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Laura Gibson/Ethan Rose Collaboration Due in February

Michael Mannheimer — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 18:33:52 +0000

I’ve probably said this here before, but no album has more excited for 2010 than Laura Gibson’s collaboration with sound sculptor Ethan Rose. Though we still don’t have too much concrete information on the release, we do know this: the record is called Bridge Carols, and it’s out on February 9 via Holocene Music.

A few months ago I spoke to Gibson about Bridge Carols (at the time she couldn’t reveal the title), and she mentioned that the basis of the project was to make each other uncomfortable. Rose’s music, until this point, has mostly been wordless, while Gibson has often fought to escape her tag as a folky singer-songwriter. Gibson said that many of the compositions were created almost on the spot, as she improved and sang over Rose’s clanging, elliptical backdrops. And judging from the first thing we’ve heard from the pair—the floating, almost weightless “Sun”—it’s also going to be a record of understated beauty. I wrote about “Sun” when it was included on the 2009 PDX Pop Now! compilation, but here’s another peak.

Download audio file (Sun.mp3)

From the duo’s MySpace page:

It began as a conversation of mutual appreciation and curiosity – a shared desire to challenge old ways of working. Ethan had mostly distanced his music from words, while Laura had often felt bound by them.

They began experimenting with different methods of collaboration. Inspired by Laura’s voice, Ethan began building soundscapes, while Laura looked through piles of notebooks, coming across old phrases that never found home in verses or rhymes. They began recording Laura singing these unused writings.

As the project developed, Laura began improvising lyrics and wordless vocalizations, stream of consciousness singing that tumbled out of her in long trailing waves. They recorded in the basement, the forest, and the field – each session having its own unique mood as Laura reflected from subject to subject.

Ethan then took the recorded words and vocalizations from these sessions – cutting them into bits and pieces – rearranging and juxtaposing them against each other to stretch them into new musical poems. These reconstructed lyrical fragments maintained the tone of Laura’s original improvisations while allowing new themes and meanings to emerge. With these vocal collages in place, Ethan would reshape tones and sounds around Laura’s words. The resulting pieces developed into songs. The songs developed into a record.

Links:
Laura Gibson & Ethan RoseSpace
Holocene Music

Photo courtesy of LG & ER

Ethan Rose & Laura Gibson, “Sun,” 2009 PDX Pop Now! Compilation I love son
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Tash of the Likwit Crew (and Friends) in Portland Tonight and Tomorrow

Casey Jarman — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 21:13:20 +0000

We didn’t have time to squeeze this into the paper, but there are two hip-hop shows of note tonight and tomorrow, both featuring Tash of the Alkaholiks and Prince Po. For this we can thank PDX hip-hop mogul My-G and his faithful companion DJ Wicked, who host tomorrow night’s big show at the Crown Room.

See the flier below for tomorrow’s show info. But if you’re under 21, or just have some free time this evening, howzabout checking out Prince Po, Tash, Black Silver, Main Flow, Kiew Nycon and Sleep at 7 pm tonight at Someone Clothing (2718 SW Kelli).

It’s quite a lineup. I even made a mixtape of ‘em, but it doesn’t seem to be working right now. So here’s a link to the new single from Prince Po and Black Silver. Good stuff.

And as a bonus (because I love you), here’s a new track from My-G. It’s called “We Need Change,” and it was inspired by the 2003 police shooting of Kendra James, a dark chapter in Portland history that gets rightfully mentioned a lot by local MCs and activists.

Download audio file (weneedchange.mp3)

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May Ling, Lion Tamer

Michael Mannheimer — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:01:00 +0000

UPDATE: No video for you! See comments section. You know what feature I’ve missed most on LocalCut the last, oh, six weeks since things haven’t been working properly? Random Video Tuesday. In honor of my favorite neglected weekly online column—and the fact that most of the LC kinks have been fixed—I’d like to share a little something with you: the (sorta) new video for May Ling’s bouncy “New Year,” which is way more AWESOME than it is random.

