Snowcap Recap
Mmm... Beeeerrrrrrr...
Rich, voluptuous and dark (like Pam Grier!), Snowcap Ale and its seven-point status made for a delicious date Friday night. Okay, the wife was there too, but on this night our heart belonged to one of the best winter brews the Great Northwest has to offer. So, it was like a threesome really. A delicious threesome.
Getting things moving was local man DJ Radam, spinning an amalgamation of old and new hits that, at the very least, had everyone bobbing their heads and tapping their feet while they perused the many booths, set up by the sponsors near the back of the big white tent (check out DJ Radam's Myspace for the rousing Bananarama/Eminem mashup "Shake That Cruel Summer"). It was here, at the back of the tent that we found out, to our surprise and elation, about Crystal Mt. opening today (opening date has since been pushed back to tomorrow).
Opening the live-music portion of the evening was local psychodelic/indie band The Delusions. These guys didn't hold our interest for very long. They were good, but we just got bored with them after a while. Probably our fault. We were, after all, four Snowcaps into the evening and yelling at our friend to join us for a little ice-sculpture beer-bong action.
Soon after The Delusions left the stage and the ice-sculpture ladies finished kindly wiping our chins, Built To Spill took the stage one-by-one and began their slow, sonic build-up to what would be a fantastic show by the boys from Boise. Doug Martsch mounted the stage first, looking very Grizzly Adams we might add, and began casually tooling around with his guitar, as the others made their way to their instruments once they were good and ready. Once all of Built To Spill were present and stroking away at some seemingly improvised jam, it took only a subtle nod from Martsch to send the group cascading into the next song. We're not familiar enough with Built To Spill to comment on the full set list. We will, however, tell you that they easily had us under their spell this night. We especially enjoyed "Goin' Against Your Mind" [mp3] and "Liar" [mp3] from their 2006 release, You In Reverse. Cheers!
