Nelly Furtado’s Electrifying Comeback at Portola Festival Day 1
The second annual Portola Festival returned to San Francisco’s Pier 80 recently. The EDM and techno-centric music festival was held successfully on the southeastern edge of the city, despite a tricky inaugural year. A slew of headlining DJs, producers, and other acts ranging from 2000’s British wunderkinds Underworld to more contemporary acts like Dom Dolla and Labrinth performed at the two-day event produced by concert giants Goldenvoice. Despite some sound issues that left the crowd both literally and figuratively rattled, it was mostly smooth sailing at the shipyards that weekend. Arriving mid afternoon on Saturday, the first day, I had made it just in time to see Chromeo.
Chromeo: Ship Tent
Originally hailing from Canada, the unconventionally paired duo have been churning out synth pop, electro funk, and nu disco ever since the mid-2000s. Predictably, the daytime party was well underway by the time I arrived. The crowd stretched all the way to the back of the pop-up, open-air Ship Tent, similar to the Sahara Stage set up at Coachella.
Chromeo served as seasoned party starters with their abundance of buoyant energy and “flashy” stage set. Dave Macklovich and Patrick Genayel’s signature chrome guitar and synth/keyboards (respectively) dually glistened in the afternoon sun while they sang their robotized lyrics. Genayel sported a San Francisco Giants jersey the festival had custom made for the artists with his name on the back. The rest of his outfit? A traditional dashiki.
Known to their fans as Dave1 and P-Thugg, the Montreal based roisterers grooved their way through nearly 20 songs for just short of an hour. “Fancy Footwork,” my personal favorite, “Needy Girl,” “Momma’s Boy,” “Night by Night,” and “Jealous (I Ain’t with It)” were standouts of the set. A glimpse into fresh track “Personal Effects” proved to be a very promising preview of their new album, “Adult Contemporary,” due out in early 2024.
When it comes to Chromeo, an unlikely pairing of longtime friends (encouraged early on by mega DJ, and college pal DJ Tiga) have been getting the party started for close to two decades now, with no end in sight. Once dubbed a reincarnation of Hall and Oates, they’ve have unequivocally honed a sound all their own, one that’s sure to keep the dance floor packed, “Night After Night.”
Nelly Furtado: Pier Stage
The highlight of day one was hands down getting to see Nelly Furtado. Making her return to the stages after a five-year hiatus in July of 2022, her pit stop at Portola was a part of the first successful tour she’s had in over 15 years. The “Promiscuous Girl” singer has had what seemed like a series of false starts up until recently, despite the first decade of her career flourishing. Clad all in black leather, Furtado positively dominated the main aka Pier Stage for a show stopping set that flew by in the blink of an eye.
Wasting no time, Furtado started immediately in on a string of her most popular singles, including “Say it Right,” “Maneater,” “Turn Out the Lights,” and “I’m Like a Bird,” before plunging into a half dozen of severely entertaining mid career songs, all sped up and remixed into electronica tinged dance tunes. I was personally impressed by the amount of live singing she did; it’s always a roll of the dice whether you get to see a “performance,” or a mixture of that and the real thing. Just shy of turning 45 years old in December, the Portuguese-Canadian performer has sold over 45 million records worldwide, and has never looked or sounded better.
And I say so far because Furtado dropped a new single with JT and Timbaland at the beginning of September 2023, teasing in an interview earlier this spring that she’s recorded “over 100 new songs,” and is eager to get back out on the road. After witnessing this set, it’s almost unfathomable to think that the turnout for the opening night of her 2015 tour had less than 2,500 attendees, a foreshadowing of a run that never gained momentum, and a sense of traction that has yet to pick back up again until recently.
And speaking of Timbaland, the performance wrapped up with a cover of “Give It to Me,” followed by “Promiscuous Girl.” The elated crowd was composed mostly of those who were much too young to see her the first few years she toured through, but had seemingly been waiting with baited breath for her return. And all of us, even those like myself who are old enough to remember seeing her 22 years ago, were just as blown away then as they are now.
And whether one actually liked the set or not, “blown away” indeed seems to be the right term to use for the sound system during the set, with a thumping bass so loud it actually made the back of my throat hurt. Many folks had their hands clamped tightly over their ears for much of the performance that was so loud, everything around us rattled like one long, ongoing sonic boom. My ears were achy from the experience for days afterwards. Not from the festival, from that set in particular.
There even came a point where I flat out began to wonder if Magneto himself was going to lower himself from the sky with a vengeful and out of control Phoenix destroying everything in sight like in the beginning of that one X-Men movie, but I digress because I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. Anecdotally, the city of Alameda–located clear across the water next to Oakland—ended up filing a noise complaint against the festival in October 2023.
Polo & Pan: Pier Stage
I was up against the barricades by then and French tropical house DJ pairing Polo & Pan were up next, and I was ready to settle in for an after dark electro-disco boogie.
