Triple Mood

Wednesday night at High Dive, Glass Souls frontwoman Lana Sparks — a 20-something wearing a black dress and combat boots, with some of the shiniest hair I’ve ever seen — stood on stage, flanked on either side by guitarist Gary Bruce and bassist Shawn Ross. Behind her, on drums, sat Stephen Adams.

On Sparks’s right, Bruce, who most likely sits somewhere on the younger end of Gen X, donned a black, wicker cowboy hat atop a mustache that screams for a Western starring Tom Selleck. Ross, on Sparks’s left, cooly embodied your dad’s quiet-but-secretly-incredibly-interesting friend that is your saving grace at family events, wearing a t-shirt under an open button-up, a baseball cap, and playing a fretless bass. Adams, wearing a graphic tee with some kind of animal skull on it and a black bandana tied around his forehead, came in as the resident goth of the group.

A motley crew at first glance, the dark blues-rock group used their gigantic sound to quite literally push any outward discrepancies between the band members off the stage.

Bruce’s rhythm guitar work throughout the set was incredibly intricate, and Ross and Adams made for an impeccable rhythm section, fully locking in together. Watching Sparks, though, in her all-black outfit, was like happily being pulled into a black hole, waiting for promises of love and comfort just on the other side.

Made to be a soul-rock singer, Sparks’s voice was so thick that it often sounded like she was both the lead and the background vocals — but there weren’t any background vocals. With an expressive face and a mouth that opened wide with every note, I often felt like I was going to tumble down Sparks’s throat, down deep into the black hole of rock ‘n’ roll, not caring if I returned.

While some of the vocals felt pushed instead of released, with intoxicating songs that averaged upwards of five minutes — including a fun cover of Britney Spears’s “Toxic” — Sparks funneled the passion and grit of the entire band through herself and into the audience, making for a set that felt like slowly sipping on a Dark and Stormy made from top-shelf rum and Rachel’s Ginger Beer.

Fat Starfish, a new, local soul sextet playing their fourth show together, took the middle set. Since the band is new, they performed mostly covers, like Amy Winehouse’s “Valerie” and Bill Withers’s “Use Me,” but threw in one funky original that showed what the band is capable of.

Frontwoman Penny Fischer has an incredible voice (she also said she stayed home from work that day because she had lost her voice; if she can sing like Etta James without a voice, I’m almost scared to see what she could do with one); saxophonist Seven Sky Spillios* bounced around stage having a great time; and guitarist Brian Ward threw out some funky riffs, but, ultimately, most likely since this is only their fourth performance, the chemistry just wasn’t quite there, and the musicians — clearly all talented — seemed to have a hard time locking in with each other.

However, Fat Starfish did put on an incredibly fun set, filled with high energy and thriving zeal. This band has some work to do, but, with a clear picture of who they want to be and the gusto to get out there and play, it’ll be fun to watch where this soulful bunch takes this project.

Triple Mood (frontwoman Kaeli Earle gleefully informed the audience that they chose the name because all three members are moody bitches), a trio from Bellingham now based in Seattle, headlined the evening. Composed of Earle on vocals and bass, Mōtus drummer Alex Roemmele, and pianist/saxophonist/melodica player Conner Helms, these three bitches knew how to hold down a stage.

Playing mostly tracks from their September 2019 EP, Stay Gold, the group had a laid-back, unafraid to err, yet completely confident and capable vibe. Earle’s aura was joyously infectious, and her voice is easy and smooth, gliding over the audience’s heads and into whatever part of your brain makes you smile just because you fucking feel like it.

Roemmele kept the drums tight, and I was especially fond of the rickety sound he got out of a largely perforated cymbal with a hoof rattle on top. Helms, on stage right, seamlessly switched between his three instruments, keeping in time with Roemmele, Earle, and Spillios, who came out on sax for two tracks, one of which was Duke Ellington’s “It Don’t Mean A Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing.)”

After a few more of the band’s original songs, Triple Mood ended the night with a mostly-instrumental Chick Corea cover, which really brought the jazz into the band’s self-described “jazz/funk/pop/fusion” genre. Earle brought equal joy to her bass playing (and scatting) on this track as she did to her more vocal-heavy tunes, and, as the last note rang out, I felt my body relax into itself, fully sated, sopping up Earle’s relaxed-yet-exuberant positivity, Fat Starfish’s dedication to fun, and Glass Souls’s intoxicating passion. - Dan Ray

Day 1: Tuesday, Oct. 8

We wake up at 3 a.m., our friend drives us to the airport. We’re all really sleep deprived from staying up the night before to play Mario Kart, but it doesn’t matter because we’re going to Europe and it’s going to be awesome.

Ten hours later we’re stuck at the Toronto airport for eight hours. God this sucks. Kaeli plays her stupid video game the whole time. The food is really expensive. Finally, we all get on a plane, somehow there’s very few people on the flight, and there’s a ton of empty seats for extra napping capacity.



