Each year I head out to the Bumbershoot lineup party wondering if it’ll be a crazy mess of a success or fall flat. This year’s theme of “Pink and Purple Pickwick Party” sounded a little weird and I wasn’t sure how it was going to play out.
Last year absolutely floored me with a high school prom theme (dubbed “Prombershoot”) complete with Mad Hatter-adorned Allen Stone and crew taking the stage and slaying the audience. Much to my pleasure, you did it again Bumbershoot peeps, you got me. This time they brought it with a game of Bumberdy! (Bumbershoot themed Jeopardy!… obviously) MC’d by Seattle’s own Jeopardy! champion Ken Jennings. You know what? Jennings is funny, really really funny. He had great comedic timing that had me chuckling the whole night.
If you’re interested in seeing the Bumbershoot lineup in its entirety check it out here. With Bootsy Collins, The Replacements, and Elvis Costello in the mix, you just can’t go wrong. The music performances last night started with Naomi Wachira, an incredibly talented singer with strong african roots threaded throughout her music. Then, after the Bumberdy! shenanigans, Pickwick thrilled us all with a slow-building but nevertheless dance-inducing set. Touche Bumbershoot, touche.
Naomi dedicated a song called “I am a Woman” to the missing Nigerian children
Naomi’s upbeat music got everyone moving and in a great mood
Ken Jennings was really funny, the perfect MC for Bumberdy! (Bumbershoot-themed Jeopardy!) where the winner got Platinum Passes to the fest.
After a little bumbling with the props, Bumberdy! turned out to be a lot of fun and the winner kind of destroyed the other players.
The winner of Bumberdy!, Amanda Walker, destroyed the others leading the pack by about 5,000 points.
Pickwick took the stage with a quieter version of some of their older hits and a few new ones.
As they worked their way through the set, the excitement built up a little and the audience started dancing.
Galen was in fine form tossing away the mic stand in favor of singing right to the audience and moving around.
As we have all come to expect, all the members of Pickwick were dancing around and having a great time
Pickwick played quite a few new songs with old ones peppered in.
The music really started grooving and the normally quiet music fans of seattle started moving.
It’s hard not to be taken in when Galen really gets going, that bluesy motown feel is hard to beat.
Can’t wait to see Pickwick and Naomi at Bumbershoot this year.
Wasn’t sure about the Wachira/Pickwick lineup matchup but it turned out to be fantastic.