There’s really no use in describing this, other than saying “New Year” is over three minutes of singer Alberta Poon (you might know her from Wet Confetti and Reporter) dancing with a lion dance master from the Portland Lee’s Association Lion Dance Team. It’s colorful, it’s bright, and it’s got soul. The video premiered (I think) at the LABELMATES night at Holocene at the end of October, and now it’s available online:

NEW YEAR: May Ling from TheWhitemanBrothers on Vimeo.

Links:
May LingSpace
Portland Lee’s Association

Thanks to the Penny Jam for the tip

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Tender Forever Cover “My Love” For Shoot the Player

Michael Mannheimer — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 00:33:59 +0000

Remember a few months ago when we mentioned that an Australian version of the Take Away Show was in town for two days? Back in July, I was lucky enough to randomly end up at Cartopia just as whimsical-pop trio Nurses were filming their take in front of Potato Champion. I later met producer Amelia Tovey and talked to her about her online video project, Shoot the Player. It’s a little later than they expected, but Shoot the Player has finally released the first few gems from the sessions: a series of clips with Tender Forever, including Melanie Valera’s cute cover of Justin Timberlake’s “My Love” filmed in the Ladd’s Addition rose garden.

Tender Forever: My Love (Justin Timberlake) + Boyz II Men outro. from shoottheplayer.com on Vimeo.

Here’s what Tovey says about the project:

I was in Portland for 48 hours. On our first night there Tender Forever happened to be playing a gig in a square downtown along with Nurses & some other bands. Her passionate Wii drumming & offstage unplugged ukulele playing had us hooked. We arranged to meet up the next day & shoot a couple of tracks – when we arrived at her place she suggested we drive to a pretty location she knew, and 20 minutes later deep in the suburbs of Portland, we found ourselves in the aptly romantic setting of an enormous rose garden.

Southeast Portland’s not quite the suburbs, but still. This footage is great, and I can’t wait to see what see did with Lovers and Nurses. Here are two more videos from Ladd’s Addition.

Tender Forever: Every Monday & Boy Life In America from shoottheplayer.com on Vimeo.

Tender Forever: Take It Off from shoottheplayer.com on Vimeo.

Links:
Tender ForeverSpace
Shoot the Player

Screen cap taken from the video

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Portland Cello Project: Texas Love (Lubbock, Austin, & Houston)

Local Cut — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 00:04:59 +0000

I’ve learned writing this tour blog that I’m unfairly prejudiced against Juggalos.

(And I’ll admit it when I’m wrong. Juggalos are awesome people and they mean us no harm, right?)

Writing this blog has been like a journey of humbling, personal awakening.

Because now I’ve learned that I was also unfairly predisposed to think that our four shows in Texas would be a little…rough. One was, after all, in a saloon and another one in a sports pub.

But I cannot express how pleasantly, happily, wonderfully surprised we all were!

Don’t get me wrong—these shows were, mostly, completely weird. But in the best, most fun, inspiring way. We’ve met the coolest people in Texas. And it totally inspired us to play pretty much the craziest sets of the tour.

Texas is home to so much rich musical history to draw upon, after all…

Buddy Holly…Pantera…

The Best Ever Death Metal Band out of Denton…

Anyway, picture, in Lubbock, a packed room with the audience exactly on cue, no hesitation, just like in Pee Wee’s Big Adventure.

I say:
“The Stars at night are big and bright—”

In spontaneous chorus:
CLAP – CLAP – CLAP
“Deep in the heart of Texas!”

That was at the last of four straight shows in Texas, which culminated in this Supersized Sports Bar in a strip mall in Lubbock called Jake’s. On its website, this bar boasts 60 television sets. There were three in the men’s bathroom alone.

In spite of all outward appearances and the context through my admittedly, and now ashamedly, prejudiced eyes, this was easily one of the coolest shows of the tour. It was definitely the most energetic.

Don’t get me wrong: the four weeks so far of this marathon national tour have been superb (excepting Detroit, which was—in any event—fascinating sociologically.) I know I’m skipping over the NE in this blog—all the NE shows were great. Sold out Bowery Ballroom, sold out Black Cat, packed Middle East, all wonderful audiences…Philadelphia, Atlanta, etc. It was all a marathon in the NE: 12 straight shows with no break.

