A sparse meditative sound, utterly sexxy at times, completely stretching the limits of reservation and patience others, there is always this lurching tension present between bassist Oliver Sim and guitarist Romy Madley Croft as they drag out interludes, fill with their signature minimalist riffs and sing/speak their ambiguous lyrics sliding around the expansive stage. Jamie Smith (aka Jamie xx) provides a plethora of beats in the background, sometimes linked to the lighting as in “Heart Skipped A Beat,” and also with the occasional steel drum filling out the ethereal soundscape. Is this Japan or Jamaica? Jah mon, Jam on!

With a live show heavy on tracks from their uber-hit 2009 self-titled debut, the crowd was happily familiar with most of the set. Although, like lots of somewhat rock-less enigmas round the festival this year, there was hardly any dancing, not that you would expect there to be much, but still, for a closing headliner act on the second largest stage at the biggest festival in Japan… Then again, Bjork set a similar precedent the night before on the largest stage. I guess the times they are a changin’.

Howling echoes and with such infinite space between their carefully crafted elements of a song, some critics say that the xx live show is kind of boring. Although imagine for a moment the pressure on even the slightest error in this case. There is no masking a missed note, a forgotten lyric or slip of any kind, for in this landscape of scarcity, every change carries greater weight and stands out much more, crisp and stark against the atmospheric silence.

“Night Time” ushered in the modest use of high-powered lasers. It was pretty neat as the band sang “I walk out in stormy weather” and the smoke curled into the light and cast what looked like storm clouds over the audience. You think they planned that?

The long LED lights framing their backdrop began changing colors slightly, a live visual art technique perhaps referencing the fading sunlight-in-oil-spill “X” on the Coexist album cover. Later, they also cleverly shot a massive laser “X” across the entire façade of White Stage more than 10 meters high.

The new Coexist album hit “Angels” was a lovely ending to a set that was chock full of super hip love dilemmas and wordplay depicting youthful doubt and looming relationship questions everyone can relate to.

Oliver on the trio’s behalf genuinely thanked the crowd a few times throughout the set, and no one doubts that it wasn’t heartfelt. However, when the band exited stage left, the stage lights came on and stage manager came out with thumbs down, the crowd up front was a little disappointed at the lack of an encore.

So as more acts shy away from archetypal rock and move into an ephemeral realm of electronic fusion, a bit too broadly defined as ‘indie,’ what does that mean for Fuji “Rock” Festival, and the future of the musical genre as a whole?

Whatever the case, listening to The xx music for me was best with my eyes closed, forgetting those around me, and imagining a night-time drive, cruising through a dark city landscape, street signs and lights blurred outside the tinted windows of a sleek black Audi A4 as I pass by and time stands still. They wore all black to blend into the stage and remove the human element of performance while speaking lyrics of love and humanity. As an art piece, that metaphorical contrast is phenomenal. And with their influential art school history, maybe that is what they were going for.

Sotaisei Riron wanted none of that. This Tokyo five-piece has earned a reputation as being a particularly private band, doing minimal interviews and banning photography and video from their live performances (extended to Fuji Rock). Of course, some people managed to sneak shots – it was going to be nearly impossible to enforce this rule at a festival, especially at a well-drawing show like Sotaisei Riron – yet the band still carried an air of mystery no photo could chip through. In particular, lead singer Etsuko Yakushimaru did everything in her power not to be on stage. She came out last, and stood mostly still for the majority of the group’s set, surrounded by a laptop, a sheet of lyrics and a microphone. Sometimes she did photo-worthy stuff – she played with a glowstick at times, and on one song she played the recorder – but for the most part she was motionless.

It was a set seemingly out of step with the rest of Fuji Rock, yet also fascinating in its own ways. Sotaisei Riron’s music has never felt particularly festival worthy – it is muted, private stuff, all precise guitar lines and Yakushimaru’s near whisper of a voice. Those qualities appear all over the group’s third album Town Age, released only five days before they took to the White Stage. The bulk of their set featured new tracks from that album, a move that surely left a large chunk of the crowd confused, as they might not have heard that disc yet. Yet those new songs could sound gorgeous – “You & Idol” highlighted Yakushimaru’s vocal abilities, while something like “Bataco” showed how tight the other four members of the group could sound, guitars zig-zagging and dual drummers making enough space for one another.

This emphasis on new material – with minimal talking in between, Yakushimaru at times only saying a few words that seemed almost cryptic (“Japan…thank you…Japan”). One older song, “Sumatra Keibitai” from their debut EP, got the crowd jumping around and putting their hands in the air. Some people even shouted after every line, which makes sense at a communal event like a festival but still seemed weird in the presence of Sotaisei Riron’s shy music. And that was one of the only moments the group allowed people to go wild – the rest of the time, they were showing off new material. The set ended quite a bit earlier than scheduled, with Yakushimaru simply saying “bye bye” after one song and walking off. It was an unconventional ending to a very unconventional set, one that felt both out of place at Fuji Rock 2013 but also so much more intriguing.

This is the box that Marshall has painted herself into, achieving early success with tunes like “I Don’t Blame You” and “Good Woman” and other downbeat hits. To her credit, Marshall is unafraid of walking the tight rope, re-working the arrangements  of her songs and challenging whatever expectations her fans may have of her. In a word, she is a brave artist who has been to the brink and back, and is not afraid to go there again whenever she takes the stage.

Fittingly, tonight she slinks onstage in a leather jacket emblazed with a logo on the back that looks like a peace sign but is actually two letters put together, a “C” and a “P” which adorned her latest album “Sun.”

She begins tonight with “The Greatest” and it’s clear that she is doing everything she can, employing two microphones to give her voice a different timbre, and even two drummers to blast through the downbeat rhythms that made her so popular, and even her dramatic appearance on stage with stark lighting and a bleached blonde  boy cut.

There is optimism at the beginning of the set, but one can see that Marshall is not feeling her best, with a bit of a cold maybe as she goes on to songs like “Cherokee” and “3,6,9″ from her latest album “Sun.” However, there is no sequencing of her own back up tracks as the vocals are thinner than the recorded version.

She uses two microphones to overcome this problem, but it’s not effective as it may even prove to be confusing to those at the sound desk. In the end she comes out with “Ruin” along with a bouquet of flowers which she flips in an underhand manner to those in the front row, unknowingly knocking off many petals before they go over the edge of the stage. That’s pretty much what Marshall’s performance was tonight, something beautiful that got a little banged around before it hit the audience.

Appearing on stage Sunday in the middle of perhaps the heaviest downpour to hit the festival to date this year, the quartet certainly didn’t pull any punches. The one-hour set included a mix of material from their debut album, “Silence Yourself,” as well as a handful of newer material — quite possibly to fill the allotted timetable (“Silence Yourself” is exactly 37 minutes 38 seconds long).

The rain seemed to get progressively harder the longer Savages’ set went on and at one ridiculous point in proceedings, various members of the audience were turning to each other in disbelief about what was coming down in buckets above them. No one left, though, and what’s a rock gig without some mud on your trousers? The brutal set Savages played made sure that this was going to be a bare minimum.

Standout tracks included “Hit Me” — featuring an introduction by vocalist Jehnny Beth that included the lyrics “I am a dirty little dog, I want to be thrown up against a wall” — and a particularly abrasive version of “She Will.” Beth was in fine voice throughout, with her multifarious talents especially on display during the hurriedly whispered chorus of “Husband.” Savages also played an unnamed new number during their set that started off surprisingly slow but ended on an intensity that would have put nuclear fission to shame.

“She Will,” ironically, could have sounded better if the rain had lasted just a little longer, with Gemma Thompson’s soaring guitar chords left unaccompanied by what eventually became a fairly pleasant evening.

Savages are playing a gig at Astro Hall in Tokyo on Monday and you’d be well-advised to pop in if you can, even if you saw them on the big stage here. As good as Savages were on Sunday afternoon, it was fairly easy to imagine they would sound infinitely better in a tight club environment. As far as this writer is concerned, there’s absolutely no excuse…

But how can you not smile at a band that is young, 100% energy, jumping all over the stage, crowd surfing from the first note and screaming continuously, incessantly, unstoppingly about “disco”. Their lyrics went: “I love disco!”, “disco disco all the time”, “A.B.C. disco” and “We’re crazy for the devil.” And that just from the first three songs.

They were not only about guitars. Listening to the keyboard parts, it crossed my mind to peg them as a Japanese MGMT, but I will just mention it to give you some rough coordinates. By the fifth song, they had swung around to a booming, pre-recorded electronic disco track. After that, they went back to the guitar disco-punk. And kept screaming, and a sizable White Stage crowd was loving it. They are a party band, and as far as they are concerned, the party is whenever they are playing. For this particular occasion, it was between two o’clock and three o’clock in the afternoon.

Nope, because his very next song was more like sound vignettes of Nanao imitating various things, ranging from weather systems to a black hole. The latter involved him playing a few dissonant chords on his acoustic guitar while occasionally screeching into the mic. At the same time, his onstage partner played saxophone. It was arty as heck, and engrossing.

And he followed it up with a sax-heavy, Auto-tuned R&B jam, that saw Nanao put his guitar down, stand on his upturned chair and eventually drop the mic…literally…so he could scream into his echo microphone. His next song was a more conventional folk number (well, except for the saxophone blasts) save for his throaty voice. Then he launched into a colorful pop song called with a screamed chorus of “happy talk!” followed by a call-and-response section that the crowd shouted along with. Nanao’s set was hardly an easy-breezy affair, and thank goodness for that.

You got about 10,000 heads in the crowd, and remember that among the younger generation of Japanese, there are a few integral hip-hop strands in damn near everyone’s DNA. And I won’t try to hide it; the palpable excitement was completely validated upon the show’s jaw-done-got-dropped conclusion.

