6th Annual
Flowmotion Summer Meltdown
Whitehorse Mountain Amphitheater, Darrington, WA,
August 10-13, 2006
We at Relix get
some pretty sweet perks of the job—year-round festival attendance, super-secret
special shows, bunches of new music, hobnobbing with musicians—and while that may
sound like the sweetest job on Earth, it sometimes wears you down. (Just ask
Mike Greenhaus, our intrepid pod-casting Staff Editor, who racked up close to
40,000 miles in flights in a three-month period.) So when we get the chance to
unwind and take a break, we do, often at a festival we like to keep on the QT,
which is why we jumped at the chance to visit our buddies from Flowmotion (Seattle, Wash.,) at the
6th installment of their homegrown Northwest festival, “Summer
Meltdown,” in the shadow of White Horse Mountain, just north of Seattle.
Building on the strong support of their loyal fan base in
the Northwest and all parts West, Flowmotion has been quietly toiling away,
perfecting its song craft and establishing solid cred as first-class festival
operators. Summer Meltdown still has that elusive, undefined element, which has
you feeling like you’ve come home to a family reunion with 5,000 friendly strangers.
This year’s venue was the Whitehorse Mountain Amphitheater in Darrington, WA.,
a step up in scale and quality from last year, and with ample campsites shaded
by old growth cedars, easy access from points north and south and perfect warm days and
cool nights. Next year you may have to bring a Washington resident with you to provide bona
fides.
The lineup featured a heavy roster of NW talent. There are
booming music scenes in Seattle, Portland and Eugene, which is not to say that others weren’t
invited to the party: Skerik, Bill Frisell, Vince Herman, Zilla and Ursula 1000 all put in a showing, broadening the variety of musical
styles on offer over the fours days. Thursday night provided early comers with
a special fan appreciation night; a bonus set of shows in a state-of-the-art
cantilever tent, with warm-up performances from the hosts as well as a late-night
Zilla set were the perfect aperitif for the weekend.
Friday dawned bright and warm, an early-morning dip in a
frigid mountain stream backstage being the perfect way to shock yourself awake.
A couple of standout performances during the day from TapHabit, DJ Postal and
Panda Conspiracy were a prelude to
a solid, funked-up, stripped-down and kicking set from the diminutive talents
of Vicci Martinez out of Tacoma, WA. Whether banging out percussive acoustic
melodies, or strapping on a djembe, this barefooted dervish had the crowd
whipped up to a storm. The ambient jazz guitar of Bill Frisell and guests came next, a change of pace that was
perhaps unwelcome by some after the manic energy of Martinez. Frisell is a legend by any measure and
his original compositions led the crowd on a merry auditory trip, jazzed
versions of Lucinda Williams tunes being a nice little touch. The March Fourth Marching Band closed the
main stage with infectious stage antics and 35-plus members rollicking through
an Afrobeat infused percussion marathon. Late-night action centered around the
Boogie Dome with DJ’s spinning through the night, including an astounding set
from KJ Sawka, performing a live
drum and bass set without any loops or samples. Nice!
With Flowmotion set to take the main stage for the Saturday
night show closer, the rest of the day allowed Eleven Eyes’ reggae-funked hip hop, the Mob Law’s dirty LA punk/Seattle funk and Aphrodesia’s horn-forward rhythms to get the growing crowds moving
to the beat of many drums. Critters
Buggin Trio took the stage before the headliners with a reprise of the
Frisell sound from Saturday night, a goosed, free-form jazz extravaganza. Skerik was in full form, wringing the
most from sax and keys backed by Brad
Houser and the mania that is Mike
Dillon in full flight—those xylophones won’t ever be the same again.
By the time Flowmotion hit the stage some 4000 fans were
crammed in front of the stage and set upon the shallow steps of the
amphitheater under a full moon. To see these guys put on a solid, three-hour,
hard-jamming set without a single set break after having organized and built a
festival literally with their bare hands should be a lesson to all aspiring
organizers and bands alike. Flowmotion put their all into it, and this party is
as much a celebration as a thank-you to their fans, and they didn’t disappoint.
Moving through three hours of material from their independent releases from the
last ten years, Josh Clauson, lead/vocals, had ample opportunity to open up his
trademark jamming licks, running through “Mtn Grove”, with Vince Herman on mandolin, the up tempo “Nu Bee”, with Brad Houser, the fan favorite “Gather Light”, a raucous cover of “Want A New Drug”, a soulful “Soukous” featuring Mike Dillon's percussive madness and the all-star final jam of the powerful “Gots Mine”, which left the crowd calling for more.
Summer Meltdown is here to stay, an annual reunion of those
in the know, and we’ve already picked out our spot under the cedars for next
year. So if you’re gunna make the trip out, just don’t tell them we sent
you.
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