Monthly Archives: March 2010

Music

Sasquatch Sold Out

If you were thinking about heading to the Gorge for this year’s Sasquatch Festival, you’re too late. As of this morning, the fest is all sold out (both tix and three-day passes), and in record time no less.  That marks the greatest number of tickets sold in the fastest time since Sasquatch was born, way back in 2002. I would give credit where credit’s due: this year’s slam-bang lineup.

Over the past few weeks, a few more acts have been added to the schedule, including They Might Be Giants, The Posies, and RAAAAAAAANDY! (Aziz Ansari, that is.) To see what you’re missing, check out the full lineup after the jump.

2010 SASQUATCH! FESTIVAL LINEUP (New additions in bold)

Saturday, May 29

My Morning Jacket

Vampire Weekend

The National

Broken Social Scene

Deadmau5

OK Go

Wale

Minus the Bear

Brother Ali

Shabazz Palaces

Public Enemy

The Hold Steady

Miike Snow

The Posies

Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros

Portugal. The Man

Mumford & Sons

Why?

The Lonely Forest

Patrick Watson

The Middle East

Nurses

Fool’s Gold

Morning Teleportation

Aziz Ansari

Garfunkel & Oates

Nick Kroll

Moshe Kasher

Z-Trip

Dam-Funk

The Very Best

Sunday, May 30

Massive Attack

Pavement

LCD Soundsystem

Tegan & Sara

Kid Cudi

They Might Be Giants

Midlake

Caribou

Nada Surf

Dirty Projectors

Girls

The xx

City & Colour

Cymbals Eat Guitars

The Tallest Man on Earth

Local Natives

Fruit Bats

Vetiver

Freelance Whales

Avi Buffalo

tUnE-YarDs

Jets Overhead

Martina Topley Bird

Mike Birbiglia

Rob Riggle

Luke Burbank

Rory Scovel

Booka Shade

Simian Mobile Disco

A-Trak

Yacht

Monday, May 31

Ween

MGMT

Band of Horses

She & Him

Passion Pit

Drive By Truckers

The Temper Trap

Mayer Hawthorne

The Heavy

The New Pornographers

Camera Obscura

The Mountain Goats

Dr. Dog

Quasi

Yes Giantess

Jaguar Love

No Age

Japandroids

Telekinesis

Fresh Espresso

Phantogram

Past Lives

Shadow Shadow Shade

Craig Robinson

Bobcat Goldthwait

Todd Barry

Hannibal Buress

Boys Noize

Neon Indian

Hudson Mohawke

Film & TV

SIFF 2010 Opening Night Film Announced

2 Comments

SIFF just announced their opening night film for this year’s fest, and it’s a good ‘un: The Extra Man. The film is well-written and -acted all the way around, and it’s witty and class-conscious enough for the various types of Seattle folks (read: even the olds) who usually hit up the big SIFF events.  There’s no trailer yet online, but above is some footage of Katie Holmes crying on set with Paul Dano. I saw the film at Sundance a couple months ago, and this was my take then:

The Extra Man is the latest by husband-and-wife writer-director team Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini (with Jonathan Ames, adapting his own novel). As the dynamic duo is responsible for American Splendor, I will go with them on any cinematic journey.

In this film, they give Kevin Kline the juicy role of Henry Harrison–the kind of performance that the Academy ignores every year–a senior citizen pseudo-aristocrat, who knows how to get things for free, whether it’s sneaking into the opera or talking wealthy friends into putting him up in Palm Beach. Enter his new roommate Louis Ives, played by Paul Dano, an English lit teacher turned magazine ad salesman, who both fancies himself a gentleman straight out of Gatsby and struggles with some cross-dressing tendencies. Dano, with his flat face and awkward demeanor, is the perfect fit as a psychologically-conflicted aspiring dilettante who often imagines a narrator telling the story of his life. Does this sound like a comedy? Because it is, and a pretty funny one at that. Even with Katie Holmes? Yes, even with Katie Holmes.

Opening night is May 20th, and this time around, the film and party is at Benaroya Hall.  Oooh la la.  Tickets still available, ranging from $45 as a SIFF member to $200 for the VIP red carpet experience.  Feel free to peruse the other SIFF-related passes and packages, and mark your calendar for the big event.

