Photo by ktjen

It’s been almost two weeks since SP20 occurred, Capitol Hill Block Part is, well by the time I finish this at least, tomorrow and I’m just attempting to polish off my coverage of the event. So, in true Noah Sanders tradition, I’ll be truncating my extensive thoughts (quickly dwindling as time goes on) in to five very quick, very informative bullet points about the events/thoughts I most vividly remember on day 2 of what I’ll continue to refer to as “the greatest musical experience I’ve been a part of”.

Once again, thanks to Sub Pop for continuing to remind me why they’re hands down the greatest record label working this days by truly putting on a celebration of their music, their friends, and all of their extremely respectful fans. It was a magical weekend and, again, I pity those who didn’t make the effort to get out there. Oh, how I pity.

So here we go:

1. No Age was, well, exactly what you’d think a live performance by No Age would be like. Dean Spunt and Randy Randall acted like a couple of talented hipsters, who’d snuck on stage with some stolen equipment to jam out some noisy melodics for a bit. It wasn’t amazing, but it was certainly solid and it did nothing to damage my huge adoration for their recent release Nouns. There were rumors that the duo would be playing within the confines of a dank basement for an unannounced house party and thats where I’d like to see them, in a tiny, sweaty little hole where the tricky distortion and Spunt’s oozing, dirty vocals could really sink in.

Fleet Foxes::Shawn Brackbill

2. I’ve seen the Fleet Foxes maybe five times now, in Austin, in Seattle, at festivals, in small clubs - hell, I feel like I’ve literally watched this uber-talented band grow in both stage presence and fanbase like a creepy old uncle. And I’ll say this: while the band, mainly Robin Pecknold, continues to blow my mind with the sheer force of beauty they’re able to create, I think they might be getting a little big for their britches. The sense of playful modesty I encountered the first few go-arounds is pretty much gone these days. Maybe it’s been the extensive touring that’s whittled them down, but I feel as if they’re very conscious of this newfound fame and they seem almost too cool for school. I’m not poo-pooing the outfit, Pecknold still has some of the more stunning pipes out there these days, I just miss the modest “gee shucks” attitude these local yokels used to expound. If you haven’t seen them, check them out this Saturday at the Block Party, your mind will be blown.

3. Blitzen Trapper has to be one of the more talented, more underappreciated bands working today. I’ve seen them live three times now, and after each performance I fall more in love with their indy-alt-country sensibilities. It was a sad sight at SP20 to watch majority of the crowd clear, favoring the shade of the adjoining stage, leaving only a small contingent of intelligent fans to truly enjoy a more country-minded collection of Blitzen Trapper tracks. On stage audience size doesn’t seem to matter to these gentleman, be it four fans or four hundred these guys are giving it their all, yelling, screaming, jumping, shaking their money makers to entertain the shit out of the audience. Even in the frequent soft moments during their SP20 set, their was such palpable emotion flowing from the stage. It was mighty impressive, and I can only wish that more were around to see it.

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As always, I’m more than a week late on my coverage of a festival, and really, this time it’s a shame.  I came out of Marymoor Park on Sunday evening sunburned, fairly intoxicated, numbingly exhausted and unabashedly in love with one of the great record labels of the last 20 years.  I mentally scribbled down all the great things about the weekend that I would write in two days of epic coverage of the event.  The great bands, the amazing VIP area, the pleasant crowds and the shocking lack of lines for bathrooms, beer, or food - I was going to write about it all, and it was going to be brilliant.

And then I slept for nearly two days.  I blame my PTSD-affected liver, but for nearly two days I was a half-asleep wreck.  In the hours I was hazily awake, I sat in front of the computer, frantically trying to place my ecstatic memories of the weekend on to a page.  But, alas, nothing.  What I’m left with is a handful of sharply-lined memories from a weekend I consider to be one of the better musical experiences of my life.

You’ll get what I remember, in a vaguely chronological order.

SATURDAY

1.  Marymoor Park is the place for a music festival.  I don’t know about how effective is logistically, but the general grassy-hill, dirty hippy feel of the immaculately laid out space, is one that’s friendly for all types of concert goers.  You’ve got everything from hammered frat-boys to tight-jeaned hipsters to toddling children all co-existing harmoniously.  Also, no matter where you at Marymoor - toilet, food line, joint-smoking corner - you can hear the music and loudly.  I’ve never felt more comfortable at a festival.