And yes, the back room of this Lubbock sports bar compared with all of those shows… as did the show outdoors at the Mohawk in Austin…as did the show at Warehouse Live in Houston…

Two weeks ago NYC easily took first place in our “Hey Ya!” competition. It was New York on the last night of the World Series and the venue was nonetheless completely packed, and we played what will probably end up being my favorite performance of the tour (the sound was pristine, the audience was dead silent while we played and beyond exuberant between songs and when they were singing along).

We didn’t think anyone would outdo NYC in terms of exuberance in the “Hey Ya!” competition (partly because the judge of the competition, Adam Thompson, is from Brooklyn).

But even Adam couldn’t really deny that the crowd on this balmy Texas night at a packed (I think sold out) Mohawk in Austin—a cool outdoor venue with outdoor balconies overlooking the stage from two sides. This crowd beat NYC hands down with their singing abilities…

Or at least with their singing volume…

Adam hesitated before delivering his judgment—you could feel his hesitation and internal questioning of “will I give Austin a better score than NYC?”

And then two days later, Lubbock beat Austin hands down, with probably the loudest and most energetic crowd I’ve ever played in front of with any band.

So Texas was great.

In fact, I think you couldn’t pick a better place to spend week four of a national tour than in Texas. You’re tired, and all the shows are running together, and then, boom. Texas. Totally different.

The people are wonderful and hospitable in Texas, especially those who support live indie rock music. (And I want to say that it’s not just Austin, though Austin is as wonderful as it’s cracked up to be, and we couldn’t have asked for a better premier in that city).

Texas is just different. I want to say Texas is weird, but I don’t want to be diminutive. The people communicate in an open and honest way and call you funny names like “sugar” and “honey bunch.” People in Texas seem to say things like “Git yer guns up” when they’re talking about their muscles, and “I’m fixin’ to [verb]” instead of “I’m about to go…”

(For example: “I’m fixin’ to drink my 10982039218123th weird mixture of tequila and beer”.)

Everything is bigger in Texas.

It’s not unusual for people to raise an eyebrow at whatever I say, Texas or not. (I guess I need a better filter.) And in Texas, they definitely raise their eyebrows. But in Texas it never feels like they’re judging; it just feels like they think you’re as adorable in your weirdness as you think they are in their weirdness.

(Whereas in Detroit it felt more like they were as scared of me as I was of them.)

In Texas we’re bonded by weirdness, even though it’s totally different weirdness. We can’t really relate in any way shape or form, but we can relate in the fact that we can’t relate in any way shape or form.

Like polar opposite weirdness.

Or something.

I don’t really know what I’m talking about.

But Texas kicked ass. And was 70 degrees.

And Santa Fe is like 20 degrees and there’s snow on the ground. So the stage is set for Santa Fe.

We’ll bring it. We’re charged up from Texas. So let’s see if Santa Fe and the SW can bring it. Texas raised the bar.

Links:
Portland Cello ProjectSpace

YouTube clip courtesy of “The obviously HD camera on Jessica Taylor’s cell phone.” Photos courtesy of PCP

Portland Cello Project: Band Vs. Tour Santa Cruz
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The Robinsons Want You to Feel the Holiday Spirit

Michael Mannheimer — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:27:11 +0000

The holidays are just around the corner. No, really, I’m not messing with you. It’s Thanksgiving in just nine days! (please don’t try to email me on Black Friday, I’ll be passed out in a pile of gravy). So that also means it’s time to bust out all your favorite Xmas and Hanukkah sweaters and get ready to rock out with your cello out.

For the second straight year, the Portland Cello Project—you might have seen its lively tour blog around these parts—is hosting a big ol’ holiday bash. Only instead of an awkward gathering of relatives, this party consists of a bunch of friends (Panther, Leviethan, the Portland Ukulele Project, and Kevin and Anita Robinson of Viva Voce and Blue Giant) getting trashed off eggnog and playing you all their favorite holiday hits. Plus some Justin Timberlake.

