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FRIDAY, APRIL 22
Dance of the Dream Man: A Twin Peaks Story
[DANCE FOR TV PEOPLE] Trip the Dark's theater-dance hybrid should hold diehards over until the Twin Peaks reboot, which is haunting the internet with rumors of a 2016-17 release date. This show, staged in a theater that looks like a railcar next to North Portland's train tracks, includes tap dance, burlesque on Fridays and the show's token drink: coffee. Friday shows include Black Lodge Burlesque (21+). The Headwaters Theatre, 55 NE Farragut St., No. 9. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, April 21-30. $15.
The 1491s
[COMEDY] Doing a comedy show at the Portland Art Museum in conjunction with the Contemporary Native Photographers exhibition may not sound like a recipe for success. Words like "irreverent" in the description are dog whistles to warn old people who don't like jokes. But the 1491s—a Native American group that made a name for itself with YouTube videos and a funny but incredibly awkward Daily Show segment about the Washington football team's mascot—is used to performing under uncomfortable conditions. Read the Q&A. Portland Art Museum, 1219 SW Park Ave., 503-226-2811. 7 pm Friday, April 22. $19.99. 13+.
Federale, the Shivas, Hickory Justice
[SPAGHETTI COUNTRY AND WESTERN] Portland's Federale has gradually evolved from a glorified Ennio Morricone tribute to a band capable of creating its own vivid soundtrack music. Tonight, the band previews tracks from its upcoming new album, including "All the Colours of the Dark," which is set to appear in director Ana Lily Amirpour's upcoming film The Bad Batch, starring Keanu Reeves and Jim Carrey. Dante's, 350 W Burnside St. 9 pm. $12. 21+.
Fruition
[STRINGS ATTACHED] At this point, it's no great stretch to call the quintet Portland's most popular Americana ensemble. They have sold out venues as large as Revolution Hall, toured with some of the major names in modern roots music, and are about to headline two nights at Wonder Ballroom. But you wouldn't know that from reading this paper, or any other in town, or from attending Pickathon, which the band has all but given up on ever being invited to. None of this has left the members of Fruition particularly aggrieved. They understand the stigma of being a 21st century string band, even though their sound—warm and historically informed, closer to the Band than the Lumineers—defies a lot of those preconceived biases. Wonder Ballroom, 128 NE Russell St., on Friday and Saturday, April 22-23. 9 pm. $17 advance, $20 day of show, $30 two-day pass. 21+.
Green Room
[MOVIE NIGHT] Green Room is a violent high-tension thriller filmed and set in Oregon. It's also the newest by acclaimed young director Jeremy Saulnier, whose 2013 film Blue Ruin was a breakout hit. Saulnier ratchets up the tension after the band's members lock themselves in the titular Green Room, with a dead girl they were not supposed to see and a bouncer they take hostage. Outside, the white supremacists engage them in negotiations to leave the room, where we know they are likely to be murdered. Like Akira Kurosawa, Saulnier finds the anticipation of violence more cinematic than its outcome, which are brief but gratuitous acts that leave a stain. Read the full review. Green Room opens today at Cinema 21.
Man Lives Through Plutonium Blast
[SEE ART] Artist Peter Brown Leighton creates dystopian 21st-century images by digitally combining black-and white snapshots from the mid 20th century. A man and a woman in '50s bathing suits stand on a beach, plumes of ominous smoke billowing behind them. Four Leave It to Beaver-era brothers crowd around the family TV, the headline announcing "AN ATTACK IS TAKING PLACE." Because Leighton's digital manipulation is so seamless, it is often difficult to know what is real and what Leighton has imagined, which makes the series all the more disturbing, foreboding, charming, bizarre and hilarious. Blue Sky Gallery, 122 NW 8th Ave., 503-225-0210. Through May 1.
SATURDAY, APRIL 23
Make it Good Warehouse Sale
[BUY PDX] Samples, seconds, overstock and extra materials from the makers' collective Make It Good are on sale for up to 90 percent off. It's literally a warehouse sale in this industrial garage space. Expect minimalist tanks, tees, dresses, leggings and bags in geometric patterns, greys and blacks. Make it Good, 1420 SE Water Ave., 10 am. Free.
Black Mountain, Marissa Nadler
[COSMIC SOUNDS] Black Mountain's IV, like many numerically titled albums from classic rock's heyday, is about both refinement and exploration. It cements the Vancouver group as a premier purveyor of psychedelic rock, one with the ability to weave Sabbath-like melodies that swirl and pirouette like our planet around the sun. At the same time, the flurry of synths offset the doom and gloom, providing guitarist Stephen McBean with a palette of hazy textures on which to unfurl his acidic riffs. It's also the best release since the band's 2004 debut—which is saying something, since the first thrilled heshers and indie-pop purists alike. BRANDON WIDDER. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St. 9 pm. $20. 21+.
The New Electric Ballroom
[IRISH THEATER] Third Rail's New Electric traps you inside the dingy cottage of three spinster sisters in a coastal fishing village. The sisters spend every day re-enacting one fateful night when they biked to the new electric ballroom and had their sexual desires crushed by a traveling rock star. It looks like a quaint fairy tale about family, but then Breda mimes being fingered and Clara calls the Virgin Mary a bitch. This is a haddock-scented Goldilocks and the Three Bears with a black Irish heart. Imago Theater, 17 SE 8th Ave., 503-235-1101. 2 pm. Under 30 $38. General $42.50.
