Pilcrow

This review was meant for the KEXP Blog. Disappointingly, the KEXP volunteer photographer found the Crocodile to be too dark to shoot; he got a few admittedly poor quality shots of Dauwd, and then apparently just gave up trying. Whether or not he could've been able to get something worthwhile, the first half of the show was certainly much too dark for my iPhone to get any photos that would've been worth using (though I tried). And then, because I'd moved further back in the club during Lusine's set and because the lighting was still pretty sparse, I didn't bother taking any photos of Lusine at all (which I regret). Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get photos from anyone else within the first couple weeks after Decibel Festival, and by that point it was old news and no longer wanted for the KEXP Blog. However, I happen to be rather pleased with my writing on this review, and as Ghostly has been such an important part of Decibel over the past decade, I would hate to let that showcase go unacknowledged. So I'm now posting it here in full, with regrets for the lack of photos and failure to have it up on the KEXP Blog.

If any one label might represent the heart of Decibel Festival, it could be Ghostly International, which has had a showcase featured at all ten festivals to date. So it was an honor to be attending the Ghostly International showcase on Friday September 27th at the Crocodile. Seattle's own Lusine—whom I first saw at the opening gala for the 2009 festival, and who like Ghostly has participated all ten years—was at the heart of the lineup, with Dauwd and Beacon opening and Shigeto closing out the evening.

Dauwd's set had a bit of a troubled start as he was rudely interrupted by a fire alarm, apparently caused by too much smoke pouring out of the smoke machines. The screeching alarm might fit in with some kinds of electronic music, but not this. Fortunately it was just a couple-minute break, and then he was able to resume his dreamy trancey dance music. He started out sounding something like label mate Tycho's breezy summery music, but worked in more of a backbeat, more like night urban highway driving. The trippy lightness never dropped out entirely, but he definitely developed a harder/solid base—neon lights reflected on asphalt. Indeed, by the second half of his set, which was a touch heavier and darker still, the background video finally changed to images of city streets at night. Despite that early alarm trouble, it was a good solid hour that set the tone for the evening.

Beacon played shorter, distinct songs, as opposed to the mostly continuous mix of Dauwd. The duo each had their own bank of synth gear, with one singing live and the other occasionally drumming on an electronic pad. Their music had touches of chill R&B, with feminine-sounding breathy vocals (was he singing in falsetto or using a filter? it was unclear): music for low-light romance. Things changed up a bit with their penultimate song, which surprisingly went into oscillating unstructured noise before segueing into a bit stronger slinky/sexy finish. Let's just say in this imaginary evening of romance, that's where things got down to business. And then they made a slow slide into a strong dance beat on the last one, as though the evening—or movie, if this were a soundtrack—ended at a dance club instead of starting there. It was totally a closing credits song; they even brought it back in for a reprise after saying good night, while their gear was broken down to set up the next act.

I thought of Lusine as sort of the "math rock" musician in this lineup: his style is viscerally cerebral*, meaning there's a lot of interesting detail to capture your mind, but it still moves your body. It's warm and living, not cold and artificial. Or maybe it's like seeing the windmills along I-90, with hawks soaring nearby—machineries of life, artificial or natural. (As I belabor the imagery here, I want to mention that I liked the variety of background videos I'd been seeing at the showcases. Last year I felt like I kept seeing the same one or two sets and they weren't that engaging; this year, the visuals seemed different for each artist, not just each showcase, and were always interesting.) I haven't yet heard much of his latest album, The Waiting Room, so I had no idea how much of his set is from that. Past experience suggested to me that Lusine doesn't play his songs straight up in concert; more like the albums capture themes he then uses for variations. That said, a friend with me did say he recognized several of the songs from the new album, and I picked out at least one myself, the single "Another Tomorrow". If the early tracks in the set suggested the open wilderness, in the end Lusine brought it around to the urban beat of humanity (again with appropriate video footage of people bustling about the big city).

*I feel compelled to mention that I wrote that phrase in my notes at the show; now that I've been looking at the Ghostly website, I see the same words were used to describe his new album. So, we're all on the same wavelength, here.

Shigeto's closing set was the least like "the Ghostly sound" as expressed by the earlier artists, yet totally in keeping with them. He played a sort of jazz fusion drum and bass, beginning just on electronic gear, but he had a full acoustic drum kit too. So he would set up the electronics to play on their own and then switch to lengthy sessions on the drums. Whereas in rock, the drum parts are usually the bed supporting the rest of the music, here it was rather the reverse. For all the electronic noodling that goes on, the beat is the fundament of dance music, making the drum the fundamental instrument, which this set highlighted. Starting from a fairly laid-back tempo, Shigeto soon picked up the pace with complex rhythms, building to a furious climax showing off his formidable drumming skills. I never came up with an overarching imagery to describe the set, but I never really needed to: this was the most present, it was music for the here and now, for the people in the club dancing and having a great time.

And indeed, the audience had a great time throughout the evening with all four acts, as did I. Ghostly International amply demonstrated why they've been invited throughout the past decade of Decibel Festival, and left us all looking forward to the next decade.

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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.