WE EVEN LOST AT COFFEE: Portland’s
competitive impulses are being beaten down. The Blazers sucked, the
Timbers may suck, and even our competitive coffeemakers were whupped at
the U.S. Barista Championship last weekend at the Oregon
Convention Center. Only Coava Coffee’s Devin Chapman made it to the
final round, where his 15-minute routine—set to a Bon Iver song and
yielding three coffee drinks—was only good for fourth place. A barista
from New York’s Counter Culture won, with two Californians taking second and third. Read our full report here.
TOO YOUNG TO DIE: One of Portland’s most promising young indie-rock bands, Youth, called it quits April 18, citing creative differences. The band, which WW featured in a November 2011 story, released just one three-song EP since its 2010 formation, the excellent June,
which is available for free at the band’s Bandcamp page. Three of the
band’s four members will join Typhoon drummer Pieter Hilton for the
summer as a group called Genders, which plans to record in the
coming months. “Losing the momentum that Youth was gaining is something
we all worried about,” Youth’s Maggie Morris, who will continue to play
with Genders, tells Scoop. “But in the end, feeling happy, productive
and creatively excited won out over the popularity of the name.”
TOUR DE FORCE: Kung Fu Theater,
the Hollywood Theatre’s monthly showcase of crane kicks, tiger claws
and batshit storytelling, is hitting the road. Programmer Dan Halsted,
who in 2009 unearthed a trove of old-school martial-arts flicks
from a shuttered movie theater in Vancouver, B.C., will host double
features of rare 35 mm prints in Chicago, San Francisco, New York and
Los Angeles, preceded by a slide show illustrating the story of how he
came across the chop-socky goldmine.
SUPER GIRLS: Comic festivals generally feature more social anxiety-riddled dudes than they do sexy, scantily clad young women, but Stumptown Comics Festis doing its bit to change that reputation. This Saturday, April 28, über-nerdy Portland tease troupe Critical Hit Burlesque
will take to the Bossanova Ballroom stage—probably dressed as famed
comic characters like Poison Ivy and Batgirl—to shake rumps for the
undersexed comic-book industry. The party, dubbed Geeklesque, should be
hotter and less creepy than that creepy Alan Moore book about underage
sex. And easier to find, too—the show is $15 and open to the 21-and-over
public. Do your bit and hook up with a lonely letterer or color
correctionist tonight.
YOUTH - IMAGE: Matthew Ross
