BottleRockit at Poggies 4/3/13

I took advantage of one of the last weekends of clubbing of the season to see one of my buddy's bands. It is starting to get nice in the Pacific Northwest. This weekend is going to be 80 in a place that is usually rainy and in the 60's at this time of the year. It is hard to sit and blog when it's this nice. I guess it could be worse, here is my view as I write.

It looks like I need to do some spring cleaning. Like I said, it is hard to sit when the sun is shining and the to-do list is growing. This will be one of my last blogs of the season. Tomorrow I see Aloha Screwdriver, one of the best surf bands in the genre. One hell of a way to end the season.

I had meant to see BottleRockit for quite a while. I knew one of the members from work. The other from the establishment in the photo above; Darrells Tavern. Andrew is a coworker and one of the talented gutairsts in this band. Scott is the sound tech for this band, Darrells and many other venues and events. He is the best in the biz. I count him as a member of this band.

Here he is making sure the sound is just right.

He is their biggest fan, he smiles and laughs as they perform. He is proud of them and it shows. And there is good reason, they rock. Here he is enjoying the show.

Andrew had been trying to get me to come to one their shows for a long time. He didn't even ping me about this one, I think he had given up. He was surprised to see me walk in (pleasantly I hope) and take a seat as close as I could get. Here is Andrew rocking his beautiful guitar.

Poggies is a homey dive in West Seattle, right on the main drag (California Ave). It is long and skinny. The bar and restrooms are on one side and a wall of CMU (concrete blocks) on the other. Not the best for sound quality. The stage was so small that they had to put one member in the men's room. Well almost, here is Paul (center) trying to stay out of the traffic.

Never the less, the band rocked, the sound was great and everybody was having a great time. A lot of the credit for the great sound goes to Scott. Luckily he had great material to work with. Each member of the band is talented and entertaining. Here is the band at a fever pitch.

BottleRockit plays good old rock and roll. They perform mostly covers from the 50's through today. Here is how they describe themselves: BottleRockit is one of the Northwest's premier rock, blues, country, pop and surf party bands.

They made a big sound: 4 guitars, two percussion (and other instruments) as well as 5 strong voices. They were tight and played with passion and skill. BottleRockit is: Phyl Stewart: Vocals and Guitar, Scott Garrepy: Vocals, Guitar, Bass, Andrew Smith: Lead Guitar, Vocals, Darren Anderson: Drums, Rick Price: Bass, Guitar, Vocals, Paul Hjorten: Harmonica, Percussion, Vocal, Scott Walker: Sound & Duct Tape Engineer.

Phyl is the lead singer, she has a golden set of pipes and can belt it out. She also plays acoustic guitar. She is quite entertaining.

Phyl was a gas to watch and her mates backed her up with some powerful rock and or roll. Here is Paul, Rick and Scott blazing the rock.

Rick is a local television reporter. He played lead guitar on one of my favorite tunes of the evening. Thanks Chet is a original song written by the band. Rick killed this all instrumental song. That is him in the center laying the bottom for the band.

I mentioned Paul before, he had a lot of tricks up his sleeve. I wonder if he is a Foley artist in his day job. He sang vocals, played an awesome harmonica, a set of chimes, bongos, maracas, and since he was so close to the can, he also played the bathroom sink.

You can see how many goodies he has on the little stand next to him. Here he is playing the wind chimes for crying out loud.

They had a great vibe and were obviously having fun. While their covers were great, I liked their original stuff the best. Take Me Dancing was a rollicking fun rock and roll classic.

They rotated lead guitars, each talented artist getting a turn. Andrew got to show off his skills on some classic and original tunes.

Scott sang vocals and played rhythm and lead guitar. He was having a great time rocking on a Friday night. Here he is with Phyl and Andrew.

There was a fairly good crowd this evening. Poggies has it's regulars and then there was the birthday party. There is gambling here in the form of pull tabs. Pull tabs are the cheap versions of punch boards. Punch boards were popular in bars and gaming houses in the 30's through the 70's. Millions were made. It just so happens I collect them.

Here is what the new ones look like:

They had a bunch of them.

Here is what the classics looked like. They were unique and fun, works of art in some cases. This is a very small parlor game from the 30's and 40's.

Here are two larger and more provocative pieces. The subject matter reflected the culture of the times.

It works like this; the player has a steel punch and pushes through a hole of his choosing. A little piece of paper comes out. If the code matches the winner list, you could get cash or gifts. You pay for each punch. This one was unique as it had the big prize right inside of it.

They are so much nicer that the latest gambling genre. But I am a dinosaur. I don't play video games either. I also collect table top and full size arcade games. Here is a bingo machine; flipperless pinball from the 50's.

But I digress, I loved Poggies and the entertainment. BottleRockit had a great repitiore, you can see their set list here: http://www.bottlerockitband.com/set-list.html

You can connect with them via Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/BottleRockit-Fan-Page/221622879919

Thanks to Poggies for presenting great live music. There was no cover tonight so it was incumbent on the music lover to tip the band. BottleRockit was not, however doing this for money. They were doing it for love. Thanks to them for some great music and a good time.