Ben's Live Music Picks is on a vacation.

Hello Dear Readers,

I will be away for a month. AristeiA is going on tour. In my absence, please check out PC-PDX. They are pretty good at listing the shows and stuff. But CIMTB is going to be fine without me. I am sure you have been noticing the excellent content that has been posted as of late.

-Ben

p.s. You can see what I'm doing at the AristeiA blog

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Unfiltered: Wednesday @ The White Eagle

A Cautionary Tale, Photo by Arian Stevens

Hey Gang! I totally forgot about The White Eagle! It wasn't until I caught up with Nick O'donnell of A Cautionary Tale that I remembered about this venue. I haven't been there in yeeeears. I liked the place but apparently no one I've wanted to see has played there until now. Well, actually this band from Seattle called The Maldives played their last month but I couldn't go. See, I forgot about it until just now! He's the one that informed me about The White Eagle's indie rock showcase. It's held every third Wednesday of the month. It's called Unfiltered.

This months show is this Wednesday March 18th and features a band I considered heavily influenced by almost every band know to man, A Cautionary Tale, The Future Historians and the band whom the Oregonian says they are "Kurt Cobain meets Leonard Bernstein" Echo Helstrom. SWEET! I love grunge and I LOVE musicals. I am defiantly going to this show.

Here's what the Willamette Week says about The Future Historians:

The five-piece band leans toward the rootsier side of the spectrum, offering a hybridization of folk-country and Shur’s unique wordplay, highlighting his strong knack for catchy vocal melodies interspersed with strong indie hooks. The end product is at once jarring and soothing, drifting between the upbeat and the lucid with a fluidity that sucks you right in and keeps you listening. -- AP KRYZA

WOW! I have no idea what that means but it sounds impressive!

The show's FREE, and starts at 8:30 sharp!

The White Eagle
836 N. Russell St.
Portland, OR 97227

-- Ste. Goldie

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Musical Etiquette: The First Date And The Music Collection

If you have a serious music habit, chances are you met your date at a record store, music shop or show. This makes it hard not to talk about music on the first date, since for all you can tell, it's the only thing you've got in common; except a shared desire to be in an awkward situation with a total stranger. It's OK, you can talk about music, just keep this advice in mind when sitting down in front of that record crate or scrolling through that iPod for the first time.

1. Try to find some similarities in your tastes:

Everyone has a few things in common, even it's the fact that you both eat food and walk on two feet. It's even easier with music! If you met your date at a show, talk about the band you saw! If it was a record store, make sure you remember what they bought and just talk about that. C'mon, you can do it!

2. Never make this face. Ever.

For any reason. Seriously... date over.


3. People will disguise their favorite artist.

It might be the fifth record, or the third or any record at all. Often people disguise their favorite tracks as 'just another song' to gauge your reaction. I know what you're thinking; "How unfair, why wouldn't they just tell me?". Well, if they tell you it's their favorite then you're more inclined to just tell them what they want to hear. Be prepared for this! Offer your honest opinion at all times but tread lightly.

4. Vinyl People are Insane

Just let them handle the records, it's Extremely Important to them and they don't know you well enough to trust you yet. There are plenty of people who will jump into bed with you in a heartbeat but won't let someone they've dated for five years put on a record without them in the room. It's alright, most of these people have an incredible record collection and love to talk about it.

5. It's alright to be ignorant.

The truth is, you can't know everything about music. I know, I've tried. Unless your date demands some heroic feat of memory and information consumption it's perfectly acceptable to be slightly ignorant of a record. In fact, it can do a great deal towards getting your dates attention. It's good to feel knowledgeable and important, and you want your date to feel good about themselves and by extension feel good about you. Be sure to listen to what they have to say about that band!

So get out there killer, enjoy your first date and try not to make an ass of yourself! Remember not to come on too strong though. If your date isn't into calypso then don't push! Music is an intensely personal thing and people all have different rates at which they're comfortable progressing a relationship. If you're meant for each other you'll be doing the limbo down lover's lane and swapping mixtapes in the moonlight in no time.

Till next time,
Eriq Nelson

Questions about Musical Etiquette? Send me your quandaries at musicaletiquette@gmail.com

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Guided History of PDX Past Volume 2 - THE DUTCH FLAT

OK. So I've come to realize that in a town/scene/era of this size, as welcoming as it can be, certain bands/projects end up slipping through the cracks.
So that said, I've decided to do a weekly documentation of some of these musical projects that maybe never really made it out of the basement but still deserve some shine.
Most of these musical endeavors never had the push of any label or any other monetary benefactor, yet in spite of that had some heartfelt passion. At least enough to make the history of Portland bands that never really "made it" but that are still are near and dear to my heart.
I will briefly expound on them and then leave a link to download a sample track.

