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As some of you seem to have noticed, I didn't manage to blog the last set of the festival the next morning as planned. In my total exhaustion, I decided to take the day off from work and ended up sleeping the late afternoon.

Anyway, one thing lead to another and it's been a few days. But now I think I'm finally rested and recovered enough to give it a shot. We had a festival organizers' swim party up off of Skyline. I collected some great photos of the last set from excellent Portland music photographer Jason Quigley (I was too busy dancing my butt off to get any of my own, but more on that in a minute). So, here goes:

In a gutsy move, that brought a definite payoff, this year's booking committee decided to end the last night of the fest with a full block of dance and hip-hop -- no guitars were to be seen. Somewhere along the line, we started referring to it as "the pdxpop dance party" and that's totally what it was.

Longtime Portland MC Cool Nutz, got the party started off with a set that did double-duty as a kind of hip-hop academy. Nutz refused to let the crowd do the normal indie rock immobile arms-folded slouch, constantly calling on us to wave our arms back and forth, shout out in call-and-response choruses, and actually move our feet in something that resembled dancing. He refused to stop until he had every last person with him, even singling out particular audience members who weren't getting involved. In one particularly poignant moment, he asked for a show of hands by "everyone who'd ever lost someone" before launching into a song about dead friends.

Cool Nutz also seemed to really get the spirit of the festival, pimping the pdxpop comp by suggesting that everyone should buy three or four copies so that they'd have extra to give away to panhandlers at the side of freeway offramps. This set went by far too fast.

Next up was Strategy, a pretty legendary Portland IDM DJ (I hope I'm getting that genre right, I definitely don't have a very strong grasp on all the many fine distinctions within dance and electronic) who almost never plays out anymore -- during his set he explained that the reason for this is that he's been working full time on an album that he can never finish and then went on to play the central track from that album.

Charmingly, Strategy seemed nervous, accidentally putting his trucker-mic down in such a way as to cause horrible wails of feedback followed by sheepish apologies a couple of times. It took a little while, but by the end of his set the crowd was definitely starting to get warmed up for the serious dance workout it was about to get.

While Strategy's set was great (and especially fascinating for those of us who were previously less clued in to the Portland electronic scene), it was Copy's relentless 8-bit beats and blips that really got the kids jumping around and shaking it (that great portrait of him in action is courtesy of Jason Quigley, by the way). Pretty much immediately after he got started a big many-armed and legged cluster of teenagers pushed its way to the center of the crowd and started to boogie. Their enthusiasm quickly spread to the rest of the crowd and after that, the dance party was unstoppable.

It took some cajoling, but during this set we managed to get most of the core PDX Pop crew of volunteers and organizers out on the dancefloor. For most of us, this is nothing like our natural habitat, so this was something of an achievement. It was also a total blast, a great way to blow off all of the stress and effort that weant into making this event happen, and a fittingly fun celebration of what we've achieved. (Not everyone was out of their chairs yet when Quigley snapped this shot, but that's definitely my hairy arm on the right.)

And then there was one. Breakout Portland MC, Ohmega Watts is a multiple threat, producing, arranging, and graphic design sitting side by side in his arsenal with rapping. In fact, Watts is so busy right now trying to finish up his new album before leaving for a stint on this year's edition of Lollapalooza on Friday, that he arrived for his after-midnight festival slot directly from the studio.

If Watts was harried though, you'd never have known it. I don't think I've ever seen another performed more relaxed on stage. It was as if we were all hanging out in his living room and he was just spinning records and talking to us. Combined with his non-stop rapid-fire rhymes, this laid back attitude comes across as less slacker and more simple charisma confidence. It was hard to avoid the thought that Watts is going to be a big star.

He also turned out to be just about the nicest artist we've ever dealt with, sticking around for a long time after his set to talk to fans and chat with volunteers as we cleaned up trash, put away the merch, and packed up the decorations (which are still filling my car's trunk and backseat, I just realized).