Celebrating the long-awaited final performance of a two-year-long tour, the Parisian duo were ecstatic as they sailed through a 70-minute-long set of the mid tempo, world-music-influenced EDM they’ve been making together since 2012. Stopping to hug and congratulate each other at least three times during the gig, Paul and Alexandre took turns singing songs off both albums and the six various EPs they’ve dropped over the past decade plus on Hamburger Records.
Joining them onstage for several songs throughout the night was French singer/dancer Victoria Lafurie, who’d appear and reappear onstage intermittently with a combination of Jane Birkin-inspired French pop vocals, and her own signature style of modern dance moves.
Her addition gave the electronic duo’s music a throwback Thievery Corporation vibe. I enjoyed her singing quite a bit and found her overall presence to be both ethereal and captivating. It was hard to take your eyes off of her, but in an odd way, as her ballet-jazz-lyrical-modern dance choreography was equal parts lovely and just plain bizarre.
For every floaty, light-as-air spin, sashay, or jump she’d do, there were an equal amount of “interpretive” dance moves which translated quite strangely. At times, she almost gave off the vibe of the stereotypical drunk mom in the concert audience, flipping her wrists and palms around in all directions. Then, she’d do another beautiful pass just like a trained ballerina. It was very hard for my brain to process if I enjoyed what I was watching in the moment or not, but at the end of the day, I did enjoy her performance, and she added quite a bit to the live dynamic.
The graphics for their gig that evening were excellent—a modern take on mid-century retro futurism with every color of the rainbow in clusters undulating with the music. Rather then trying to look high tech, super robotic, or hyper extra terrestrial with their visual displays, Polo and Pan served up a super serotonin rush with fully saturated colors with satisfying bold outlines moving in organic directions as they changed in a kaleidoscope of different patterns, all with softly rounded edges.
Despite not seeing this act before, (and considering they’re due for a good long break after over 730 days on the road) I’d absolutely go see them again—not for some rowdy outrageous raving dance party, but for the immaculate vibes. It’s no wonder one of their most popular songs is called “Feel Good,” and I’d love to see Polo and Pan tour with a band like Poolside for the cohesive overall experience it would provide and their capacity for collaboration is clearly well honed. It’s no wonder they’ve stayed booked and busy for over two years straight.
Cobrah – Ship Tent, Eric Prydz – Pier Stage:
I was then faced with the conundrum of five artists overlapping back to back to back, and although I aspired to stick it out, I managed to catch at least four out of five. First, I hightailed it back to the Ship Tent for rubenesque cyber pop star Cobrah’s energy filled set. Reminding me a lot of Peaches early on in her career, I could have easily stayed for the entirety of her 50 minute long dance party, but I had to hightail it back to the Pier Stage for Swedish mega DJ Eric Prydz and his epic visual display, HOLO.
Unsure what to expect, other festival goers explained that the show alone was the biggest event of the day. Unlike Odesza, for example, who utilizes laser lights and various drones, HOLO took advantage of the concert’s giant screens to create a larger than life, extra terrestrially-inspired 3D experience that took you everywhere from the pyramids of Egypt to outer space, and beyond.
Chris Lake and Armand Van Helden, The Warehouse – Flying Lotus, Crane Stage:
The crowd was ecstatic, and the giant rave that had formed had unmatchable energy. I pried myself away from the madness in order to duck into the Warehouse for the first time that weekend, because DJs Chris Lake and Armand Van Helden had started up. Also because the port wind had picked up, and I was freezing cold.
Chris Lake & Armand Vanhelden, Flying Lotus:
The warehouse was just as it seemed: a long, oblong building with large square doors for big rig trucks to unload in during the day, and the site of a controversial skirmish last year. With the overall strategy of dancing inside until I warmed up enough to face the elements again, I had more fun than I expected, dancing to their set of house and classic EDM alongside a football field of folks having the time of their lives on a Saturday night in San Francisco.
By the time I left the Warehouse and drug myself back to the semi outdoor Ship Tent for what turned out to be my last set of the night, I chuckled thinking I’d make it all the way through the very last act I wanted to see, early 2000’s U.K. sensations Underworld, because I was freezing my ass off.
Trying my best to stay warm towards the center of the crowd, there was no way I wasn’t going to see at least a little bit of Flying Lotus. The legendary producer who worked with just about every big name in rock, hip hop, r&b, soul, funk, and EDM for the past three decades was well worth the wait AND bad weather. Undulating from heavily sampled, soulful funky grooves, to vibey, boppy vocal house, to breakbeat laced straight up techno, I only lasted the first 25 minutes, but I’m quite positive the set evolved far beyond that.
Day one under my belt, I was as inspired as I was exhausted but had a lot more fun than originally anticipated. Despite not knowing what to expect of an EDM festival set up on a shipping dock at the edge of San Francisco in only its second year of operation, I had a really positive experience at Portola Festival and was looking forward to the next full day of music.
All photos in this article by Rose Eden