I've also realized that while my previously proposed title, "Secret History of Forgotten Portland Bands" may sound sexier than the current title, I had to switch it up because -

A) None of these bands are/were a secret. Being underrated and not as appreciated as they perhaps should have been does not a secret make.
and
B) I've also come to realize that these projects are anything but forgotten. In fact if anything they are, in the parlance of the popular yearbook bon mot = 2 Good 2 B 4gotten.

Ok. Semantics lesson over. Time travel commences....

BAND: The Dutch Flat

LABEL: Woodson Lateral Records

DESCRIPTION: Much like my previous post re: Laserhawk this was a pretty big band in the old early millennium Blackbird on Sandy scene that brought a welcoming breath of fresh air to the culture of, for lack of a better term, experimental post-rock in Portland. When I first moved to Portland in 2001 I found it to be a haven for genre-defying local bands that existed in a pre-MySpace/pre-Holocene/pre-Doug Fir/pre-Roturre /pre-Towne Lounge/pre-PDX-POP/pre-Local Cut world. And as this link attests Portland was still seen as the ugly step-sister to Seattle 10+ years after the whole grunge thing went down. I could go on and on with the pre-'s here, but at the time it was pretty much Elliott Smith, Dead Moon and the Dandy Warhols as far as the rest of the country was concerned.

In fact the Dutch Flat actually began as a Seattle band, and their page on the Woodson Lateral website is as succinct a place as any to gather further biographical info. And to buy the full CD from them direct. Don't front, you know you want to.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW: Matt Genz and Sam Schauer have both continued playing together in the inimitable ......worms with Scott Sloan (who recorded "Ghosts") along with the batshit crazy - off the chainsaw vocal stylings of my man Davis Hooker.

Sam Schauer also continues to release solo recordings under the name Modernstate which I've put out on my label, Lucky Madison. The first of which, Highwater Moonboot, was co-released with Woodson Lateral as I was just coming up and had no national, or local for that matter, distribution at the time.

I'm not sure what Tim Graham's up to these days, hopefully some of our readers can help fill in the blanks on that.

MUSIC LINKS: the epic 14:33 track Ghosts/Button Thief

Or, if that's too much for you to handle here's the equally amazing but only clocking in @ 2:10 track 1000 Deaths

PS It's come to my attention that as I am not currently a paid member of Rapidshare as of yet, this link as well as the Laserhawk one can only be downloaded 10 times and expires in 90 days. I will be rectifying this situation early this week. When my paycheck clears and I can pay for a membership so that these downloads can be available for everyone.

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MTV Flashback 1983 / Personal Flashback 1995

In between talking to the Vanity Fair Twitter gal and watching this video I almost didn't feel sick today. My eyes burn as I type this but I love you guys to much not to share something that brought a smile to my snotty swollen face. It's one of my favorite songs. I can say I've seen the Ramones* which made me an instant fan but I have close friends** who are hardcore fans so I can't even front. I hope it makes you happy and not sick for a little bit too.

The Ramones - New Music - More Music Videos

The director of this video is unknown. If you find out who it is and can prove it I will send you a present.

Love,
Ste. Goldie

*I saw them at The Roseland sometime around 1995
**I was with Stephen Charbonneau and Jason Dodson. We were standing on Burnside and someone threw a half gallon of Newman s Own Lemonade at us.

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Ben Meyercord's Live Music Picks for March 13th to March 15th

Hello Dear Readers,

I could have sworn that I had included yesterday in my last post. It really is a shame cause I meant to list the show I played at a House called the Arctic Circle Pit with His Name Shall Breathe. He was so good. He certainly knows his way a guitar. And knows how to write a song. I was looking forward to see how he was going to pull off his songs. On his album a lot of his songs flow into one another. He did the same last night except this time he had help from Blake and Nicole Hooper (of Day of Lions) singing some very nice harmonies. Plus they played a couple of their own tunes. The night ended with a rare performance of The Indigo Boys who do covers/mash up covers of popular 90's female lead bands. It was pretty interesting, and very funny. Anyway, here is what is going on this weekend show wise.

Friday, March 13th

Oh Captain My Captain is having a show at their house with a band that rhymes with purses. I would check out 14th and Division if you are interested in this show (and you should be).

Backspace is having an amazing show with Parenthetical Girls, No kids, East Burn is having a show with Reclinerland and Shoeshine Blue. I like both of these dudes song's. The show is $ and starts at 10 PM.

Chaos Cafe is having a show with New Century Schoolbook, Hearts and Minutes, Treva Jackson. Amber (Dawn) shout alert. New Century Schoolbook is pretty fun to see. The ALL AGES show is FREE.