But, before we get to tear down and tears at the festival's end, there's one more awesome thing to describe. As his set ended, Watts got the crowd to form a big circle in the middle of the room and introduced us to his b-boy crew. He went on to spin a few Bob Marley remixes he'd made while they hit the floor, spinning, jumping, and flipping the crowd into a frenzy. I shoved Quigley in front of me to make sure that someone got a great shot of the action and he came through:

The b-boys were still going strong when Watts' record of remixes ran out and, sadly, one of them had to leave disappointed since he was calling for another track (it looked like he had some serious moves planned -- they been kind of upping the ante with each go 'round).

Anyway, I couldn't think of a more fun way to end this year's fest. So, thnks to all of you that came out this year. Be sure to visit pdxpopnow.com to keep track of our activities and to volunteer to help out. I'll be seeing at next year's fest and out listening to lots of Portland music between now and then!

Ladies and gentlemen, a report from the Wet Confetti set, by Merch Master and all-around PDX Pop all-star Mike Fuchs:

As always Wet Confetti hit the stage ready to bring their danceable sound to their fans and curious onlookers. Opening with old material they played with more comfort, fun, and presence than last year. After dedicating a song to the volunteers, recieving a custom made Wet Confetti skate board from a fan, and cajoling people into dancing they debuted two new songs, making me excited to hear their new album. Having danced myself out I moved my sweaty self back to the merch booth to have discovered that Cool Nutz had wasted no time in getting started. Knowing Greg he probably pulled down his pants, dawned his bling, and is sporting a bandana ballin with the rest of the Hip Hop dance crowd."

Well we're definitely nearing the end. People are getting tired (happy but tired). All the volunteers are getting a little loopy. In my burst of blog enthusiasm just before, I ended up missing all of The Swallows' set.

I did manage to get up there to catch Wilding, though, before coming back down to work a shift running the merch booth. All the Merch Kids are totally nuts about Wet Confetti who are on right now, so I made them promise to blog in exchange for working. They'll be down in a minute.

Meanwhile, a few words about Wilding: Gus is a very fluently melodic bass player and it's neat to watch him put his beats and sounds together through his incredibly complicated live setup (this is what happens when you let engineers make music). This morning's opener, Sleepyhead also made a compelling guest appearance.

OK. Here comes everybody in the world down the stairs, which means it must be time for the beginning of the last set and so I'm going to run! Look for more from the Merch Kids and a final wrapup post from me tomorrow.

Well, that was exactly what I needed. At the start of this block, I was definitely feeling tired and music saturated. Old Growth started and I could really hear or understand them, even though they were incredibly loud. They come from the Santa Cruz transplant, Drive Like Jehu-influenced, noise rock world and they have a bit of an early punk feeling (a fact I reconstructed afterwards from eye witness reports). But it wasn't really registering.

And so I started to get worried. There's still quite a bit of great and exciting music still to come and I didn't want to feel like this for the rest of it. Luckily, the one two punch of White Rainbow and Evolutionary Jass Band came along and sorted me right out.

White Rainbow is part of the Jackie O' Motherfucker family of bands. A duo, they started with a low rumble of synth and mic-looped noise, eventually adding percussive clicks and thwacks, near-static effected guitar and singing, and assorted other mysterious sounds and noises. It's the kind of music where at first glance it feels like all one sound, but gradually, as you listen deeper and get sucked in, you start to hear all little bits of melody and rhythm emerging, you start to hear what the players are hearing.

This immersive experience was just what I needed. It cleared my head.

After the rejuventating White Rainbow set, Evolutionary Jass Band was pretty much the fathest distant extreme possible. Where White Rainbow made totally free music out of what are normally pop instruments, EJB took an approximately free jazz format and made it totally spellbinding and catchy.

This is what I love about pdxpop, seeing such radically different music all in the same place and thinking of it all as pop. Seeing a team of teenagers run over to the merch booth to buy EJB's record just does my heart good.

Just got downstairs from a great set that made it totally easy to make it through the middle of the day and into the homestretch. First off was Treva Jackson. Her song, "Drive", a catchy buzzy throwback to the halcyon days of the birth of indie rock, was one of my favorites on this year's comp and this set didn't disappoint. Jackson is part Mary Timony and part ethnic pixie and at their best her songs have the effect of those early Sebadoh and Helium efforts of making relatively straightforward heartfelt pop sound fresh and exciting.

