Date: Fri 11-Jul-1997

Publication: Bee

Author: SHANNO

Quick Words:

Orbital-Lollapalooza-Meadows

Full Text:

(phoner w/ Orbital's Phil Hartnoll, 7/11/97)

Festival In CT On Sunday: Orbital's First Summer With Lollapalooza A Success

(with album cover)

BY SHANNON HICKS

HARTFORD - Brit Techno wizards Paul and Phil Hartnoll - a/k/a Orbital, a

mainstage band on this summer's Lollapalooza Festival - named themselves after

London's M25 orbital motorway, the route to the raves during the house

explosion of the late Eighties. While it took them a long time to do so, four

albums and almost a decade later Orbital is traveling a lot of new highways,

including one that will bring the duo into Connecticut on Sunday, July 13.

In Sides , the duo's latest release, has been called everything from

melancholic to a proclamation of the brothers' "ever expanding discontent" (

Rolling Stone ). The album is excellent listening, whether heard in a club

setting or while at home. That alone makes it an unusual album, since most

electronic music is not something that can be played outside the confines of a

pulsating, heavy duty rave setting.

What will be interesting Sunday night (Orbital closes the show) will be how

the brothers transpose their album's attitude - computer bleeps and blurps

galore, electric chords and melodies, even a few vocals, very unusual in

electronic bands - into a live musical display. Word has it Orbital is a show

to be seen.

The band is on the first 13 dates of the now-legendary summer festival. After

Lollapalooza, the Hartnoll brothers will head back home, to England, to take

part in the Phoenix Festival in Britain.

This is the first time Orbital has been on Lollapalooza, but far from the

first festival the brothers have played. Phil Hartnoll explained recently the

biggest difference between American and European festivals, calling the

European versions more of a true festival experience.

"The Phoenix, for example, is a four-day festival," he said. "You see a lot of

people camping in the same place for days at a time. These [multi-day] events,

you just plan on camping there.

"A touring festival, though, was quite appealing to us," Hartnoll said. The

brothers were first invited to join the Lollapalooza tour last summer, but

declined. With the formerly "alternative" event changing its focus

dramatically from what it started out as, the Hartnoll brothers did not want

to be mixed in with that vein of Lollapalooza.

"When they have a band like Metallica headlining, that's heavy rock, or

whatever you call it," Hartnoll said. "We thought it would be better to be on

our own tour. When Perry Farrell opted out, the festival went into Monsters of

Rock."

This year's lineup is still a far cry from the days when Nine Inch Nails and

its ilk were the festival's headliners ( Korn? Snoop Doggy Dog? when did these

guys become "Alternative"?? ), but it's a lot closer than what lineups of

recent years boasted.

"We didn't hold any expectations," when they started this tour, Phil said. But

audience response, he added, has been "brilliant."

"There is a little less pressure on you because you're out there playing your

music to some Snoop fans, some Tool fans, everybody really," he said. "You get

a constant changing of people in front of the stage, which is normal, and some

people leave, but that's to be expected.

"But a festival," he continued, "is a good way to get people exposed to a lot

of your music, especially when you are an electric, instrumental band."

Lollapalooza `97 pulls into Connecticut on Sunday, July 13. The festival will

be at the Meadows Music Theatre in Hartford. Main stage bands this year

include Orbital, Tool, Snoop Doggy Dog, Tricky, Korn and James. Tickets are

$26.50 apiece, and the festival starts up at 2 pm. Tickets will be available

at the gate.