Recap: Friday at The UMS 2011

Well, I was pretty haggard Friday morning, but was able to put the pieces back together and make it out to Denver’s Underground Music Showcase Friday evening. It was blisteringly hot (by Denver standards), but sometimes that’s what you have to do in the name of music appreciation. I saw a lot of bands, and there were definitely highlights and lowlights. I’m going to focus on the highlights.

Hellogoodbye, 6pm, Goodwill parking lot

Even though it was so hot, it was worth getting to the UMS early to see Hellogoodbye. This band had a ton of energy, with some great musicians. One guy played guitar, mandolin and a ukulele (which has a Descendents bumper sticker on it – hilarious). Happy sounding, lots of jumping around. Plus there were guys wearing shorts on stage (go shorts). There was also liberal use of a tambourine. The guys also had sweet hollow body electric guitars. Hellogoodbye had good crowd interaction, and I loved their short replay of some wasteoid dancing earlier in the day. This was a great way to start off Friday at the UMS.

I was looking forward to a few bands at 7pm, but they turned out to pretty much suck. Instead of writing about them, I’m just going to post this nice photo of the sunset from yesterday.

Gardens & Villa, 10pm, Hi-Dive

After plopping down at Barry’s on Broadway for 90 minutes to watch the Rockies, I mozied down to the Hi-Dive to see Gardens & Villa. It was maybe the first time I’ve seen a flute on stage at a rock show and actually enjoyed it. Some of their tunes were reminiscent of the Talking heads, with a solid, hard driving beat beat. Plus there was 40% mustache participation from band members.

A Great Big Pile of Leaves, 11pm, Skylark

After a mostly subpar evening of music, I was waiting outside the Irish Rover to see another band. But they were taking too long to set up, so I cruised down to the Skylark to see A Great Big Pile of Leaves. They were on my list of bands I’d heard on Spotify leading up to the UMS, and Hellogoodbye gave a glowing recommendation of them during their set earlier in the day.

And I am very happy that I made it to see them. AGBPOL were definitely the best musicians I’ve seen so far at the UMS. They played loudly and with a good amount of distortion, but were very melodic at the same time. These guys from Brooklyn definitely brought their A-Game. One of my favorite parts of their music was the unique strumming rhythms, not something you usually see in an indie band. They were super tight, and have definitely made it into my regular playlist. In listening to their albums on Spotify, though, their live show was better than their albums. Maybe I just need to listen to them a lot louder.

There’s more music happening tonight, excited to see it even if I’m tired. Definitely stoked to see bands including The Photo Atlas, Patrick Dethlefs, Snake Rattle Rattle Snake, Abi Robins, Bear Hands and the Black Heart Procession.