Tea For Julie features PDX Pop's own Michael Deresh and so it's hard for me to be objective. I can say that since their appearance at the first year of the festival, they've significantly matured. They play tighter and their songs seem to derive from more diverse sources: there was a lot of The Cure in this set, a surprising and satisfying ingeredient to hear from a band that I've previously thought of as cast solely from the U2, anthemic stadium rock mold.

The block closed down with a terrific set from Alan Singley and Pants Machine. Since playing the festival last year, the Pants Machine have put out by far their best record, Lovingkindness, on the newly transported to Portland label Slow January. Alan is a really fun combination of Burt Bacharach and a crazy little kid. His songs are intricate, harmonically dense, and catchy as hell.

During the set, most of the upstairs filled up with people and by the end just about all of them were singing along to Highways of Your Mind, the leadoff track from Lovingkindness. Afterwards, there was fairly a stampede downstairs and a feeding frenzy at the merch table. In fact, Mike Fuchs, our Merch Master just told me that Lovingkindness is on the verge of selling out. Pants Machine: this year's breakout hit?

Just saw a nice pair of solo artists downstairs before having to grab some lunch. Unfortunately I'm missing The Whips and Whales right now, but it's going to be a long night and I needed to dig in (I can kind of hear them from where I'm sitting (they're definitely blues rock), but not well enough to pass any judgements or make a run at a description.

Anyway, earlier we had Quiet Countries, which is Leb Borgerson's guitar and electronics one man band. Leb, who as guitarist in Pants Machine is doing double duty today, does something that's refreshing for this kind of act: actually plays in all the loops and does all the effects processing himself in real time. Once he gets a big swell of guitar and synth going, he sings soaringly over it in a voice that, I just realized, sounds spookily like Bright Eyes, but without the teenybopper crybaby-ness.

After Leb, Garland Ray took the stage. She played dark caberet numbers (apparently she performs in a full-on cabaret "revue" occasionally) and sung in a kind of PJ Harvey meets Jessica Rabbit style. Her multi-octave range and bag of vocal tricks, pops, and squeaks kept the stylistically unifrom songs interesting. Also, she closed with a cabaret-style cover of Born in the USA, which was cool.

Treva Jackson just got started upstairs and the noises coming through the ceiling sound cool, so I'm going to run. . .

Also, I just noticed that sometime during the night a PRA associate painted a totally kickass mural behind their booth upstairs. Check it out:

Off to a laid back and rad start here. I decided to stop for some coffee, a banana, and a non-fat organic blueberry yogurt on the way (hunger management is key to festival enjoyment) so I only caught the last ten minutes of Sleepyhead's set. He was the perfect flavor for a Sunday morning: mostly mellow laid back hip-hop with enough excitement to get the small crowd's blood pumping.

Next came Y.A.C.H.T. Jona was added to the bill at the last minute after a conflicting gig fell through. He offered to do "magic" and we took him up on the offer. So, of course, he brought a David Copperfield DVD and read us the contents -- including such highlights as "Test of Knives" and "Romantic Interlude" -- during a lull caused by technical difficulties. Jona brought his usual fake-bearded dance-tastic theatrical glitch pop and got the crowd involved through trust falls and microphone cord jump-rope.

And, for something completely different, the set closed up with I Can Lick Any Son of a Bitch in the House. Rocking it Outer Southeast style, Son of a Bitch played all out kentucky fried blues-based classic butt rock with super politicized liberal protest lyrics. They finished their set off with a rolicking cover of Keep On Rocking in the Free World that summed up both their politics and their sound quite nicely.

Good morning. I'm coming to you live once again from my bed. It's a little bit before 11 which gives me an hour to get you caught up on the total madness that went down last night since my last post, shower, dress, pick up bagels and coffee, and get to the Loveland. Are you ready? Here goes:

I only caught the very end of Dykeritz' set. I was big exhausted at that point, trying to save my energy for the big last push. Plus, I had to spend some time downstairs at my blogging station getting things down. Oh, the sacrifices I make for you people! Anyway, I'd seen Dykeritz a bunch of times before (we'd even played a show we them once), but not since they slimmed down their lineup. They also made sunny fun fractured music. And there used to be a lot of them, so it was always a party up on stage. Somehow having a third as many people in the band didn't seem to take away from the size of their sound or the fun of their presentation. Their newly laptopified sound did add a bit of eighties gloss, though, making their music feel more like it belonged over the closing credits of Ferris Beuler's Day Off, which is cool.

