Internet Memes: Brony

My son turned me on to "My Little Ponies" and the Brony movement. The "My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic" cartoons are watched without irony and the music is listened to obsessively. In addition to the cartoons, there is a whole universe of media - similar to fan fiction, but with music and storyboards and the occasional animated bit. Ben listens to a wide variety of musicians doing an odd assortment of styles - with plenty of dubstep, for some reason.

While attending last month's Steering committee meeting at the Vera Project, Beth mentioned they had a Brony show coming up. I checked with Ben and signed us up for the show. Music about rainbow colored horses with tatooed buts and occasional wings or horns, couldn't be much odder than the wizard rock show we saw.

The show was put on by the Everfree Northwest folk. They run a yearly convention for My Little Pony fans and use this event to build some excitement and sell some convention tickets. I enjoy the brightly colored hair and horse ears.


The show kicked off with Tarby, who played guitar and sang with a saxophone player accompanying him.
Interesting sound, I managed to get a bit of video of the performance here:

Next up we had Maestro Scherzo playing something in the alto sax or oboe range, a reed instrument, anyway. Definitely getting plenty of reed instruments!

Speaking of plenty of reed instruments, the Cutie Marks and Donn Devore (I'm torn, the show schedule said Don DeVore, but a YouTube video said Donn DeVore) set had one too.

I enjoy the beat and the sound in this one:

The final act was DJ Everfree. He had some fun laser effects; I didn't video tape his set but I took some pictures.

The audience also put on a show with the wigs, t-shirts, and lots of pony ears sticking out on top of everybody's hair. It was somewhat odd and silly, but earnest and non-ironic, and actually quite fun and different. Just like My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and the Brony movement in general, kind of hard for an old fossil like me to process. My 15 year old who is bigger than me and needs to shave watches juvenile cartoons and appreciates their message, and then he listens to Brony music. Rainbow colored cartoons. With ponies and unicorns and some have wings and many have magic. Then lots of 8 bit music and dubstep and pop and disco all about ponies. The Vera show didn't cover all of those genres, but it gave us some fun music and songs about ponies and friendship and magic. Totally new genre for me, which is all good as far as I'm concerned.

Live Music at the Lake Trail Tap Room

I've wandered past the Lake Trail Tap Room several times in the last year, even went in to the yard and checked it out a little, but I only stuck my head into the bar and didn't order anything. I knew they had live music - I ended up Facebook friending Jeremy Serwer, a local singer/guitarist I saw at the Musiquarium Lounge last year, and later he mentioned playing there.

I just thought he played outdoors in the yard. This week I figured out that I was wrong. The weather was nice and Heather wanted to get out of the house, so we took a walk down to the Burke-Gilman trail. We usually go West, towards Lake Washington, but this time we went East a little to the Lake Trail Tap Room and walked in and checked it out more thoroughly. We ordered a nice local microbrew while we were at it. It looked like they were serving tasty pulled pork sandwiches too, but I stuck with the beer.

While we got a table in the small tap room and sipped the beer, a few people came out of a door on the opposite - interior - side of the tap room. I realized that there was a further public space, and the familiar Pink Floyd music I was hearing was being played live. Heather and I picked up the beer and walked into the music area - I had no idea it even existed! It's still a little cool in early Spring, and we noticed a wood stove in the corner that was pumping out some heat and took seats near it. I hadn't come prepared to see live music, so I only got fairly lousy cell phone pictures.

I didn't catch who the performer was, but we had a nice discussion about Pink Floyd - it's the 40th anniversary of "Dark Side of the Moon" and that was a seminal album for me as an adolescent. It also had ridiculous staying power, never dropping off the charts well into my adulthood over a decade later. I mentioned seeing Floyd back in the old Kingdome on the Momentary Lapse of Reason tour and again on the Division Bell tour, he mentioned seeing Nick Mason getting interviewed, and we both silently acknowledged just how important that band was to us. He played Breath, The Dark Side of the Moon, and others, and it was quite pleasant listening to the theme songs of my adolescence and drinking a potent hoppy local microbrew with the wood burning stove warming up my backside.

I'll definitely have to catch some more shows there, and next time be prepared with cameras and take notes on who's playing and such. According to their web site the tap room has free live music every Friday and Saturday. I always figured it was less frequent, and I had no idea it was an indoor venue. I should see more shows now that I realize I'm a 5 minute walk from  free show every Friday and Saturday night. Pretty cool. I recommend you check the Trailside Tap Room out, they allow dogs and kids in the yard and the performance area (not the bar), they have outdoor fire pits once it gets dark, good food and nice drinks, and they are right on the Burke-Gilman trail if you are a biking enthusiast.

Don't Talk to the Cops, Punishment and Everybody Weekend at Heartland

Carina and I loved Don't Talk to the Cops the first time we saw them during Reverb Fest in 2011, so we kept an eye out for them. We got to see them again at Bumbershoot and Ground Zero and the Vera Project too, and every show was a hot dance filled energetic set.

We saw they were playing Heartland (a new venue to me) with some bands that were also new to me and decided to go. In the end Carina dropped out, so Heather and I went to the show.

Heartland is a mildly small space on Roosevelt in the U-District, just North of 53rd. The "stage" is the far end of the room from the entrance, it's not raised or anything. They have some lights up pointing at it, and a sound system too, which worked fine for the crowd of perhaps 40 or 50 that came to see the show.

First up was Everybody Weekend. We were a little late getting in, so we weren't too close to the performer.

Everybody Weekend did an intense set of short, emotional tunes. The intensity pulled me out of the dancing some, getting me into more of a spectator mode as I listened to the lyrics. EW wrote complex unexpected lyrics that reward attention. Interesting opening, nice fit for the venue and the evening.

Next up was Punishment.


Similar to Everybody Weekend in that he sang against pre-sequenced or recorded material, he also sang with some emotional intensity. The crowd enjoyed the beat, dancing and moving some, and his voice carried the song well in this video:

On occasion the performance was low-affect, including a bit where Punishment sang from behind the cloth backdrop, but he milked even those odd bits of "he's not there" performance for an additional odd impact. All in all I enjoyed the opening acts and was curious to hear more from both of them if I ever get the chance, and I was nicely warmed up for Don't Talk to the Cops.

Classic hot loud Don't Talk to the Cops, simple loud fun beats with Emecks and Djblesone dancing and singing and rapping and El Mizell rapping and hyping and dancing and the crowd dancing all over and sweating and yelling and having a good time.
Good stuff off their two albums, like this one off of "Let's Quit" They also introduced at least one joint about eighties butt they said would be on their upcoming third release. Kelly Lebrock! DTTTC got a dance circle going with a couple of BBoys for a song about BBoys, so that went well too. DTTTC shows are dance shows. Emecks and DJ Blesone always dance their butts off in some synchronized and choreographed moves, El Mizell works it hard, and the audience always ends up dancing all over to the fun beats and chanting repeating lyrics.

Good fun classic Don't Talk to the Cops show, automatic immediate cure for seasonal afflictive disorder: it may be gloomy out and you can't recall what sunlight really feels like, but you can't stop smiling as you leave the show, wiping the sweat off your brow and letting the rain wash the salt down your cheeks.

DTTTC always puts on a dance party every time they play, and you always leave dance partys happy,.