A bit of hot goss just came our way regarding
last night's Road to Bonnaroo installment at Mercy Lounge. According to multiple sources at the Lounge, indie-pop underdogs Colorfeels won both the audience votes and the judge votes — "by a landslide," said one source, "not even close." Unfortunately for the 'Feels, however, they allegedly broke one of RTB's cardinal rules: They played what sounded like four songs rather than the allotted three, and they played for longer than 15 minutes — thus disqualifying themselves and allowing By Lightning! to slip into the top slot. Apparently, all the participating bands received multiple notices that they were to stick to a three-song, 15-minute limit, and this is a zero-tolerance policy.
I managed to contact Colorfeels' manager, Bo Brannen, who assured me that the band's overextended set was "not intentional." In fact, he pointed out that the outro to "Pretty Walk" — which you can hear here — was misinterpreted as being a fourth song. And while Brannen says the band's set apparently lasted for 17 minutes, they "never saw anything about a time limit — only a song limit — until the day of the show." He was careful to note that Colorfeels weren't attempting to eschew the rules or disrespect the other artists.
A shame that this controversy might sully memories of Colorfeels' performance, as — on a personal note — I found it to be the most engaging of the evening. But here's some good news: For the next four days, Colorfeels are offering a free download of their song "Shapes" — the final tune from last night's set. The song was "produced by the whole band and recorded at Sound Emporium with tracking engineer Josh Papp and mixed and mastered by our good friend Ryan McFadden," and it "features two drum sets." You can download "Shapes" via Colorfeels' Bandcamp page and stream it below. Dig those groovy horn blasts. By the way, Colorfeels are playing with Daniel Ellsworth and the Great Lakes this Friday, March 2, at Exit/In.
