Performance Christmas is a divisive holiday. There are those who decorate their lawns in November and revel in each tinsel-strewn moment with the slack-jawed grin and open wallet of a Midwesterner at Disney   More

Music Slowcore outfit Low is probably the last band you'd ever expect to record a Christmas song. Led by married couple Alan Sparhawk (guitar, whispered voice) and Mimi Parker (drums, whispered voice), the trio traffic in long, glacial songs that barely crawl past a healthy gallop. But despite the gravity of its recorded work, Low has a secret softer side that is revealed in concert, where it tends to cover ...   More

News Chris Willis really, really digs Santa Claus. In fact, the Southwest Portland artist is so taken with St. Nick he's collected 150 vintage light up effigies of the jolly old elf, specifically blow molds from Empire Plastics Corp., a "now defunct Tarboro, NC-based company that produced the joyful figures from 1968-1985." (He's also got a ton of snowmen, angels, reindeer and elves.) Bask in the electric ...   More