view from the VIP Lounge

Head Like a Kite:

Head Like a Kite Head Like a Kite Head Like a Kite Head Like a Kite Head Like a Kite

YACHT:

YACHT YACHT YACHT YACHT YACHT

Nortec Collective presents Bostich & Fussible:

Nortec Collective presents Bostich & Fussible

Lake:

Lake

Ill Cosby:

Ill Cosby

214:

214 214

Phantogram (on the Fountain Lawn stage):

Phantogram

Hall & Oates:

Hall & Oates Hall & Oates Hall & Oates Hall & Oates

See the full Bumbershoot 2011: Monday photoset on Flickr.

I think that, as with the Concerts at the Mural, I'll just do a single summary post for Bumbershoot 2011 rather than break it up across the three days. I didn't take lots of notes, partly as I spent half my time there running about the Bumbershoot Music Lounge to take photos and upload them to Facebook and Twitter for KEXP, just as I had been doing for the Concerts at the Mural. I think I took the most notes for Bumbershoot After Dark, as I had some intentions of writing a proper post for the KEXP Blog about it, and indeed ended up doing so.

For all of the Bumbershoot Music Lounge sets, I tended to miss out on the middle two or three songs, as I had to run into the green room to upload a photo to Facebook and Twitter. In some cases I wasn't interested enough in the artist to go back into the theater and listen to the rest, in others I did.

Saturday, September 3
Bumbershoot Music Lounge

  • Shabazz Palaces—I'd never paid that much attention to them, but I liked them a lot more seeing them play live; I think it was the percussionist playing a thumb piano that won me over, but really they had an interesting style that I liked a lot.
  • Vetiver—Folky rock, I didn't stay to listen to the whole set, so that I could see Craft Spells instead.
  • Vusi Mahlasela—A solo artist on acoustic guitar, singing at least in Zulu and English, and maybe other languages; some of it sounded like scat singing rather than actual words. He's from South Africa, and seemed to be singing mainly political/social songs; I actually recognized "Say Africa", which I guess made him an "oh these guys" musician. I missed the middle few songs, but caught the last one which got upbeat and dancey, fun stuff.
  • Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue—Hot stuff! Really good New Orleans soul/jazz combo, one of the highlights of the weekend. I'd meant to see Nortec Collective, but stayed for all of Trombone Shorty's set first.
  • Starfucker (STRFKR)—I didn't really stay to listen.
Outside the Lounge
  • Craft Spells—One of the bands outside the Lounge I really wanted to see, and I was able to leave the Vetiver set in order to catch them. I really liked their bright summery pop with ringing guitar. They're a step above "oh these guys"—I knew I liked them and wanted to see them, but still didn't remember a specific song until they started "After the Moment"; I also recognized "Party Talk" and another.
  • Nortec Collective presents: Bostich & Fussible—Another band I knew I wanted to see, but couldn't name anything in particular they do. I caught the second half of their set, as they overlapped with Trombone Shorty; it was fun techno-Mexican music.
  • Little Dragon—I recognized the name and knew I'd heard and liked some of their music, but didn't remember anything about it; I wasn't sure whether I was confusing this band's name with another one. I ended up catching about half the set, and I was kind of too far away outside too big and noisy a crowd for me to really get into it, but they played a kind of electro dance music that I think I'd really like.
  • Bumbershoot After Dark: The Dowlz, Jokers of the Scene, DJ Craze (plus Claude VonStroke, whom I missed)—I liked the Dowlz the most this evening, and didn't care much for the little I heard of Craze, but I had to leave very shortly after his set began in order to catch the bus. See my post on the KEXP Blog.

