Pilcrow

Over this weekend my final post on the 2011 Capitol Hill Block Party went up on the KEXP Blog. I got off to a late start on Sunday and missed out on one of the bands I wanted to check out, Lumerians, but otherwise I only had plans to see Battles. So like Friday, Sunday was a more casual day of just seeing whomever happened to be playing at the time. That led to me discovering two more good bands, Dunes and Lake, both playing at the Vera stage, which really was very well curated this year. Battles of course were in my opinion the best band to play all weekend, but also may have been the loudest band on the main stage. I was overjoyed when they unexpectedly broke out a reworked version of "Atlas", their hit from their first album, and also used an even more radically reworked "Tonto" from that album as a transition piece between two of their newer songs. Compared to the thrill and inventiveness of Battles, Explosions in the Sky were something of a letdown—good, but not as engaging, and not really the right setting for them. And Pink Mountaintops were also good but not really what I wanted to finish out the evening. Still it was definitely a good day, and a very good Block Party overall.

As I mentioned, the full write-up is now up on the KEXP Blog. I also have a small set of photos from Sunday up on Flickr. I'm particularly disappointed that I couldn't get any decent photos of Battles, but I just couldn't get close enough to the stage, and facing the sun also made it worse for me. I actually had the write-up done in time to be posted last Wednesday, but I held off for a couple days hoping that one of the official KEXP photographers would have some better photos for me to use, in particular of Battles but also of the other bands. Unfortunately none were posted, and I didn't want to wait any longer and have the final write-up be too outdated.

I had a pretty good time at Bumbershoot this year. I was going to do a single post about it, because I thought I could keep it short, but of course it's just gotten longer and longer as I write. So, I'm going to do separate posts for each day after all. All of my photos can be found in my Bumbershoot 2008 set on Flickr.

Read about Saturday at Bumbershoot 2008.

Read about Sunday at Bumbershoot 2008.

Monday

Monday I made it down to Bumbershoot toward the later half of the afternoon. I had no plans before seeing Battles at 7:45, so I wandered about for a while. I stopped to watch some of Strange Fruit, a sort of mime theater performance done by two couples atop tall flexible poles. It was indeed strange, but also funny and cool. I hung out by the Du Pont Fountain for a while, hoping to catch another performance of the Bottled Operas that I saw on Saturday, but they did not come by before I had to head across the Center for the Battles set. However, while I was there, a couple people came by and asked to take my picture with their friend, Little Roy the Corduroy Boy; you can see the photo of us here. (I didn't realize at the time that Little Roy's appearances were actually officially scheduled events.) [Strange Fruit photos start here.]

Battles were hands-down the best act I saw at Bumbershoot this year, and no question gave one of the best performances out of all the acts. Drummer John Stanier reminded me of Animal from the Muppets, flailing fast and furiously at his drums, although with a precision and control Animal could never match. I almost expected Stanier to explode Muppets-style with a flash and bang, leaving nothing behind but a wisp of smoke. The rest of the band were slightly more restrained but no less enthusiastic, and together they roared through a thunderous set of instrumental, highly-danceable art rock. The first part of the set, from the opening bass loops of "Race: Out", was a continuous half-hour of music, and they barely paused later to do more than say hi to the crowd while setting up the next song. I didn't recognize all of the music, so some of the first half may have been new, but they definitely finished with the two singles "Tonto" and "Atlas", followed by an extended "Race: In". They led into "Atlas" just with a very simple sampled beat, a steady tik, tik, tik, tik, for a good two minutes while they were adjusting other equipment, but that simple beat was enough to get the audience clapping along in anticipation. When they finally broke into the song, a bunch of kids surged forward and nearly started a full-fledged mosh pit, causing a Bumbershoot staff member to wade in to the crowd and warn them to simmer down a bit. Battles played a full hour of exciting and vital rock that ought to kill the label "math rock", and I can't wait for their next show. [Battles photos start here.]

After that set, pretty much anything was likely to be a bit of a let-down. Still, I went to see Mike Doughty, since my sister said I should introduce myself to her friend Andrew "Scrap" Livingston, who was playing bass for Doughty. As a solo artist, Doughty's gone the singer-songwriter route, playing folk-tinged rock à la Dave Matthews, and frankly I just didn't find it that interesting, even when he covered his own Soul Coughing song "Circles". After listening for a few songs, I wandered off in search of ice cream and then went to hear the first couple songs by Minus the Bear. I returned for the end of Doughty's set, waited around for about 15 minutes until Doughty came out from backstage briefly, and managed to catch him before he disappeared again just to ask him if he could get the bassist for me, which I thought was a little funny. After chatting briefly with Livingston, I went back to hear the last 20 minutes of Minus the Bear, who sounded all right and finished with "Knights", the single I recognized from airplay on KEXP. Although the high point of Bumbershoot had passed already for me and the final acts weren't so great, I still left feeling quite satisfied with the evening and Bumbershoot in general. [A few Mike Doughty photos start here.]