It only takes moments for Colin Howard to show his scar. He turns his right wrist and points to the purple loaf of healed skin where thick glass invaded a few months ago. The accident occurred at Howard’s job, sliced through a tendon and gave his band, Portland’s Blue Horns, an unwanted break. But Howard’s tone is a happy one. His Scar Story (one of the best kind of stories to tell and hear) is much like a Horn’s song: odd, twisting, nearly-dark but mostly fun. And like everything the Horns have played and recorded in their short time together, I can’t stop listening.

“So, here’s how it went,” Howard begins, beer in hand, shirt sleeve pulled back, loud country rock surrounding him and I and Christye at the bar of Ballard’s Sunset Tavern. “I was carrying boxes at my job at a distillery in Portland. I got my foot caught in a pallet and dropped a giant glass container. Then, I fell right on the glass. That’s thick glass. It went through my wrist about an inch. I thought, Oh no, that’s not good. That’s about the time when I saw the tendon fall out of the cut.” As most scar stories go, my girlfriend Christye and I were then invited to feel the wound and witness the odd popping sensation where the tendon was reattached. Sadly, this distillery debacle has not been the only setback the Blue Horns have faced in the last while.

After a strong debut (Blue Horns–self-released), Brian Park, Brian Kramer, Andrew Stern, and Howard toured as much as a band could with only seven songs to sell on one album. They drove south once or twice, worked hard in the Portland scene, and made riff-heavy rock and a jumpy falsetto into a party wherever they went. But, as any band would, they wanted a follow-up record. But, apparently, fate did not want the same thing. “Yeah, my hand slowed things up,” says Howard. “We had plans to record with The Decemberist’s Chris Funk, but he got caught up in his own projects. We’ve had to take things bits at a time.” In this way, the Blue Horns are a A+ student writing a term with no due date. The final result may be good, but it won’t come timely. And even though the band is looking forward to more well-deserved notoriety, they might enjoy the freedom of Self-Releasedom even more.

This night, the band takes to the short Sunset stage quietly. They arrive to perform the same way they arrived on my intern’s desk at Sound over a year ago. Along with The Final Spins debut, The Blue Horns were my favorite group I reviewed while at the magazine. They were the most fun to interview. They’ve been the most fun to listen to. And the songs they play at the Sunset show–mostly new jams to be included on their up-n-coming, yet-to-be-determined release–make my toes tap the same way that paper-packaged album did coming through my headphones back in the Spring of 2009. “Daughters” and “Mountain Eats Men,” features Park’s unmistakable croon, guitar riffs that twitch and glide, and jazz drums darker than an Old-Growth midnight. “You Destroy Me,” displays a lyrical side of Park not yet seen, but one that does not distract from the bouncing good time that is the Blue Horns.

“There are still a few songs that need to be written,” says Howard. “We’re working on getting out of Portland a little bit. Getting the album done. Doing some different stuff.” And based on the sounds, the structure, the rock and roll style that sounds like no one else (hell, it doesn’t even remind you of another group playing in the Northwest), these songs will make a more mature album. But not too mature.

“We stopped for McDonald’s soft-serve on the way up.” Brian Park mentions this even before Howard can mention his scar. “Colin had a dip cone though. The rest of us kept it real.”

The Blue Horns are a band made of movement. And no matter what tasty treat or nasty, tendon-tearing accident gets in their way, they’ll continue to move like the Columbia River to the Pacific coast–always in the direction of a good time.

The Parson Redheads fought the Lord Himself to play their set at the Comet.

“Our guitar player got bit in the face by a dog.” This is how Evan Way, Parson Redhead singer and sweater-donning husband of drummer Brette Marie Way, begins discussing his Northwest tour and Comet club residency. “He had to go to the hospital to get shots. We had a flat tire on our up from Portland. We had to take a tiny car here. We also blew an amp.” Evan looks up and tries to recall any other calamities. With the universe and fate against them, the LA pop group are now safe and sound on Capital Hill for the second time this month.

