Pilcrow

Once again this year, I volunteered for the Concerts at the Mural, sponsored by KEXP and Seattle Center. These were held each Friday evening in August 2011, with a KEXP DJ spinning tunes starting at 5 pm and live music from 6 pm to about 9 pm. The KEXP BBQ was also part of the series, held Saturday August 6 from about 1 pm to 9 pm.

Also once again this year, I took very few notes on the bands, this time as a deliberate choice because I felt the brief summary post I did for last year worked fairly well. Also, I spent a lot more time running around because my volunteer role changed. I was responsible for taking photos and posting them to the Facebook and Twitter accounts of KEXP, both as the bands were setting up and as they started performing, to help drive awareness of and interest in the events. It was pretty fun to do that. By coincidence, the one Friday that I was not responsible for taking photos and posting them (August 12), my iPhone camera failed—apparently either the lens cover finally got too scratched up, or else some dust or moisture somehow got trapped inside, so all of my photos came out hazy and darker than they should (with light areas being too bright and fuzzy by comparison). Fortunately, I was able to borrow my friend Gina's camera for the last two Fridays, which actually helped me get some better photos than I would have otherwise, as her camera included zoom, flash, and night photo functions, unlike the iPhone.

As I did for 2010, I'll list out the concerts with the artists in bulleted lists below, and include links to my photosets next to the date.

Friday August 5 (photos)

• Black Whales—Okay folk rock, not really into them, but I did get a copy of their CD, maybe they'll grow on me.
• Hey Marseilles—Same general category of folk rock but richer band sound, more like Annuals; pretty good, I liked them.
• The Maldives—Country rock, not really my thing, but good band with two drummers.

Saturday August 6: 9th Annual KEXP BBQ (photos)

• Mad Rad—Are pretty rad! I had already taken note of some of their recent songs, but seeing them perform live won me over. Good tunes, the music seemed to be all original rather than sample-based, the synth/keyboard player and the drummer (Trent Moorman, naturally) were great, all three rappers were good to hear too.
• Virgin Islands—Hard rock, not metal but not quite to my taste, not bad though.
• School of Rock—One set of kids did a very credible cover of "Barracuda"—I had my doubts the singer could pull it off, but she did—and all of the kids were fairly good overall. I wondered how they decided what songs to cover.
• Capsula—Heavy hard-driving rock, I liked them; the female bassist sounded like Kim Gordon when she sang. These guys and Mad Rad were probably the best of the day.
• Rainbow Arabia—Funky worldbeat electronic dance music.
• Fool's Gold—"Oh these guys" (the song "Nadine"), Paul Simon / Vampire Weekend worldbeat pop; not bad, not really exciting to me.

Friday August 12 (photos, such as they are)

• Math & Physics Club—Pleasant indie-pop, like Belle & Sebastian; good for a summer's afternoon.
• Gold Leaves—Fleet-Foxy folk rock, pleasant but unremarkable, mostly lacking the choral aspect of Fleet Foxes.
• Seapony—Still really good, but felt a bit light to headline a larger outdoor show like this; I'm interested to see where they go.

Friday August 19 (photos)

• Whalebones—"Oh these guys"; dark rock, hints of Sixties a la Raveonettes, also a bit Southern rock; sounded pretty good. I probably need to pay more attention to them.
• My Goodness—Bluesy hard rock (White Stripes, Zeppelin); also "oh these guys" except I recognized more than one, so again I should keep them in mind.
• Black Mountain—Really good set, variety of songs from albums, including "Don't Run Our Hearts Around" (one of my favorites); I still haven't bothered to get the newer albums but whenever I see them live I wonder why not; really good rock for a summer's twilight.

Friday August 26 (photos)

• Drew Grow & the Pastors' Wives—I didn't take any notes on the first three bands! They were all in the overlap of folk-rock / art-rock / post-rock to some degree. I want to say that Drew Grow was more on the folk-rock side. They were all likeable.
• Pickwick—These guys were the most toward the prog/art-rock side of things, and possibly whom I liked the most.
• Ravenna Woods—You'd think I'd remember these guys better, since I got to see them again the following night playing in a garage at a private party to about 30-40 people. Nope, I just know they were likeable in the folky/prog-rock way.
• Shane Tutmarc—Unlike others, very country / country-rock, also a bit soulful at times.

I'd say Mad Rad were the surprise of the series, as I hadn't expected to discover I'm a fan, and Capsula were probably the best new discovery. There weren't any bands I was really excited to see, although I did look forward to seeing both Seapony and Black Mountain, but it was still a good series overall.

Just a week after the Unwoman concert, I was back in the chilly Rendezvous JewelBox Theater on Friday January 7 to see Seapony, playing a set with Blue Skies for Black Hearts opening and Yuni in Taxco headlining. I liked what I'd been hearing of Seapony on KEXP and wanted to check them out, and I recognized Yuni in Taxco's name too, though I'd forgotten that I'd seen them do a KEXP Concert at the Mural last August. I'd also seen Blue Skies for Black Hearts before, back in August 2008, but had missed most of their set that time and didn't have much of an impression of them.

Blue Skies for Black Hearts are the kind of band I don't like to review: they were decent and likable but unremarkable, nothing much jumped out to hold my interest or give me anything to say. They played a bit of Tom Petty during soundcheck, that and Imperial Teen were the touchstones for their style, I thought. However, I did take note of their last song that evening, "Majoring in the Arts," from their forthcoming album Embracing the Modern Age; it had more oomph and was probably their best that evening. 

Seapony played sunny twee pop, British style, like Camera Obscura. The trio had nice melodic guitar lines, sweet if reserved/hushed vocals, and subdued bass; they were rounded out by a drum machine. I felt the singer's voice was notably stronger on their recorded single "Dreaming", which also felt a touch more rock. I also thought it seemed like they could just use a bass machine too, though actually I'd rather they keep the bassist and get a live drummer as well. But for all that, I actually did enjoy their set a lot and look forward to hearing more from them.

Yuni in Taxco played more raucous post-punk, kind of a twisted surf rock sound, due to the guitar style (Beach Boys rather than Dick Dale) and theremin, and some slide guitar as well. They seemed to have a wandless theremin, which I thought was quite cool. They had an interesting mix of styles/sounds, sometimes moody post-punk instead of surf punk, and I was really enjoying their set—I don't know why I didn't take any notes on their set last August. Unfortunately I had to leave early to catch the bus, but I thought they were definitely a band to watch and I'll have to catch them again.

Once again, just a few photos, here in this set on Flickr.