Music Two festivals hit Portland this week: Only one shall exit alive!

On the surface, Lilith (formerly Lilith Fair) and the Waterfront Blues Festival don’t have much in common. One is a low-key, estrogen-fueled singer-songwriter road show; the other is a predominantly male, local festival aimed at the lawnchair-toting Portland Tribune demographic. On the other hand, they wor...   More

Music Kurt Hagardorn Leaves
(Self-Released)

[SOFT POP] When we last checked in with Kurt Hagardorn, the North Carolina transplant had just released Ten Singles, a severely overlooked collection of smooth twang-pop that sounded like it was straight out of the ’70s. At the time, we explained Hagardorn as a very talented mimic; an immensely enjoyable one-trick p...   More

Music I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch In The House The Sounds Of Dying
(Suburban Home Records)

[COUNTRY ROCK] When I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch in the House broke up in 2006, frontman Michael Dean Damron had already started on a new journey as a singer-songwriter. He was learning to craft his music without the safety net of a big, sweaty, shit-kicking country rock band behind hi...   More

Music By Dark Time Sunshine

5. The Nachables: One Lunchables package, covered in hot nacho cheese, with a suicide Slurpee.4. Burger Box With Fries: One hot dog-shaped burger with cheese and the works, covered in hot nacho cheese with Jays shoestring potato chips on top. Washed down with cherry Dr. Pepper.3. El Ranch Hand: Chopped-up chicken tenders covered in pico de ...   More

Top 5 5. The Nachables: One Lunchables package, covered in hot nacho cheese, with a suicide Slurpee.4. Burger Box With Fries: One hot dog-shaped burger with cheese and the works, covered in hot nacho cheese ...   More

Music This weekend, LCD Soundsystem graced the stage twice in the Northwest—first at the Roseland on Saturday and then on the mainstage of the Sasquatch! festival on Sunday night. I was there for the Sasquatch! show, and the band sounded incredible: Seven musicians onst...   More

Music Blitzen Trapper Destroyer Of The Void
(Sub Pop)

[OUTLAW FOLK-ROCK] There are risks to opening your album with a six-minute epic. Especially when the song in question is a sonic departure wherein your band’s signature Southern rock harmonies clash violently against unmistakable Queen and Bowie-mused rock operatics. The first risk is that longtime fans won&rsquo...   More

Music Brown Caesar 4 Tha Crown
(Broken Homes)

[HIP-HOP] The greatest gift an MC can have is a recognizable voice, and Portland’s Brown Caesar (formerly Santotzin) certainly fits that bill. While his lyrical stick-and-move brings some comparisons to mind—a touch of House of Pain’s B-Real, a little GZA, perhaps—his voice is pretty unique: conversatio...   More

Music By John Roderick Of The Long Winters

5. Flat topography encourages hippies to build ridiculous bicycles.4. Application to become fourth member of Menomena rejected on the grounds that I was “too fat/not bicurious enough.”3. Plenty of contact with smug, self-satisfied white people in Seattle; no need to relocate. 2. The prospect of eating steak...   More

Music In a digital world, Portland seeks to redefine the mom-and-pop record shop.

By Jenny Tatone

Times aren’t getting any easier for traditional record stores. As iTunes sold 5 billion tracks between 2003 and 2008, some 3,100 record stores across the nation shuttered. Yet there’s a feeling—in Portland, at least—that interest is growing aga...   More