Caught the end of The Black Angels at Mellow Johnny’s (Lance Armstrong’s bike shop), part of the KEXP showcase. Dag, who knew the acoustics in a bike shop could sound so good?  Bunch of pics from the set, including bikes, can be found here.

Then, keeping the Seattle spirit, started making my way to the Free Ballard party at Trophy’s, which was out on S. Congress.  Passed a bunch of day parties on the way and got pulled into one with free margaritas and free tacos – tequila on St. Patrick’s Day – at Wahoo’s Fish Taco. Ended up catching Morning Teleportation set as the sun started going down.  Guitarist never used a pick, had a really cool fingerpicking style with a long thumbnail. He even did some Eddie Van Halen-style fret board wizardry soloing aka Eruption.  Super creative set, getting kinda progressive for awhile, then coming back to pop, tons of ideas in each song.  These guys are from Portland, which made me think of 31 Knots momentarily, another Portland band, that fused indie and prog in a great way. Morning Teleportation’s recorded stuff sounds good too; check it out here. This music video of “Expanding Away” is mesmerizing:

Made to Free Ballard party where plastic Viking helmets were donned and one could buy Sunset Tavern and Tractor Tavern t-shirts.  Discovered new cheap Austin beer, Pearl.  Saw a band out back called Awesome Death, a three piece metal band: drums, bass and … theremin. The theremin player took it to new heights. He sang and played the theremin at the same time and stayed in tune. Mad props. Also ended up catching The Moondoggies whose twangy alt-country made sense in Austin as the sun set.