Remember that new all-local, commercial free, radio station that everyone is chatting about? Well, they just got a name (KZME) to go along with their home on the FM dial (91.1).

Granted, it’s not “The Buzz” or “Charlie,” but since it’s just a call name there is plenty of time for them to work on a snappy name. Also, maybe get a logo too. I’m getting tired of using the same damn radio tower clip art. And what about some promotional windbreakers from the street team, or a wacky and offensive online game for your listeners to silently judge people? Amateurs.

Full release after the jump…

(GRESHAM, OR) June 24, 2008 - MetroEast Community Media has chosen a format and selected call letters for its new radio station. With a transmitter to be located on Mt. Hood, the signal of the new station - 91.1 on the FM dial - will reach most of the eastside area and with the expected addition of a translator, will reach most of the Portland area.

When the station goes on the air sometime in 2009, the new call letters will be KZME and the format will be dedicated to showcasing local music. As a non-commercial station, 91.1 FM will not air advertising and will be supported by its listeners and underwriting from local businesses.

Rob Brading, CEO of MetroEast said, "This is an important next step in our exciting effort to bring an amazing resource to the airwaves of the Portland area. The local music scene in the area is one of the most vibrant in the country and our goal is to showcase this great talent by providing the access that all the talented musicians and eager listeners have been looking for over the years.”

MetroEast Community Media was founded in 1984 and is a non-profit community television organization that provides opportunities to produce and cablecast Public Access, Educational and Governmental (PEG) programming. It administers eight cable channels and offers video production training to individuals, community groups and non-profit organizations.

Photo by K.C. Stimson

Attention, musicians of Portland: Rollerball has been here longer than you. The prolific collective has been transgressing boundaries and stomping all over musical genres long before you ever dreamed of packing the Subaru and hitting the Oregon trail. And as willfully weird as you think your alt-freak-skronk-noise project is, Rollerball has already done it, with results that range from conventional songcraft to free-jazz pinwheeling to outer-wind motorik spacewalking. Ahura, their 14th record—that’s right, 14th—celebrates its release tonight, with confident explorations and a warped, enveloping production that makes you feel like you’re trapped inside the snare drum. “Cesena Sweat Pants” assembles a looping piano figure with wandering airpipe sax, while the tense, red-heat “Towel Boy Tent” features gargles and creepy babbling, sounding like something from a Dario Argento flick.

MP3:
Rollerball - Cesena Sweat Pants

A few notes and additions to Rob and Ezra’s posts of the day:

Indeed the Dodos were impressive, as was the turnout for a Tuesday show at Doug Fir. The band certainly didn’t strike a rock-star posture—they had very little to say between songs—but held the crowd on a string. They did it was an immaculately conceived and expertly executed set—most songs segued into each-other without really stopping. There were breathing points, and it was obvious when a song had concluded, but the music rarely stopped. The guitar would wrap around and the riff would twist into the next, or the beat would continue. Long’s voice was very strong live, and as a whole the band took please playing with the songs, warping them, rather than deliver carbon copies from their records. At times long switch chords in musical breaks, adding a touch of dissonance or just a little shock. His guitar playing is quite impressive. He’s fast as hell.

And for all that has been said about drummer Logan Kroeber’s innovative beats, dude looks somewhat mellow in comparison to speed at which he’s playing—certainly he doesn’t thrash emotively like a Keith Moon, even when his rumblings are thick and busy as hell.

The idea of Dodos as a two piece is cute and marketable but indeed the third member was, for the most part, indispensable, whether it was banging on his delayed floor tom, vibes, gong or whatever. Although he did leave the stage occasionally, dude deserves to become a full time member.

Rob makes the comparison between the Dodos and Au as folk v. pop and I’m going to disagree, slightly. Live, the Dodos are very much a rock band (on record, yes, they are a sort of meta-folk). Long’s guitar was amplified and distorted, and the speed at which he rammed through his fingerpicking offset it’s traditional roots. All in all, a pretty hot show.

