Album Reviews [VOX HUMANA] I don’t envy any new artist trying to get themselves noticed these days. Unless they’re packing some major-label heat, the only way to crack the full-to-bursting head and hard-dri   More

Album Reviews [MATH POP] Tender, the four-song sophomore release from Portland trio Wax Fingers, finds the group growing further accustomed to life within its oddly colored shell. A group of psychedelic day   More

Album Reviews [HEAVY POP] Amateur Hypnotist opens with 3½ minutes of queasy, warped-tape instrumental fare. That shaky stretch of sound serves as fair warning to ye brave souls who dare venture beyond. Thoug   More

Album Reviews [PO-HOP] Portland rapper Cassow (pronounced KAH-so, as in Picasso) has fast become known for his ability to rap thought-provoking lyrics, but it was one of his recent tweets that had a big effect    More

Album Reviews [POST-HIP-HOP] The Chicharones are best experienced live. This isn’t likely to change, barring the release of a high-budget 3-D live show on Blu-ray, because so much of what makes the Chicharone   More

Album Reviews [HAZE HOP] Do you smoke good? Lawz and G_Force, aka Green Team, sure do, and they’d like to tell you about it. On the duo’s new 10-track “concept album,” Official, the MC/producers rhyme o   More

Album Reviews [BEAT POP] I really want to compare Fanno Creek to the Shaky Hands. It’s not that the trio’s sound particularly reminds of that gone-but-not-forgotten Portland act—sure, there’s some jangl   More

Album Reviews [SPACE DISCO] Even more so on In Absentia than on its previous releases, Pegasus Dream achieves a sunny, seamless concatenation of melodies similar to that perfected by Starfucker and attempted    More

Album Reviews [BAROQUE POP] Robbie Augspurger may have been born in the wrong decade. In his photography, the Portlander captures contemporary characters in classic formal poses, their hair neatly slicked or br   More

Album Reviews [JANGLE FOLK] Dave Shur is a master of taking somberness and peppering it with giddiness and goofballery. He’s a melodic acrobat who can lull you into a folksy, dreamlike haze then snap you righ   More