Music

Soul Love for David Bowie from the Seattle Rock Orchestra

Let’s just get the formalities out of the way: The Seattle Rock Orchestra’s experiment with wrapping live rock in a gorgeous feather boa of strings, horns, and choral richness merits a major thumbs-up. Their David Bowie tribute Friday night spelled that out in big moonage-daydream letters.

The packed Moore Theatre sported one of the broadest demographics I’ve seen at a show in a while, with everyone from seven-year-olds to retirees (no exaggeration) represented. And they all ate up every orchestral flourish, every surge of horn muscle, and–of course–every classic David Bowie song.

The tunes–mostly representing the Thin White Duke’s glammiest and most drama-drenched career phase–really were built for this kind of treatment. The full-on instrumental heft just pointed up the richness of Bowie’s songwriting, and SRO mastermind Scott Teske’s arrangements were almost 100 percent on-the-money (one exception: the jaunty marching-band arrangement on “Heroes” proved an ill fit for the song’s wounded melodrama ). Ziggy Stardust received the most cover version love: “Five Years,” Ziggy‘s apocalyptic opener, started off the show (crooned in classic Brit-Pop style by Tom Beecham of The Raggedy Anns), and no less than four other tracks from the iconic glam album surfaced. Hunky Dory came a close second.

Aping that oft-imitated Bowie baritone woulda been a fool’s game, and thankfully the revolving cast of guest vocalists sidestepped that bit of sincere flattery. The Kindness Kind’s Alessandra Rose suggested Hope Sandoval and Bjork hanging out on “Life on Mars,” David Terry lent low-key cool to “The Man Who Sold the World,” and People Eating People‘s Nouella Johnston actually improved on Diamond Dogs’ hammiest ballad, “When You Rock and Roll With Me,” by injecting a dose of gospel fire into her performance.

My favorite vocal turn of the night, though, was probably the simplest. Jon Auer of veteran power-poppers The Posies lent his pipes to “Moonage Daydream,” “Starman,” and an especially gorgeous final encore of Hunky Dory’s “Quicksand.” Auer possesses one of the most clarion beautiful voices in Northwest rock, and his singing brought to light another oft-overlooked virtue of David Bowie’s songs–how damned pretty most of them are, with or without the glam makeup.

News

Seattle City Light to Mother Nature: “Bring it on!”

Courtesy of KIRO TV’s Wildside, Summit West web cam.

I have two $90-plus electric bills this month, one for the office, one for the home–a 13.8 percent rate increase went into effect this January–so my inner Scotsman danced a jig on reading Cliff Mass’s weather report on our blustery weather:

This is exactly the kind of pattern that lays down lots of snow. Below is the forecast 24-h snow amounts ending 5 AM Tuesday morning…some locations get well over a foot. City Light should think about revoking their electricity surcharge.

Mass is probably being a little facetious there, but I spoke with City Light’s Scott Thomsen about it anyway. You never know when you might learn something. Besides, Crystal got 26 inches the last 48 hours. That’s not nothing.

Earlier this month, Seattle City Light announced that thanks to an anemic snowpack (the lowest in 20 years), the amount of hydropower they could generate would likely be limited. With no “extra” power to sell, they were forecasting a loss in revenue of $70 million. On March 22, the City Council approved a 4.5 percent rate increase, to go into a rate stabilization account.

The rate stabilization account, claiming $2 extra per “average” customer per month, is supposed to create a $100 million fund that Seattle City Light can use to combat volatility, either in power costs or in snowpack. Once the account reaches $100 million, the surcharge goes away.

Thomsen will take the extra foot or two of new snow, but, he says, given that the snowpack was at 66 percent of normal, it’s going to take a lot more than a single storm to change City Light’s financial outlook. City Light’s Pend Oreille dam, for instance, is a run-of-the-river dam with no reservoir, and is completely dependent on snowpack doing its time-release thing properly. It also produces about half of Seattle City Light’s power.

In short, don’t expect a smaller electric bill. But definitely get out there and enjoy the powder.

News

Seattle City Light to Mother Nature: "Bring it on!"

Courtesy of KIRO TV’s Wildside, Summit West web cam.