Sunday, September 4
Bumbershoot Music Lounge
  • Mad Rad—Again, damn these guys are good! They had a cellist and guitarist in addition to synths and drums, which filled out their sound well. Despite playing first thing at noon to a relatively small audience, they had lots of energy and didn't hold back. This was the set of the afternoon for me.
  • Tennis—Pleasant pop, singer had a really sweet voice although it was actually sweeter when she was warming up quietly backstage.
  • Shelby Earl—Seemed to be pretty straight-up country, I didn't stay to listen.
  • Davila 666—In contrast to Shelby Earl were very raucous rock, again I didn't stay for all of it as I was still updating the photosets on Flickr for KEXP.
  • Pickwick—Good modern prog-folk-rock, I liked them.
Outside the Lounge
  • Warpaint—New song! It sounded lovely, but I do hope to hear them change things up a bit. They had a nice (if easy) segue from "Composure" to "Undertow". I was amused that they introduced one song by saying "this one can be kind of angsty"—umm, have you listened to yourselves? Also, it felt more angry than angsty. Also amusingly, in contrast to the musical style, they were clearly having a great time onstage, with the drummer and bassist cracking each other up. Unfortunately I missed the last two songs in the mistaken belief that School of Seven Bells were starting at 7:30 and I had to get over to the EMP.
  • Tycho—However, thanks to my mistake and to my press pass allowing me to skip the long line of waiting people, I did catch last couple songs by Tycho as a result. Good trippy dance music, though the crowd was mostly chilling to it.
  • School of Seven Bells—With the departure of Claudia, they're a duo now, but had a bass and drums backing duo too. They played a brand new song that was pretty rocking. "Half Asleep" was definitely lacking the dual vocal harmonies—given the contrast with the following song "Jovian", I'd guess Claudia did lead on "Half Asleep"—as were a couple others, and they'll have to do some more adjusting to make up for it. But they finished with the epic "Sempiternal-Amaranth", which sounded fine.
  • The Kills—I half-heard the beginning of their set, as I was wandering about while eating some pizza. I'd wanted to see more of their set, but they were up against Lusine, and I just wasn't feeling it. 
  • Lusine—I caught the last 20 minutes and wish I'd seen it all but I really needed food. I was also glad I chose this over the Kills, as I needed something relaxing and groovy which he delivered.
  • Bumbershoot After Dark: Dam-Funk, DJ Z-Trip (plus Four Tet, whom I missed)—Dam-Funk was pretty great, spinning groovy electro-funk and disco from the early '80s, singing along, and playing a couple of his own originals on keytar. What I heard of Z-Trip involved heavier hiphop beats than I usually care for, but I liked the different things he was mixing in, including the Godzilla theme. I suspect Four Tet would've been my favorite but unfortunately couldn't stay that late. Again, see my post on the KEXP Blog.

