L-R: Head Like a Kite, Fresh Espresso, Truckasauras (images from Marlon Schaeffer, Sound on the Sound and Kyle Johnson)

"Director's Cut" by Head Like a Kite feat. Tilson

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"Angels Sound Like Bottle Rockets" by Truckasauras

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"We Desire What's Real" by Fresh Espresso

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Head Like an Espresso Truck is a Seattle-centric display of musical bonhomie and experimentalism, a one-off team-up between local acts Head Like a Kite, Fresh Espresso, and Truckasauras. It goes down Friday, Feb. 12 at Neumos and then never again.

The concert channels our city's pop musical zeitgeist by exalting the possibilities of the hybrid. In Seattle's current pop landscape, the genres of '60s/'70s garage rock, folk, and the now-meaninglessly named "indie-rock" are all seeing a few one-trick ponies make great art while everyone else just stands around. Swollen with broken-record bands, the traditionalist style is staling, and the best new music is in fringes and overlaps.

As an event, Head Like an Espresso Truck is one big fringe overlap. Each participating band is a blend — Head Like a Kite is electro-pop/rock, Fresh Espresso is electro-rap, Truckasauras (aka the best band in Seattle) is instrumental electro-post-rock/hiphop — and the event will blend them together, making various metablends. Using the same set of instruments, each will play a solo set, cover some of the other groups' songs, and then participate in a tripartite group finale. It will be jam-y, but rehearsed.

I have it on good word that Truckasauras will cover Fresh Espresso's "Diamond Pistols," one of Seattle's biggest '09 rap smashes. Judging by Truckasauras' previous success with covers — an analog synth flip of KRS-One's "The Bridge is Over," a screaming/soaring take on Sleepy Eyes of Death's "Crushed by Stars" — I'm expecting greatness. The original "Diamond Pistols" syncopates a big melodic hook with the beat for a vicious swing, and it'll be interesting to see what Truckasauras does with that, whether it plays up the song's cock-and-blast energy or tries to pull off something more subdued.

Something else to look forward to: Truckasauras' Tyler Swan will have his drums on stage, which doesn't normally happen (he normally uses drum machines in the band). He's a local drummer worth celebrating, capable of turning out nuanced break beats on a three-piece kit. Head Like a Kite drummer Trent Moorman is no slack either, and he'll have his kit on stage, too. It's not unreasonable to expect a drum-off.

Wrapped up in the structure of the event is a sales pitch, and it's one we need to hear in this city more often. It says: "Tonight, you will be entertained because we have theorized, practiced, and prioritized the live experience. We are focused on making something happen before your eyes and ears, rather than doing what all the other bands in Seattle are doing, which is use staggered, limited-time stage allotments to play identical sets to the ones they played last week."

Really, there's not much reason to see a local concert if it's just going to be groups trying to look like they know what they're doing. Much better that local musicians push themselves. Head Like an Espresso Truck is part of the solution.