Pitchfork Music Festival

For other uses, see Pitchfork (disambiguation).

Pitchfork Music Festival
250px Official logos for the Pitchfork Music Festival
Genre	Alternative rock, indie rock, indietronica, alternative hip hop
Dates	Third weekend of July (Friday to Sunday)
Location(s)	Union Park, Chicago
Years active	2006–present
Founded by	Pitchfork Media
Website
pitchforkmusicfestival.com

The Pitchfork Music Festival is an annual summer music festival organized by Pitchfork Media and held in Union Park in Chicago, IL. The festival, which is normally held over three days (Friday, Saturday, and Sunday) in July, focuses primarily on artists and bands from alternative rock, rap & hip-hop, electronica, and dance music, although it has also included acts from hardcore punk, experimental/avant-garde rock and jazz in its lineups.

In addition to music, the Pitchfork Festival also includes food, beverages, art, and gig posters from local, regional, and national vendors. The Pitchfork Festival also hosts a record fair that is organized and managed by CHIRP Radio, a Chicago community radio station.

2015 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2015 Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 17–19 at Union Park in Chicago. The event's headliners were Wilco, Sleater-Kinney, and Chance the Rapper.

2015 Lineups

Friday: Chvrches, Steve Gunn, Iceage, iLoveMakonnen, Tobias Jesso Jr., Mac Demarco, Ought, Panda Bear, Natalie Prass, Jessica Pratt, Ryley Walker, Wilco

Saturday: ASAP Ferg, Bully, Ex Hex, Future Brown, Future Islands, Jimmy Whispers, Vic Mensa, Mr Twin Sister, The New Pornographers, Parquet Courts, Ariel Pink, Protomartyr, Ratatat, Shamir, Sleater-Kinney, Sophie (No-Show, replaced by Towkio), Vince Staples (No-Show), Kurt Vile and the Violators

Sunday: Bitchin Bajas, Caribou, Chance the Rapper, Clark, A. G. Cook, Courtney Barnett, How to Dress Well, Jamie xx, The Julie Ruin, Madlib & Freddie Gibbs, Mourn, Perfume Genius, Run the Jewels, Single Mothers, Todd Terje & The Olsens, Viet Cong, Waxahatchee

2014 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2014 Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 18–20 at Union Park in Chicago. The event's headliners were Beck, Neutral Milk Hotel, and Kendrick Lamar. Three-day passes for the festival sold out by the beginning of April.

2014 Lineups

Slint at Pitchfork Music Festival

Friday: Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks, Beck, Neneh Cherry with RocketNumberNine, Factory Floor, The Haxan Cloak, Hundred Waters, Giorgio Moroder, Isaiah Rashad, SZA, Sun Kil Moon, Sharon Van Etten

Saturday: Danny Brown, Circulatory System, Cloud Nothings, Empress of, FKA Twigs, The Julie Ruin, Ka, Kelela, Mas Ysa, Neutral Milk Hotel, Pusha T, The Range, St. Vincent, tUnE-yArDs, Twin Peaks, Wild Beasts

Sunday: DIIV, DJ Spinn, Deafheaven, Dum Dum Girls, Earl Sweatshirt, Grimes, Jon Hopkins, Hudson Mohawke, Kendrick Lamar, Majical Cloudz, Mutual Benefit, Perfect Pussy, Real Estate, Schoolboy Q, Slowdive, Speedy Ortiz

2013 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2013 Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 19–21 at Union Park in Chicago. The event's headliners were Björk, Belle & Sebastian, and R. Kelly.

2013 Lineups

Friday: Björk, Mikal Cronin, Daughn Gibson, Joanna Newsom, Angel Olsen, Frankie Rose, Trash Talk, Mac DeMarco, Wire, Woods

Saturday: ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Belle & Sebastian, The Breeders (performing Last Splash), Ryan Hemsworth, Julia Holter, Low, Merchandise, Metz, KEN mode, Parquet Courts, Pissed Jeans, Phosphorescent, Rustie, Savages, Solange, Andy Stott, Swans, White Lung

Sunday: Autre Ne Veut, Blood Orange, Chairlift, DJ Rashad, Evian Christ, El-P, Foxygen, Glass Candy, Killer Mike, Lil B, M.I.A., R. Kelly, Sky Ferreira, TNGHT, Toro Y Moi, Tree, Waxahatchee, Yo La Tengo

2012 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2012 Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 13–15 at Union Park in Chicago. Three day passes went on sale March 9 and sold out by the end of the month.