Monday, September 5
Bumbershoot Music Lounge
  • Urge Overkill—Driving rock, a bit Southern. "That was the title track to our new album 'Rock n Roll Submarine'. It wasn't so much 'Can we name it that?' as 'How could we not name it that?'"
  • Charles Bradley—Old-school funk and soul, walking in James Brown's shoes. It sounded good but I didn't stay for the whole set.
  • Fitz & the Tantrums—High energy soul, they were pretty awesome, and definitely had the most packed and excited audience of the weekend. They were right in the middle of Head Like A Kite's set, which I'd really wanted to see, but I had no choice other than to stay for Fitz & the Tantrums, it was that hot.
  • Phantogram—Led with "As Far as I Can See", played a couple new ones from an upcoming EP, and finished with "When I'm Small". A good if short set, but in this case I wish I had skipped out to catch the rest of YACHT, which I think I would've enjoyed more.
  • Grant Lee Buffalo—I was surprised by how many songs I recognized; I've never really been into them but they're quite good. Grant Lee Phillips was amusingly affable.
Outside the Lounge
  • Head Like A Kite—I caught their first couple songs, went back to the Lounge for Fitz & the Tantrums, and then ran back for last 15 minutes of HLAK. It didn't look like they had too much of a crazy show, although they did have a panda onstage. I caught a few new ones with Asya as the Daydream Vacation project, though officially they were performing as HLAK. Sadly, Trent Moorman is no longer playing with HLAK due to some dispute; the new drummer was fine, though no Moorman. I didn't see any other guests besides the rapper Tilson, who came out for the last song, "Diamond Paint", which Einmo said had been the inspiration for the Daydream Vacation project.
  • YACHT—Their set overlapped with Phantogram's Music Lounge set; I caught the first couple songs, including a new one and "Summer Song", before I had to run back to the Lounge to get photos of Phantogram's soundcheck. I wish I'd been able to see more, but by the time I'd covered Phantogram, it was too late to run back.
  • LAKE—I caught just the last couple songs of their set, and didn't have time to get into them, but I'd still like to see them again another time, as I did really like them at the Capitol Hill Block Party.
  • Ill Cosby—I ran downstairs from the EMP Level 3 stage back into the Skychurch only to catch the very last couple minutes of Ill Cosby's set, which is too bad as that was enough to tell me I'd probably have enjoyed it a lot and should've skipped Lake.
  • 214—However, I then stayed for 214, which I hadn't planned on seeing, and I found his cool, deep house music good for relaxing and dancing.
  • Phantogram—The other reason I should've skipped out on Phantogram's Music Lounge set to see YACHT is that I knew I'd be seeing at least some of this set, but then I also knew it'd be crowded and harder to enjoy. But it was still a really good set. They played a few new ones in addition to a good chunk of their first album. I was actually leaving early, about halfway through, to go see Hall & Oates when I ran into David and Alethea from Beehive, so I ended up staying through the whole thing while talking to them.
  • Hall & Oates—I convinced David and Alethea (and their friend Joy) to join me for Hall & Oates; we entered about halfway through, and I could overhear them playing "Adult Education" as we were walking the outer hall heading for seats. Unfortunately we were just in time for a set of slower sentimental ones, such as "She's Gone" and "Sara Smiles", which even I didn't care for so much. But everyone gamely sat through them, and we were rewarded with a great final set of songs: "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)" closing the main set, "Rich Girl" and "You Make My Dreams" as a first encore, and "Kiss On My List" and "Private Eyes" as the second encore. (I figure they must've played "Maneater" early in the set.) They did a neat slow intro and extended version of "I Can't Go For That" to close the main set, featuring long-haired "Ben Franklin" on sax solos. (Seriously, that's who he looked like.) I'd been really looking forward to "Kiss On My List" and was afriad they'd played it earlier, and was ecstatic that I hadn't missed it. Scoffers can scoff, scorners can scorn, but Hall & Oates put on a great show and have some damn fine pop songs—that was totally worth it, and I probably should've caught the whole thing. 
And that was Bumbershoot 2011! I took over 700 photos throughout the weekend (in part because of having to cover the Bumbershoot Music Lounge), and haven't yet taken the time to go through them and upload them to Flickr, which is going to take literally hours and hours thanks to my pitifully slow upload speeds. I'm planning to go through at least some of them tonight and start uploading, I'll have to do another post once they're all done.
The car crash in mid-October didn't keep me down for long; not quite a month later, I was at Chop Suey on Saturday November 13 to see the Bran Flakes, a wacky performance-art band, with Velella Velella and Dat'r. For some reason I actually wrote that review in a timely manner and posted it right away; you can read it in the archives here on my blog. One thing I didn't emphasize enough in that review was that Velella Velella were quite good and I'd like to see them again.

On Monday November 29, I went to the Showbox at the Market to see the Black Angels, with Black Mountain opening. Black Mountain do the early '70s heavy psychedelic rock really well, and it helps them stand out when so many bands seem to look a decade later for inspiration. It now seems inevitable that they'd grow to this level, as their sound filled the Showbox, and although they were the opening band, the place was filled for them. They played a mix of older and newer songs, storming through "Don't Drag My Heart Around" to finish. I'd never thought of the Black Angels as '70s style heavy/dark rock, but they actually fit in very well with Black Mountain. They maintained a cavernous echoy sound even when the guitars or keyboards were grumbling or shimmering beneath. One song, "Telephone", jumped out for its strong '60s sound, making me wonder if it was a cover. (It's not.) They concluded with "Manipulation" and "Empire", both from their debut album Passover. It was a really solid show, with good performances by both bands and a generous use of time at about 75 and 90 minute sets.

