that’s missing are T-shirt cannons and grabbing someone from the crowd to play guitar or sing.

Frontman Deryck Whibley is as much singer as master of ceremonies, constantly addressing the audience with some variation on “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to get crazy/jump/scream/get those hands in the air.” They do, but it’s hard not get swept up when Sum 41’s songs are so immediate. Motivation and The Hell Song, which kick off the party, are the epitome of ’90s California punk (written in Canada). No Reason (with its chants of “hey hey hey”) adds some hard rock riffage to the mix before breaking down to just vocals and a beat. We’re All To Blame and Walking Disaster play with dynamics (and audience participation) as they lunge between loud/fast/heavy and quiet/slow/pretty. A raging Rise Up (a standout from final album Heaven :X: Hell) and Pieces (the closest Sum 41 get to a ballad) bring the arena-sized choruses before the final run to the end. A no-nonsense In Too Deep is straight to the point, the quiet bit of an otherwise aggro Fat Lip offers one last chance for the audience to sing along, and a furious Still Waiting sends Sum 41 off into the night. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. Bye,” is all Whibley says as he disappears in a hurry, one day closer to retirement (and the inevitable reunion).

Meanwhile, Khruangbin have already begun hypnotising the audience over at NOS Alive’s Heineken Stage. The trio from Houston, Texas are as difficult to categorise as their name — which means “flying engine” or “aeroplane” in Thai — is to pronounce or spell. But that mystery is part of their allure. It extends to tonight’s performance that plays out against a backdrop of open windows, not unlike those on the cover of their latest album, revealing post-apocalyptic sky-is-on-fire lighting, various shifting colour patterns, slow-motion live visuals, and lightning strikes. As the world ends behind them, guitarist Mark Speer and bass player Laura Lee float up, down, and along the stage-wide steps, sometimes in unison (as if entwined in some mysterious ritual) while playing music that could best be described as psychedelic. Occasionally they’ll run on the spot or play with their faces almost touching or gather at the foot of the stairs to breathe some virtually indistinguishable lyrics into their microphones. All the while drummer DJ Johnson keeps time at the top right corner of the stage, completely unfazed by what’s going on below him. 

Perhaps it’s the combination of music and visuals, perhaps it’s the lack of sleep kicking in, perhaps it’s the late hour, but the effect is completely mesmerising and utterly brilliant. “LOVE THIS BUT DON’T UNDERSTAND IT” read my notes. Hallucinogens may have helped. But even without, the likes of Lady And Man (with guitar playing that shifts from funky to roaring engine to Joe Satriani virtuosity), People Everywhere (Still Alive) (which changes so frequently it’s impossible to pin down), and The Infamous Bill (with that big drum break) are impossible to ignore. Like Swans or Sunn O))) or Godspeed You! Black Emperor without the post-punk heaviness, this is music that isn’t simply listened to. It completely engulfs.

Pearl Jam have a similar effect even if their approach is a little less subtle. Having long since evolved from grunge upstarts to legacy rock band with three generations of fans (but still plenty left to say), they could headline a festival like this in their sleep. That they still give their all — perhaps more so after those cancellations — is one of the reasons for their enduring popularity. Another is their ability to play (at the highest level) seemingly anything from their extensive back catalogue, shaking up sets from one night to the next, dropping in rarities between the staples. Tonight’s no different, although there aren’t as many obscurities at NOS Alive as you’d get at a standalone PJ gig. 

The big ’90s hits are mostly present and accounted for: Daughter opens the show; Animal roars; Given To Fly soars; a still menacing Jeremy ends with the audience shouting as loudly as Vedder; Wishlist, accompanied by handwritten notes on the big screens, is as poignant as ever; Even Flow features Mike McCready’s extended behind-his-head guitar solo; Porch ends the main set with an extended jam after the singer’s picked up a Portuguese flag; Black boasts more McCready heroics, tens of thousands of voices singing its melody, and a kneeling Vedder bowing down to the audience; and, of course, Alive shows up up in all its glory.

A couple of cover versions make the cut: a solo acoustic rendition of Imagine (accompanied by a sea of lit-up mobile phones and a plea to “find good leaders and heal ourselves”) and a raucous Rockin’ In The Free World (accompanied by the front man running around to throw one tambourine after another into the audience). And a few selections from the last 20 years turn up too: apart from a blistering Mind Your Manners, there’s plenty of time for tracks from latest album Dark Matter. The menacing title track, riotous React, Respond, musically breezy Wreckage (the most vivid of the new songs), sprawling Waiting For Stevie (which really gets to stretch its legs on stage), and moody Upper Hand keep the show fresh without it losing momentum. Sure, the cheers are quieter, but there’s no rush for the bar either. Vedder notices; after an extended Yellow Ledbetter, he shares his gratitude: “We are very blessed, because you have blessed us.”

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Words by Nils van der Linden. You can visit his author profile for Louder Than War here. He tweets as @nilsvdlinden and his website is www.nilsvanderlinden.com.