As Damien Jurado, Robin Pecknold and other Fleet Foxes pow-wow in the corner of the bar and two TV’s play NBA highlights from the mid-90′s–featuring Shawn Kemp at a time when he could dunk (and run, jump, move sideways, play basketball, support dozens of illegitmate children and a budding cocaine habit)–Marty Marquis strums quick country chords and hollers into the sloshing tap-beer and electronic goggling of Mrs. Pac-Man. Tim Meining and Javier Suarez of Yarn Owl, a young group with Morning Jacket swing and springtime bounce, sell their five-song EP (Stay Warm) from a picnic table behind the stack of speakers. Dollar bills hang on the ceiling like green birds as bundled listeners bob and bounce like pigeons to the alt-country sway of Marquis, guitar player of Portland’s Blitzen Trapper. Even he can’t ignore the dunk-fest taking place on the flatscreens. “Those dunks are inspiring,” he says and leads into “Jericho.” He then commits his set to America (the idea or the nation, no one is sure) and exits. Joe Syverson quickly invades.

Syverson’s band, The Final Spins, are a great hope, a McCarthian fire-bearer of quality pop music into the new decade. Led by the punchy and precise lyricism and baratone delivery of Syverson and motored through by the stool-less drumming of Colin English, the bouncing bass of Zach Tillman, blaring keys of Chris Early (who engineered the Yarn Owl EP), and hidden volume of Colin Wolberg, the Spins bring as much rock ‘n’ roll grit and groove as they can and just as much as the crowd desires. No song last more than three minutes, and although the band looks relaxed (it is hard not to wearing sweatshirt and jeans), everything is in place, perfect. “Party Time” from the band’s freshman LP This Was Then/That Was Now, sounds better than ever as Tillman cooly walks his bassline like James Dean with a middle-school mustache as the song moves effortlessly into the sunshine. “Let Me Know” and “Another Sunny Day” (also from This/Then) cause occasional handclaps and a good-many smiles and stomps from folks standing on the bending benches and tired floorboards. Cold drafts of rain-soaked wind sneak in from Pike Street, but all anyone can feel is the beach-rock vibrations born of a house party jam session and Syverson hope for “another sunny day if don’t go away. Oh, there’s another sunny day if we don’t go away.” And as in the cold shadow of the Cascades a sunny day seems rare, a bright set of bright music at the Comet is never far.

“We wanna thank the Final Spins for letting us use their stuff,” says Evan Way as he pushes his thin, red hair out of his face. “Oh yeah, and playing a great set. We’re the Paron Redheads from Los Angeles.” Evan Way looks tired. This is probably why he quotes the movie Fletch to tell his wife he looks good behind the borrowed drumset. “I love your body, Larry,” he says and sort of shakes his head. No one gets the reference. Everyone seems a little tired. “Thanks for staying with us on a school night. Yay for school,” says Way.

PR’s music is not demanding. Just good. In just the right way. Jurado has gone home and all The Foxes are standing outside smoking cigarettes in four-part harmony. Those remaining are treated to a brand of pop that could only be made by former Oregonians who now experience a blue sky most of their worldly days (read: grateful). Songs like “You Can Leave It” and “Punctual As Usual” arrive at the truth like a Woody at the beach, without a grain of cynicism. From the moment Brette Marie thuds on her snare and Sam Fowles strums sunshine in a single note, the fight against fate seems to end. A wall of forbidding clouds opens like a gate. The way the Redheads play rock music is the same way Way talks about his struggle to arrive in Seattle in one piece; his words move straight in an Oregon drawl, his red mustache rises under his smirk as he says something like: yeah, he got bit in the face by a dog. Simple lines like “It’s alright/Don’t you know it’s all okay/It’s alright,” from “Got It All” (featured on their newest release, Owl and Timber EP) stand out and make everyone leaning on the splintered beams and sitting in heavy cafe chairs think the same way. For the time, at least. Good pop may warm the soul, but a fight against cold rain waits on the street just waiting to pop a tire. Or bite someone in the face.

The Parson Redheads continue their residency at the Comet next Thursday, as well as two Thursdays after that. They will also be playing shows in Portland, Euguene and Salem this month. Visit here for a full schedule.

The dark backdrop behind the Triple Door stage fades into orange and purple stars. The performers on stage, all dozen of them, seem to float underneath like the angels and cherubs and Saviors they sing about. It is chaos. Nathan Marion, the man in charge of bringing each painter and singer and instrumentalist to the Fremont Abbey’s yearly benefit, does not know what the night will bring. No one does. “It is brilliant to see the backing and improv band behind the singers and poets,” says Marion, who has concentrated on bringing together musicians who do not know one another, but hopes they will get along. “My favorite part is how the artists connect. They often end up working on shows and songs together in the future.”  The Round is a rapid fusion of artistry unscripted, set free, unacquainted. And as the deathly cold waits outside on Union Ave, artists who have not practiced together and who hardly know each other put together one of Seattle’s most unique shows–piece by spontaneous piece.

