Scenes within scenes

Here's another of my not-fully-formed thoughts:

The Unsmashable show on thursday got me thinking and recognizing that there are groups of bands that are friends of other bands within the powerpop "community" in Seattle (is it a community or multiple smaller communities?). So, which bands are down with which other bands?

There seems to be a pretty strong connection in the Unsmashable neck of the woods -- Young Sportsmen, The Riffbrokers, The Small Change, The Doll Test. All solid bands, and seemingly friends who share band members liberally.

Also somewhat connected, at least by a few members in any given direction, is a gathering (past and present) that includes: The Doll Test, Model Rockets, Paul Lynde Fanclub, The Tripwires, Pure Joy, Sgt. Major, and Llama.

Via Sgt. Major we get into the Kurt Bloch related groups, such as Young Fresh Fellows, Once For Kicks, and The Fastbacks, and Kurt is connected to Scott McCaughey in YFF and The Minus 5, in which he is also connected back to the previous group via John Ramberg in The Tripwires/Model Rockets.

The Minus 5 of course also had members of The Posies along the way. So, we get into the Jon Auer/Mike Musburger line of thinking, and it seems Mike's probably played with all of these folks at some point or another. :)

In a totally different line of folks (maybe??), there's what I perceive as a less-defined connection with The Lashes, Sirens Sister, The Divorce, and The Neons, with maybe The Turn Ons and The Blakes in the mix somewhere. I don't know if there really is a literal connection with these bands in the same way as the Unsmashable folks. But, I generally think of them in the same breath (to mix a metaphor).

And in the next corner, there is a Boss Martians, the Pranks, The Electric Kisses, The Pop Machine and some others. These folks are a little more garage in their approach (save for maybe The Pranks) and driven by the 60s in a similar way as The Ramones or The Muffs were. Again, not exactly sure if there are literal relationships between these bands (other than the Pranks/Boss Martians blood relations), or if I'm just connecting faux journalistic dots.

An obvious collective approch exists with the Tiny Volcano, Vanilla, Liar's Club triumvarate. But, I'm not sure who else might be in that clique.

Anyway, it's almost 5pm and time for me to go home for the day. So, I'll end this pointless ramble of a blog post. But, these connections are pretty interesting to think about. Maybe I'll one day give a shot at one of those relationship diagrams. :)

What are some other sub-communities, or band enclaves with shared members?

A fruitless exercise in list making

As all publications, big and small, do their 2006 lists and wrap ups, I'm prompted to think about what an appropriate equivalent would be here on the blog. In fact, this blog is only a half a year old. The first post was on June 22, 2006 at precisely 2:08 pm.

Therefore, it feels a little weird trying to do any kind of typical year-in-review. I decided instead to do a list of another sort -- namely, a list of Seattle powerpop bands. If this blog has done nothing else for me, it's made me even more cognizant of how many great bands are in the area.

The question, as always with a list of this nature, is how do you define who goes on it.. At the heart of that question is determining the definition of "powerpop," and since I've always avoided doing that for the blog, I'm hesitant to start now. This list, and certainly the blog as a whole, gets fuzzy around the edges.

The following randomly-ordered list represents currently functioning bands (for the most part...) in the gretaer Seattle area that I think fit pretty neatly into the powerpop genre. Of course, I have and will continue to talk about bands outside of this list.

I'm confident there are bands missing from the list that should be included. There there were a number of bands that I felt were "on the fence" of fitting my vaguely-defined parameters. Ultimately, some went in (Dept. of Energy) and others didn't (Speaker Speaker). I'd love to argue about the list, so feel free add anyone I missed via the comments link below and give me the "what for" for leaving them off.

With all those disclaimers, hold on to your hat....

The Posies
The Long Winters
The Doll Test
Model Photographer
The Lashes
The Neons
Young Sportsmen
Ghosts & Liars
Tiny Volcano
Vanilla
Brides of Obscurity
The Pranks
99 Men
Dept. of Energy
The Pop Machine
The Action Suits
Henry Boy
The Tripwires
Andy Werth
The Scheme
The Small Change
Boss Martians
The Capillaries
Shake Some Action
Sgt. Major
The Universe
The Pale Pacific
New West Motels
Slender Means
The Riffbrokers
Don't Tell Sophie
The Reluctants
Central Services
Young Fresh Fellows
Jim McIver
The Color Bars
The Lund Bros.
Once For Kicks
Llama
The Sterling Loons
Pris