I have two $90-plus electric bills this month, one for the office, one for the home–a 13.8 percent rate increase went into effect this January–so my inner Scotsman danced a jig on reading Cliff Mass’s weather report on our blustery weather:

This is exactly the kind of pattern that lays down lots of snow. Below is the forecast 24-h snow amounts ending 5 AM Tuesday morning…some locations get well over a foot. City Light should think about revoking their electricity surcharge.

Mass is probably being a little facetious there, but I spoke with City Light’s Scott Thomsen about it anyway. You never know when you might learn something. Besides, Crystal got 26 inches the last 48 hours. That’s not nothing.

Earlier this month, Seattle City Light announced that thanks to an anemic snowpack (the lowest in 20 years), the amount of hydropower they could generate would likely be limited. With no “extra” power to sell, they were forecasting a loss in revenue of $70 million. On March 22, the City Council approved a 4.5 percent rate increase, to go into a rate stabilization account.

The rate stabilization account, claiming $2 extra per “average” customer per month, is supposed to create a $100 million fund that Seattle City Light can use to combat volatility, either in power costs or in snowpack. Once the account reaches $100 million, the surcharge goes away.

Thomsen will take the extra foot or two of new snow, but, he says, given that the snowpack was at 66 percent of normal, it’s going to take a lot more than a single storm to change City Light’s financial outlook. City Light’s Pend Oreille dam, for instance, is a run-of-the-river dam with no reservoir, and is completely dependent on snowpack doing its time-release thing properly. It also produces about half of Seattle City Light’s power.

In short, don’t expect a smaller electric bill. But definitely get out there and enjoy the powder.

Sports

Are the Mariners Having Too Much Fun?

The centerfield wall at the Mariners’ spring training stadium is a joke. No, really, it literally is a joke. Prankster Ken Griffey Jr. had the wall covered with a 60×30 foot photo of him jostling notoriously gruff coach Roger Hansen. See? (via @theRealmariners)

Impressive, huh? The joke being that no-nonsense Hansen, the M’s catching coordinator and Griffey’s minor-league roommate, isn’t one to let another man embrace him. Now, proof positive that Hansen’s a big softie. Hansen got his revenge by calling Griffey’s mom to complain.

Other hilarity highlights from spring: Milton Bradley leaving a box of “Just for Men” hair coloring in graying Griffey’s locker. Ryan Rowland-Smith interviewing teammates after an ESPN The Magazine photo shoot (video!). A “Mariners Idol” singing competition, with Ichiro and Griffey serving as judges. (Three minor leaguers won by singing in grass skirts and coconut tops.)

Yesterday, the Mariners played a game of “backwards baseball.” Right-handed hitters had to bat lefty, and vice versa, and players ran the bases clockwise. Ha!

Spring training is long and boring, and a little bit of levity is a good thing. But how much is too much? All the goofiness puts me in mind of the 2006-08 Mariners, who led the league in shaving cream pies under Wardens of Wackiness Eddie Guardado and J.J. Putz. In ’06 spring training, Guardado lit Jose Lopez’ shoes on fire, pulled the old three-man-lift garbage-shower trick on newcomer Kenji Johjima, and defaced Yuniesky Betancourt’s locker after Cuba lost in the WBC.

Guardado didn’t last the year with the Mariners, posting a 5.48 ERA in 28 games and losing his job–and, somehow, his joker’s hat–to Putz.

Griffey and fellow vet Mike Sweeney seem to be the ringleaders of the current M’s mayhem. Is it stupid to point out that between the two of them, they have played 36 major league seasons, been named to 18 all-star teams, and appeared in a total of zero World Series games?

Yes, that probably is stupid, reliant on factors well beyond Griffey and Sweeney’s control. However, if the idea is that these two know how to set a mood for a winning major league baseball team–well, neither Griffey nor Sweeney have been on many winning major league baseball teams.

Griffey says that the plethora of pranking will lessen once the season begins. “When the bell rings, it’s a different story,” he told the Times‘ Larry Stone last week. “It’s a little more serious. You can still have fun … before you step onto the field. And then after you win, you can stir it up again. But that four-hour, five-hour period, you have to do some work.”

The bell rings just six days from now, when the M’s open their season at Oakland. And if the M’s don’t win early, all those spring smiles will be distant and possibly rued memories.