For some reason I insisted on taking photos, even though I was far from the stage, so there's a small set here on Flickr.

December is always a tough month for catching shows, with so much going on including my annual trip home for Christmas. This year however I was able to end in style by going to the Crocodile on New Year's Eve to see Head Like a Kite with Fresh Espresso headlining. I can't do a proper review of this show, as I didn't take any notes and I didn't see the whole thing: I missed the opener, which the Crocodile's website tells me was Concours d'Elegance, and I missed about half of Fresh Espresso's set because I was out in the alley watching the Space Needle fireworks with a couple friends. I will say that I found Head Like a Kite surprisingly on the subdued side, not quite the crazy dance party with people in costumes that I expected from past shows, but my guess is that was due to them not being the headlining act. They were still great to hear, though. What I saw of Fresh Espresso was fun, too, although their rap style still isn't quite to my taste. In any case it was definitely one of the best birthdays/New Year's Eves I've spent in Seattle.

And hey, that's 2010! Now I just have a few more reviews to write in order to catch up to the present.
In August 2010, I volunteered once again for the KEXP Concerts at the Mural series, held each Friday evening at the Mural Amphitheatre at Seattle Center, as well as for the KEXP BBQ held on Saturday the 14th. It's kind of a shame that I didn't take more notes during the Mural concerts, as I enjoyed this year's series overall more than the 2009 series. But on the other hand I was responsible for managing sales of Live at KEXP Vol. 6 during the concerts, so that kept me in the booth a lot, which is probably part of the reason why I wasn't taking notes. In any case, I'll just list out the concerts and performers, with a brief note where I can, and links to the photo sets on Flickr.

Friday August 6 (photos)
  • Gabriel Mintz—He's really good, and I noted I "should pay more attention"; also, Trent Moorman drummed for him, prompting me to wonder whether there's any band in Seattle he's not drumming with.
  • Grand Hallway—That week's "oh yeah, these guys" band; good stuff, also noted I should pay more attention to them.
  • Elliott Brood—Didn't care so much for their folk rock at first, but warmed up to them and they had some good clap-along songs. 
Friday August 13 (photos)
  • State of the Artist—A hiphop group, apparently I thought their style was alright, but I don't remember what they sound like.
  • Noddy—His new songs were great, made me wonder why I didn't yet have his first album; and I caught a photo of him levitating in the air suspended by his music.
  • Brite Futures (formerly Natalie Portman's Shaved Head)—A fun pop band that still gets to be too shrill for me after a while, but their new name seems rather apropos.
Saturday August 14: 8th Annual KEXP BBQ (photos)
  • Victor Shade—A solo rapper who looked like an indie rock hipster. No real opinion on his music.
  • Dinosaur Feathers—Sunny pop, good harmonies, "oh these guys".
  • The Joy Formidable—Very good dark indie rock.
  • The Lonely Forest—Sounded like the Long Winters and a dozen other bands.
  • Suckers—Pretty good talented multi-instrumentalists; the lead singer had a crazy high clear falsetto. I recognized a couple of their songs too.
  • Quasi—Embarrassingly, I spent a while before the BBQ wondering why they were headlining, only to realize that (a) duh, they're kind of a big deal in their own right, not just because they include Janet Weiss, formerly of Sleater-Kinney, on drums, and (b) I knew several of their songs already. Solid post-punk indie rock.
Friday August 20 (photos)
  • Tea Cozies—All my notes say is "bratty rock", but I'm pretty sure that was a good thing.
  • Head Like a Kite—Way too busy dancing in the crowd to take notes for this, but not too busy to take a bunch of photos.
  • Say Hi—Umm, they played. I guess I thought they were okay, I really don't remember.
Friday August 26 (photos)
  • Yuni in Taxco—Oh heck, totally forgot I'd seen them here, when I saw them again this past January (which I haven't written about yet). I don't remember what I thought at the time, but I definitely liked them in January.
  • The Head and the Heart—Don't remember anything about them.
  • Mt. St. Helens Vietnam Band—Any set that begins with a dozen musicians onstage playing drums can't be that bad, and in fact they were pretty entertaining. Good conclusion to the series.
Regardless of how much I enjoy any of the particular bands, these concerts are always fun events, and I'm looking forward to volunteering again at this year's series.

