Ben Meyercord's Live Music Picks for Saturday, October 9th

Hello Dear Readers,
I have company in town. I love music, but I think I might love spending time with her more. What I am saying is that I did not blog yesterday. Nor did I go to any shows. Despite there being an amazing one at Mississippi Studios. Typhoon played and I hope some of you went out to see it. They are amazing. Tonight there are some cool shows as well:

The Waterheater is having a show with Ross & The Hellpets and The Contestants. You probably recognize Ross Beach. He was always a part of PDX Pop Now. Plus he goes to a good number of shows. He also makes music with this band. He grew up with a lot of the Elephant 6 crowd. His band resides in the same "acousti-fuzz" realm of those folks. The Contestants are a classic pop rock band that I am not familiar with. One of the main reasons I am writing about this show is because I think it is cool that there is a new ALL AGES space for shows. You should check out The Waterheater. The ALL AGES show is FREE and starts at 8 PM.

Backspace is having the second night of Sound Judgement Festival. Tonight they have Arctic Flowers, Bellicose Minds, Spectres, Grey Anne, Wishyunu, and Midnight Callers. Arya Imig is a pretty cool dude and he knows how to throw a show. Though I don't know all of these bands, the ones I do know are great. Grey Anne is one of my favorite performers in Portland. She doesn't play out that often so when she does I always urge people to go. Her songs are well written well arranged and well worth checking out. I am also a fan of Wishyunu. They make pop music that is heavy on looped synth keyboards and drums. It is impressive to see them at work. The ALL AGES show is $5 and starts at 8 PM.

The Woods is having a show with Frog Eyes, Deer or The Doe, and Here Comes Dots. Frog Eyes is a a Canadian band that tend to share the same space my mind as Wolf Parade. It is probably because both make music that is fronted by frontmen that have a yelpy vocals and make rock music that makes me think both of times past while feeling very contemporary. Maybe is is also because both front men, or at least on of the front men of Wolf Parade (they have two) play in Swan Lake together. Portland's Deer of The Doe is actually a really good fit with Frog Eyes. They play guitar driven indie rock. And will hopefully have a new album out soon. In the meantime you can get an ep from them for free right here. Here Come Dots sound like a catchy indie pop band with epic and spacey guitars (correction only one guitar). It really puts them on the next level. The show is $10 and starts at 9 PM.

Doug Fir is having Led Zeppelin Night. There are about a million bands who contributed to The Portland Zep Tribute Record. Tonight Threads (members of Clampitt, Gaddis & Buck
Power of County, Mighty Ghosts, Rally Boy, andLookBook), Portland Cello Project, Loch Lomond, Laura Gibson, Jon Moen, Arch Cape, Miss Murgatroid, Lana Rebel, LKN, Carcrashlander, Chris Funk (of The Decemberists), Rob Jones (Jealous Butcher owner), Holly Morgan (Thee Headliners), Tim Ervin, Dan Jones, Ryan Sollee (The Builders and the Butchers), Pellet Gun, Jeff London, Luz Elena Mendoza (Y La Bamba, AgesAndAges, Jennifer Stefanich, Jenny Conlee (of The Decemberists), Little Sue, Adam Selzer (Norfolk & Western, and Nate Query (of The Decemberists) will all play Led Zeppelin Songs. Jealous Butcher is putting out the record. It has been six years in the making. This was on the Jealous Butcher's website, "We've been working on this compilation of our friends and musical colleagues covering songs by Led Zeppelin for around 6 years now and we're finally done with it. The comp, like the band being covered, is epic. There are 50 bands participating in the project, playing over 210 minutes of music. The songs span Zeppelin's career, veering from faithful revistings to dramatic left turn takes on the originals. We've put together 2 full CD's of material and, as there was so much amazing music, we added a digital download of a 3rd album free with each compilation. It all comes in a deluxe tip-on gatefold jacket, which is how all gatefold LP's used to be packaged. The cover are was done by Carson Ellis (Decemberists, Lemony Snickett), who is super awesome, and the inner gatefold art was done by John King (M. Ward), who is also super awesome. For this release we've partnered up with the fine folks at First Octave, to whom we will be donating a percentage of the profits from this comp. First Octave is an amazing group of folks who give grants to Portland Public Schools to help fund music programs. Something very dear to us here at Jealous Butcher. This all comes out on Oct 12th, though if you come to our very special release show on the 9th you'll be able to get it early, along with all sorts of other awesome things. ". This is a one time only show. I will be honest, I was not into Led Zeppelin growing up. It was not until I heard a different tribute album that had Stone Temple Pilots on it that I familiarized myself with their songs. Then I got to know them for what they are. Kinda awesome. Hopefully this tribute will bring another generation closer to the band. The show is $10 and starts at 9 PM

If you see me at any of these shows please say, "Hi". I will be the one with the beautiful woman from Sacramento by his side.

-Ben


Here Comes Dots will look very similar to this tonight.