With the rumor mill churning out names like Pulp, The Replacements, Guided by Voices, and Superchunk, the initial lineup announcement for the 2011 Pitchfork Music Festival feels anti-climatic. Yes, Animal Collective, TV on the Radio, Deerhunter and Fleet Foxes (All confirmed artists) are all indie rock A-listers at this point, but there isn’t that one knock-out, lose your sh*t band in the bunch. 2010 had Pavement and LCD Soundsystem, of course. And past years featured The Jesus Lizard, The Flaming Lips, Public Enemy, Dinosaur, Jr, Mission of Burma, Boris, Spiritualized and Spoon. Call me a cynic, but I don’t foresee James Blake or Destroyer (Also confirmed) wowing the festival crowd.

Now that we’ve gotten that cynicism out of the way, there are some quality acts in the bunch. TV on the Radio will be a very entertaining headliner on Sunday night, and Yuck and Kylesa will appeal to the rockers in the crowd.  Plus, there’s the spectacle of the very buzzworthy, LA rap collective, Odd Future performing on Sunday.  As far as curiosities go, it doesn’t get much better than Odd Future.

2011 Pitchfork Music Festival (Initial Lineup) July 15th – July 17th @ Union Park, Chicago:

FRIDAY, July 15th
Animal Collective
James Blake
Das Racist
Curren$y

SATURDAY, July 16th
Fleet Foxes
The Dismemberment Plan
Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti
Woods
Sun Airway
Kylesa

SUNDAY, July 17th
TV on the Radio
Cut Copy
Deerhunter
Destroyer
Odd Future, aka, OFWGKTA
Yuck