So I missed Partman Parthorse last night. I was at Tara Thomas’ art show at the Anne Bonney and got out a little late. (A word about LaTara’s show: Go see now. Girl has spent her life pasting together amazing scrapbook collages that bend your mind and twist your funnybone. It was great to see a bunch of “art patrons” just sitting on couches, paging through scrapbooks in rapt attention).

For some inexplicable reason PMPH went on first and their set was cut short due to some sort of altercation, so by the time I arrived the Coconut Coolouts were setting up. The Coolouts started their first song with their bassist taking a pratfall over his amp and trying to recover while the dick-end of his banana suit kept getting caught in cords and straps, turning the situation into a Jerry Lewis skit. It was wholly unintentional, but I think they should start all their shows like this from now on. They did their usual good-time party bop and left everyone smiling.

Next, Natalie Portman’s Shaved Head busted out with some aerobic electro-pop. The matching white outfits, sweatbands and exercise routine schtick was a bit tired, but the youngsters rose above these self-imposed limitations and fully committed themselves to their steez, especially their singer/robot-dancer/gutarist. Give them a little time and hopefully they will be able to transcend the Anna Oxygen-meets-the Fitness-lite corner they seem to have painted themselves into.

I didn’t see No-Fi Soul Rebellion.

The Columbia City Theater is a beautiful, smallish old vaudeville theater, and it’ll be nice to see more shows happening there. There are some kinks to work out in the sound (they didn’t seem prepared to run electronic instruments through the board) and it’s in an area that’s not the most convenient location for a lot of people to get to, but it’s great to see an all-ages venue that also serves alcohol and seems to have reconciled the two pretty well.