SINGERS

Most artists of the night rely on covers (Noah Gunderson sings Jackson Brownes, “The Rebel Jesus” and Star Anna plays a heartfelt rendition of Nick Cave’s “Into My Arms”) as well as classic standards (Matt Bishop’s popified “Angels We Have Heard On High” and John Van Duesen hollering “We Three Kings”). Damien Jurado, a Round veteran with at least six prior appearances, decides that no matter how much he loves the timeless Christmas tunes, he should write his own songs for the night. “I’ve always loved the idea of ‘one time only’” says Jurado. So, with only the shushing crowd and clanking of thin glass to accompany him, Jurado performs his exclusive songs with his son’s tiny keyboard and sacred source material. “The Bible can do it better than I can, but the first song is being told from the perspective of Joseph and Mary. The whole scenerio speaks volumes. This king will grow up to be hated, cast aside. This is the kind of kid I want to follow.” Jesse Sykes sits to Jurado’s left and describes the night as ”warm and natural, innocent even. I applaud what it stands for,” she says. ”Music is powerful, but it’s what surrounds the music, an invisible halo of light and energy.” For all the singers, the night is an opportunity to do something special. “There is just magic,” says Jurado. “The Christmas Round is the same as others, just with more beautiful colors and lights.”

POETS

Like a car engine chugging in the cold, the night’s beat poets Buddy Wakefield, Elaina Ellis, and Sara Brickman, begin slow and drive deep. After three songs, the poets are met with silence as they stand, empty-handed and forcefully confident, to deliver what singer Jesse Sykes considers “a beautiful storm of equations and metaphors.” “I see real courage and desire to bring out the divine from themselves,” Sykes says. Buddy Wakefield, two-time World Poetry Slam champ, member of Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records and former lumberjack, says that his objective is to “charge the hearts of people. For tonight, I wanted to tell a story, perform a non-tragic work. I like to disarm a crowd through humor.” Wakefield enters the stage with a too-short holiday sweater he got from his cousin Lace and opens with a short, unrhymed couplet that brings a somber crowd to tripping chuckles about a young Buddy wandering into strangers’ home and asking to see their toy collection then asking, innocently, wha the fuck? “The Round is always good vibes, good people,” says Buddy. “Jurado and I have done a few Rounds together and have found a mutual respect for each other. Plus, he’s hilarious. And Star Anna really blew me away. With the the band, we figured things out for ‘Hurling Crowbirds at Mockingbars’ in no more than three minutes. It’s–the people, the singers, everything–always been quality.”

IMPROV BAND

“All we had was a pretty rag-tag practice,” says Philip Kobernick of The Round Improv Band. “We were given some chord charts, but that was all. It’s a learning experience.” Kobernick says an event like The Round is important because the spontaneous art benefits everyone. “The audiences get a great show. The artists, all of them, get to play with and be around other great artists and are moved outside their comfort zones.” Just beyond the stage light, the relaxed audience cannot see the subtle tension on stage, cannot see the miracle of each song moving effortlessly, as though precisely planned, which it is not. “Four days before, I realized, ‘We have this huge event with 23 artists, and I need to coordinate all of them!” says Emily Peterson, celloist and member of the Seattle Rock Orchestra, as well as the unofficial PR person partly responsible for the sold-out show. Peterson says artists will bring old, tired songs to the Round and be blown away by the the unplanned arrangements the backing band brings. “Novelty in the context and creation of any idea produces new life. I can’t speak for the mindset of the other artists, but mine was, ‘Well, here it goes. Hope we land safely!’ And we always do. I don’t know why I worry about it.”

PAINTERS

Solio Thompson admits that as a painter at The Round, scrambling with wide brushes and narrow time, it can be difficult to concentrate. “I meant to paint Kate Tucker,” says Thompson with a slight scowl. “I listened to Kate Tucker and the Sons of Sweden before the show and loved songs like ‘Faster Than Cars Drive’ and ‘New York,” says Thompson. “I’m working on illustrating a comic book and I love finding the narrative, discovering the relationship between word and image in songs and stories. I tried it here, based on Kate’s music, but it didn’t quite work this time. But oh man, you should see my sketches.” Jesse Brown, four-time Rounder and mini-muralist of traffic control boxes around Seattle, stands relaxed at his small, blue canvas, dabbing away the distractions to create his piece. “I  came up with the idea while we were all in the green room. I made a small sketch of a castle type structure and decided to go with that. I was happy with the outcome of the piece. I’m used to working in a busy environment.” At The Round, there are no guarantees or preconcieved ideas of success, and all artists cannot seem to stop saying how proud and happy they are to perform at the event. “I just think this is a phenomenial event,” says Thompson after a heavy breath. Although all Rounds are their own snowflake of an event–unique, light, beautifully chaotic–Brown says this Round was especially impacting. “There’s a real holiday feeling. I’m kind of a sucker for Christmas and sappy holiday emotions.”