At this point in the night the crowd was seriously starting to get huge and we all tramped down to the cavernous first floor which was starting to feel really full. At that point the Shaky Hands took over. The Hands' music is tough to describe. Maybe the closest band to them in the festival was The Conductors, but the Hands lie on the other side of the College Rock/Alternative Rock divide. They also had a loose jam band aspect, that was amplified by their bass player's scruffiness.

I don't think anything, even the evening's earlier decadence, could have prepared the crowd for Fleshtone. Fleshtone consisted of two djs, three scantily clad dancers, one scantily clad singer (I guess the normally perform topless, but fleshtoned it down a bit for our all-ages crwod), and one guy who dressed variously in: a jock strap, a diaper, and raver gear. They performed a long narrative cycle of songs about drugs and sex, huffing and penises, with music that merged 8bit with 80s stadium pop metal accompanying lascivious dance routines of the kind slutty girls choreograph to Britney Spears at high school talent shows. While a very few people were offended enough to leave, the great majority of the crowd, including all of the high school-aged kids there, was totally into it.

Next up, with almost no switchover time, was former Portland fixture and now re-transplant, Dahlia. Just back from spending a period of time in NY, Dahlia's music used to be a mixing pot for a deverse series of styles. Depending on who you'd ask you'd hear about her as chick-power singer-songwriter in the mold of Ani DiFranco or about her trance-inducing weekly gig at the Ohm. Her time back East seems to have been spent in the New York club world and that influence was super evident in her deafeningly loud laptop driven set.

Finally, there was 50 Foot Wave. I'd never had the opportunity to see Kristin Hirsh live before a couple of weeks ago at a quiet acoustic (actually totally unamplified or mic'ed) solo set at Mississippi Studios. There, her songs were interlaced with confessional and funny banter about her past and family. It made for incredibly intimate and personal music making.

Last night, could not have been more different. As soon as the band plugged in Kristin got this blankly agressive stare in her eyes and they just totally tore into a half-hour of roaring blistering hard rock over which Kristin's voice roared and screamed in ways I never would have thought possible after seeing her in that other setting. There was a large group of kids moshing like crazy up front the whole time and while the late hour caused some attrition, those lucky enough to have stuck around were treated to an appropriately intense end to yesterday's long day of music.

Ok, I've now blogged so long that I'm going to have to hustle not to be late to this morning's first set. There's going to be all kinds of great music all day today, so be sure to stop on by. If you miss it, you'll have to wait until next year!

I think we just had decadence hour.

First, it was Strength downstairs. Just back from touring behind their brand new long-overedue record, this straight up un-ironic disco band has picked up a lot of confidence since their pdxpop show last year. Bailey, their mullet-haired singer, dove out into the crowd to lay a big fat hug on some dude adding a good dose of mosh pit to their already bumpin dancefloor.

In a totally different direction upstairs was the unpronounceable Guau Guau. Lke Chuck Berry just having crawled out of a swamp, they brought a dented low down dirty Jon Spencer-y approach to good old 50s-style rock songs. Their shambolic, child-like stage banter totally won over the rapidly growing crowd upstairs.

Finally, I just came down from Reverse Dotty and the Candy Cane Shivs. As weird as their name, this sextet, played psychotic sexed-up 80s-club-hit style. Reminiscent of nearly no one currently operating (except maybe The Knife, the Swedish group that recently came to fame with Jose Gonzalez's cover of their great song, Heartbeats). The Shivs perectly evoked the dark drug and sex-soaked milieu of dance clubs like Studio 54 with choruses like "Aderol, casual, sexual" and "I wanna fuck you in the face". Combined with the mosh pit of sweaty teenagers up front, this was an intense set.

It sounds like Dykeritz is getting started up there and I could definitely use some of their sunny pop right about now. And then, after that we'll be into the homestretch. . ."