2012 Lineups

Friday: ASAP Rocky, Willis Earl Beal, Big K.R.I.T., Clams Casino, Dirty Projectors, Feist, Tim Hecker, Japandroids, Lower Dens, The Olivia Tremor Control, Outer Minds, Purity Ring

Saturday: The Atlas Moth, Atlas Sound, Danny Brown, Chromatics, Cloud Nothings, Cults, Flying Lotus, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Grimes, Hot Chip, Nicolas Jaar, Liturgy, Lotus Plaza, Schoolboy Q, The Psychic Paramount, Sleigh Bells, Wild Flag, Youth Lagoon

Sunday: AraabMuzik, Beach House, Chavez, Dirty Beaches, The Field, Iceage, Kendrick Lamar, A Lull, King Krule, The Men, Milk Music, Oneohtrix Point Never, Real Estate, Thee Oh Sees, Ty Segall, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Vampire Weekend

2011 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2011 Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 15–17 at Union Park. Three-day passes for the event sold out in one day.

2011 Lineups

Friday: Animal Collective, Battles, James Blake, Curren$y, Das Racist, EMA, Gatekeeper, Guided by Voices, Neko Case, Thurston Moore, Tune-Yards

Saturday: Julianna Barwick, Chrissy Murderbot, Cold Cave, Destroyer, The Dismemberment Plan, DJ Shadow, Fleet Foxes, G-Side, Gang Gang Dance, No Age, Off!, Sun Airway, Twin Shadow, Wild Nothing, Woods, Zola Jesus

Sunday: Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Baths, Cut Copy, Darkstar, Deerhunter, The Fresh & Onlys, Health, How to Dress Well, Kurt Vile, Kylesa, OFWGKTA, Shabazz Palaces, The Radio Dept., Toro Y Moi, TV on the Radio, Superchunk, Twin Sister, Yuck

2010 Pitchfork Music Festival

The fifth annual Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 16–18 at Union Park. Three-day passes for the festival sold out in under a week. 2010 marked the first and only year that the festival included a stand-up comedy stage.

2010 Lineups

Friday (Music Stages): Broken Social Scene, El-P, Liars, Modest Mouse, Robyn, The Tallest Man on Earth

Friday (Comedy Stage): Hannibal Buress, Wyatt Cenac, Eugene Mirman, Michael Showalter

Saturday: Sharon Van Etten, Bear in Heaven, Dâm-Funk, Delorean, Free Energy, Freddie Gibbs, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, LCD Soundsystem, Netherfriends, Panda Bear, Raekwon, Real Estate, The Smith Westerns, Sonny & the Sunsets, Titus Andronicus, Kurt Vile, Why?, Wolf Parade

Sunday: Allá, Beach House, Best Coast, Big Boi, CAVE, Girls, Here We Go Magic, Lightning Bolt, Local Natives, Major Lazer, Cass McCombs, Neon Indian, Pavement, St. Vincent, Sleigh Bells, Surfer Blood, Washed Out

2009 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2009 Pitchfork Music Festival was held July 17–19, 2009. On Friday night all of the performing bands played sets consisting of songs voted for online by ticket-holders in an event Pitchfork called "Write the Night: Set Lists by Request."

2009 Lineups

Friday: Built to Spill, The Jesus Lizard, Tortoise, Yo La Tengo

Saturday: The Antlers, Beirut, Black Lips, Bowerbirds, Cymbals Eat Guitars, Disappears, DOOM, The Dutchess and the Duke, Final Fantasy, Fucked Up, Lindstrøm, Matt and Kim, The National, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Plants and Animals, Ponytail, Wavves, Yeasayer

Sunday: Blitzen Trapper, DJ/Rupture, Dianogah, The Flaming Lips, Frightened Rabbit, Grizzly Bear, Japandroids, Killer Whales, M83, The Mae Shi, Mew, Michael Columbia, Pharoahe Monch, The Thermals, The Very Best, Vivian Girls, The Walkmen, Women

2008 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2008 Pitchfork Music Festival was held July 18–20, 2008. Three-day passes for the event sold out in May. On Friday night the promotion company All Tomorrow's Parties again collaborated with Pitchfork to present a "Don't Look Back" stage, on which all of the evening's bands performed one of their classic albums in its entirety.