Thanks to the gracious help of volunteers and all performers, The Holiday Round was able to take in $2000 for the Fremont Abbey, the nonprofit arts organization located at Fremont Ave and 43rd. The Round will continue into the new year with performances by Kevin Murphy of the Moondoggies for Round 56 on the 12th of January. Please visit www.theround.org or www.fremontabbey.com for more information on The Round and the Fremont Abbey.

Portland’s Carcrashlander, they ride a dark groove. They are a black ship, a level cruiser of smooth organ, dirty guitars and the deep, haunting whisper of Cory Gray. The newest release, Where To Swim (Parks and Records: a San Francisco label which releases all records with recycled packaging and liners, always at a minimum impact on the environment), is like what Gray describes in “House Arrest,” a  ”yellow house of dried up leaves.” This is album is both light and bright, harsh and cold, comforting and welcome in the way of an Oregon autumn, all at once. Swim will hi with a Built To Spill rhythm, then jump to a grungy bebop jam, such as in “Boatfull of Buckeyes,” just before Gray sings, with quiet ernesty, “To those hills of gold, we row row row.” The emotional weight of Carcrashlander seeps in from multiple listens, not from a whack over the head by a tearful two-by-four, which only serves to give each word gravity. “Windtunnel,” a loungey, finger-snapping tune about living with a heartbreak that will not leave, makes one want to dance across the kitchen to put away the tea. Swim is a winter album, it is jacket and gloves album, it is a fireplace and coffee album. It is a fine piece of music. It may be easy to label Swim as depressing or needlessly dark, but within each tune, behind the barrel-chested hum of Gray and the deep horns, there lies a chance for a handclap, a toe-tap, a sway, a two-step. “Rosie,” stands out like a tulip in the burn-pile, a waltzing jam that builds up from Moment One and doesn’t let go. “Yellow Car Tides” finishes this steady ride with a orchestrated dance with dissonance, as Gray, tapping his keys, Jacy McIntosh behind on guitar, and Shelly Short crooning beautifully behind, sends the listener, bundled and at peace, out in the cold.

Matt Bishop leads a Seattle band called Hey Marseilles. When I say he leads, I only mean that he stands center-stage and sings the songs his bands helps creates. He is at the center of a seven-member assault of guitars, violins, keys, drums, horns and hand-painted shakers. His band has one album they produced and released on their own, but Matt hopes that will change soon. Matt Bishop is on the cusp of national indie success with a new publicity company pushing his wild and romantic tunes, a steady audience in Seattle and Portland and Bellingham, and (more than likely) national distribution. Matt Bishop also works five, eight-hour days at a Catholic school on top of Seattle’s Capital Hill. He is a simple complexity, confident and humble, joyfully misunderstood, a rock star with a mortgage. Truly, a paradox.

Matt is fifteen minutes late and dressed in black pants and a gray tie. He chose to meet at Moe Bar because of the two dollars drinks during this early, post-work Happy Hour and its walking distance from Seattle University, where he works in the Admissions Office “I need a haircut,” he says and orders a vodka-cran in short glass with plenty of ice. His blonde hair is just beyond Professional and combed to his right, frayed in the back and around his red ears. About a year ago, next door, at Nuemo’s, a mid-sized club that has homed great bands, Matt played with his bandmates to a sold-out room for an album made on spare time and sparse dollars, To Travels and Trunks.

Selling out Neumo’s, especially for a low-budget band with little distribution know-how, is not easy to do. Even national acts on a Saturday night can have trouble booking out the venue. I’ve only seen one sold-out show and that was Explosions in the Sky at a time when post-rock was a buzz word and Friday Night Lights was watched by 6.2 million people. As we talk, Matt Bishop comes back to this night. And although he sees a sold-out show as a kind of an arrival, he is still uneasy, unsatisfied. Matt has goals, and he does not expect anything to be handed to him. “As far as my musical goals go, I want to make some money at it. We rent our practice space, pay for gas and CD production. And as far as my work goals, I want to be the Dean of Admissions someday.” He says this as though he can have both. And maybe he can. Maybe both will grow together like friendly weeds and coexist in the same spontaneous and organic way they began.