Flight of the Conchords::Shawn Brackbill

2.  I’ve never seen a reunion show before.  I’m not old enough to be super excited when fucking Boston or a reunited Styx come roaring in to town, and in truth, I’ve always been pretty skeptical, even negative, about the whole idea.  Sub Pop changed that for me.  Seaweed was the first act of the day I caught (what, a man needs to drink some cheap beer in the grass next to his car before entering a music festival, it’s one of the Ten Commandments … or something) and all of my worries about bands reuniting fell to the side.  These weren’t bitter old grunge-veterans churning out a tired set for a measly crowd, these were genuinely happy musicians blasting through a set of early-90s sludge-punk to a fairly adoring fan.  I don’t know if it was the third beer of the day or how much I enjoyed Seaweed’s set, but I was wearing a pretty solid shit-eater when the band was through.

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Oops… I snuck a few
Green River ::: Photos by Josh

Yes, that’s right. We youngun’s have a lot of learning to do from the older-but-not-that-much-older generation. Many of our parents would have you think they’re a bunch of burnouts with no prospects, no fashion, and no class. I learned different. Or did I? We’ll get to that later.

Saturday

The weekend began just before noon in Redmond, at the termination of Microsoft’s private highway out of Seattle, where the expansive Marymoor Park carpets valley floor just northwest of Lake Sammamish and just northeast of the Microsoft campus. The park is an all purpose mega park with baseball fields, a bicycling velodrome, picnic areas (hosting a Star Wars group one of the days), and oodles of space for dogs to defecate. And of course a built out outdoor stage area. For parking we were ushered into a sometimes soccer field that had played host to the college ultimate frisbee regional tournament during the time I attended UW. (It seems typical that Ultimate would be relegated to the field normally reserved for cars.)

As we strolled in the completely cloudless sky to the entrance we found ourselves confronted with former Sub Pop band Girl Trouble under a tree playing for a crowd of about 30 about 50 yards up from the entrance. We hung out for a few minutes until hearing the Obits sounding surprisingly Nirvana-esque to start out, and decided to head in. After learning of the no camera policy loudly being lectured to patrons at the door, we walked it back to the car.

Girl Trouble

We returned to the venue for the final half of a very electric set that left me impressed and stoked for what this weekend had to bring. I guess they maybe be announced as a new Sub Pop signee any day now? If so I think they’ve got another winner. The Constantines who followed them on the main stage upped the energy even further and reminded me just how compelling, entertaining and relevant they still are after earning my award for the best performance of 2006 for their Sasquatch set in the hail.

The first of the big reunion bands to play were Eric’s Trip and unexpectedly they struck me as kind of cute and not hard at all. Yeah, not the word I was expecting for a reunited Sub Pop band, but there it is, I said it. Seaweed who followed were completely in the grunge camp though and finally brought to life what the Sub Pop sound is known for best. Their set had what many were doubtlessly coming to the festival hoping to find: palpable volume, headbangable riffage and an involved crowd. Pissed Jeans, also a fairly new member to the label with an album released in June of 2007, delivered what I thought was the set of the day, essentially powering through forty straight minutes in a fashion better suited for an unhinged midnight punk show for hungry underagers than a mid afternoon festival stage show in front of napping middle-aged parents.

Fleet Foxes who was arguably the biggest draw of the day for the younger crowd delivered a good if not great set on borrowed instruments, as their’s were still in New York, where apparently they’re still on tour. The moment of the day was brought to us by Josh Tillman, Fleet Foxes newest member on drums, who turned an awkward drum interruption into an opportunity for comedy, through an impromptu drum battle with a drummer on the other stage. Unfortunately the sound check on the adjacent stage did bleed over a couple of times during key parts of the Foxes set, slightly ruining the pristine harmonies that is the bands trademark.

The Fluid from Denver, the second reunited band to play, had ood energy, but the songs just all sounded the same to me. Mudhoney on the other hand brought it and played their greatest hits, starting with two new ones (”new” as in released this year) and ending with Superfuzz Bigmuff hit “Touch Me I’m Sick.” The Vaselines, credited with being Kurt Cobain’s favorite band, also reunited featuring members of Belle & Sebastian backing them, and were also another unusually cute band. Their in-between song banter was very endearing, but maybe their sound doesn’t have quite the edge it used to either.

Sunday

After learning our lesson from the previous day we did something we never did before and snuck in a camera to a show. I’ve never needed to before. It wasn’t hard. It was a thrill. I felt so illicit. Festival blankets are clutch. It felt like a watershed moment in me realizing either you work the system or the system works you. And rules are meant to be broken, especially at festivals. All the losers the day before had done it so why shouldn’t I?