Day 2: Wednesday, Oct. 9

We touch down at the Manchester Airport and meet up with our contact, Johnny. Johnny drives a really nice Jaguar. On the way to Lancaster while passing a bunch of sheep he tells us a little about the music festival and the city of Lancaster. The steering wheel’s on the wrong side and Johnny drives like a maniac.

The festival hooked us up with an Airbnb right above one of the pubs, and it’s adorable. The ceilings aren’t level, and it looks super old. Apparently an Italian family lived there with their children before it became an Airbnb. We’re dying to go to sleep but also, carpe diem, so instead we go to a party at a local brewery for the festival volunteers. There’s free beer and free food and lots of new faces, but we spend the whole event in a daze. Super super super tired.



Day 3: Thursday, Oct. 10

This is a day off for us, and I was really hoping to sleep but I wake up at 5am and can’t fix it. Conner’s also up so we go to this big wooded park somebody recommended to us, with a massive marble monument in the middle and a butterfly greenhouse.. Butterfly houses are a really good activity to do when you’re basically braindead from sleep deprivation because butterflies are pretty and require no effort to appreciate.

I still can’t sleep by the time we get back, but Johnny shows up with the instruments the festival is providing and it turns out they’re heavy as fuck. That evening we check out an open mic and do a song or two, but Alex doesn’t have his drum set so he finds a sample kit on his phone. I think we sound pretty bad but everybody’s into it – our first experience with just how different British audiences are. We then go to a funk jam where, again, audience goes nuts, people keep buying us beers, and somebody has a bottle of moonshine so the next thing I know it’s 3am and I’m pissed (“pissed” in the UK is basically wasted.) Alex went back early because he doesn’t drink and he’s feeling kinda sick.



Day 4: Friday, Oct. 11

The first day we’re actually playing a show. I wake up way too early again, but one of the pub owners said he’d provide breakfast to the international musicians so I head over to the pub (in Lancaster everything is seven minutes or less walking distance away.) The pub owner makes me a bacon bun, which is just a bunch of ham in a bun served with ketchup and coffee. It’s all right, nothing special. But it turns out it’s the best food I’ll have all week, so I wish I appreciated it more.

When we show for our first gig, it was miserable because we had to haul all our heavy equipment on foot and there was nobody there and we were afraid we’d come all the way for a string of shit gigs. As soon as we started, though, the room filled up quickly and soon it was standing room only – they were so into it! Post show, Alex promptly goes back to the Airbnb because he’s still feeling pretty sick. Conner, myself and this Brazilian dude we’d met the day before end up going out and finding a whole crowded bar with people dancing to live rockabilly, followed by a karaoke bar where a dude who says it’s his birthday gets wayyy too comfortable with us and annoys the fuck out of me.



Day 5: Saturday, Oct. 12

By now I’m starting to imitate the speaking patterns of British people and I don’t know how to stop. We have two shows, the first one starting pretty early, at this vegan cafe. It’s the same deal – we show up, there’s not a whole lot of people there, but by the time we start the room is full to overflowing. The sound was absolutely terrible but we were having so much fun it didn’t matter.

The second show is at this underground bar, and the infrastructure is terrible so just getting our instruments down there involved 12499 steps, and when we showed up, the bartender said he wasn’t expecting us for another hour. So set-up was a squeeze, but Alex gets his drums together in time, and we’re all ready, and that basement bar is so crowded by the time we started – and so hot – it was surreal. We have our new friend Becca sit in on the trombone, she’s awesome.



Day 6: Sunday, Oct. 13

This is the final day for us, and the most shows. We play the main stage at noon but there’s so much rain, and it’s kind of a bum slot, so not very many people show up. I drink a beer at noon cos it’s the last day, f#ck it.

Our second show is on an outdoor stage and it’s still raining pretty hard. We start late but have a solid crowd, and we’re all having fun - it turns out you can walk around with beer in Lancaster! What a beautiful thing. We head to the third show and set up, and by now we’re very tired but we know it’s the last show, and I’m somewhat delirious but I think that last show was the best we played.

After our set, a beatbox trio from Austria plays and turn the little pub into a night club: a ton off people are dancing in a tiny space, dudes are taking off their shirts and bumping each other with their sweaty chests, and a ton of musicians from the festival sat in with the band, including Becca the trombone player, this guy from New Jersey who turns out is a dope rapper besides playing bass, and myself. Unreal. Really really good. As the show ends and the pub empties out, Conner starts playing a melodica line and it turns into a cipher, people are freestyling, improvising, clapping, throwing in melodies – it was one of the coolest jams I’ve EVER had. I want to go back.



Day 7: Monday, Oct. 14

Oh god I did not sleep enough. We wake up super early to take the train and Alex was the one to buy train tickets, so he’s making sure we’re not late but I’m just super grumpy and I hate him a little. Finally get to the airport. Finally get on the plane. Finally get to Toronto. Another long layover.

It’s like all the lack of sleep over the week hits me at once and I just want to be home, but it’s not until a full 30 hours later that we land back in Seattle, see our friends, and play some more Mario Kart. The next day I slept until 6 p.m. and I have no regrets. - Triple Mood