“I had a few songs. Nick and Jacob convinced me to play together. Then the other guys, Colin, Jacob, Patrick and Philip joined in. We would meet at Gasworks Park and play outside there together. It grew from there, very naturally.” When I ask Matt about success in the future, he does not give me a detailed scenario of luxurious The Paramount Theatre in downtown Seattle, no visions of Central Park or Madison Square Garden. And, when I ask about the band’s journey in general, he doesn’t mention playing before Sonic Youth at the Capital Hill Block Party or being included on a bill along with big-name artists like Jason Mraz, Sheryl Crow and Elvis Perkins at 2009′s Bumbershoot. Matt Bishop wants to be able to do something he loves, make music with his friends, and make enough money for a little food and fair-priced liquor on cold afternoons.

Matt Bishop studied literature and concentrated on modern American poetry while at the University of Washington. “Sometimes I feel hindered as a songwriter that I studied so much poetry. The two seem related, but they aren’t much when it comes down to it. Words simply on a page can have meaning in themselves, but lyrics need to serve the song in melody and emotional weight as it interacts with the music.” For some odd reason, I decide to interrupt Matt here and tell him my favorite line of his from “Someone to Love”: “All I want to do today I sleep like I once could/If you could give me that/That’d be good.”

“I wrote that line, a big part of that song in five minutes,” says Matt. “I wanted to play the song for a solo show and busted it out. That was a good time for me, creatively.”

Matt Bishop, it seems, writes travel songs. Or, at least, few of his songs seem to be about love, or about heartbreak, or about partying all night long, or doing the twist. “My songs are about moving through your place on earth. About moving in space, you know. Some of my songs have lines about love and that sort of thing, just in a certain context.” Regardless of what lyrical and linguistic skills that have accompanied Matt from his undergrad days, Matt Bishop has learned from poetry, and found in songwriting, a love for the paradoxical. Matt Bishop gets more upset when journalists and fans give him more credit for songwriting and arrangement within Hey Marseilles than he does when his lyrics are misunderstood. “I like that things I write are understood in different ways that different people.” This, to Matt, is liberating as a songwriter. It is also liberating as a believer. “There is so much grey,” says Matt. “You know?”

Matt Bishop has experienced many forms of the Christian traditions in his time on earth. Seattle University, the Catholic college for which he will fly out of Seattle on Friday and then travel through Montana, Idaho and Utah to numerous college fairs and high schools, is a Jesuit school that values what John Keats called “negative capability.” I ask if he thinks truth exists out there somewhere. “Yes. That is the simple answer.” Then Matt and I begin discussing David Bazan’s newest album and never make it back to the complex answer of absolute truth. Though we do discuss hope. “To me, there are two kinds of hope. There is the hope for the future. Those things to accomplish and have and be. But, those things we never come true–not as we’d like too, not entirely. So, there is the hope to find now, in the things we have and are. Now, I find hope in community,” says Matt. “I play with Eric Anderson (of Cataldo) and he can do everything on his own. That works for him. I need people to bounce around ideas. It can be hard to try to make discussions with six other guys in a band. It’s not easy, but I wouldn’t trade it.”

“Between my admissions work and my band, I’m pretty much working two full-time jobs.” Matt says this suggesting that he is both excited and exhausted. “I don’t have much in the way of musical ability. I can strum three chords along with some really talented musicians. I feel comfortable taking the role of the frontman.” Once Matt returns from his long business trip, lasting essentially a month and some change, he will put energy into making a West Coast tour a reality. It will be the first tour since Matt Bishop and six other post-grad dudes began jamming on the well-kept grass of Seattle’s Gas Works Park over three years ago. In that time, Matt knows his band has done more than okay in a town full of poetry-loving, country-chord-strumming, musical hopefuls.

Joe Syverson shuffles into the Sunset Tavern, an aged lounge-turned-venue located in what most Seattle folks refer to as Old Ballard. He is hunched over with a blue jacket and red cheeks. “It is fucking cold, man,” says the Final Spins frontman and rubs his hands together frantically. Blood still slow and biting, Joe moves on quickly to the back room to join his bandmates and the collection of scraggly musicians on the evening’s line-up. A scrawny technie fidgets with cords and knobs onstage while cigarette smoke driffs in from the street door and hangs onto Virgin Wool and synthetic polyester.  On this Friday the 13th, the rain is beginning to look more like hail and causes everyone wandering the Ballard streets to think SNOW and shudder. The walls of the Sunset Tavern are still decorated for Halloween; brittle trees and oversized moons drawn with an Extra-Width Sharpie from ceiling to floor. Whiskey, rum and soda warms the blood, scarfs hang on necks, pop music welcomes everyone in from the fucking cold.

