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Napboulé's Transnational Firestorm
A grinding crowd packs an Old Town dancefloor set ablaze by the worldbeat reggae band Napboulé. Marc Charles, the Haitian lead singer, intones the translation of the group's Creole name: "We are on fire," he says.
Napboulé's sweaty fusion of reggae and a vast range of international musics such as Kompa, Ra Ra, dancehall, Calypso and Soca (and even the occasional butt-rock intro/outro) can be nothing short of incendiary. In conversation, however, Charles is careful to take a stand against the violence recently inspired in Jamaica by the burning lyrics and anti-Babylon political messages found in some dancehall. "Our music is about positivity," Charles says, adding that igniting souls with messages of peace and freedom is his mission. "I would like to see all people work really hard to live peacefully in togetherness."
Many musicians would say the same, but Charles knows more than most about the importance of social justice and non-violence. In 1992, amid horrendous political turmoil, a teenage Charles fled his native land, seeking asylum in the United States.
"The suffering of the Haitian people comes out in my music," he says. "I have seen a lot of people die for no reason--just because they wanted to help the poor people." Granted refugee status, Charles made his way across the country following a government employee's suggestion. "They said Portland is a nice town," he recalls.
Charles formed Napboulé in 1996 and cut a demo in '97. Then the first incarnation of the band dispersed. A desperate two-year search for new musicians led to Napboulé's current lineup. Charles found drummer Josh Skins working in a record store. Skins and lead guitarist Ross Seligman provide harmonizing backup vocals, while Lou "Dr. Bam-Bam" Butts brings 25 years of reggae experience to the bass line. Tim Andrews (like Skins a member of the dub group Systemwide) plays keyboards.
The group's diverse sound, uniting the members' range of skills, can rise from dead slow to militant fury. Charles' charisma anchors the band's live presence. "Roots and reggae please the crowd," Skins explains, "but when Marc goes into a trance, everybody follows."
The band is currently in the lab recording a full-length album. The disc's slated February drop coincides with the group's first international gig, back in Haiti. They will perform before 75,000 fans in Port-au-Prince, during Carnival, a pre-Lent, decadent free-for-all where unchecked violence, crime and fires have made travel-advisory headlines in recent years. When asked how he feels about going from political exile to lauded guest of the new Haitian government, Charles replies "I feel good, but it's a little scary." Sherron Lumley
Napboulé plays Sunday, Oct. 7, at Berbati's Pan, 231 SW Ankeny St., 248-4579. Systemwide and DJs S-Dub and E3 also perform as part of the Voices of Reason Benefit. 8 pm. Sliding cover, $5 and up. See also Music Listings, page 39.
bar review
Outside the Box
Tube Tries Something New. Will it Fly?
In the departed salad days of the bubble economy, architecturally adventurous bars sprouted in booming cities around the world. It sometimes seemed that one-word "concept" names and graphic design "identities" had become the modern equivalent of vanity matchbooks. These places catered to the young and illogically affluent, people who preferred Red Bull and vodka to whiskey with a beer back.
This trend didn't make much of a dent in Portland. And so Tube, the new-jack Old Town bar with curved, cream-lime fiberglass walls which opened two weekends ago, seems like a bold step beyond the city's usual neighborhood dives, sports bars, hipster haunts and yuppie joints. This is a bar that imagines itself as an Event.
From the outside, Tube emits an emerald glow from a 19th-century brick façade. Abstract digital patterns dance on video screens flanking the door. The main room, a hollow rectangle with rounded corners and that unearthly light-green skin, looks deeper than it really is. With its tight spaces and sleekly surreal design, the room conveys several appropriate suggestions: the inside of a subway car, a submarine, a television. It might seat 45 in a squeeze.
A slender bar extends along the north side of the Tube cube, a staff of PYTs turning out generally sparkling cocktails. The short food menu consists almost entirely of pastas and quiches, stuff easily compacted into squarish little bricks roughly the same shape as the room.
