Pitchfork

Björk photo by Thomas Kjær

Welcome to Day 1 of Jason Crock's Roskilde diary. For Brandon Stosuy's Day 1 diary, click here. For Stosuy's Day 2, click here.

Arcade Fire [Arena Stage; 6 p.m.]

Photo by Terje Sørgjerd

Like a sign from the heavens, the rain ceased and a beam of light split the clouds just as "Wake Up" peaked...nah, just kidding, it poured like a bastard all throughout the day and during the Arcade Fire's late-day set-- one of the first major artists to perform on Thursday. Festival-goers who didn't queue up under the "intimate" Arena tent in time were left without cover from the weather, but a sizable gathering of dutiful fans stuck through it. A heartfelt dedication from Win Butler to the throngs of attendees caught outside could only warm us so much underneath our ponchos and garbage bags, and the band didn't change the slow-building approach to their setlist for a crowd that could have used an early rush of relief, considering most of these people are camping through this misery.

Now, maybe the weather made me cranky, but a "life-changing" live act should be adaptable, and their job should have been to make us forget we were there. For a band that specializes in rousing choruses, I'd have thought Butler & Co. would be a little more rousing. Chalk it up to vantage point, maybe, as I was one of the stragglers caught in the cold, and even the large monitors that flanked the stage were hard to make out from a distance. Still, they played many highlights pretty early, such as "Crown of Love", "Intervention", and, er, "My Body Is a Cage". Aside from just some good money, festivals of this size offer bands the chance to snag a wider audience, but due to the already-packed-full Arena stage/tent, Arcade Fire were preaching to a waterlogged choir. It quickly became apparent that you'd have to hit the next stage early if one hoped to stay dry, but the crowd never thinned for a moment. Who needs new fans when your fanbase will follow you anywhere?

Talib Kweli [Cosmopol Stage; 8 p.m.]

Photo by Thomas Kjær

Björk [Arena Stage; 10 p.m.]

Photo by Rune Johansen

Everyone who made it this far deserves a cookie. Walking between stages, checking for directions, eating food, even using the bathroom meant dealing with what was a historic amount of rainfall in the festival's 30-plus lifetime and ground that had turned into two feet of mud, if not straight-up soup. A large red stoplight on the monitors meant the standing room in front of the main Orange stage was at capacity a half-hour before Björk took the stage, but what seemed like every last attendee stood out in the wind and rain as night finally fell on Roskilde.

Wearing a dress I can only describe as a pan-global explosion of color (even for her), green leggings and bare feet, Björk's set was just as much a spectacle as her recent tour, and after a cloud of smoke and fire introduced "Earth Intruders", her set kept the crowd rooted in their muddy place by coming with Homogenic hits early with tracks like "The Hunter" and "All Is Full of Love". Sightlines were surprisingly clear from a great distance, easy enough to see Björk bounding across the stage in her merry way in person as the monitors switched between the performer dancing and waving a collapsible spiderweb-like net, her DJ's enviable video interface, her stoic keyboardist, and her incredible backing choir, lending their voices while swaying back and forth to the thumping beat with a rhythm that betrayed their flowing church-like robes. Each member waved a tall flag that mirrored the ones the crowd held up as signposts for their friends, like a real-world application of the supposed one-tribe attitude that's inspired Björk's recent album and rash of concerts. (Well, it was Björk's hand-crafted medieval symbols versus the crowd's skull-and-bones or an inflatable alien violating a cow, but, it's all one world.)

Not only that, the same chorus doubled as a brass ensemble, adding gentle accompaniment to "All Is Full of Love" or a well-timed atonal blurt for the laser-light augmented "Army of Me". Indeed, Björk's set veered from fragile lullabies to screeching dance-rooted experimental material like "Innocence" without ever seeming disjointed, while her voice was in top form and her impervious enthusiasm swept through the crowd. To say she's an inimitable performer is an obvious affirmation, but to the girl behind me in the blue Hefty trying to sing along with "Joga": Just stop.

Roskilde Crowd

Photo by Tobias Zehntner