Cabinessence, oddly enough, sounds like the essence of a cabin. The five-man Portland band begins their roots set, all pine-sap and biscuit steam, from the short stage which nestles itself between the Sunset’s bathrooms, bar, and green room. The space in front of the stage feels more like a hallway than a concert hall; audience members split between drinking at the bar, moving in groups to the latrines, or just moving through for nothing else but warmth. The only two enjoying the country tunes are the two redheads of the Parson Redheads, Evan and Brette Marie Way. The married pair (this could be figured by a)the familiar hand on the back b)the rings c)and, more than anything, the fact that Evan held Brette’s wine while she went to the bathroom) bob and smile to Comes Back to You tracks such as “Bread and Butter” as well as ditties from a self-released EP–for sale only from the bardershop pocket of the bookish keys player. After a varied set of country swing, country soul and country jam, Cabinessence join the crowd on the gum-ridden carpet and leave an empty stage for a short-handed Parson Redheads.

“We’re a bit short today. We usually have a full band,” says Evan Way behind his Yamaha guitar, sandwiched between his lovely wife and a guitar player resembling something between a green bean and chemist. Why was this sunshine pop band, usually teeming with high-pitched solos, classic drum fills and keyboard hooks reduced to something music fans call intimate? “Well,” says Way, “that is a funny story. Our bass player just bought a house. And, just found out he and his wife needed all their stuff out of the house. Today. So, he’s doing that.” This trio scenario is something PR is used to. On an east coast tour this summer, the band, a la Duchess and the Duke, kept their beach rock energy to a minimum. “We practice the three person often. Just in case something like this happens.” The chord-and-melody driven songs played by the three–most notable tunes from a recently released 7″–stick together with high harmony, tight guitar work from the Bean Chemist (real, not as funny, name: Samuel Fowles), and the most sparse and lovely lyrics a former U. of Oregon lit major and avid Byrds fan could craft. Riding on flower-power exhaust, Parson Redheads take the come-together-y’all message out of the sociopolitcal and into the personal and metaphorical. It’ll make the hardest heart hold a glass a booze while his friend goes for a piss. What greater love is there?

“Love the one who hates you,” they sing. “Show them that you care. That you care.” After a final cover of Neil Young’s “From Hank to Hendrix” it takes about twelve second for the band to gather equipment (Brette Way’s normal drum kit was reduced to anything she could fit in her pockets) and exit the stage. “These shows are fun,” says Evan. “You’re up, you play and then you’re done. When we get a full band, I’m like, what is taking so long!” Evan’s patience will be tested when he and his West Coast company holds four straight Thursday gigs at Seattle’s Comet Tavern in December, beginning next Thursday, November 19th.

Carrying the theme of stripped renditions of full-band songs, Final Spins (a washing machine reference?), take the stage in a different form than any had seen before. Joe Syverson, songwriter, singer, tall person, stands stage left and tries to coax the crowd out of no-man’s land and up towards his black guitar and silver amp. Missing keys and lead-guitar, Syverson is joined by bassist Chris Early and drummer Colin English (Secret Agent), as well as a lady not previously a Spinner, on vocals. Blue jacket gone, it doesn’t take Joe long to warm up, to shimmy around the stage, holler and strum. Before the first song ends, sweat can be seen on his forehead below his straight, light-brown hair. He came just short of reversing his testimony and claiming, “it’s fucking hot, man.”

Most Final Spins songs could be played sweetly; most have at least some pop cuddliness. Tonight, Joe Co. go for loud. And that damwell works too. Cymbols crack and ring like dry stones and bassnotes fall like giants, while Syverson sings about losing himself in Chicago, a good party, hoping for “Another Sunny Day.” The pop tunes from the band’s two releases (This Is Then/That Was Now and City Of…) that could take a Redhead route and be played with a gentle hippie-dippy hum, instead are delivered with a pounding energy that shakes the paper-thin walls and low ceilings. Outside, the cold rain clings to jackets and beards and long brown hair and the deathly wind begins to move down Ballard Ave. The music still rings and kitchens stay open long enough for Happy Hour comfort food–nachos and pizza: the culinary equivalent of the three minute pop song.