With Cut Chemist and DJ Nu-Mark elevated in the back and sporting salary man suit and ties like a couple of Agent Smiths from the Matrix, and after a Motown sample, the show pops off with “Back 4 U” off their 2006 album Feedback, “Got the rhythm make ya fingers snap.”

“I Am Somebody” gets the crowd testifying in tow, then Nu-Mark shows his agility and hops down off his DJ throne to sit in a school kids desk to bang out some beats. This is not your ordinary wooden desk either, just one of many tricks to come.

Like they say, “We can rock shows with no rehearsal,” but I am pretty sure they practiced this set and fine tuned everything before the tour to reach this pinnacle of performing confidence and excellence, regardless of all six members so obviously oozing immense talent.

Guess it was about now that the sheet was pulled off the Guinness World’s largest turntable in center stage, equipped with a J5 vinyl the size of Wisconsin.

Unfortunately when they went to spin and scratch it later in the set (apparently it is a working turntable and real record, not just a bad ass prop), there were some technical difficulties. I wonder if the crew is getting an earful about it now (Nu-Mark seemed pretty disappointed as that was kind of their solo finale).

As if the DJ duo solo as-is wasn’t ill enough, Cut Chemist with his turntable guitar contraption and Nu-Mark with a washboard the size of his torso made of vinyl records ghetto-rigged as drum pads. Wow.

The hook on “Quality Control” sums up the atmosphere as even kids who were still in grade school when it dropped in 2000 could recognize “the classic rap shit from Jurassic.” Fuji Rock typically has some of the most receptive audiences. Here in the case of J5, the audience being 90% Japanese, you have to remember that English, especially rapped English, is not even the first language, and yet there is a chorus in the crowd! Akil drops to the floor and busts a groove with some throwback breakdancing footwork at one point, too; pure entertainment these guys.

Sometime after the kazoo cameo (yes, kazoo), Chali 2na asks the crowd for a favor, just one, of many. “Hands up,” he says, “open and close (with the beat)… then shake ‘em out… Yes, Lord!” The fans liked that interaction, and so did Reverend Chali.

Then when the guys had everyone’s attention they could educate and lay down some wise words on relations with the opposite sex in “Baby Please” and “Gotta Understand.”

“Freedom” rang, too, and with 10,000 left-hand fists raised in the crowd, things got political. Thankfully it was in a positive direction with the sentiments of “Love, peace and unity, all across the world” clearly stated as the platform; I will pump to peaceful fists.

The next time Cut Chemist and Nu-Mark came down from on high was for a brief two-step and electric slide with the guys. All six in line doing the wave, the robot and a hokey pokey they turned the party out, to the joyous screams of the crowd.

Honest and considerate, Chali points out that while the audience might not understand what J5 is saying the “Energy is all love.” And their energy is clearly evident every second.

At this point, Akil still has the energy, speaking of, to do jumping jacks, just to make sure everybody else is doing so, ‘cause “It ain’t over! The party ain’t over!”

Mark 7even had to be fanned by the other three due to his ridiculous flowing speed, accuracy and sheer hotness.

The closing track as to be expected picked from among one of their greatest hits was “What’s Golden,” and it was. The acapella start and Zaakir’s wordsmithing finished strong and solidified this concert as one of the fest’s best in my eyes and probably in the rest of the White Stage’s sprawling masses thanks to the awesome audience participation instigation throughout and just a damn fine performance overall.

Jurassic 5 showed up like the superstars they are and performed exceeding expectations, end of story.

Back then they were making marginally big headlines for the song Kazuyoshi wrote in response to the nuclear disaster following the March 11 earthquake, “Zutto Uso Datta” (It was all/always lies).

This time the duo (with support) took to the White Stage accompanied by Muddy Waters’s “Mannish Boy” playing in the background. The sun was just about to set, and you could almost smell the anticipation in the air. They started off with a light retro-rock song about a monkey, and finished the song with a short intro of the of each other as well as the support members. When it was Tatsuya’s turn, instead of the mean drum solo you’d expect, he hit a cowbell, once.

Kazuyoshi asked, “Where did you even get that thing?”

Tatsuya replied, “At Don Quixote in Yoyogi Uehara,” before clinking the bell once more and received a wild eruption of applause in return.

The Adult male-like kids ventured on with a selection of songs that were so strong and varied—they covered pop-rock, rhythm and blues, ska/reggae, a 90s ballad and some progressive, trippy rock too. It felt fresh and at the same time familiar, fun and exciting.

But while it’s all well and good saying what I think, I decided to ask some different festivalgoers why they liked Mannish Boys, and here’s a selection of some of the best answers:

“I can enjoy watching them with my parents. They know their (the members’) music from before, and I know they make together now.”

“Mannish Boys give me lots of energy to keep going!”

“They’re versatility! They’re light and fun, but deep and serious at times, too.”

“I don’t know! I was on my way to another stage, but I felt I had to stop and watch them play… They were really good!”

And thus, the people have spoken.