We arrived a bit late to a surprisingly engaging Kinksi set (as far as those things go anyways). Foals whom I hadn’t been impressed with in just the recordings, were in fact very impressive live, and fit perfectly into the Sub Pop aesthetic as of late that has brought some renewed interest and success to the label. Along with Helio Sequence, No Age, Low, Constantines, Fleet Foxes and Wolf Parade (and maybe now the Obits?) they convincingly represented for the future of the label and proved that this whole exercise really was one big long bragging session on Sup Pop’s part. Red Red Meat, the early incarnation of Tim Rutili and Brian Massarella’s Califone, was also a worthy addition to the reunion lineup, setting a bit of an experimental folk tone to afternoon’s waiting sun.

No Age

Red Red Meat

Everyone pretty much knew the act of the night was going to be Green River, who owns the honor of having the Sub Pop label’s first non-compilation release with the Dry As a Bone EP in 1987. Upon receiving the recording of the record, Sub Pop was told the band was no longer a functioning entity. Now more than twenty years later members of Pearl Jam and Mudhoney reunited on stage for a set that the world had never had a proper chance to witness.

With all the former members in attendance it meant a three guitar attack, and in that I finally found the sense of nostalgia I was expecting from this festival. I could literally taste the heavy, dirty riffs that gave birth the grunge era. The point of inspiration was obvious and I could finally personally identify with the excitement of that time for that place and those people (I was 6 at the time). Mark Arm’s wild-eyed undulations recalled the frantic physical nature their shows must have been at the height of Sub Pop’s early era, easily stirring up the crowd at the foot of the stage into a pit. Were they the set of the festival? Maybe. Maybe. No matter what, it’d certainly be a shame if they never played again as Green River.

Stone Gossard - Green River

Green River

As we strolled up to the gates of the Marymoor stage, right around noon, just up the meadow were a small coterie of folks surrounding a large tree (an oak?) and listening to the band who was playing in it’s copious shade. It was Girl Trouble following through on their previously announced ad-hoc acoustic show. After a couple of songs a pack of security guards came over to evaluate the situation. They looked like they were going to do something, but they didn’t. We hung out for about six songs are really enjoyed ourselves. Hopefully Girl Trouble got to finish their set. We were pulled by the Obits to the festival stage…

A Snakebites shirt!

Flickr: Girl Trouble at Marymoor

… but were confronted by “no camera” signs everywhere and people shuffling back to their cars with even their tiny handheld point-and-shoot cameras. The people searching the bags are loudly lecturing “no cameras” to just arrived patrons. Oh well, we told ourselves. If nobody is getting in with any kind of camera, then fine. We trucked ourselves back to the car and left it there.

The first thing we see when we walk through the gate though, is one of those stand-up painted board scenes where people can put their faces through a hole so it looks like they are involved in a nominally amusing scene, in this case a tandem bike ride. OK, so somebody didn’t get the memo. I guess it’s only a light slap in the face to the people who were forced to drop cameras at their car ( which would include everyone who arrived before noon at least). A slap none the less though. I suppose you could still use your cell phone camera.

So I go and enjoy my rock and roll for a while. The Obits and the Constantines were both really money as expected, yadda yadda yadda. Anyway, once Fleet Foxes comes around and everyone moves to the front of the stage I’m realizing everybody but me has a camera. Point-and-shoots, Digital SLRs, it didn’t seem to matter. WTF. People are happily snapping away all over the place without repercussion. Clearly the rule has changed. So I decide to go to my car and get my camera.

We try to leave and are told “Sorry. No re-entry after 5pm.” As I turn around from the gate demoralized to go mope back and try and enjoy Mudhoney, somebody is happily taking a picture with his buddies mugging out of the tandem head holes. Another slap.

When I leave the venue I check again to see if there are any “No Cameras” signs still posted. There are. So are camera’s allowed or aren’t they? I really want to know. Inside you nobody seems to care, but my experience coming in was different with signs and loud bag searchers turning people away at the door.

I’m so glad I got to pay money to get into a place where they have holes for me to put my head in, but I wasn’t allowed an actual camera to take a picture of the event. The inconsistencies of this situation are mind-boggling and personally quite irksome.

Green River better be fucking stellar tomorrow. Otherwise I may have very little else positive to say about the weekend.

Photo By Josh

It’s hopefully going to be a sunny, hot weekend up at old Marymoore this weekend for SP20.  And I can’t imagine a band I’d rather see playing their dirty hippy hearts out more in the blazing sunshine of sweet, sweet Seattle, WA then New Zealand’s own The Ruby Suns.  I drunkenly stumbled in to the final two or three songs of The Ruby Suns set at SXSW this year and, in my inebriated state, couldn’t make heads or tails of what the hell was going on.  A trio of smiling Kiwis (not the bird), bedecked in jangling shell-jewelry (?) and tai-dye, surrounded by loosely assembled drum kits, playing a form of music I’d imagine originated in Hawaiian Air commercials from the late ’60s.

To say the least, my mind was just little bit blown.

The Ruby Suns album Sea Lion is a jumble of percussion and what I believe to be ukelele that invokes a the sub-tropical oddities that define New Zealand as a country.  It’s a little bit off, a little bit kooky, and pretty much entirely enjoyable.  These Kiwi-bastards will be opening SP20 on Sunday and the smart kids will be parked as close to the stage as possible, dancing shoes tightly laced.

Thanks for reading!  Hope to see some of ya’ll out at Marymoore this weekend.

Myspace: The Ruby Suns

MP3: The Ruby Suns - Tane Mahuta

You know what I’m excited about this weekend?

SP20.  Duh.

Though I’ve spake to many a die-hard music fan who’s forsworn the event for some ridiculous reason (distance, crowds, generally lack of cajones), this is going to be the event of the summer concert season (sorry Block Party, you’ll be fun too!) and I hang my head and shake a weary finger at those who deign to miss it.  Sub Pop’s been impressing the shit out of me for as long as I’ve been listening to interesting music (sadly, not as long as you’d think) and this collection of their brightest moments, past, present, and future is shaping up to be absolutely fantastic.

Though there are a handful of one-shot reunions occuring at old SP20 (The Vaselines, Green River, Red Red Meat) that’ll sure to draw the crowds I for one am damn near frothing at the bit to see L.A. no-wavers No Age.  Truth be told, when I first chanced up Weirdo Rippers, the first album by this noisy little duo I could barely understand what was going on.  The layers of distortion and buried melodies washed over me, leaving me confused and not entirely happy.  Yet, Sub Pop’s release of their second album Nouns absolutely blew me away.  I can’t say if it’s a slight change in production that better fused the noise with the pretty, or that I grew up somewhat as a music listener, but Nouns as quickly escalated in to one of my most spun discs this year and even spawned a deep, unknown love of a more lo-fi brand of music.

Thus, this weekends performance by the duo (a highly recommended performance at that) is near the top of my excitement.

Myspace: No Age

MP3: No Age - Teen Creeps

All sorts of shows, radio appearances and other things will be happening in conjunction with the SP20 Festival, and I thought I would bring them all together in one post for you.

KEXP In-Studio’s

July 7 - Noon - Grand Archives
July 8 - Noon - Foals
July 9 - Noon - The Fluid
July 10 - Noon - Les Thugs
July 11 - Noon - The Constantines

Festival Associated Club Shows

July 11 - Death Vessel, Les Thugs at Neumos
July 11 - Retribution Gospel Choir at the High Dive
July 11 - Obits at the Funhouse
July 12 - The Gutter Twins, Brothers of the Sonic Cloth at the Showbox

The Festival (see the set times)

July 12 - The SP20 Festival at Marymoor featuring Fleet Foxes, Constantines, The Helio Sequence and more! - SOLD OUT!
July 13 - The SP20 Festival at Marymoor featuring Green River, Foals, Wolf Parade, No Age and more!

Other Events

July 10 - 7pm - Jonathan Poneman and Bruce Pavitt speak at EMP
July 11 - Sub Pop Comedy Showcase w/ Todd Barry, David Cross, Eugene Mirman, Patton Oswalt, and Kristen Schaal at The Moore Theatre

Club Shows that aren’t Festival Associated but with bands that are or were Sub Pop associated

July 12 - Pierced Arrows (former members of Dead Moon) at the Funhouse
July 12 - Girl Trouble insurgent all acoustic show at Marymoor Park
July 14 - Wolf Parade at Neumos
July 16 - The Jesus and Mary Chain at Showbox SODO

Also look for the top of the Space Needle to not only be flying the Sub Pop flag, but for it to resemble a record. Rad!

Former Sub Pop band Girl Trouble aren’t sitting idly by while they are left out of the 20th Anniversary festivities happening this week. In guerilla fashion, they’ve decided to stage their own free set, outside the festival grounds at Marymoor Park, where they will play an all acoustic version of their album Hit It or Quit It somewhere on the park grounds. Hit It or Quit It was the Sub Pop label’s first LP release in 1988. (Curiously Girl Trouble isn’t listed as a band at the Sub Pop artists page.)

Thanks to Hannah for the news.

We’ve already heard about the Constantines and the Obits…

I’m thinking one of July 12’s early day TBA’s could got to be reunited Dead Moon. Pierced Arrows is playing the Funhouse later that evening, so it isn’t out of left field.

Also, The Jesus and Mary Chain are playing Showbox SODO July 16. Hmmmmm….. very interesting.

The one act I would really like to see, but don’t believe is happening though is the Fruit Bats. I would give my left nut to go to a Fruit Bats show and hear some new songs. I hear Eric is planning on playing a few shows this year…