Edit: as an afterthought, I think maybe I actually like this format better for covering this series: one post, a quick point or two about each band, and done. Save the in-depth notes for concerts with fewer distractions.
I went to five concerts in November 2009 and one in December 2009, but only took notes at two of them, and again not very extensive notes. So here's another summary post.

First up was Hotels at the Crocodile on November 2, with Alligators and Apes of Wrath opening. Alligators had a good modern art/pop rock sound; I spoke with their manager later, who aptly compared them to Supertramp. Apes of Wrath were on the punk side of upbeat post-punk rock, and played a tight, energetic set. Hotels of course were great as always, or at least I expect so; I didn't take any notes on their set, as there are only so many ways to keep saying I love their music. 

Next, I went with a few friends to check out KJ Sawka playing at Heaven on November 6, along with a DJ whose name I didn't get down. No notes for this show; I'm sure Sawka played his usual solid set, though I tend to prefer when he has guest musicians rather than playing solo. 

On November 18, I went to Nectar Lounge for an unusual show. Billed as a "musical journey," it began with Thione Diop & Yeke Yeke playing the music of West Africa ("departure), BeleBá playing Cuban rhumba ("layover), and finished with Tubaluba playing New Orleans funk ("arrival"). It was a lot of fun hearing great dance music from styles I don't usually listen to. I remembered writing something about Tubaluba, and thought I'd made a blog post, but no, it was just a comment on Twitter: "for a good old-fashioned N'Orleans party time, check out the band Tubaluba. Great stuff."

For another unusual show, Cairo and the Anne Bonney (now closed) held "Expo 87", a small three-day music and art event. I attended on Friday November 20 so that I could see one of my favorite local bands, CMYK, do their usual set of great soulful dance pop. I also went to see Rachel Ratner's "Seattle Band Map—A Cartographic Study of Musical Incest" project, a huge diagram showing the interconnections among as many Seattle-based bands as possible. Check it out, it's pretty cool. Besides the photos on that blog, I have a few photos of the map and my own contributions here on Flickr.

To finish November, I was back at the Crocodile on the 21st for Head Like A Kite, with Foscil and the Animals at Night. The Animals at Night not only had a full quartet of musicians, not only a trio of backup singers as well, but also brought out country-western musician Brent Amaker to sing a remix of his song "I've Got a Little Hillbilly in Me". The Animals at Night were groovy or soulful or even a little hillbilly, but they also brought the rock. Foscil was a band I saw back in 2005—or at least I thought I had, but I remembered them being a group of four guys at a table-full of synthesizers and electronic gear. This time, they were still a quartet but had a mix of electronic and acoustic instruments, including one player alternating on trumpet, clarinet, and bass clarinet. They played jazz/art rock with an electronic base, and I thought it was good but a bit odd placed with the other two bands. Finally, Head Like a Kite always put on a crazy dance party at every show, and did not disappoint this time with multiple guest backup singers and costumed dancers. Both Greg Markel and Brent Amaker came out for guest spots, as did a very heavily pregnant Barb Trentalange for lead vocals on "Daydream Vacation". From electroclash to funk, indie rock to trip-hop, Head Like a Kite played a killer set. I have a too-dark-and-too-far-off set of photos from this show here on Flickr.

