The good people at NW Folklife Festival have finally drawn back the curtain on their 2011 Festival lineup, and as I expected it would be, it’s a doozy. Here are the artists I know and am psyched about (not counting me and the bands I play in):
The Stares – Meridians
(2010, self-released)
(Listen and purchase on their site.)
The Stares – Drew Whittemore, Angie Benintendi, and the various other brilliant musicians they surround themselves with – are slow and quiet, and not just in the music they create. After 2005’s near-perfect debut Spine to Sea, they took five years to record and release its follow-up, Meridians (a song from which you might have heard on Ball of Wax Volume 21). When they finally had it just how they wanted it, they released it very quietly last summer, slipping it out into the world with nary a live performance to support it.
This was a busy weekend for me. I went out to the NW Folklife Pre-Festival show on Friday, and (after an ill-advised road trip to look at tulips) played a show at the Josephine with Mike Dumovich on Saturday night.
Friday night’s show was great; Kelli and the gang at Folklife did a terrific job of balancing some more traditional folk artists with some of the boundary-pushing acts that will be featured on the Indie Roots stage. The Crow Quill Night Owls, Corespondents, and Led to Sea all put on great performances. Here are a couple videos courtesy The Archiver to give you a taste of the greatness on display: Continue reading
Two years ago, I went to Scotland on tour, and a very good friend sat me down and played an EP by Withered Hand (Dan Willson is his non-stage name). The EP blew me away for its songwriting. The singer, whose range is on the higher end of the spectrum like my own, hovers along on a few notes delivering verse after verse of witty, painful reflections from a man stuck in a place and time trying to find the beauty of life and the moment. The constant theme: sacred versus profane.
The first song I heard has been released as one of those cool lo-fi videos:
I am a big fan of the Northwest Folklife Festival. I have been for years, and it just keeps getting better. It really is the perfect festival, as far as I’m concerned: It’s free (although you really should donate a few bucks on your way in if you can), it’s a bus ride away from my house (and most places in Seattle), and it’s packed wall to wall with local and international artists that have not been hyped to the gills and aren’t booked at every other festival in the country. It doesn’t involve driving for ten hours or being forced to pay five dollars for a bottle of water or having the sweat of strangers smeared on your face, and at the end of the day you can go home and sleep in your own bed before heading back for more the next morning. (I think there’s some other festival going on Memorial Day weekend, but I’m sure it’s not remotely as interesting.)
This is going to be a good one!
Through no particular planning of my own, the release show celebrating the next volume of Ball of Wax Audio Quarterly (Volume 24, Spring 2011) will be quite the old-school BoW affair. Everyone performing at this show was featured on Volume 1, 2, or 3 – and we were all on Volume 4, the covers edition. The newest installment features tons of new music from artists brand new to Ball of Wax (including Your Heart Breaks, TheM All, The Washover Fans, and many more), but the fact that all five of us from the early days were on this new volume was too great a synchronicity to pass up. Suffice it to say, it should be a fun show.
Amateur Radio Operator
Robert Deeble
Levi Fuller
Sun Tunnels (formerly The Graze)
Casey Alexander (formerly Troubleshooting)
Wednesday, May 11th, 9:00 p.m., The Sunset Tavern
Free copy of Ball of Wax 24 CD with entry
See you there!
I first met Isaac Pierce trading mini-sets at Citizen Coffee in Lower Queen Anne. Mattie P (a totally unique soul who just left town last month) had invited me to join one of his periodic afternoon gatherings of songwriters playing a few songs each, in the charming tiny lofted space above the espresso bar.
Here is the song “a reminder,” recorded by Matt Ploszaj (aka Mattie P) from that afternoon. Isaac graciously gave me permission to post it here even though it was a first test-flight of a not quite finished song. It’s a good example of what he has been up to recently (and damn good in general). Press play.
These are records. Go buy some. Image courtesy FourthFloor on Flickr.
As I hope you are aware, this coming Saturday, April 16th is the fifth annual (I think) Record Store Day, an unofficial holiday (though I’m sure Congress will recognize it any year now) started to help support and recognize the great work that independent music stores do all over the country. Of course the point of Record Store Day is to get you out and about to physical stores around your city, lured there by in-store performances, signings, and exclusive new product created by artists just for RSD. We here in Seattle are fortunate to have over 20 participating stores, and there are probably tons of events that should have you criss-crossing the city on the trail of fun and sweet, sweet vinyl.
Knick Knack Records, while not a brick and mortar store, is certainly as spunky, smart, and independently-minded as any indie record store (they stock the full back catalog of Ball of Wax, for instance – and we highly recommend you go over and pick a few up right now). While their online-only existence prevents them from being an official participating store, they wanted to show their support for Record Store Day however they could. In an expression of solidarity with Record Store Day and the local music community (and those who support it with their hard-earned dollars), Knick Knack will be giving away all kinds of vinyl, CDs, and more all day on Saturday via their Facebook page and Twitter feed: LPs from Lonesome Shack; 45s from Miss Mamie Lavona and Ball of Wax favorites The Foghorns; CDs from GravelRoad, Angry Waters, The Foghorns, Half Light, and Ball of Wax; books from Kurt B. Reighley; and downloads from Uncle DooDad.
So friend or follow Knick Knack now, and while you’re running around town buying limited edition vinyl and hearing exclusive in-store performances, keep your Magical Pocket Internet Device on hand and scoop up some free stuff all day!
Yarn Owl – Montaña Y Caballo
(2011, self-released)
Way back in 2006 I played in Pullman with a band called Ether Hour, a piano-driven, Elliott Smith-esque indie rock band that I found on MySpace, back when it was still useful for booking tours. They had the most “friends” of any Pullman band I could find, which coincided with the fact that they were very good, in no small part for their drummer Ted Powers, all of 19 years old, who rocked it like nobody’s business. I saw Ether Hour again that summer when they came through Seattle, and kept up with them from time to time on the Internets. At some point their bass player Andrew left and was replaced by one Javier Suarez, and shortly afterward pianist Jake and singer/guitarist Jeff moved out of Pullman, and that was it for Ether Hour.
Almost instantly, Ted and Javier started Yarn Owl, and for the last few years they’ve been steadily blowing up. It didn’t take long for them to rise to the top in Pullman, playing with most every established act passing through town, including Ted Leo, Fruit Bats, and the Helio Sequence. They released a 7-song cassette (Tiny Dots) in 2009, followed by an EP (Stay Warm) last year (both available at their Bandcamp site). Now a four-piece, they’ve just released their first LP, Montaña Y Caballo.