But indeed, Au—like it’s music—was something altogether different. We arrived at the top of the mountain, so to speak—the orgiastic, orgasmic climax of the whole thing. I wonder what the payoff/release would’ve felt like has we climbed the entire creshendo, rather than having arrived near the top. Still, it was unbelievable. That happy, life-affirming collective come-together shit—you know, drum circles and shit.

Having the 20-odd person choir standing in front of the stage, rather than on it, was a huge help. It blurred the line between audience and performer almost completely. I—and many of those around me—couldn’t help but clap along and yelp occasionally. It was one of those rare musical moments where Everyone rode the same wave. And goddamn, it took it’s time to crest. All those harmonies kept soaring. A skillful expertise in restraint, Au mastermind Luke Wyland conducted the thing teasingly along to combustion (and for the record, the drummer, who’s name I unfortunately don’t have, is a fucking monster—and quite a singer to boot).

Lovely show. I feel lucky to have been a part.

It’s a goddamn shame that the 20-member ensemble wont be joining Au on the road—it’d be on hell of a chautauqua. But hey, it was a one-time-deal. A moment and a feeling insanely difficult to re-create.

And finally, ending this ramble, let me again trumpet the absolutely gorgeous, airy, and stunning new album from Sigur Ros, Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust. The title’s definition: “With a buzz in our ears we play endlessly.” Holy Shit! It couldn’t be more perfect. I learned that, and a whole lot of other cool shit—like the band, which often records for months and months, blew this one out in 11 days—in this great article by Nate Chinen.

“My fear of the bear at Showbiz Pizza when I was six
was overwhelming and not dissimilar to this”

That line is one of many lyrical gems dropped in Alopecia, the most recent album from Why?. Given ones rational fear of animatronic carnivores that play instruments, it’s easy to see where frontman Yoni Wolf is coming from. But perhaps Wolf never saw the Showbiz Pizza band get down, Usher style…

A gold dodo! Get it?

The Dodos were great last night.

They really did surpass all the expectations I had for their show, and proved that they are a phenomenal live band. There were a few times, especially during “Jodi” and “Paint That Rust”, that the band just transcended the guitar and drums duo thing they have going to make a ton of beautiful, cacophonous noise, with singer Meric Long yelping his way though his second, reverb-driven microphone, and drummer Logan Kroeber pounding away with ridiculous precision and fury. Third man (sorry, I don’t know your name) added a ton to the mix, too, with his percussion assistance.

For a “folk” band, they really do some incredible things. I really liked Meric’s second microphone, and the reverb-effect that it had on his vocals sounded pretty true to what they do on record. Also, the way he looped his own voice to harmonize with himself was pretty impressive. Hell, as was all he did with the loop pedal, like looping the trombone (it was a trombone, right?) as the back bone of “Eyelids”. Also, for sitting down the entire time, they managed to really keep the sold-out crowd fully captivated, which itself is a pretty decent feat.

However, as good as the Dodos were (which they were!), the last two tracks I caught of Au’s set completely blew them out of the water. It could have been for a number of reasons (local band versus touring band, pop band versus restrained folk band, etc), but the atmosphere at the Holocene was that of complete jubilation, with Au’s music soaring high and everyone smiling along as they went for the ride. It really was fun as all hell, and Au seemed excited to be playing, grinning and clapping and rocking the fractured pop they’re so good at creating. Those two songs were as good as I’ve seen that band, by far, and there was an excellent audience/performer vibe going on that seemed to be feeding both real well.

Had I only seen the Dodos last night, I would’ve been pretty happy. However, seeing Au made them seem more than a little pale in comparison, which is too bad.

If you’re at home keeping score, you can chalk another win up for the home team.

The Shaky Hands have released some information and artwork (If you can decipher that rorschach-esque cover art—you win a prize!) on their upcoming full-length Lunglight, which will be released on Holocene Music and Kill Rock Stars. A band so big that they need two labels.

Supposedly “slightly darker” than the stoner summertime pop of their self-titled debut, Lunglight will hit the streets on September 9th. Full press release (my favorite line: “Mayhaw Hoons’ wildly swinging curly red hair”) and track listing are below. Can’t wait…

In their hometown of Portland, Oregon, The Shaky Hands are the one band that virtually everyone agrees on. Respected throughout the underground for their basement show origins and complete lack of ego, critically adored for their instantly recognizable, earthy-meets-explosive sound and loved by the general populace for putting on really, really good shows—they represent Portland, one of America’s best music cities, as well as any contemporary indie rock act.