Finally, December has proven to be a tough month to catch a show, even though there are often several good ones. 2009 was no exception, as i only made it out to the KEXP Yule Benefit on December 12, and only because I was volunteering to help. The lineup included Grand Hallway opening, followed by the Builders and the Butchers, the Cave Singers, and the Thermals closing. I wasn't particularly excited about any of the bands, but did like all of them well enough; unfortunately I missed Grand Hallway, the rest put on a good show. 

And that finally covers all the shows I went to in 2009. Now to get started on reviewing 2010… hopefully I can return to more timely reviews for 2011. 
Since I'm in the middle of editing a 90-page paper and don't have time to do a proper post, how about some more photos from the KEXP Concerts at the Mural series? Here's a four-shot panorama of the crowd during the Head Like a Kite set on the 21st.

Mural concert audience during HLAKMural concert audience during HLAKMural concert audience during HLAKMural concert audience during HLAK

I'm sure there's some tool out there that would help me make a proper single-image panorama instead of just posting the four shots in a row, but I don't have time now to go looking for one.

The crowd was pretty full for Head Like a Kite, as I'd expected. Apparently Seattleites love bands with Head in the name, as last Friday's set by The Head and the Heart had an even bigger crowd. I didn't get as good a panorama set, although I did try to capture it from the back of the crowd; I haven't yet uploaded those photos to Flickr, so I can't post them now.

Dave Einmo

Guest guitarist Graig Markel

Trent Moorman in back on drums, with Barb Trentalange on guest vocals

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

I decided early on Friday that I wasn't going to bother taking extensive notes on the bands all weekend, and instead just try to jot down a few quick impressions, basically a sentence's worth. And I'm now taking a little time to clean some parts up a bit and add just a few details in a few places, but I'm not even bothering to make these complete sentences. So, here are my mostly-unedited impressions of the weekend.

Friday
  • Ravenna Woods: folk rock, Fleet Foxes like, very good
  • Yeasayer: solid, new stuff sounded good, several from the first album too, still don't excite me as much as I'd expect
  • Head Like A Kite: always a crazy party with lots of guests, good to see Asy of Smoosh do two vocal turns ("Let's Start It All Again" and "Daydream Vacation"), is Graig Markel actually part of the live lineup or does he just show up regardless?
  • Holy Fuck: sounded pretty cool, weirdly only recognized "Lovely Allen" even though KEXP plays a bunch of their songs a lot
  • MGMT: poor muddy sound for some reason, also even more packed than for Sonic Youth last year, only listened to first three and that included "Electric Feel"
  • Fruit Bats: an "oh THESE guys!" band—recognized them when they played "When You Love Somebody"—little more country than I usually care for but liked them
Saturday
  • The Redwood Plan: WOW, bar set very high, totally rock, look like they're having so much fun, Lesli Wood is cooler than you'll ever be, I should own their album
  • !!!: playing a short set live on air for KEXP, easily vaulted the bar set by the Redwood Plan, short but intense high-energy set, leader is crazy-awesome dancer, glad I got to see them up close since I won't get near mainstage, I should also own their albums
  • Blitzen Trapper: country-ish, sounded okay but nothing stood out
  • Aveo: also playing a live on air set for KEXP, nice stuff, again nothing stood out to me
  • !!!: full set at mainstage, crowd plus noise made it hard to enjoy, but I found spot in the middle back that worked, sounded good but definitely could use better venue, also kind of all blended together
  • Zola Jesus: very goth, slow paced—even the ones with more of a beat, voice more like Siouxsie Sioux than Bat for Lashes, also she is totally a four-foot-tall elf queen—big voice in a tiny body that looked ageless in an ancient/youthful way

