Labor Days: Bumbershoot Wrap-Up Saturday 9/4

Like owning something North Face or drinking in parks, Bumbershoot is one of those things that every Seattle kid has experienced and can share as such with one another. That one last weekend before school starts, the sky turns grey, and that North Face is worn for the duration. One last weekend of supreme beauty, the reason we endure the other 9 months of the year, one last weekend of unsupervised mischief, keeping lookout for security at a gathering of dozens of peers by the trees.

Things done changed. For my friends and I, we’re out of school, and when Tuesday rolls around it’s back to the grind. The trees are gone too, not that they’ve been chopped down or anything, but the area next to the fountain historically left vacant and thus inhabited by throngs of loitering underage drinkers is now home to an expanded beer garden and eco-friendly carnival rides. But Bumbershoot still offers that respite from reality, one grand three-day weekend to (hopefully) enjoy the (hopefully not) last good weather of the year, a diverse selection of live music, the gathering of friends, and more activity one still wishes to be kept hidden from their parents. And this year, Bumbershoot finally delivers on its promise of including more hip-hop on the bill, with tons of local acts and some anticipated sets from rising stars in the national scene. Years past, you’d get one underground block at the exhibition hall (some of my favorite sets ever from the likes of Zion I and Brother Ali) and maybe one set at the mainstage (Wu-Tang! Nas! Public Enemy! …Nappy Roots?) with local acts almost entirely ignored. In 2010, hip-hop, its influences, and those it has influenced dominate the bill.

Grynch

All photography by Kristian

However on Saturday, there was only one true hip-hop act on the bill: Ballard icon Grynch, kicking off the festival as one of the first acts of any genre performing. Grynch is one of Seattle’s lyrical lyricists, a writer who has studied the craft
extensively by listening to and dissecting verses from the greats, but is no studio rapper. His live show works because it showcases his top-notch flow and because he can command a crowd; though diminutive in stature, he fills a stage, bouncing from one side to the other, a skill he must have learned by studying the greats once again. All the more impressive, he held down most of the hour-long set by himself, with only DJ Nphared, a participant in Wednesday’s Red Bull Big Tune (#NoMoonMan), to spin beats and serve as hypeman. Grynch ran through songs off Chemistry, My Second Wind, and his mixtapes, with “Good Chemistry” and the Illmind-produced “A Dream Undeferred” sounding the best of the set’s first half. Even though fall felt dangerously close as the sky remained overcast throughout the thankfully rain-free day, Grynch performed a new song dedicated to the Emerald City’s best months, the hook going “It’s a beautiful day, call me Mr. Rogers,” and staple “Summertime,” minus Geo.

Though Prometheus Brown was not there to perform his collaboration, Grynch brought along a few of his Seatown cohorts to share the stage, starting with Sol for a new song about partying that kind of fell flat and catchy, excellent weed song “Spliff.” DJ Nphared commented that he smelled “something…delicious” before dropping the beat, and it seemed that the newly-treeless youths decided to relocate to the Fisher Green Stage as a good half of the crowd was probably in high school. Next, after flowing over a collage of well-known beats including mentor Warren G’s “Regulators” and briefly bemoaning his height with Skee-Lo’s “I Wish,” Macklemore popped onstage to the most enthusiastic applause of the set. Mack is a showman, putting on energetic live shows, and hopped on the barrier separating the crowd from the stage during the frequently performed collaboration “If Only.” The two emcees have great chemistry onstage, a tribute to having shared one often. El Mizell of Mash Hall made it a trio for the brand-new “Something New,” performed for the first time. Big man killed it, bringing a frantic energy that the others fed off, with all three appearing to have a blast performing. Grynch held it down for sure while as the only rapper onstage, but had more fun sharing the spotlight and putting on for his city – as the only hip-hop bill of the day, Grynch made it his duty to give some shine to the other hardworking individuals who have helped make the scene a big enough deal to warrant such coverage at the city’s largest and longest-running music festival.

