Terrain 2010 on Friday, October 1st at the Music City Building
Terrain is an event Spokane folks look forward too. Personally I look forward to seeing the bands, the art, and getting to chat with people we don’t see every day. I accomplished all of that and managed to have a few adult beverages this evening.
The space was the same this year, at the Music City Building downtown on First Ave just ½ block west of Monroe. It’s a big building, but after this year’s attendance almost not big enough. The place was packed the entire evening including the sidewalk out front. I managed to run into people from High School, Work, the Music Scene, and even our Mayor. Terrain appeals to everyone, there was even a surprising amount of kids enjoying the night as well.
Three new “items” were added to Terrain this year; a pinball room, a performance/art with bricks, and they expanded back in the venue with more art too see. There was ceiling to floor, wall to wall art. That included every type/form; painting, watercolors, photographers, ceramics, balloons, visual, just a great variety. Some of my favorites were the balloon parrot room where you could even adopt a parrot after the show which the artist managed to name and number all of them. I also enjoyed the Ronald Reagan Bananas. The toy/robot paintings were very cool especially the “PeTA Pit.” It was cool to see the work on display of people we know like Amia’s drum set & lamp, Brandon Vasquez’s photography, and Dan McElfish’s art. The Room to Recall Sadness was a brilliant work as well. There was even an area where you could write and create your own art with a table full of markers.
The best part about Terrain is that while you are looking at the art there is live music! Some of the artists we caught this year were Sueño Del Verde which is a side project from the Please Draw In Me kids, Silver Treason, The Soul and the Machine, Yarn Owl, and the Bad Penmanship Crew. I wanted so badly to see James Pants but I thought he was supposed to take the stage at 11:30pm. We left a little after Midnight because I had to work the next morning at 6am. So it was a bummer to not catch James but the evening set list was diverse and fun. Sueño Del Verde was the only band we haven’t seen before and I loved it! I especially dug the huge Terminator head they played behind that also had a screen in one of the eyes. It was new and exciting, which to be honest I haven’t seen a lot of in the scene lately. I hope we get to hear and see more from this band!
Yarn Owl is always a treat. I think my favorite part of their set other than singing along was to see Caroline and Kurt from Mon Cheri in the front row clapping and dancing to every song. Yarn Owl sounded perfect and they just keep on getting cooler and cooler each time we see them! Silver Treason another wonderful local band; it was cool to see that the organizers of Terrain picked a more indie alt-country band to play this year. These cats know how to play their instruments and have a good time. Plus any band that has a steel guitar, hello beautiful!
I only caught a few songs from The Soul and the Machine and Bad Penmanship but each time there was someone performing on stage there was a big crowd watching and dancing. Before Bad Penmanship they even had break dancers, which was awesome!! I love watching kids break dance, so much strength and creativity. It was really cool to see a big circle form around them too with everyone cheering them on. Overall the night had a good flow, and a nice mix of art, music, and people. Like I mentioned earlier now we just wait with wonder and excitement for Terrain 2011.
Photos courtesy of Matt Auclair.
