Tacoma's Mono in VCF first caught my imaginary ear back in 2005, when the band played live on KEXP's Audioasis and completely blew me away with their catchy hooks, their swirly wall-of-sound aesthetic, and great vocals. I was so impressed that I immediately interviewed the band, and we subsequently reviewed their debut release, The Voltage Control EP.

The band seemingly went on hiatus for awhile (or at least, I didn't hear much from them), and re-emerged with a new lead singer, this time a female one (Kim Miller), and with a stunning gig -- opening for the legendary Jarvis Cocker at the Showbox back in April. I intended to catch their set that night, but an hour before showtime was wiped out by my first (and hopefully, only) case of food poisoning. Ack! So I managed to satiate my Mono in VCF curiosity at Bumbershoot by catching a few songs in their set at the Sky Church.

While the band still heavily features the reverby sound I remember them for, they seem more dramatic and less hook-laden than I remember. Miller's voice is lovely and definitely sounds trained in all the right places, though overall I would have liked to see her move about a bit more during the performance and engage the audience. I'm a sucker for an animated frontman (or woman).

A little birdy named Martin told me the band has a record in the works, so we'll get to hear how the whole shebang translates to our iPods and home/car stereos very, very soon...

In the meantime, we had not one but two awesome photographers at the show: C. Charles Bowden and Eduardo Brambila. Check out their great photos below:

Mono in VCF photos from C. Charles Bowden

Mono in VCF photos from Eduardo Brambila: