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MFNW NEWS, LKN HURT AND SWORDS NO MORE
Here at Local Cut headquarters we have a line on WW's MusicfestNW and we must say, it looks like we'll be pulling our hair out again this year deciding what to see. Check out the following info that just came across our desks for Friday, Sept. 8. At the Crystal Ballroom will be Viva Voce, Stephen Malkmus and the Silver Jews, while Roseland will host a night of hip-hop featuring Lifesavas, Little Brother and M-1 of Dead Prez. See? Hair. Out. Keep your eyes on Blotter each week for a new leak from festival sources. And go to www.musicfestnw.com for more info on the festival. >> Lauren K. Newman, of LKN fame, fell face-first down a flight of stairs last week, fracturing her skull, herniating a disc and damaging a major blood vessel. "Doctors said it's amazing that she lived," says Newman's friend and bandmate, Jason DuMars. DuMars is planning a benefit concert to help cover medical expenses. To help out, contact DuMars at jaydumars@yahoo.com or (503) 888-7808. >> Swords is dead. Arena Rock Recording Co. boss Greg Glover said in a statement released last week, "Just as they began, they'll dissolve into other 'projects.' The various members will likely perform together again in their new endeavors." The band's last show will take place during MusicfestNW this September. That's called full-circle, baby.
Sate our thirst for Portland music news. Email localcut@wweek.com.
NIRE Wednesday, June 7
The folks in Nire are living in a "Mad World." Do they have any idea?
[SINGER-SONGWRITERS] One of the biggest cheeseball moments of my young life occurred when, at the end of Donnie Darko, I teared up (there you have it). Remember that sequence where everything's going back in time and fixing itself while that Gary Jules cover of Tears for Fears' "Mad World" plays in the background? Well, I've grown up a bit since, and the last time I heard that song it was on a bar jukebox, and I said something like "Fuck, it's that Donnie Darko song," which is pretty much what I said after a few sessions with Nire's new EP, My Father's Record Player (Ought Implies Can Records). The EP, released this week, is a mix of whispery vocal cascades, unassuming acoustic guitar and electric organ/piano lines directly targeting the weepy cortex of the 20-year-old brain, where, in most cases, a squishy gray Elliott Smith jukebox resides.
This is the second release by the Portland duo of Josh Hinton and Erin Morgan, and either it marks a regression from their somewhat more interesting (piano solos!) debut, or it's an 18-minute-long experiment in reworking one song five times. The exception to that, "Appointed Roles," is no savior, a glaring appropriation of the greatness of the soft and resigned observations of "Mad World" into Nire's you-and-me-oriented lyricism ("I wish that I could tell you/ I would never let you down"). The track following that song, "Static Glow," is essentially the blueprint for the rest of the disc, closely (and unabashedly) echoing Elliott Smith's "The Biggest Lie." All this isn't to say there isn't a certain pleasure in this disc: It's good rainy-day emo-session music, and its uniformity makes for a fine sedative. In the end, however, I'll take the cheeseball pleasure of "Mad World" any day over the guilty pleasure of the ultimately one-dimensional My Father's Record Player.
—MICHAEL BYRNE.
Nire celebrates the release of My Father's Record Player at Holocene with Dykeritz and Junkface. 9:30 pm. $5. 21+.
Rachel Taylor Brown Friday, June 9
Brown's Ormolu fills the Chuckie void in piano pop, as if there were one.
[creep-pop] Rachel Taylor Brown is a fiery redhead, a trait a lot of people think makes one tend toward the crazy side. But after a few listens to this local songstress's new EP, Ormolu, I think she's more haunted than crazy. Comprising eight songs laced with discordant piano and creepily affecting vocals, Ormolu (Cutthroat Pop Records) is intriguing, but it's more a car wreck you can't look away from than a piano pop masterpiece.
Unlike Brown's Jonah Days, which takes her self-described "sardonic wit" and cleverly wraps it around thoughtful, uncomfortable-yet-pretty story-songs, Ormolu drops the uplifting pop hooks and takes Brown's dark lyricism to a new depth—one the listener drowns in. Named after a faux-gold finish (like you'd see on gaudy 18th-century furniture), Ormolu examines the underlying bitterness that grows and festers when you pretend something—or someone—is more or different than what it is, when you pretend they actually are what you'd like them to be.
The EP is supposed to hinge on the skin-crawly, Child's Play-esque title track, which obsesses over the incredibly creepy existence of an unwanted, imperfect baby, but the most outstanding song, "Upright Man," comes (thankfully) right after "Ormolu." The song features Chris Robley (whom Brown plays with as part of Fear of Heights and the Sort Ofs) as well as lightly stepping piano, haunting in-the-round vocals, eerie grumbling and sullen-yet-catchy "duh-duh-doo-duhs." "Upright Man" truly showcases Brown's voice and songwriting skills; the image she conjures of a man being trampled, almost peacefully, by a steady stream of foot traffic while repeating, "I'm under you" and "I'm a good man," is desperately sad, but ultimately very human and empathetic.
Overall, the songs on Ormolu—like the album's artwork (countless macabre images of dilapidated baby dolls)—are too far immersed in a single idea. From the cringe-inducing piano and recurring echo of the baby's name ("Ormolu") to Brown's jarring screech toward the end of the title track, it's clear she—or the body of characters she's chosen to examine—is haunted. Next time around, I just hope she makes it more listenable, or keeps it to herself.
—amy mccullough.
Rachel Taylor Brown celebrates the release of Ormolu with Chris Robley and John Vecchiarelli at Mississippi Studios. 9 pm. $10. 21+.
Western Aerial, Tuesday, June 6
"Serious" music fans might scoff at Want It All, but carnies are gonna love this stuff.
[RIDICULOUS ROCK] Western Aerial plays the kind of tough-guy cock rock that makes for a smooth transition between the Nickelbacks and Disturbeds of a Clear Channel "new rock countdown," in which pissed-off dude bands are the order of the day. So I am supposed to hate this band.
Still, I have a soft spot for leather jackets and other rock-'n'-roll clichés. Western Aerial's sophomore self-release, Want It All, is full of them: hijacked AC/DC riffs, extended vocal snarls and plenty of allusions to doin' it. They have a scantily clad girl on the album cover attempting to rein in her obviously out-of-control rack, for crissakes. How rock is that?
This is ridiculous rock, but there are hints that, perhaps, the members of Western Aerial appreciate their own ridiculousness. The lyrics of songs like "Highspeed 'N Lawless," "Hell on Wheels" and "Dirty" imply a childishly simple view of a balls-to-the-wall rock-'n'-roll lifestyle that exists only in over-the-top Russ Meyer films. That's part of the fun. Besides, Want It All's silly lyrics are only there to fill the space between the surprisingly warm, kick-ass guitar solos.
When vocally capable frontman Geoff Metts frees himself of his gravelly-voiced influences and really sings, as he does on the furious opening lines of "Hell On Wheels," Western Aerial starts to sound like an honest-to-god original band. For the most part, though, this is fun, derivative rock that would sound great blasting from my favorite carnival ride, the Flying Bobs. The question is, what am I going to listen to for the 99 percent of my life when I am not drunk at the carnival or going on one of my 96-hour meth binges?
—CASEY JARMAN.
Western Aerial plays with Geoff Byrd and Justin Hopkins at Dante's. 9:30 pm. $8 advance, $10 day of show. 21+.
El Cerdo Sunday, June 11
Local metal engineers manage to build tension without the pretension.
[METAL] I have a vivid mental snapshot of El Cerdo vocalist Josh Greene holding both arms straight out and staring wild-eyed at the audience of about 25 in a basement in Southeast Portland last month, taking a few deep breaths during an instrumental break before dramatically bringing the microphone back to his mouth to finish pummeling onlookers with a scream influenced by Carcass' Bill Steer that the 20-year-old has been perfecting since he was 13.
So it comes as a surprise to me when, over lunch at Vita Cafe, El Cerdo guitarist Jayson Smith tells me that all the movement and crowd interaction I saw "isn't something [the band] is doing on purpose." Greene adds, with a hint of disdain on the last word, "When we get up there, we don't have the intention of 'we're gonna put on a show.'" He goes on to explain that his band's practices probably look pretty similar to what I saw at the basement gig. "I just love the music and I feel it," he continues. "And when you feel it, that's what happens."