The Grind Coffee House is having a show with Generifus (Seattle/Olympia), Shelby Sifers, Temple Vibe (Seattle), We Play Quiet (Vancouver, WA). Shelby Sifers is so good. This ALL AGES show is $5 and starts at 7 PM.

Saturday, March 14th

Mississippi Studios is having a sweet ass show with Loch Lomond, The Old Believers and Brothers Young. This is an awesome line up. Seriously, check out the links. This show is $12-14 and starts at 7 PM.

Doug Fir Lounge is host to a really good show featuring Portugal. The Man, We're from Japan, Themes and Dr. Helicopter. I love me some WFJ! I laso have been hearing good things about Themes (they are also currently band space with me). This show is $10-12 and starts at 9 PM.

East End is having a show with Past Lives (Seattle), White Circle Crime Club (Belgium), Vanishing Kids and Mega Church. Past Lives were Blood Brothers in a uhhh...past life. Also I want very much to attend a MEGA*CHURCH mass. This show is $8 and starts 9 PM.

Rotture is having an edition of Supernature with Supernature: Copy, Hooliganship, E*RockM and DJ BJ (of Atole). I love Copy so much. I am not really into dance music. This is one of the exceptions. The show is $5 and starts at 9 PM.

East Burn is having a show with Audie Darling and Monique Full of Grace. Both of these lovely ladies are pretty great. I think the show is FREE. The show is at 10 PM.

Mississippi Pizza is having a show with Hearts and Minutes, The Brightest Comet and Moments in Static. The Brightest Comet is the very good side project of WFJ!. Hearts and Minutes has Vince, ex- AristeiA and current CIMTB model. There is a FREE show with 9 PM.

Kelly's Olympian is having a show with The Jezebel Spirit, Hearts and Minutes and Moments in Static. These bands use a lot of pedals. And again, ex- AristeiA and current CIMTB model Vince. The show is $4 and starts at 9 PM.

Sunday, March 15th

Worksound is hosting the Portland Round 7. There will be music by Sallie Ford (aka Down South Sallie), Poetry by Lisa Wells, and art from Jeremy Okai Davis. This is amazing. Sallie is so good, and Jeremy is so good. I am unfamiliar with Lisa Wells, but it looks real good. The show starts at $5-7 and starts at 8 PM.

There is also a house show that will serve as a benefit show for Y La Bamba to go to SXSW. It will be all the bands that comprise Y La Bamba including Make Nice, Secret Codes, and Meyercord. Kelli Schaefer will also play. She is always great. There might even be a performance of Y La Bamba. You can email me if you want the address. The show will probably have a cover (it is a benefit), but it will probably be cheap it starts at 7 PM.

This is what looks good to me this weekend. So say "Hi" if you see me, or I might say it to you first.

-Ben


We're From Japan! (not actually from Japan, though to be fair they have visited) is playing on Saturday at Doug Fir

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Rant: I hate you Indie Genre Tag.

I listen to a lot of music. By a lot of music I mean I border on obsession. I listen to every kind there is, all the time I'm not playing it. Before you can say "Everything? Who does this guy think he is?" I will tell you this. My last few procurements are a collection of ancient Chinese folk songs, some Blur albums (Parklife is great by the way, very 80's in spots) and bunch of old ragtime records I found in a thrift store. So I'm into it, hardcore ya know?

A few years ago my CD collection had grown to an unmanageable size and I decided it was time to rip the whole thing into MP3. It took me about 2 years to get through it all but it was totally worth it. Now I had most of my music in a searchable index and I was pleased. Soon as my collection grew beyond it's original 60GB size it started getting harder and harder to search so I decided that it was time to start tagging all of my music. The only fields open to me were Artist, Album and Genre. I groaned, I wailed, I pulled on my hair and finally sat down and started creating genres for my music.

I hate genre. I hate it with a burning passion, I think it's a terrible way of describing music in any but the broadest of terms. So I stick with some pretty broad terms; Opera is easy to distinguish from Punk Rock, Hip-Hop sounds very different from Mexican Bolero etc. The real bitch of it comes in truly modern music. Where the hell do I put Devotchka? They're a Gypsy/Bolero rock band from Denver for fucks sake. Genre? They want nothing to do with it, just enjoy. What about Beck? Every album sounds like a new street drug I've never tried and any attempt to file it in my collection feels wrong.

Alas a gigantic music collection requires some organizing or I'll find myself back with my CDs, staring at a giant cluster fuck of boxes and buying the same album three times in one year because I don't think I own it. So I can either create a genre tag for every Balkan Beat Box that keeps scribbling outside of genre lines or I can try and group some of this crap together so I can find it. Recently a genre tag that I truly despise is creeping into my digital music.