The only downside? The thing costs $13, or $15 if you’re cheap and wait to buy your tickets at the door. But here come Kevin and Anita to the rescue, because they want you to get your holiday cheer on. They also know that it’s been a tough year for the pocketbook. The remedy? The couple is giving away five spots on its guestlist, and all you have to do is email them (therobinsonsmusic@gmail.com, be sure to put “Cello show Dec. 4″ in the subject field) with a good reason why you should bust out your favorite Xmas sweater and join the rocking cellos. Just don’t hit on Anita, ’cause that’s so not cool. Shit, how do you unsend an email?

Man, I’d look really good in this vest:

Links:
The Robinsons blog
Portland Cello ProjectSpace
Ugly Sweater Store

Photo by Alicia J. Rose

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Blind Pilot Plays on CNN

Michael Mannheimer — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 21:19:06 +0000

The signs that local indie-folk outfit Blind Pilot have officially made it are everywhere. The band has opened for the Decemberists and Counting Crows. It has toured stadiums. It finished tied for second place in our 2009 Best New Band poll. And single “Story I Heard” has been downloaded over 2 million times on iTunes—yeah, it was a free download, but still, that’s mighty impressive. A lot of people actually give a damn. So I’m not really surprised at this point when I get an email from my friend and college roommate with a link to a clip of Israel Nebeker and Luke Ydstie performing “Two Towns From Me” on CNN.

Yes, that CNN. The whole thing is super awkward, from the introduction (do Blind Pilot really sound like Death Cab For Cutie?) to the few points where the microphones seem to cut out and you can barely hear Nebeker’s voice. Both players look a little uncomfortable sitting down to play in a newsroom. Still, it’s rad to see any band from Portland getting this kind of major media attention.

So, CNN, when when are you going to invite Explode Into Colors to your set?

Links:
Blind PilotSpace
CNN

Screen cap taken from the video. Yes, this really happened.

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Live Review: The Mountain Goats, Wednesday, Nov. 11 @ the Wonder Ballroom

Ben Waterhouse — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 01:25:07 +0000

Review by WW’s food and theater critic, Ben Waterhouse.

John Darnielle was in a good mood last night. Maybe it was the vegetarian platter he ate for dinner at Queen of Sheba (I was star-struck on the way to the bathroom when I ran across him eating, alone, at the MLK Blvd. Ethiopian joint), but I’ve never seen the Mountain Goats frontman so chatty. He lectured, in his breathless, endearingly geeky style, about the prophet Jonah, the psychological phenomenon of confabulation, the romantic tragedy of Mario Brothers and his realization that the city of Portland, where he spent a year of youthful dissipation, is not out to kill him. More on that later.

These days it really makes sense to call Darnielle, who recorded and performed solo under the Mountain Goats bandle for years, a frontman. The band has now expanded, at least for this tour, to include a fourth member, axman Perry Owen Wright. This formulation of the group is most definitely a rock band, and the show boasted new, loud arrangements of “Handball,” “Against Pollution” and “See America Right.” (check out the whole setlist at the forums).

Darnielle still takes a solo break in the middle of the show, allowing for a nice blend of his old arrangements and new, full-band material. During the solo stretch last night he described the experience of returning to the apartment building on Northeast Broadway where he lived the terrible year that he describes on We Shall All Be Healed. It’s a brick apartment building near the intersection with Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., with one of those clunky call phones at the front door, which Darnielle stared at until a woman walked out, and he walked in. “I found a door I left a scuff mark on when I lived there,” he said. “The mark was still there.” That experience became a song on the new album, “Genesis 3:23.”

By the end of the show, which included a larger-than-usual quantity of biblical imagery, Darnielle was pacing the lip of the stage, reaching out to touch fans, singing through an ecstatic grin. He’s become a sort of preacher of self-revival, unaffected, unselfconscious, apparently reluctantly agnostic. His Gospel consists of rock ‘n’ roll and poetry and no small amount of actual Gospel, and he sells it with inspired fervor. You want holy spirit? The Mountain Goats are possessed.