Some have damned Tube as either a sign or an agent of gentrification, a charge leveled by someone against virtually every new enterprise in the city. But there's no denying that this decidedly upscale experiment clashes with surrounding homeless missions, scruffy rock clubs and greasy restaurants. No question, it's not for everyone. It's not trying to be. Of course, it remains to be seen whether a bar so tied to its own innovation can leap from place-to-see to place-to-hang and become part of a city nightlife to which it now seems a stark contrast. Zach Dundas
Tube is located at 18 NW 3rd Ave., 241-8823.
PORTLAND MUSIC'S POISONED PEN
HISS & VINEGAR
A HOOCH LICENSE AT LAST?
Since it opened earlier this year, B Complex, a club located in industro-ville Southeast, has evolved into one of the city's most venturesome venues. Ken Vandermark played there, and so did Unwound and Tricky. Brit-creep electronic stars Goldfrapp were supposed to hit the place this week, but canceled (blame the Taliban; everybody else is). Incendiary hip-hop dudes The Arsonists show up on Oct. 15. The club has taste, but it hasn't had a liquor license. Instead, B Complex has been locked in a long battle with the Oregon Liquor Control Commission, its efforts to secure booze rights haunted by the travails of previous nightclubs at the same location and by neighborhood opposition. Now, though, a state administrative judge has recommended that the club get a license, with some restrictions. The matter goes before the sauce commission this week. Cheerio!
LOVE MEANS NEVER HAVING TO SAY YOU'RE SORRY
Last time Chris Whitley turned up at the Aladdin, things didn't go so well. In July, the wiry singer-songwriter's set ended in a confused mess of disjointed mumbling and ticket refunds. According to witnesses at the time, Whitley was, shall we say, a little too "happy" to play well. Or, really, at all. But you have to hand it to the man--in an apparent goodwill gesture, he returns to the Southeast theater on Tuesday, Oct. 9, for a show.
KNOW YOUR PRODUCT: NEW LOCAL GEAR
Naughty-named Portland experimental group Jackie-O Motherfucker have a new album, Liberation, out on Portland's own Road Cone Records. But when can we expect the Oregonian feature? Other new destinations for disposable income: electro-rockers TV:616's debut, Poison Blanket (Elemental), is feted with a release party at Dante's on Friday, Oct. 5; ex-pat Irish accordionist Johnny B. Connolly's Bridgetown is out on Celtic tiger Green Linnet; Beaver'Tron-based Doppler Effect Records has released a comp of various "power noise" artists called Feedback Loop; Organic Mechanic and Woke Up Falling have new discs due out soon.
FEZ SHEDS PANORAMA, BOOKS BIG
Fez Ballroom plunges all the way back into the live music world this week, as the queer-friendly dance party of Panorama, which "borrowed" the Fez's quasi-Moroccan digs for awhile, returns to its old location on Southwest 10th Avenue and Stark Street on Oct. 12. The last "Fez-o-Rama" night comes this Saturday, Oct. 6. Fez blazes with a suh-weeet lineup in October. The diaphanous Dahlia and sharp-edged Systemwide offer the yin and yang of Portland electronic music for First Thursday, Oct. 4. And look out for the all-star Iggy Pop Tribute Night, featuring Crack City Rockers, the Gleaners, Fireballs of Freedom and MANY MORE next Wednesday, Oct. 10.
GORILLAS IN THE MISC.
Sales, sponsorship and expense information for MusicfestNW, the weekend-long blowout sponsored by WW Sept. 20-22, isn't all in yet. We should have stats soon, so watch this space.... The local dubnauts at BSI Records have launched a hip-hop imprint, One Drop Recordings. A disc by OlDominion's Onry Ozzborn christens the subsidiary at midmonth.... Another one bites the dust: Scottish indie darlings Arab Strap postponed their U.S. tour with Matador labelmates Aereogramme--not because of World War X, but because one member has pancreatitis. Sounds dreadful.... Send propaganda, communiqués, love notes, hate mail and, oh, press releases if you must to hiss@wweek.com.
WWeek 2015