Oregon Repertory Singers
[20TH-CENTURY MASSES] The ethereal opening "Kyrie, eleison" ("Lord, have mercy") of the double choir masses by Swiss composer Frank Martin and English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams could almost have been heard during the Renaissance. It'll be a treat to hear the city's finest large choir perform these relatively rarely heard masterpieces. BRETT CAMPBELL. First United Methodist Church, 1838 SW Jefferson St. 2 pm Saturday, April 23. $35. All ages.
Reinheitsgebot
[BEER] The Dan Hart Deutsche double-whammy of Prost and Stammtisch will celebrate the 500th anniversary of the only German purity law that doesn't strike fear into the hearts of men: the beer law that demands Bavarian beer use only barley, hops and water (and eventually yeast and wheat) in beer. Both bars will host special beer releases brewed in Germany, with dainty food items like entire pig roasts. Prost, 4237 N Mississippi Ave., 503-954-2674. 2 pm.
Triple Dip
[DIRTY DANCING] Like a Rubik's Cube of bar acts, three dance companies and three bands mix 'n' match to make nine different performances. Dancers from SubRosa, AUTOMAL and WolfBird take turns performing to Grand Arbiter's ambient electronic, Tig Bitty's raunchy hip-hop and Consumer's one-man live lopping—all packed inside a heavy-metal fringe bar in NoPo. High Water Mark Lounge, 6800 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 503-286-6513. 8:30 pm. $10. 21+.
SUNDAY, APRIL 24
Dej Loaf, LeekDaBarber, Bonaphied, Prodiga1, Kody
[DETROIT DARLING] At first glance, Deja "Dej Loaf" Trimble is a petite 25-year-old MC with a knack for stylishly smooth lyricism. The internet took notice when "Try Me" dropped in late 2014—a song that has since amassed over 44 million views on YouTube—but Dej had been part of the Detroit scene since 2011. She's a model of the Drake-ian sing-rap trend, able to float buoyant hooks into crisp verses without flinching. It's no wonder that in the past two years she's spent time in the studio with E-40, Big Sean, Future and Eminem. Dej Loaf has carved her own lane, and it's looking like everyone wants to ride along. MATT SCHONFELD. Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., 971-230-0033. 8 pm. $35 general admission, $45 reserved balcony seating. All ages.
Baraka
[HIGH FILM] Whoever arranged to bring Baraka to the big screen after Oregon legalized marijuana deserves a medal. This tour de force of time-lapse photography spans the globe, the cycles of the moon and every color of the rainbow, with messages so fundamental that age, language and THC levels will have no bearing on your ability to enjoy it as a fine art film. Hollywood Theatre.
Beyond Lolita: Literary Writers on Sex and Sexuality
[BOOKS] Cheryl Strayed, the most portrayed-by-Reese-Witherspoon of any Portland author, and Lidia Yuknavitch, who just won the Oregon Book Award (twice!) will be joined by Porochista Khakpour (The Last Illusion), MariNaomi (Dragon's Breath), and Sarah Hepola (Blackout: Remembering the Things I Drank to Forget) for a conversation about sex in literature, writing about others' experiences and the importance of including LGBTQ experiences in their work. Powell's City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 800-878-7323. 7:30 pm. Free.
Mala Sichuan Pop-Up
[EAT] Mala is a pop-up within a pop-up within a ham bar. The last Sunday of every month, chefs from Chinese pop-up Mian will make numbing, spicy Sichuan fare. Last month, this included a chili-pepper rabbit dish, not to mention twice-cooked pork and cocktails from Hamlet's Ryan Magarian. This month, it's no reservations, no irritating tickets and no prix fixe. Just show up, order and eat. Hamlet, 232 NW 12th Ave., 241-4009. 5-10 pm.
The Renderers, the Lavender Flu, Sleeping Beauties
[NIGHT MUSIC] Discovering the Renderers is a treat. Inexplicably unsung, the New Zealand band has evolved a woozy, country-tinged sound all its own, but it shares Yo La Tengo's knack for decorating delicate, skeletal melodies with densely woven textures that transform songs into eerie dreams. On their eighth album, In the Sodium Light, the Renderers give in to the sublime strangeness of Joshua Tree, the desert outpost they now call home. It's a gorgeous and unsettling part of the world, and the Renderers have made a perfect soundtrack for those long, lonely nights when the sky seems too close and stray sounds grow into echoing threats. CHRIS STAMM. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave. 9 pm. $5. 21+.
Wayne Thompson Tribute featuring Randy Porter, Gary Hobbs, Dave Captein, David Evans
[JAZZ FOR JOURNALISM] At the end of the day, jazz musicians and journalists have a lot in common. Both are storytellers, offering interesting and nuanced perspectives of particular moments in time. An indefatigable jazz advocate and a lifelong storyteller, Wayne Thompson, who passed away earlier this year, was a shining star in the world of jazz writers, a beloved critic who was recognized by the Jazz Journalists Association as a jazz hero, and was named a Portland Jazz Master by City Hall in 2015. Several of the region's most acclaimed musical voices assemble this evening to pay tribute to Thompson's life, sharing classic swinging sounds in honor of the writer's venerable and nuanced prose. PARKER HALL. Alberta Abbey, 126 NE Alberta St. 3 pm Sunday, April 24. $25. All ages.
Willamette Week