Caspar Babypants

After Grynch’s Northwest anthem “My Volvo,” myself and photographer/festival companion K.Skjal had to find something to do before the Husky game. Looking through the Stranger’s festival guide and seeing the name Chris Ballew attached, we knew we had to go check out Caspar Babypants over at the Northwest Court Stage. The Presidents of the United States of America were an essential part of my childhood, with their self-titled debut being the first CD I owned and their ’96 Bumbershoot performance the first concert I attended. PUSA’s first three albums dominated the carpool CD changer with their presentation contingent on a solemn oath never to repeat any of the lyrics, a promise that was repeatedly broken on the elementary school playground. For those parents who don’t want their kids to repeat “Fuck you, kitty,” Presidents and now Caspar Babypants frontman Ballew has created a more kid friendly experience, with all the goofiness, positive energy, and three chord punk of his original band with the volume toned down a couple notches and the bad words erased. The crowd was an interesting mix of eastside Microsoft yuppies checking out the Youngershoot event and Capitol Hill clans where mommy has tattoos on her neck and daddy has a sweet handlebar mustache, the kind of people who were moshing at my first eye-opening introduction to live music. The musicians, which included Ballew, a pianist, and a jack-of-all-trades percussionist, were obviously having lots of fun playing to the younger crowd, entreating them to “run, baby, run” as the swirling mix of toddlers directly in front of the stage became the equivalent of baby’s first mosh pit. Ballew came off as the musical equivalent of Half Baked’s Kenny – kindly, loving, encouraging, and goofy, presumably minus, you know, the pot. Before we headed out for some adult playtime aka the beer garden (and not the one directly next to the Northwest Court Stage, which Caspar Babypants completely cleared out) the trio played a cover of Nirvana’s “Sliver,” reducing the song to what it is: a recollection of childish angst and irrationality, one of those memories you have and you don’t know why you remember it or why you recall it so vividly. Ballew encouraged the crowd to throw temper tantrums and shout “Grandma take me home,” and his little legion gladly complied. Caspar Babypants is definitely for the children.

Wheedle’s Groove

After checking out Flatstock, Bumbershoot’s annual market of original, awesome concert art, and spending way too much money on Dam-Funk and Stevie Wonder prints, Wheedle’s Groove took over the Fisher Green Stage. Reunited in the wake of a documentary of the same name, the collection of over 30 musicians who made a thriving Central District funk and soul scene in the 60s and 70s fit in as much groove as they could into their hour or so long set. There were around 15 talented musicians onstage at a time, running through hits that dominated local radio playlists. KYAC DJ Robert Nesbitt handled MC duties, providing background and introductions between songs. The overwhelmingly 40+ and white crowd packed the green and got funky to “Sweet Soul Lady” and a funkified “Hey Jude” that had the whole crowd singing along, and a song (whose name I didn’t catch…) that I recognized as the source sample for Devin the Dude’s “Bust One Fo Ya.” Along that line, it’s unfortunate that many of my generation (myself certainly included) do not have an appreciation for or knowledge of this music. We hear it in our favorite songs, chopped up, slowed down, in the chipmunk voices sublimely favored by producers, but don’t know the sources, the roots of the music. Wheedle’s Groove provided a nice education for this wayward soul.

The rest

Atlas Sound performed a solo set at the uncomfortable Broad Street Stage that I caught the last few minutes of. I’ve seen him before and dude is seriously talented and makes some of the most interesting indie music out there under his Atlas Sound guise and as part of Deerhunter. Too bad it was the same time as Wheedle’s Groove.

Huskies lost. I liked Jamie Liddell better when he was an electro weirdo rather than doing whiteboy soul. I tried to see Edward Sharpe but by the time we got there short dudes like me (“I wish I was a little bit taller…”) were S.O.L. The crowd was thick and deep, and from where I was I could barely hear anything. The Broad Street Stage sucks, it’s awkwardly orientated and the placement of the beer garden disrupts traffic near the stage and cuts off a good chunk of prime viewing space. Fed up, we bounced over to Balkan Beat Box at the more manageable and enjoyable Fisher Green Stage. The Brooklyn-based “gypsy rock” band was in the midst of throwing the livest set of the day. The group’s songs run the gamut from reggae to disco with a little bit of hip-hop swagger and a lot of eastern European influence (Balkan, no shit). The crowd was gigging hard to their pulsating genre-bending concoctions, displaying trippy dancing one normally only sees at Folklife.

Having sold our Mainstage passes (which it sounds like was a good call) we exited Seattle Center with the idea of going to Zion I at Chop Suey or Fresh Espresso and Jamie Lidell at the Croc but ended up doing neither, deciding that we spent too much already at Peso’s happy hour. No loss though, it’s a long weekend, with a packed Sunday schedule of local favorites Fresh Espresso, forward-thinking songstress Georgia Anne Muldrow, next big thing Jay Electronica, and hometown heroes The Physics and Fatal Lucciauno all gracing the stage today in addition to the enticing possibilities of legends the Dandy Warholes, the presumed debauchery of LMFAO, the effervescent electro-pop of Delorean, and…Hole. A fine way to end the summer, as always, even if we can’t loiter at the trees.