Sunday
KEXP was hosting additional sets all weekend in the Caffe Vita Bean Room (as mentioned above); I staffed the entrance in the afternoon, where I heard:
  • Brite Futures: new name for Natalie Portman's Shaved Head, same shrill synthpop, but the kids love 'em and they are good, just in small doses
  • Villagers: Brit dude on guitar doing folk singer-songwriter thing, sounded good
  • A Million Years Ago: noisy pop, busy at the entrance so didn't get to pay much attention, sounded worth catching again
  • Damian Jurado: folk rock, again busy at the entrance and didn't pay much attention
After my shift was done, I went to see:
  • S: project of Jenn Ghetto from Carissa's Wierd [sic], low-key performance, two songs sounded very familiar but thought they were covers (Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Bjork)—cool if covers, still good if not
  • THEE Satisfaction: another KEXP on-air set, very short, nice though, smooth & sweet vocals/raps, soulful
  • Hey Champ: high energy synthpop, lots of fun, teased beginning of "Africa", got a little crowded for my liking but still ok
  • Truckasaurus: experimental electroclash, kinda noisy at times but good, dancy, used sample of that Mel Gibson phone call business at one point and really can we all just forget about that?
Saturday was the best day for me. I knew I wanted to see The Redwood Plan and though I waffled a bit about whether to make the effort to get there on time, I did make a point of doing so... and they ended up starting 45 minutes late, because Blonde Redhead had cancelled so the whole mainstage schedule was shifted later. Anyhow, they were more than worth the effort to get there on time and totally blew me away. And then I got to see !!! up close and that was just as amazing, more than I'd expected.
Three weeks ago, on Friday April 10, I went with a crew of KEXP staff and interns to the Crocodile to see Partman Parthorse, which includes KEXP DJ Rachel on bass. They were opening for Head Like A Kite, with Wild Orchard Children taking the middle slot in the bill. Despite the heavy KEXP presence, this was not an official KEXP event so I can forego the disclaimer about all views expressed here being solely my own... though that's still the case.

Partman Parthorse are a noisy post-punk art rock quartet, heavy on the punk side of post-punk. Like their namesake the centaur, the band is a somewhat awkward combination of two parts. The musical part was very good, with a lot of interesting things going on, and I believe they'd do well as just an instrumental art-rock band. However, the vocal part mostly involved very punk-style tuneless shouting, which is not my thing at all. At least one song featured more rap-style vocals, which I think worked better, but overall I'd prefer the vocalist turned down the shouting and put a little more singing into his style. Still, again like their namesake, the combination does work in its context, and they can't be faulted for not appealing to my particular taste. I did like the band overall, and perhaps the vocals will grow on me over time.

Although I may not have cared much for the vocal stylings of Partman Parthorse, they were far preferable to Wild Orchid Children. This psychedelic jam band can be easily summed up as sounding like Zack de la Rocha (of Rage Against the Machine) fronting the band Santana. The lead singer sang a little bit in one song, providing more of a Hendrix feel, but otherwise just shouted unintelligibly in a most grating fashion. I thought the music was fine and band was enjoyable enough when the vocalist wasn't shouting—he also played conga—but the longer their set went on the less I liked them, entirely due to the vocalist. It's rare that I will come out against a band, but while I'd recommend you check out Partman Parthorse for yourself, I cannot recommend Wild Orchid Children.

Fortunately, headliners Head Like A Kite were worth the wait. The duo of Dave Einmo (guitar, synths, sampler, and vocals) and Trent Moorman (drums, keys, sampler, and vocals) played a funky set of electropop to a very excited full crowd. They created a crazy party atmosphere for the show, starting with a fog machine and background video of Barbie-type dolls having sex, and later having dancers in weird bright-colored costumes—I was told the suits were of "Nordy", the old Nordstrom mascot—on stage and in the crowd. Graig Markel jumped in on backing vocals a few times during the set, which seemed appropriate as the band's sound was similar to his current project, The Animals at Night. Later in the set, they were also joined by a pair of female singers and a guitarist or two for a few songs, including "Daydream Vacation". I also recognized "We Were So Entangled" and "A Dime and a Cigarette", and was hoping for "Noisy at the Circus" but unfortunately they didn't play it. Oddly, I found the music was not as engaging as I had expected, but the show was still entertaining and enjoyable, and I'm glad I stayed to see them.

I have a small set of photos mostly featuring Head Like A Kite, starting here in Flickr.