Later this week, I will take a brief summer vacation to go to Florida for three days. I’ll be visiting family in the Sarasota/Tampa area, on the Gulf Coast.

I’m hoping to take advantage of this time away from Portland to check out a different local scene, and maybe catch a regional band that would never tour to the Northwest, far away as we are from their sunny Florida home. So I’m doing some research on bands and venues in the Sarasota area, figuring I can go as far afield as Tampa to catch a show… and I’m coming up empty-handed. Can’t find anything worth a damn. I know that we’re in a comfortable position to easily look down with disdain at virtually any other music scene in the country, but surely there’s got to be one band worth seeing. The only things that seem to be happening are a whole bunch of cover bands.

There is a Tampa band called Zillionaire who have some passable songs on their MySpace page. Sadly, they will not be playing any shows during my brief stay.

So, if you have any tips on some cool Florida bands who play the Gulf Coast, let me know. Meanwhile, I’ll be combing through Creative Loafing to find something to occupy myself.