Capitol Hill Blog Party

On Saturday after lunch and a walk in the park, Angel and I put on our best hipster costumes and walked down the street to the Capitol Hill Block Party--our local--suddenly really hyped--indie rock music festival. Here are some pictures (most of which are really bad, sorry) and a recap.

(Oh, and PS--Shayne, these are Hipsters. Allll Hipsters.)

We stuck almost exclusively to Northwest bands--not really intentionally, but b/c there were a lot of them there, I wanted to see them, and Angel had no preference because she'd never heard of anyone at the show. First up were the Cave Singers, who make a really good back-woods-old-timey-whiskey-jugs-and-broke-down-cars-and-pentecostal-churches kind of indie rock. There's a lot of that coming out of the PNW these days, and I like it. Fake back-woods as the new grunge?

After them, we sat and drank coffee while Kimya Dawson was singing. I think the top picture is the crowd during her show, and the bottom picture is definitely my old buddy Joel, who we talked to while we were drinking coffee (he wasn't doing that when we talked to him). Neither Angel nor I really liked Kimya, but apparently she sang a song from the movie Juno, which is one of the best movies of the year--apparently.



After Kimya's show we wandered into a packed club called Neumo's to watch Portland's "The Builders and the Butchers". Neither one of us had heard them before, but they were probably the highlight of the festival for us. More slightly pentecostal/old-timey flavored NW indie rock, and awesome. I always think that religious imagery makes a nice spice for music, and they sprinkle it through nicely. I liked them so much (and my pictures are so bad) that I've included someone else's video of their song "Let it Rain". We weren't anywhere near this close.

After that we wandered out to a packed Fleet Foxes show on the main stage. They're everyone's favorite Seattle band right now. As Angel said, they're kind of like the BeeGees. Well, I guess kind of indie rock BeeGees. They use four-part harmonies anyway. They're a good band, but not really a great live show when you're standing near the back of the crowd and a steady stream of people keep pushing by you and tripping over you and that sort of thing.

After the Fleet Foxes, we went back to Neumos and watched two songs by Jaguar Love, who are a one of the three new bands composed of ex-Blood Brothers members. Shrieking indie rock/sort of hardcore kind of stuff, not a bad band, but not my thing. Angel couldn't take it, so we left.

After that, we left and went to dinner at a Vietnamese place next to a grocery store. I had Mongolian Tofu and Thai Iced Tea, and Angel had some mushroom kind of thing.

After dinner, we went to an 'unofficial' Triumph of Lethargy Skinned Alive to Death show in the ChaCha Lounge, which is in the basement of Bimbo's Cantina, which used to be called Bimbo's Bitchin' Burrito Kitchen, which was a much better name. TOLSATD put on a great show as always; more punk rock than I've seen them before. As a band a few years back, they started off really heavily experimental, but have morphed into something more accessible. Andrea Zollo (ex-Pretty Girls Make Graves) on vocals has been a nice addition to the band over the last year or so. She is pictured above with Spencer and Joel and some people in a bar doing a Bikini Kill cover.


That was kind of the end of the night for us. We stuck around and watched a few songs by the Hold Steady (above) who are fun and dorky, and I probably would have liked more when I was a teenager.



After that we stood around for a few songs by Devotchka. Once again, apparently everyone loves them--they were the festival headliner--but I don't really get it. They're kind of world-musicky and had a song on Little Miss Sunshine, which makes me think that if you consider yourself cultured, fun and indie, you should try to enjoy their music--or at least tell people that you do. With that in mind, I've included one of their videos above.