Marymore Park is one of the most relaxing places for a concert. The security is lax. You can bring in your own food. Families bring lawn chairs and blankets eager to camp out all day. It is a place where any music could be enjoyed in the sun.

107.7 The End’s annual Summer Camp took place Friday, under the radar compared to Labor Day weekend’s Bumbershoot activities. The End’s concert lacked a considerable headliner. There was no established draw. No MGMT or Flogging Molly. This wasn’t like an EndFest in the past. Summer Camp was cheap. For only twenty dollars you had the opportunity to check out ten bands. These were the kinds of bands you’ve probably heard their single, and liked it, but didn’t know much about the rest of their work, what the rest of their songs or complete albums sounded like. This was a good opportunity to find out. At the very least you could hang out in the sun at Marymore.

Needless to say, I didn’t know what to expect. I have a vague understanding of what The End plays right now. From my perspective, it seems like they’ve picked fifteen or so Indie-Rock singles to latch onto. The best performance of the day was one of the first bands I saw; Givers, who put all of their energy onto the sunny stage. They’re lead by a front woman who strums on the ukulele, sharply sings, and bangs on a drum kit. Their flutist gave them an Irish-jig vibe but their rock instruments kept them loud and engaging. They didn’t do anything complicated; they just kept their sound clean and fun.

It seemed like every band played their single as their last song. Portugal. The Man, who is always full of sound, exploded through a set of songs mostly on their newest record. The crowd seemed confused until they played ‘People Say’ their single from two years ago. Naked and Famous is a teenager’s wet dream, a sappy/catchy/high school fantasy. The kids love to wave their arms and clap along with the guitarist. They’re going to realize how cheesy this band is in a few years and wonder why they listened to them. Awolnation seemed unsure of what sound they were going for. They started by sounding like Depeshe Mode and then they growled like a hardcore metal band continuing to transfer between emo whines, punk riffs, and Indie-rock plucking. When they played their single I saw people running to the stage and I noticed the lyrics in the chorus were “blame it on the A.D.D.” I will blame it on your A.D.D. but it’s not much of an excuse.

The Joy Formitable was having more fun on stage than most bands I’ve seen in recent memory. They smile, make faces at each other and bump around the stage. The lead singer, an adorable blonde chick, commented on how they’re from North Wales where the sun never comes out. They raced through a set of fast pop punk hits. This is when I noticed the crowd surfing.

I haven’t seen this much crowd surfing since I was fifteen. Every thirty seconds someone would fall on top of me. Even though Manchester Orchestra always put on a powerful performance it was hard to appreciate because every thirty seconds someone would fall on top of me. There were as many as five or six kids crowd surfing at once. An irresponsible crowd surfer destroyed my friend’s glasses.

Have I grown up? I remember when I used to enjoy crowd surfing, moshing, and uninhibited fun. The crowd was having fun without thinking. They didn’t care that they only knew the singles. They weren’t thinking deeply. They weren’t plagued by another Seattle stereotype of standing with crossed arms. To quote one of my favorite high school banks “well I guess this is growing up”.

Warm summer night in Seattle. Didn’t have ticket or press pass and didn’t know it was sold out. Scalpers looking for$80.  And then walks by Dan Boeckner. Started talking with him and he put me on the guest list – what a nice guy!

Got in to catch most of Moools. Japanese indie rock.  Singer letting loose with bravado singing anthems in the key of D, bouncing around and putting on a show.  Everything sung in Japanese. Occasionally would pick up a plastic flute or harmonica and eek out a few notes and then would abruptly discard them.  Bassist shed glasses midway through set.  Everybody playing Fenders. What a fun band. Reminded me of Toddle, who I saw in 2008 at house party at SxSW.  Really liked these guys. Moools rules.

No band sounds quite like Wolf Parade.  They have their own distinct sound.  Put on a helluva show, sweating and singing and generally giving everything. These guys are kind of intense. Cool to see Boeckner and Krug trade back and forth. Boeckner going for the indie rock anthems, like the indie Bruce Springsteen; Krug writing songs with creative keyboard riff stomps. Audience super into it, going wild between songs and fired up during the music, dancing, cheering, yelling. The Wolf Parade guys seems genuinely flattered – perhaps haven’t got this kind of reception during other spots on the tour.  Seattle represents, showed them the indie rock love!  They came back out for encores after extended stompin and hollerin. 

Maps on Fire with e-bow usage. Lots of play with digital delay. A song about a bird with a broken wing.  Drama.

Olivette mostly with two guitars no bass except a couple songs.  Some keyboard. Big vocals.

Walked by Michael Shrieve's Spellbinder set, guitarist shredding.

Here are the flyers from the High Dive show:

Sittin at the bar in the Blue Moon with the Mariners down 1-0 in the bottom of the eighth against the damn Yankees. Jose Lopez blasted a grand slam and then Felix Hernandez struck out two in the 9th to finish it and pitch a complete game. Applause in the bar as the Mariners made us feel good.

An auspicious start to a rare show by Trip Audrey. They played mostly tunes from their record Please Do the Needful with a few other songs thrown in that haven't been recorded but can be found as demos done by Hunior.  This included "Fertility", giving it a country twang, sounded great. And they also busted out "Twenty To One" also sounding good. Closed the set with a tune called "Mary Queen of Scots" the lead singer, Josh Lanza, letting loose.  These days, yr as likely to find Josh singing Russian songs as American stuff -- check out some of his Russian material up on YouTube. Nice to see these guys bustin it out.

Here's some footage from the show of them doing Hattie, another old school fav:

Hattie (Partial) from Erynn Rose on Vimeo.