A word about the opener: In Wednesday’s paper, I described Final Fantasy as “cheery electropop.” This is an inadequate label, drawn from a cursory listening to Owen Pallett’s MySpace tracks. The band’s (it has 1.5 members) live show involves an impressive layering of bloopy keys, tapped drums and violin trills over Pallett’s airy tenor voice. It’s a complex, often dissonant sound, not really my thing but impressive nonetheless. Pallett coaxes a surprisingly broad atmospheric range out of his fiddle, from echoey thrumming and electric rain to big bass thumps and shrieking moans. Some of the tunes were quite beautiful.

John Darnielle with Owen Pallett in Seattle last weekend:

The Mountain Goats + Final Fantasy from CakeIn15 on Vimeo.

Links:
The Mountain GoatSpace
Final FantasySpace

Photo courtesy of the Mountain Goats

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Win Two Tickets to see Saul Williams! Easiest Contest Ever!

Casey Jarman — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:36:49 +0000

Avante Garde musician/poet Saul Williams—who visits Portland Sunday—has worked with a lot of artists: Trent Reznor, DJ Krust, DJ Spooky, Coldcut and recently, the Arditti Quartet. Each of these collaborations has sounded distinct (hell, anything Williams touches sounds unique), and each has been an experiment in genre-crossing. Few artists are more passionate and immediate as Williams, and his career gets more interesting as time goes on.

So, for this giveaway, we’re asking two questions: Who should Williams work with next, and what should the title of their collaboration be. Got it? Post your answer in the comments section with your full name (YOU MUST INCLUDE YOUR FULL NAME) and we’ll decide on a winner tomorrow afternoon. You can be funny, you can come up with something incredibly smart—you can enter as many times as you like. Our favorite collabo wins the two tickets for Sunday’s show.

If you want to get some ideas, check out Williams’ recent shopping selections at Amoeba Records:

Or, check out this intense video of Saul’s collaboration with DJ Krust:

Good luck. And whether or not you win, you should know about Saul Williams’ Visit: Saul Williams plays the Aladdin Theater on Sunday, Nov. 15, with CX Kidtronic & Tchaka Diallo, Earl Greyhound and American Fangs. 8 pm. $15. All ages.

Links:
Saul Williams

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New Ghost To Falco Vinyl Out This Month (With Guest Appearances Galore! MP3s here!)

Casey Jarman — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:24:46 +0000

Whoah, this was unexpected. We knew Portland experimental rock/folk/etc. trio Ghost to Falco had been touring a lot, but we didn’t know there was a record coming out so soon. The band, currently in Europe, will release third full-length Exotic Believers as a ~~vinyl-only~~ (I’ve been informed that there will also be a CD version) release before the month is out.

If you haven’t checked out Ghost to Falco, you really should. Eric Crespo’s group plays a lyrically conscious experimental folk-pop with nods to post-punk acts like Fugazi and Cursive. Just when one anticipates Crespo’s next twist or turn, he injects a jazzy departure or wall of noise into the mix. And while Crespo has played with a handful of musicians under the GtF monker, the band’s recent local lineup—with AAN’s Bud Wilson and Ohioan’s Ryne Warner—is quite a formidable one.

Even more exciting, this new release features appearances from an impressive list of local contributors (highlighted below). Fans of Portland’s experimental music and pop scenes should have their jaws drop a bit at it.

Here are two of the disc’s tracks, “Secrets of the Free” and “Comfort Series #2.”
Download audio file (secretsofthefree.mp3)
Download audio file (comfortseries2.mp3)

Unfortunately, Crespo and his crew won’t be home to celebrate the record’s release until the aforementioned Infinite Front label debut and Exotic Believers release show on Jan. 16 at Artistery. But holy cow is that going to be a show. Here’s a chunk of the press release:

Ghost to Falco’s long awaited, highly anticipated follow-up to 2007’s Like This Forever is finally being released on vinyl. Exotic Believers is an achievement in forward-thinking/ancestor-respecting experimental music. It was recorded over a year between tours onto an analog 1/2″ 8 track machine in a giant warehouse. In addition to songwriter Eric Crespo and GtF mainstays Ryne Warner and Bud Wilson, Exotic Beleivers features performances from musical acts such as Dragging an Ox through Water, Evolutionary Jass Band, Horse Feathers, Shaky Hands, Argumentix, Parenthetical Girls, Reporter, Au, and many more. This is a split release with Portland’s Infinite Front collective.

