Airwaves Day 3

img_7182| 04-Nov-2016 | Technically one could say our day “started” around 4:30am with the arrest of some loud, drunk dude who’d been walking up the street yelling threats.  Jeff observed some of the commotion from our window and reported that dude was being restrained by several people while a guy from Reykjavik Excursions (probably now late to a pick-up) called the police. They arrived shortly thereafter and hauled the dude away. Back to sleep.

 

Breakfast baked goods from Braud & Co., a new bakery located just a block from the apartment. A no-nonsense section baked items but everything we had was outstanding. Our friend Leanna said it’s not uncommon to see the line out the door. Much love for the crusty, rustic breads and sweet treats.

First up on our music schedule is Disable Planets at KEX at 3:30pm so plenty of time this morning to ease into the day. We decided to go in search of Wall Poetry 2016 murals, the cheese shop in the harbor and whatever looked good for lunch before heading over to KEX.

Wall Poetry started in 2015 with UrbanNation pairing 10 international street artists with local musicians to create visual images from song or poetry. The results are amazing murals around a city already no stranger to the urban art scene.  We walked for a couple of hours in the rain last year to see the first Wall Poetry collaborations. Some of this year’s are harder to locate due to all the construction but here are a few we found today. Once I sort out which these are from the 2016 collection we’ll hopefully find the others.

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After lunch at Slippbarinn, we headed to KEX to post up for Digable Planets. I figured it would be a popular set (if only because of the hip-hop style), but it was SLAMMED by the 3:30 pm start time.  The band looked and sounded tight – awesome set and it looked like everyone was having fun. Turns out they’re heading out on a short European tour so this was a good warm up too.  Got a few shout-outs to hometown Seattle and the KEXP crew from Ishmael “Butterfly” Butler; better known now locally as Palaceer Lazaro of Shabazz Palaces. Represent! The KEXP live stream is available here. 🙂
With five of us this trip there’s a lot of schedule mixing and matching going on. Thanks to fairly consistent, free wifi around town we’ve been able to stay in touch and arrange meet ups for shows and meals. Tonight it was pizza again, but eating in this time.  Tristen and Andy were off to another off-venue and we went back to the apartment to chill before heading out to Harpa where we’ll bounce between the two main rooms this evening to catch some electric-pop and metal; a mix of bands we’ve seen and new-to-us bands. If we can stay awake long enough, we can close out the night with Kiasmos.
 

For your daily dose of nonense, I give you toys. Andy was telling us about seeing these random plastic army men perched about town when he was here in June. He pointed out a few the other day and now we’re finding them, and other assorted small toys, perched on doorways, ledges and signs about town. Jeff and Berto inquired at Prikid earlier today while awaiting coffee and the kid was stoked that they were noticed. The story they got was that the toys are placed around town by “The Toy Distributor” who also works at the video game Arcade across the street from Prikid. Dunno if the story itself is true, but there’s no doubting the volume of small toys; we’re noticing them everywhere now. There’s even one on the ledge outside the window of our apartment.

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First up tonight was Ayia – purely because they’re ahead of another band we wanted to see. I liked what they’re doing; I’d like to see it again in a year when its had more time to develop.
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Next up: Dream Wife.  This started as a performance art piece but has become a solid, edgy electro pop. We’ve seen Rakel, the vocalist, with other projects and she has a great voice and stage presence; this project is no exception. Love what these women are doing.
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Following Dream Wife we bounced to the other room at Harpa to get a dose of metal, compliments of DIMMA.  We’ve seen these guys a number of times and they are exceptional live.  Rock on!
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Staying with the metal theme – following DIMMA was Seattle’s own Thunderpussy. We met the guitarist Wednesday night at The Sonics and figured we’d check out their set since we’d be in there already. The ladies put together a good set; the stage at Harpa North is no joke – it’s big, you need to own it.  I think I’d like to see them in a smaller venue where there’s less pressure to fill space with dramatic performance.
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Wrapped up the night with Kiasmos.  They were originally scheduled for 1:50am but were swapped at the last minute to the 11:50pm spot so that was a win for us. Those shows that start around 1:00am or later are kickers. It was packed for Kiasmos so we only stayed for about half the set. Truth be told, we have their album on my laptop and could play it at the apartment; it’s a DJ set, you’re really not *seeing* anything. Sounded great though. 🙂 

That’s all for day 3 of the festival. Tomorrow we’re meeting a friend for breakfast; probably checking out the Flea Marche, and the Björk show is at 5pm.

BJÖRK!!!