Bumbershoot Day 2: Is It Over Yet?

We hate to sound cynical and old, but my god! Day two at Bumbershoot felt a lot like a tenth grade field trip to white people's rock and roll camp. We ain't dissing the kiddies, but when we head to the overcrowded, sweat-drenched beer gardens just to be amongst people our age, it's worth mentioning.

That said, day two was (a) crazy crowded (we spent 15 minutes in the crossroads by the cajun salmon booth, just trying to make it through the crowd to the Miller Lite Stage), and (b) awesome!

Velella Velella

We didn't know anything about these four local cats when we wandered into the seemingly so-far-from-everything-else EMP Sky Church. And we're not sure if it was the lights show, the jazz flute, or the super cute way the lead singer danced his little butt off, but Seattlest is now converted to full-on Velella lovers.

Matt Costa

Another guy we'd heard only mention of before, but who turned out to rock our world, Matt Costa played an incredible set on Sunday at the Miller Lite stage (this would be the show for which we stood in the crossroads, and then the beer garden, as mentioned above). Costa came out in a fuck-the-hot-weather hat and played an hour of Beatlesque folk-pop that may have impressed us even more if we weren't standing next to Mr. Drunky McSmellypants.

Common Market

From there, it was on over to beat another buncha teenagers to the front of the stage for some hardcore rocking out to Common Market. Seattlest couldn't be more pleased with the amount of people who loved and adored these guys on Sunday. We miss the good kind of hip hop that came out of articulate MCs with more on their minds than bling and bitches, and we're stoked to see Common Market anytime we can. DJ Sabzi, fly shades and all, ruled the turntables, and MC RA Scion, as usual, infected everyone from the start.

Jeremy Enigk

Then, as if we hadn't exposed ourselves to enough different types of music for one day, we ran over to the Backyard stage to catch the end of Jeremy Enigk's set. Seattlest was a diehard Sunny Day fan, and we loved Return of the Frog Queen, so it was great to take a little walk down memory lane with Mr. Enigk, who, without a doubt, has still got it. His band was crazy tight, but the best part came when he closed the show out solo acoustic version of our favorite, "Explain," at the end.

Jose Gonzalez

By the time Jose Gonzalez went on, we'd really had enough. The kids were getting more and more ornery the closer they got to bowing at Kanye's feet, and their parents had long ago been drunk, sobered up, and were now sporting pissed off hangovers. If it weren't for Gonzalez's super low-key brand of Argentinian-Swedish folk-pop, there may have been a brawl at the show. After all, some silly kid was standing up in the front, and everyone wanted him to sit down so badly that they applauded when he finally left.

Meanwhile, Jose Gonzalez put on a fantastic show. He doesn't talk much between songs, which made us start to believe that his English wasn't so great. Then he introduced his radio single "Heartbeats," and we figured he's probably just not much for conversation. Either way, it didn't really matter. The songs he played from his American release Veneer were beautiful and simple, and got the crowd to finally just shut up and listen.