Boomjam Music Festival’s Second Year Brings Out Spokane’s Burgeoning Music Community
- Tilsen Mulalley
- Oct 6
- 7 min read
By Tilsen Mulalley
Spokane’s Boomjam Music Festival celebrated its sophomore year on September 20th. 13 bands, ten straight hours of top-notch performances, fantastic food, and immaculate vibes rang in the indie music fest’s second year of existence. Consisting of two stages nestled snugly inside the Spokane Convention Center’s courtyard, a staggered setlist between them meant festival goers could attend every performance. The main stage overlooked a grassy field covered with inflatable chairs and tables for attendees to lounge upon. Local vendors lined the edges of the space, offering vintage clothes, CDs, and even flash tattoos. Fairy Godwomen did face and body paint for attendees under the shade of a large tree. Nearby, four-foot-tall shag-carpeted letters declared one word: BOOMJAM. The Upperdecker stage was up a flight of stairs on a veranda overlooking the courtyard and was flanked by a full-service outdoor bar. The second stage provided a more intimate space, and performers and patrons mingled under canopy tents in the soft glow of twinkle lights.
Walking into all of this, I was impressed. Spokane has always just… existed, overshadowed by its West Side sibling, Seattle. Music certainly doesn’t come to mind when thinking of humble Spokane, and that is a damn shame. See, Spokane is home to numerous venues, big and small. It hides within its charming downtown a rich local music scene. Bing Freakin’ Crosby grew up here. It is quietly the musical hotspot of the Inland Northwest. That fact, however, is rarely acknowledged. Boomjam Festival aims to be a yearly event and Spokane’s premiere indie music showcase. Its goal is to promote independent artists, while firmly planting the Lilac City on music lovers’ maps. It may do just that.
When the doors to the festival opened at 12:45, I had been on site for an hour. I was there to experience the event firsthand and talk to performers and attendees alike. I wanted to make sure I knew my way around. Thankfully, the relatively small area made this easy. The cozy dimensions of the venue promoted an intimate air over the entire festival. There was enough space to spread out comfortably, while never feeling too far away from the music or the crowd. Each stage was easily accessible from the other, and as people trickled in, one could feel a sense of amiable intrigue in the air. For many, it was their first time at Boomjam, and they were curious as to what to expect.
“I’d heard about it from friends who came last year,” said Kylie, a first-time attendee. “I wanted to find new artists, and I liked the low-key vibe.”
Fifteen minutes after the doors had opened to the public, Pancho took to the Upperdecker Stage. Consisting of students from Gonzaga University, which lies a relative stone’s throw away from the venue, their bright, lo-fi sound floated over the early Fall air and drew the crowd up to the veranda. After their set, the vocalist for Pancho Henry Seward had this to say about how a festival like Boomjam affects Spokane.
“It’s all positive,” he said. “Everyone has a good time, and [the tickets] are cheap, too.”
As the day carried on, Spokanites began to gather en masse to see a litany of other indie performers. Some, like Pancho, originated right here in Spokane and were eager to rep their home turf. Spokane-based band Timeworm played an intimate set on the Upperdecker Stage as the third act of the day. Led by drummer and vocalist J.I. Gassen, the group was happy to show up and show out for Boomjam.
“There’s a perception among non-musicians, they don’t know what’s going on in the music scene [in Spokane],” Gassen said. “...Things like Boomjam communicate that there’s stuff happening here; you don’t have to go to Seattle, you don’t have to go to LA, Nashville. You can do it in Spokane.”
Other performers travelled much further to put on a show: St. Augustine, a musician from Austin, Texas, travelled up to Spokane to perform and help out her friend, Tucker Miller, the founder of Boomjam Festival.
“He asked, and I wanted to come help him out,” she said. “We’ve worked together at festivals like Coachella, and he’s been talking about this for years.”
When asked about what festivals like Boomjam could do for smaller cities like Spokane, St. Augustine had this to say:
“It might bring bands from other states,” she said. “I know a few California bands that came up here; It gives people a reason to come out to Spokane.”
Music lovers attending the festival agreed.
“Music brings together generations of people,” said first-time attendee Casey, referring to the age range of those in attendance; folks of every decade, from toddlers to grandparents, spent the day milling around the grounds and taking in music. The Boomjam Festival prides itself on being an all-ages event, ensuring that anyone who wants to come and enjoy live music for the day can.
“[Festivals like Boomjam] One hundred percent create a sense of community,” said Loudon, another festival-goer who has attended both years. Their friend Damien, a first-time attendee, agreed.
“Festivals are important for the music scene,” they said. “I think Spokane is amazing for music.”
The diversity of the performers reflects Damien’s statement. Described as an ‘independent music and arts festival,’ Boomjam leaves a lot of room for interpretation on behalf of its performers, and the results are nothing short of eclectic. Some of them sat down with Aftershow Editor Sean Alexander to talk about their own sounds and how they fit in under the indie umbrella.
