JOE IZENMAN: WENT FOR BATTERSEA; LEFT A BANDOLIER FAN >>>

Sometimes a band catches you off guard. Usually it happens to me at festivals. I'll see a band I've never heard of, and be absolutely hypnotized, by their show, by their music, by their everything. The first time I saw the Decemberists at Bumbershoot; Frank Turner opening for Gaslight Anthem; Ben Harper wailing his way through a weather-worn crowd at Sasquatch 2006.

Last night I went to The New Frontier Lounge to see Battersea, and Battersea was good. They are a band full of people who love English post-punk, and it comes through in their songwriting. There is a balance of driving guitar strums and melodic vocals to be struck in that kind of music, and they execute well.

Before Battersea was The Color Of East (celebrating the release of their EP In The House Of Endless Light), and The Color Of East was good, too. They delivered a solid set of what they aptly deem "psychdelic-garage-pop," and though it took some time, they got the crowd up on their feet at the end. 

But before all of that was Bandolier, and Bandolier absolutely blew me away.

Bandolier writes pop songs, and I mean that in a good way. They are floating somewhere in the ephemeral songspace between ‘50s bubble gum and modern indie, and making a kind of music that is far too rare on much of the local scene: music made of different instruments which you can actually hear. It is, put simply, musical. A hollow-body electric guitar sound that fails to utterly overpower the rest of the band. The sharp pop sound that doesn't come out of anything but a Rickenbacker bass. Noisy keyboard mashing eschewed in favor of constructed counter-melodies. A drummer with the skill to be interesting but the restraint to lie back instead of driving the volume to extremes (a frequent problem with mixing at the New Frontier). And two lead singers who can, who would guess it, actually sing. Not wail or scream or growl or moan, but just genuinely sing. It's hard to pull off two lead singers in a single band, but Lino and Ann do an admirable job balancing male and female leads while still continuing to sound like the same band, and spewing crafted harmonies all night long.

There is plenty to be said for well-constructed noisy rock. The aforementioned Bandolier, for example, and any number of other Tacoma and Seattle bands. But I miss music like this, music that's pretty and happy and energetic and fun. It's music that makes wallflowers dance. It's music that makes people smile. It's music that sounds like music, for people who like music. It is, in short, really really good.

Don't be sad, though, if you weren't there. Bandolier is back in Tacoma on Oct. 24, playing an all-ages show at The Den inside UrbanXchange on Pacific Avenue, to celebrate the release of their new CD. Go forth and attend. It'll make you smile.

(Also I really liked the keyboard player's sparkly hat. I want a sparkly hat to play keyboards in. Seriously.)