The first thing you're likely to "feel" at an El Cerdo show is the rhythmic stampede of drummer Nick Pugh's low, rumbling floor tom and bass drum. Having recently switched to a classic single-pedal kick, Pugh now does half the work of the band's complex beats—formerly played on a double bass drum—with his hands. Smith's description of Pugh as "an octopus" is apt. The heavy 4/4 doom-metal parts of El Cerdo's often seven- or eight-minute songs stand out and feel particularly warm compared with the unpredictable, uncomfortable 5/4 or 7/8 riffs that often pound off of Ben Joner's bass at top speed. There's rarely a recognizable verse-chorus structure; rather, the band writes in a linear fashion, building each of the dozens of changes onto the one before it. The songs themselves are exercises in instrumental complexity, anchored in constantly morphing time signatures.
In fact, the increasing technicality of El Cerdo's instrumentals led Smith, who used to handle vocal duties as well as guitar for the group, to seek out a new throat to front the band. After a short stint with a vocalist who Smith says had trouble making it to practice, they tried out Greene—whose old group, the Hordel, performed with El Cerdo—and he immediately fit in perfectly. A listener would not guess he's been in the band for only six weeks.
Its stylistic diversity and honest approach make El Cerdo a band that can play a doom festival, as it did this fall in Austin, Texas, or with Northwest power metal gods 3 Inches of Blood, as it will Sunday at Sabala's, and with underground hardcore/thrash up-and-comers Lords and Ed Gein, as it will Monday at Food Hole. Unlike a couple of its favorite local bands, Black Elk and Tragedy, El Cerdo is not really exploring new territory within the metal genre, but the performers' disinterest in artifice, earnest passion and artful synthesis of influences makes the music accessible and infectious.
—JASON SIMMS.
El Cerdo plays with 3 Inches of Blood, Diesto and Flying Fortress on Sunday, June 4, at Sabala's Mt. Tabor. 9:30 pm. $8 advance, $10 day of show. 21+. The band also plays with Lords, Ed Gein and Sumara on Monday, June 5, at Food Hole. 9 pm. $5. All ages.
Pellet Gun June 2 at Dunes
Pellet Gun reunites in a flash of screaming and destruction: sweet release.
[INDIE ROCK] "You have no idea how good it feels to be able to scream myself hoarse."
So said Pellet Gun frontman Eric Jensen Friday night at Dunes. But, actually, I do have a pretty good idea what it feels like. See, I, along with 20 others crammed into the dark Dunes cave, was doing a decent job screaming along with him last Friday night during a rare reunion of the foursome.
Jensen's songs are irresistible singalongs, something fully realized in his current bandle, Tractor Operator, but born three years prior when his band, Pellet Gun, was playing Eugene clubs. Three hours before Pellet Gun's late-night set, much of the same Dunes crowd sat three miles away at Valentine's, downtown, for the release of Tractor Operator's 7-inch, "Evil Will Hand You Boredom." There it was just the Portland songwriter on stage with an acoustic guitar singing slow, cutting pieces about fucked childhoods and fucked romances tangled in simple irresistible melodies. And yes, then, too, we were singing along with him.
The grand tie between the two shows was "Two Dead Cats," something I've considered to be a Tractor Operator classic, but have since learned was—like much of the catalogue that Jensen performs as Tractor Operator—originally written for Pellet Gun. So maybe it's a Jensen classic, but its origins are a far cry from the acoustic version he perfomed at Valentine's. At Dunes, he played the song a second time with Pellet Gun, a post-millennial echo of Hazel now comprising guitarist Greg Dalbey (of Ferocious Eagle), bassist Dave Snider (of Thong) and drummer Brian Gardiner (whose trip back to Oregon from Indiana made the whole night possible). At 10 o'clock I'm whispering along to "Two Dead Cats" into the mouth of my beer, and at 1 o'clock, I'm screaming the words into the Dunes' omnipresent smoke cloud. It felt damn good, but I know it didn't compare to how it must have felt to Jensen after months of solo touring as Tractor Operator. Blowing blood vessels, smashing guitars, knocking cymbals over: You can get a lot of shit out just with words and an acoustic guitar, but it doesn't quite compare to plugging in, twisting the dial to 11, and torching your vocal chords.
—MICHAEL BYRNE.
WWeek 2015