{Photo credit: Heather Christianson}

The three of us sit together around a microcorder in a dark corner of Chop Suey. It is Wednesday night at the Laff Hole and last minute arrangements are being made before doors open at 9:00. As PROK comics Kevin Hyder and Emmett Montogmery sit down to speak with me, Kevin muses over a potentially serious problem. “I need a rib bone…” he says, “For my act. I need something like a rib bone that I can pull out of a dummy and scratch my back with…This is a real problem for us, you can write that down…Maybe we can go somewhere that sells meat.” The rest of the interview is occasionally punctuated by screams, heavy metal guitar riffs, and a hurdy gurdy to which neither bat an eye. “Tonight is going to be a…different kind of show,” says Montgomery, with an arch smile, which is something that could easily be said on any given night at the Laff Hole.

Hyder and Montgomery are two of the founding members of the People’s Republic of Komedy (also known as PROK). PROK will be curating the local comedy events on the Comedy West stage at Bumbershoot this year. We spoke at length about PROK, Bumbershoot, and…botany.

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The seven-piece dance party band USE, nee United State of Electronica, is just about ready to release their long-awaited sophomore album L O V E W O R L D. Despite the time in between LPs, USE’s prominence hasn’t waned and they’ve remained one of the most popular bands in the northwest.

The next USE show is at Bumbershoot, on Sunday, September 6 at 4:15pm on the Broad Street Stage. It will be just two days prior to the digital release of L O V E W O R L D. The band is set to embark on a brief tour down the west coast.

I met up with USE’s two female singers, Amanda Khanjian and Carly Nicklaus (full disclosure: the latter has been a close friend for several years), over drinks at a Capitol Hill bar during happy hour to talk about the delay between USE albums, making music in a band with seven people and playing reunion shows for a band that had never broken up. As USE is one of the most fun bands to watch live, it should be unsurprising that this was one of the most fun interviews I’ve done.

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Peter Bjorn & John's Writer's Block was my favorite album of 2006, and is still one of my all-time favorites.  Lead singer Peter Moren was good enough to answer a few questions about the band's latest synth-infused effort, Living Thing, and what it's like to rub elbows with the likes of Dave Gahan and Depeche Mode...

Sonically, Living Thing is completely different from Writer's Block. It's less guitar-heavy, and there's so much more space in the arrangements, seems like the songs are breathing freer and there's less melancholy. How did you decide to go in such a dancey, synth-based, almost pop direction?

Peter Moren: To us Living Thing is a natural progression from an arrangement style that we started on Writers Block but that we know have taken to an extremer degree. Songs like "Young Folks," "The Chills" and "Amsterdam" are also lacking a lot of guitar and have a lot of air and a less-is-more approach. So it’s kind of more of the same. We did listen to a lot of 80's pop from our childhood this time around as inspiration, a bit more glossy synthy reverby pop like OMD, Depeche Mode, "Tango In The Night" by Fleetwood Mac, etc. We wanted the retrofuturistic, scifi sound dreams are made of. We did use some synths but hardly any drum machines at all. Just beating up natural objects. And African music, funk, hip-hop and soul informed the dancier arrangements. At the same time, Living Thing is the PBJ record so far with the most guitar solos!!

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When you visit The Not-Its website, it promises that “if you’ve never seen us before, be prepared to jump around – it’s guaranteed to be your first rock and roll experience”.

The Not-Its was formed because the members of the band wanted to continue making music after the started their own families, even if the typical musician’s schedule conflicted greatly with their family life. The result is a band that makes some very catchy, fun, upbeat pop-rock music that is for children and their parents. They will be playing Bumbershoot this year as part of the “Youngershoot” program, with their set being on Saturday, September 5 at 1:30pm on the Northwest Court Stage.

The five-piece band features Sarah Shannon, the lead singer of the excellent 90s rock band Velocity Girl on lead vocals. The rest of the band includes guitarists Danny Adamson and Tom Baisden, bassist Norea Hoeft and drummer Mike Bayer.

I talked with Not Its Sarah, Norea and Danny at Sarah’s lovely North Seattle home, where we discussed the band, writing children’s music and why being a rock star and a parent are not mutually exclusive ideas.

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The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry is Seattle author Kathleen Flinn’s brilliant memoir about attending the legendary culinary school Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. It provides a first-person, insider account of attending the famous institution, but what makes the book so interesting and readable is that Flinn is such a great writer and a likeable character telling her own story. The book gracefully balances the story of Le Cordon Bleu with Flinn’s Cinderella-like love story and enough delicious food to whet any appetite – and, fortunately, there’s a French recipe at the end of nearly every chapter.

In the classic 1954 film Sabrina, Audrey Hepburn’s character also attends the French institution (or so it’s presumed, but never explicitly named), and Flinn makes the hilarious comparison between Hollywood and her own story at Le Cordon Blue by writing in one of the funniest passages in her book, “[I]n a classroom kitchen with views of the Eiffel Tower, she learns to boil water the first day and crack an egg the next… Our learning curve feels a bit steeper.” A few pages later she notes, “Audrey Hepburn would never have ended up covered in fish guts.”