Indie.

I hate you, Indie genre tag. You are a method for distributing music, not a damn genre. You describe nothing, but so much of what I'm all about these day keeps landing in this pile. Again, Devotchka? Where the hell do you go Devotchka? Beyond creating a specific genre for Ukranian/Mexican Rock I can find little else to place them in. Maybe rock, but it still doesn't fit quite right. I'm not rocking out while I listen to them, I rock out when I hear The Black Keys. Or to make things worse, where am I to file Beirut? Gypsy-folk? AAAARG!

I've tried replacing the Indie tag with a few others and I've managed to extract Indie Pop and Psychedelic into their own categories but honestly it's painful work and not something I'm interested in spending a lot of time laboring over. I want to enjoy my music, not spend a couple hundred hours organizing it. That is the exact reason I went to MP3s so long ago, it's supposedly very convenient. Prove it to me MP3s, be more convenient.

I want music playing software that allows me to write in my own fields and then populate them with data that matters to me. Like what kind of sex goes good with this particular Leonard Cohen collection, or what color fruit reminds me of this Animal Collective track. I want emotional tagging. I want to be able to ascribe a mood to every track and every album in my library so when I'm feeling pissy I can just scroll down through my Ani Difranco records and listen to all the tracks tagged as "Pissy". Where's my Magical iPod that can do all of this? Damn you Indie genre, damn you for being useful and annoying.

Fuck it, someone please just take a picture of me every time I play Gulag Orkestar and tell me where it should be filed.

Thanks for listening to me rant,
Eriq Nelson.

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Ben Meyercord's Live Music Picks for March 9th to March 11th

Hello Dear Readers

I want to ask one thing. Why do not more bands incorporate french horn? Last night I saw Matt Sheehy play with his new band The Menders for the first time. It sounded great. A lot in part of the addition of Jen who plays french horn in everything from indie-bands to the Vancouver Opera. Thats Range!. That is not to take away from the rest of the band which in cluded Ryan Doliver, Pia (of Loch Lomond), Justin Power, Michael (3 Leg Torso) Dan, Anyway, I thought they were great. Plus as part of the encore they pulled up Ritchie Young (of Loch Lomond) on stage for a very fun if not perfect version Tears for Fears "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" (Brent knoff of Menomena also played piano on the cover song).

Monday, March 9th

Okay, So I have not been able to listen to many of the bands this week. So I will bfreifly justify my listing of every show.

Aladdin is having a show with M. Ward, Tu Fawning, and Blue Giant. This show as of when I am writing this is not sold out. I thought was but it might not be. I think M. Ward is just a phenomenal musicican and songwriter. He always assembles a top notch band and is fun to see live. This show appeals to me more as a Portlander because all the acts are from right here. Tu Fawning is the joint effort of Corrina Repp, Joe Haege (The Decemberists and that dude formerly of Swords. I have never seen them before, but would love to tonight. The show is $20 and starts at 8 PM.

Valentine's is having a show with TacocaT, Forever and Nucular Aminals. I list this cause Valentine's is pretty rad, and the name TacocaT is even radder. The show is FREE and starts at 9 PM.

Backspace is having a show with These Are Powers, Guidance Counselor, and Fuck You Safari. Guidance Counselor makes me dance. I like to dance sometimes. The ALL AGES show is $5 and starts at 9 PM.

The Know is having a show with The Friendly Skies and CJ Boyd. The show is

Tuesday, March 10th

Same deal as above. Short and sweet justifications.

Valentine's is having a show with Evolutionary Jass Band, Kusikia and Palo Verde. Evolutionary Jass Band Rules it. Justified! This show is FREE and starts at 9 PM.

The Know is having a show with Les Flaneurs and Pigeons. Les Flaneurs is part of that Leonard Mynx/Audie Darling etc... circle of really good musicians that play in eachother's bands. This show might be FREE? I think it starts at 8 PM.

Wednesday, March 11th

Justifying is easy. See.

Holocene is having an amazing show with Phosphorescent, Nurses and The Battle of Land & Sea. Nurses is one of the best bands in Portland right now. The Battle of Land and Sea's music is so pretty and they hardly ever play. The show is $8. The doors are at 8:30 and the music starts at 9 PM.

Slabtown is having a show with Elder Mason, and Bear Hat. I have heard good things about Curious Hands. I am, dare I say, curious about them? The show is $5 and starts at 9 PM.


So if you see me at these shows. Give me a "Hi" and I will give you a "What Up?".

-Ben


This Jass band plays Valentine's on Tuesday. It will be "Jassy".

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