SEATTLE — By now, the sweat has dried. So have the signatures on the stacks of records the guys from Washington's buzziest band, Enumclaw, sold during what frontman Aramis Johnson deems the young indie rockers' top local show to date — a Friday night album-release bash recently at a packed Easy Street Records, a rite of passage for hometown acts on their way up.
Between a wonky power strip, a brief duct tape shortage and a sliding drum kit, it almost went off the rails. In what might have been the grittiest show of support for the rising quartet that's become the talk of western Washington, a friend of Johnson's cousin knelt in front of the kick drum to physically hold it in place during a fun and frenzied set that, for about an hour, turned the West Seattle shop into the coolest punk house on California Avenue Southwest. More than three weeks later, dude's ears are probably still ringing.
"The drummer needed so much help tonight," jokes LaDaniel Gipson, the soft-spoken, steady-handed drummer in question who's perched on the ledge of Easy Street's outdoor parklet as cars whiz by.