King Isis, an Oakland-based artist who travelled to Spokane to perform on the Boomjam stage, blends post-grunge, alternative, and whatever else strikes their fancy.
“I would say my music is like a blend of rock and alternative, sometimes a little R&B, definitely a little dirty, grungy… and a little poppy sometimes. It’s a bunch of different things depending on the day,” they said.
King Isis has had music lurking at the back of their mind their entire life, but really leaning into music and finding their sound over the last few years has been an adventure for them.
“The process has not been cute,” they said. “I definitely have a lot of imposter syndrome a lot of the time… so it’s been a lot of getting over that, and learning production myself has really helped with finding my voice.”
Screen Frogs, a Seattle punk and psychedelic troupe whose set at Boomjam birthed a moshpit with its wild and frantic energy, has a simple definition for their sound.
“Loud is a good way to put it,” vocalist Will Bacon said.
The band’s never-stop, do-it-yourself mentality has them constantly pushing themselves and evolving.
“Each year we try and go a little bit bigger,” said Bacon. “We had a tour earlier this year. We had our first full-length studio album come out last year. We’re always trying to one-up ourselves.”
Mike Bacon, lead guitarist and Will’s brother, goes on to solidify that mantra, teasing a new EP.
“We got an EP that we’re actually going to start recording on Monday,” he said, “so we’re basically booking it out of Spokane and we’re gonna hit the studio on Monday.”
Projectile, a wacky, hard-hitting, punk collective made up of childhood friends from New Jersey, did not mince words when describing themselves.
“We’re the best band in the world,” they said, laughing.
“Beyond the music, we won the hearts of many today,” guitarist Sam added.
De Lux, an ongoing project from LA artists Sean Guerin and Isaac Franco, has spent the last decade perfecting a slick, crisp, post-disco sound.
“We started the project like ten years ago when we were 22,” Guerin said. “And we recorded it all ourselves, mixed it all ourselves… fine-tuning over the years in the studio.”
With their songs “Cool Up” and “Moments” featured in the video game Forza Horizon 5 and the film Paper Towns, respectively, the duo has become known for their excellent production. Guerin likens their process to that of hip hop producers.
“A lot of bands usually write demos and then go into a studio and re-record,” he said, “but hip hop producers tend to record something, make it sound as good as possible, and then go from there, and that’s what we do… when we’re recording the drums, we’re mixing the drums.”
Another project that began as a duo before morphing into a four-piece several years ago, Laguna Largo has found success in collaboration, making music that the members themselves would like to listen to.
“We just make what we want to hear, and hopefully people like it,” said bassist Grayson Padgham-Walker.
While the band cautiously calls themselves “dreampop-adjacent,” they stress that their music is a conglomeration of the four members and their individual interests.
“I feel like we definitely got a lot more influenced by classic rock and prog when Grayson and I joined in,” keyboardist Christian McGovern elaborates. “I like to bring in elements of synthpop… and more electronic elements into it.”
Some, such as show headliner Blk Odyssy, refuse any real kind of genre label at all.
“Odyssey means journey, and we consider ourselves a group that creates sonic journeys,” he said in his post-performance interview. “It’s not bound to any particular genre… sometimes it's rock, sometimes it's hip hop, sometimes it's R&B… whatever the message calls for.”
Time Worm, of Spokane, came together piecemeal through jam session meetups and songwriting sessions, coming up with a sound as they went.
“Indy [Heyer] and I met at a jam sesh in town, started writing stuff right away… Drew [Brererton] was a friend of ours, and he came on board like a year after that, and we’ve been flying ever since,” lead vocalist J.I. Gassen said. “It’s like indie, funk, psychedelic… whatever the song calls for.”
Gassen reiterated how important music and events like Boomjam are to Spokane, hammering on the importance of the local music scene.
“The music scene in Spokane is sick,” he said, “I want Boomjam to keep growing… There are a lot of bands [in Spokane] that are hungry, and I don’t want them to move to LA or Nashville. Let’s make Spokane the next thing.”
Gassen’s message jives with the main idea behind Boomjam: community. As the day waned into purple evening and then full-on night, community is the only word that could describe the festival grounds. Kids and adults blew bubbles, people hula-hooped and hacky-sacked on the grass. Sponsor Washington Trust Bank handed out glowsticks and earplugs, and the sound booth for the main stage had constant sticks of incense burning. Along with the herbal, comforting smell, laughter and applause filled the air throughout the day as a city came together to celebrate music with each other.
There is an artistic drive in Spokane, and it can be felt in events like Boomjam Music Festival. Should it continue to put on fantastic showcases like it did this year, and inspire others in Spokane to look under the surface of this unlikely cultural hub, the perception of this strange little city might change for the better.
Comments