You’ll be able to order the disc shortly at Cape & Chalice Records (or pick it up, presumably, from finer local retailers). If you’re hungry for more info on GtF and the new disc, here’s the band’s new bio, which explains how the new disc and its many collaborations came about:

Ghost to Falco strives. It strives to reach the unattainable—the perfect chord progression, the combination of tones that unlock secret passages and long forgotten dreams, the unknowable, the unanswerable, the mystery tied into existence. And it does so with a level of honesty that is more in line with the void-probing writers of bygone eras, than with the plethora of modern freak folkers or neon-clad, technology-addled trend setters.

Ghost to Falco is essentially the brain child of one, Eric Crespo. Starting in 2001 as a one man guitar symphony of sorts, he set out on a solitary path onto the highways of America, crisscrossing it more times than he could count, playing any ramshackle living room or dwindling institution of live music he could find. As long as there was anyone who cared to listen, he was happy to share his unique quest to bridge the gap between his two loves; avant-garde weird America and the more tuneful turf of the enlightened songwriter. Eventually he added Europe to his touring repertoire and released two fantastic, but under the radar full lengths, on fledgling labels—2004’s torn or broken, shadowed or dark, cast off all doubts and ride the flames to freedom and 2007’s Like This Forever.

In 2007, after returning from a month and a half of solid touring in Italy and Germany, Crespo came back to his adopted home of Portland, OR and got to work on the recordings that would become the third Ghost to Falco album, Exotic Believers. Recording took place in a makeshift studio housed in a former Oriental rug warehouse downtown, two blocks from Powell’s Book Store—all of it recorded on a ½ inch analog 8 track machine—an old fashioned recording device made for amateur hobbyists, being used here to its full capacity by an obsessive auteur to create a magnum opus that he couldn’t be sure would ever see the light of day. No labels hassling about the release date. It simply had to get made for the sake of getting this stuff out of a brain and into the world. There was no choice and he worked with what he had. Between continuing to tour, the schedules of the 30 collaborators, and the perfectionism of the mastermind, the project was two years in the making. But good god it was worth it.

The role of the 30 Portland folks who played on this thing cannot be underestimated. Super hotshots like Brian Mumford (Dragging an Ox through Water), Jonathan Sielaf (Au), Heather Broderick (Efterklang, Horse Feathers), Nick Delffs (Shaky Hands), Bob Jones (Evolutionary Jass Band), Rachael Jensen (Parenthetical Girls), Nick Bindeman (Jackie O Motherfucker, Tunnels), Mike McKinnon (Reporter), and O Ryne Warner (Ohioan, Castanets) to name a few, appear to have roles written specifically for their talents in this vast soundscape. “It should have some Brian Mumford style gnarly electronics here,” or “This needs Mike Mckinnon hitting the drums really hard here” or “Bob Jones should be bowing super low notes on the double bass here.” Couple solid structure with the spontaneous combustion of mega talents feeding off one another in the same studio and the result is an inspired collaboration that showcases what the best of the best are bringing to the table these days.

Stylistically, there are familiar touchstones here and there. One could reference some early Neil Young, maybe a hint of SPK, some old Alan Lomax southern field recording there, some Steve Reich here, some Leonard Cohen there. Not in direct conscious influence from these artists, but rather the writer’s brain momentarily tuned into and taking direction from the same cosmic voices – shaping the transmissions into something both modern and timeless – something wholly his own.

This is an epic if there ever was one. Shadowy paths lead you out onto the wide open mesa, throw you over deep canyons, and finally submerge you in cleansing rivers. Exotic Believers leaves you sitting next to the warmth of the fire wondering what to make of all this—the existence of this world, having grown into what it is without your permission or even your agreement.

The record is over. What are you going to do now?

Image courtesy of Ghost to FalcoSpace.

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