Kathleen Flinn will be appearing at Bumbershoot as part of a panel alongside local restaurateur and author Tom Douglas on Saturday, September 5 at noon on the Literary Arts Stage. She spoke with me by phone about her upcoming appearance at Bumbershoot, her memoir, her next book(s) and the big controversy amongst food bloggers in the summer of 2009.

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Immediately after their triumphant set at the Capitol Hill Block Party last month, I checked Twitter to see if my friends had the same reaction to Gossip’s set as I did. The comments were buzzing, referring the lead singer Beth Ditto as a force of nature and raving about the dance party the band created while on stage.

What makes this band so special, though, is the combination of their sound with their message. Ditto is a lesbian, feminist and overweight and has been outspoken for body acceptance issues and feminist causes. It never sounds preachy because band’s sound is so accessible with danceable beats and a punk ethos, held together by Ditto’s commanding voice. She sounds like a soul singer leading a punk band. The sound is filled out by Nathan Howdeshell (aka Brace Paine) filling in the guitar, bass and synth parts and drummer Hannah Blilie, formerly of the aesthetically and ideologically similar band Shoplifting.

Gossip just released their excellent dance punk album Music for Men on Columbia Records, working with producer Rick Rubin, one of the most well-known people in the music business. That raised a few eyebrows, with Gossip known for their punk, DIY aesthetic and Rubin being the ultimate music insider. Still, the result is a great album that continues Gossip’s sound while reaching a broader audience of new Gossip fans.

I spoke with Nathan Howdeshell by phone about the album, being a punk band on a major label and their upcoming tour, which includes a stop in Seattle at the Showbox at the Market on October 23. When he told me about the tour he wanted to put together next, I wasn’t kidding when I said I want to quit my job and follow that tour across the country (or world).

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For more than fifteen years, the Tractor Tavern has been an institution on Ballard Avenue, and with its friendly atmosphere that is free of pretension, has provided one of the most comfortable places to see a show and has booked some excellent shows throughout its history, with artists like Drive-By Truckers and Neko Case playing the Tractor before superstardom. Even more impressively, the club has maintained the same owner from over that time, giving it the greatest longevity in Seattle.

The Tractor celebrates its fifteenth anniversary this week, kicking off with three nights of The Maldives starting Thursday, August 27. Thursday night’s show also features North Twin and 17th Chapter; Friday’s has The Moondoggies and Zoe Muth & the High Rollers and Saturday’s show has Shim, Thee Emergency and Pickwick.

I met up with owner Dan Cowan at the club this week to talk about the club and its storied history. For such an impressive roster of artists that have taken the stage at the Tractor, I found him remarkably modest.

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“Synchronicity is the star of Radio8Ball” was what the program’s host, a musician and actor named Andras Jones, declared when I saw his program at the Little Red Studio a few weeks ago.

The idea behind Radio8Ball is that audience members write down questions that they are pondering and several are drawn randomly throughout the course of the evening. Jones discusses the question with the audience member and then a wheel is spun, and will land on a number that corresponds with a song by the show’s musical guest, who will then perform the song and Jones, the audience member and the artist will discuss how the song answers the question that the audience member was thinking about.

It’s a really amazing show that is carried by Jones’ charisma and intelligence, as well as the musical guests who appear on the show. The next episodes of Radio8Ball feature the Radio8Band (which is discussed below) and We Are Golden, on August 26 and September 2, respectively. There will also be a performance of Radio8Ball at Bumbershoot on Monday, September 7 (at Theater Puget Sound at 4:45pm). I spoke with Andras Jones, as well as Radio8Ball band member and frequent returning champion Jon Auer (who I have, full disclosure, known as a friend for several years), as well as Radio8Ball sponsor Dibspace’s founder Dominic Canterbury over drinks at Liberty Bar on Capitol Hill last week.

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Being a rabid Paul Giamatti fangirl, I saw Cold Souls earlier this year at SIFF and have been pretty much dying for it to be released so I could harass everyone I know into going to see it.

Writer and Director Sophie Barthes worked with her partner, Cinematographer Andrij Parekh, to create a film that I loved, loved, LOVED – and I got to ask them all about the process.

I read that you had a dream, and that was the basis of the story – and that you two talked about it and decided to develop it together – is that right?

Sophie: Yes. We live together, we’re life partners – and we shot short films and documentaries together, and he works as a Cinematographer, so he has a career that is much more established than mine. Because we're together we always share ideas, and so he wanted to shoot this.

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Over the past few years, Hotels have emerged as one of the most enjoyable bands in Seattle. They have a synth-heavy sound recalling artists such as New Order, Joy Division and OMD; their excellent second album, Where Hearts Go Broke, would not sound out of place if it were released by Factory Records circa 1981.

I’ve known a few members of Hotels casually for a couple of years and it is a pleasure to watch their live show and recorded music improve and grow more confident while finding their own sound and take on their inspirations. They’ve played several important shows this year, including the Capitol Hill Block Party and playing at the Crocodile just a few nights after its big reopening. They’ll also be playing Bumbershoot this year on Saturday, September 5 (at 2:00pm in the EMP Sky Church).

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