Album Reviews
[HEARTBROKEN ROCK] Don’t be fooled by the picture on the
cover of Scout Niblett’s new album, a photo-booth shot of a couple in
full make-out mode. The heart of It’s Up to Emma is not a
rom
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Music
When I first moved to Portland about 15 years ago, the fun kneejerk complaint was directed at Californians who migrated north to take advantage of our lack of sales tax, better coffee, and milder weather. Now, it would seem the tables have started to turn. Over the last six to eight months, a slow but steady trickle of people from our fair city are starting to head to sunnier climes, with a ...
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Album Reviews
[INSTRUMENTAL MINIMALISM] Ambient music
is a dangerous proposition for even the most studied of musicians. The
combination of elongated drones, stillness and washes of synth has to be
measured p
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MusicMasaki Batoh's performance last night was part experimental concert, part technology demonstration. The leader of the long-running psychedelic outfit from Japan known as Ghost, Batoh cooked up a device known as a More
Music Stories
[HIP-HOP HERESY] Early on Soopah Eype’s most recent mixtape, El Planeta de los Simios
(that’s “Planet of the Apes” for those without access to Google
Translate), the Portland rapper drops
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Music
Even if you've never had the privilege of visiting the Northeast Portland home of Ju Suk Reet Meate and Rock & Roll Jackie, if you've heard some of the deliciously overstuffed music the two have recorded as The Tenses or as members of the long-running collective Smegma, yo...
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Album Reviews
[GARAGE POP] True fans of the Shivas have already heard
the songs on their second album a dozen times over, either through
seeing the quartet’s sensational live show or by purchasing a copy of W
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Album Reviews
[ELECTRO-POP] Kevin Robinson has already made his name as
one half of dream-pop duo Viva Voce and the countrified Blue Giant, and
he’s got enough cultural currency saved up to indulge in whateve
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Music Stories
The phrase that gets tossed around most often when
publicists and writers talk about the music of Portland’s Shook Twins is
“quirky folk.” It’s a simple enough descriptor that’s great to
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Music
These are boom times for fans and players of solo guitar music. The past few years have seen an impressive glut of new and reissued recordings that feature a performer eking out beautiful, eerie, and sometimes grotesque noise from a six- or 12-string. The first few months of this year alone have seen the release of some amazing documents from the past, including reissues of More