Transportation: Since Plainfield Station is only about six miles from downtown Davis, attendees are encouraged to ride their bikes to the festival. KDVS has arranged two group bike rides to the festival leaving at 1 and 4 p.m. from Delta of Venus in downtown Davis. A free shuttle to the festival will also be available on Saturday and will leave from the Memorial Union bus terminal at 1:30 and 6:30 p.m.
Tickets: Tickets are $7 presale or $10 at the door. Presale tickets are being sold at Armadillo Music, at all KDVS organized concerts, and through the festival’s MySpace.
Bands Performing:
LSD and the Search for God
Traditional Fools
Blackblack
Hexlove
Ohioan
Inca Ore
Beware of the Knight
The Countless Others
Religious Girls
San Francisco Water Cooler
Davisites thirsty for live music should be well satiated when KDVS’s 8-hour outdoor music festival Operation: Restore Maximum Freedom returns this Saturday.
The festival – which includes performances by 10 bands and an afternoon DJ set – takes place in the grassy backyard of Plainfield Station, a bar and restaurant nestled in the fields between Davis and Woodland. Scheduled bands include Davis locals San Francisco Water Cooler – who will get the live music started at 2 p.m. – and Sacramento acts Hexlove and Beware of the Knight. Headliners LSD And The Search For God will finish their closing set by 10 p.m.
This Saturday’s festival is the sixth incarnation of Operation: Restore Maximum Freedom since its birth in May 2005. Elisa Hough, one of the festival’s organizers and the publicity director for KDVS 90.3 FM, said in an e-mail that the festival began three years ago as a crazy idea to have 20 bands play in one day.
With 10 bands scheduled for Saturday’s operation, this year’s O:RMF will be noticeably more streamlined, Hough said.
Craig Fergus, a KDVS DJ and O:RMF organizer, said in an e-mail that besides a few recent UC Davis graduates, current students organized the entire festival.
“[The students] brought a fresh enthusiasm to the planning,” he said. “And it resulted in a lineup with some talented newcomers that may have been overlooked by other eyes.”
Fergus said he is excited to see East Bay experimental group Religious Girls – who he described as a “rhythmically varied group in the vein of Health and Liars.” Fergus also mentioned Hexlove and Inca Ore as acts that should prove interesting to watch at an outdoor festival.
“O:RMF sort of epitomizes KDVS’ mission to expose underground music to an audience with a very open mind,” Hough said. “Chances are no one has heard of all the bands on this lineup, or even most of them – I definitely did not – but people still come because they know O:RMF only features quality music.”
Hough said that the event has helped make Davis a desirable location for bands to play. Past O:RMF festivals have included bands from Europe and Japan.
“People think they have to drive to San Francisco to see a good live concert, but as long as KDVS is putting on events like this, you never even need to get in your car.”
Saturday’s opening act, San Francisco Water Cooler – whose debut album is now available through KDVS Recordings – said in an e-mail that playing the festival was an easy choice.
“Plainfield Station is a great place to see all these [acts],” said band member David Novick. “KDVS has been nothing less than stellar in helping out our band.”
Inca Ore, a one-woman keyboard act led by Eva Inca Ore, said the unique nature of the Davis student body encouraged her to perform.
“I want to play because the music-loving by Davis students is unparalleled,” Ore said in an e-mail. “I just spent a month traveling around the country to colleges and universities, and I am so glad the students of Davis are true exceptions to the zombie culture I witnessed around the U.S.”
With increasing gas prices and an American economy that continues to look bleak, Portland-based act Ohioan encouraged potential attendees to take advantage of an opportunity like O:RMF.
“The luxury of having out-of-town bands come to you is going to diminish in the very near future. Get in on it while you still can.”
ZACK FREDERICK can be reached at arts@californiaaggie.com.
