MFNW: I Made it Out!

Long before deciding that attending Musicfest Northwest sounded like a good idea, I once fell asleep at a Dinosaur Jr. concert. Everyone seemed amazed that I was able to sleep through the incredibly loud music, but with a little bit of vodka, it just sounded like white noise to me. And I can honestly sleep anywhere. So it should come as no surprise that I also nodded off at the Bob Mould show last night. This time though, I’m saying it was far less pathetic.

My people!

First of all, we went to another show first. Fred Armisen at the Crystal Ballroom. If I was really choosing my shows by venue, I would have skipped this one. This place is too big, set up weird, and there are not NEARLY enough seats. But Jared wanted to go, and while I had very little idea of what to expect, it seemed like it had entertainment potential.

The set started with Armisen’s faux British persona Ian Rubbish, which was kinda funny, though I was concerned about how I would sit through an hour and a half of fake accents and British jokes. Luckily, it was short lived before he brought out Bob Mould! That’s right, the very Bob Mould that Jared wanted to see next. Part of me got a little excited that I wouldn’t have to stay up through another show, but when he only played one song (which happened to be a Husker Du song I knew the words to) I realized we’d probably still be going to Doug Fir next.

After Bob Mould, ol’ Fred did some music-inspired stand up as a lead in to the chick from Six Pence None the Richer coming out and doing a song. At first I was excited thinking it was the Dawson’s Creek theme song, but as it turns out that’s a different song. Anyway, totally knew the words to “Kiss Me,” so that was cool. The set then turned into showing some rejected Portlandlandia skits and we decided it was time to move on.

Maybe I should have brought a better camera than an iPhone.

We showed up at Doug Fir in time to catch the end of John Vanderslice’s set. I think he’d made my initial list partially because of convenience and also because I got a promo CD once so I felt like I’d heard of him. However, I knew none of his songs, and found myself starting to fade.

The good news is, the crowd at Bob Mould was a bunch of old people (as to be expected for someone who’s heyday was the early 90s) so they likely don’t give a fuck anymore. I made it a couple songs before the log bench I’d found to sit on became a nice place to lean back and relax. You can probably see where I’m going here, so needless to say, don’t have much to say about the show. Jared was nice enough to wake me up to leave before I awkwardly fell onto the floor or anything, bring me home and drop me off. Then he headed back out to Dante’s to see some other band I’ve never heard of, so good for him! Glad one of us is making the most of these wristbands.