2008 Lineups

Friday: Mission of Burma (performing Vs.), Public Enemy (performing It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back), Sebadoh (performing Bubble and Scrape)

Saturday: !!!, Animal Collective, Atlas Sound, Boban & Marko Markovic Orkestar, Caribou, Elf Power, Extra Golden, Jarvis Cocker, Dizzee Rascal, Fleet Foxes, Fuck Buttons, A Hawk and a Hacksaw, The Hold Steady, Icy Demons, Jay Reatard, No Age, The Ruby Suns, Titus Andronicus, Vampire Weekend

Sunday: The Apples in Stereo, Bon Iver, Boris, Cut Copy, Dinosaur Jr., Dirty Projectors, The Dodos, Ghostface and Raekwon, Health, High Places, King Khan and the Shrines, Les Savy Fav, M. Ward, Mahjongg, Occidental Brothers Dance Band International, Spiritualized, Spoon, Times New Viking

2007 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2007 Pitchfork Music Festival was held on July 13–15, 2007, again in Union Park. The festival was sold out with 48,000 visitors.

On the festival's opening night all of the performing bands played all the songs from one of their classic albums. These three sets were part of a collaboration with British promoters All Tomorrow's Parties as part of their "Don't Look Back" series.

During the 2007 festival, musician and performance artist Yoko Ono performed "Mulberries," a song about her time in the countryside after the Japanese collapse in World War II, for only the third time in her life, with Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth; Ono had previously performed the song once with her husband John Lennon and once with her son Sean Lennon.

2007 Lineups

Friday: GZA (performing Liquid Swords), Slint (performing Spiderland), Sonic Youth (performing Daydream Nation)

Saturday (Mainstages): Battles, Califone, Cat Power and Dirty Delta Blues Band, Clipse, Grizzly Bear, Iron & Wine, Mastodon, Yoko Ono, The Twilight Sad, Voxtrot

Saturday (Tent): Beach House, Girl Talk, Dan Deacon, Fujiya & Miyagi, Ken Vandermark's Powerhouse Sound, Oxford Collapse, Professor Murder, William Parker Quartet

Sunday (Mainstages): De La Soul, Deerhunter, Junior Boys, Jamie Lidell, Stephen Malkmus, Menomena, The New Pornographers, of Montreal, The Ponys, The Sea and Cake

Sunday (Tent): Brightblack Morning Light, Cadence Weapon, The Cool Kids, Craig Taborn's Junk Magic, The Field, Fred Lonberg-Holm's Lightbox Orchestra, Klaxons, Nomo

2006 Pitchfork Music Festival

The 2006 Pitchfork Music Festival was the first festival organized and run entirely by Pitchfork Media. This was also the only year that the Pitchfork and Intonation Music Festivals were held in the same year. The 2006 Pitchfork festival drew more than 35,000 visitors to listen to 41 bands on July 29 and 30.

2006 Lineups

Saturday: 8 Bold Souls, Art Brut, Band of Horses, Tyondai Braxton, Chicago Underground Duo, Chin Up Chin Up, Matthew Dear, Destroyer, Flosstradamus, The Futureheads, Ghislain Poirier, Hot Machines, Man Man, The Mountain Goats, Silver Jews, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, The Walkmen

Sunday: Aesop Rock, Ada, Bonde do Role, Cansei de Ser Sexy, Devendra Banhart, Dominik Eulberg, Danielson Famile, Diplo, Glenn Kotche, Jeff Parker/Nels Cline Quartet, Jens Lekman, Liars, Mission of Burma, The National, Os Mutantes, Spoon, Tapes 'n Tapes, Tarantula A.D. aka Priestbird, Yo La Tengo

2005 Intonation Music Festival

In 2005 Pitchfork Media was hired by a music promotion company called Skyline Chicago to curate the Intonation Festival at Union Park in Chicago. While this was not technically the "Pitchfork Music Festival," because of Pitchfork Media's prominent role in the event as well as its future success in staging similar festivals at the same location, many Chicagoans and music fans consider the 2005 event to be for all intents and purposes the first Pitchfork festival and refer to it by that name.

The event's featured performers included Tortoise, The Wrens, The Decemberists, The Go! Team, Les Savy Fav, Broken Social Scene, Andrew Bird, and The Hold Steady.

External links

• Official site
• Cokemachineglow 4-part coverage
• Pitchfork TV has many past performances from 2007 and 2008 Pitchfork Music Festivals
• Gigposters Gigposter's page of Pitchfork Music Festival's concert posters
• Riverfront Times coverage of Pitchfork Music Festival 2008