That reputation was cemented in 2007 when the group won Willamette Week’s annual Best New Band poll, an honor previously bestowed on experimental pop acts Menomena and Talkdemonic and electronic electronic dance sensation Copy. The Shakies’ victory seemed a foregone conclusion to most involved in the local scene: The Shaky Hands had been a band on the tip of Portland’s collective tongue for well over a year thanks to a handful of sweaty, packed houses and a standout performance at the 2006 installment of Portland’s PDX Pop Now! festival.

The Shaky Hands’ self-titled debut, released in 2007, was a fantastic snapshot of the energetic young band discovering itself. Nick Delffs’ vibrato-infused, homespun vocals and bobbing acoustic guitar strums complement Colin Anderson’s organic, driving percussion while Jeff Lehman’s own guitar rockouts remind listeners that The Shaky Hands were, after all, a rock band. The album approximates the irresistibly frenetic Shaky Hands live experience, which finds frontman Nick Delffs stomping and galloping across the stage, occasionally running directly into bassist Mayhaw Hoons’ wildly swinging curly red hair.

But The Shaky Hands were not content with being everyone’s favorite good vibe summertime rockers. The now-quintent (Nick’s brother, multi-instrumentalist Nathan Delffs, officially joined the band shortly after the full-length was recorded) went swiftly back into the studio to record Lunglight, a record that proves them to be evolving with remarkable speed.

Where the Hands’ debut was jangly and upbeat, prompting visions of long summer days spent lounging on the front porch, Lunglight lives in a slightly darker space. Tracks like “Neighbors” and “Love All Of” add a sheen of Doors’ psychedelia to The Shaky Hands’ early Talking Heads-influenced sound, with Nick Delffs looking increasingly inward for lyrical inspiration. On “World Gone Mad,” perhaps the darkest and most driving Shaky Hands song recorded to date, Delffs sings “See it coming/ In his eyes/ You better stay where/ You can hide,” and feedback flies like shrapnel around the verse. For a second there, The Shaky Hands get scary.

But that’s not to say that Lunglight is a downer. Brighter numbers like “Air Better Come” and “Settle On” keep The Shaky Hands’ trademark head-bobbing, multi-rhythmic rock intact, and even in their darkest moments there is a reluctant optimism in Delffs’ lyrics and the band’s instrumentation. To the contrary, Lunglight’s complexity is its biggest strength. In a world of throwaway pop, this quintet has built itself from the ground up, naturally and beautifully. It’s just that instead of being the quintessential summertime rock band, the new Shaky Hands are a band for all seasons.

Tracklisting:
A New Parade
Loosen Up
Air Better Come
We Are Young
Neighbors
World's Gone Mad
No Say
You're the Light
Show Me Your Life
Settle On
Love of All
Wake the Breathing Light
Oh No

If you don’t make fun of our jugglers, sir, we won’t make fun of your mustache. What’s that? No deal?

Every week, John Roderick of the Long Winters writes a blog for Seattle Weekly, the lesser of Seattle’s alt-weeklies. But don’t hold that against him. In this week’s blog, he talked about what Seattle can learn from its smaller, rosier sister in the south:

Before I start, let me just say that no one hates reading “What Seattle can learn from Portland” lectures more than me. Portland, despite its charm, has one thousand percent more mimes, jugglers, and crusty potters than any city outside of Germany, and this fact permanently disqualifies Portland from teaching any civics lessons or from standing as an example of responsible growth. Until they fumigate their city of all its jugglers it will only be possible to appreciate their example by piecemeal.

Still, it is an undeniably nice, small town, and all the more impressive for having formerly and in recent memory been a totally scary left-coast wreck. It was only a few years ago that you practically had to wade through junkie prostitutes just to get your chainmail fitted at the Renaissance smithery, and the only interesting thing about the city was the curious abundance of punk rock/hippy chicks who dressed like a cross between Minnie Pearl and Tank Girl that you could find nowhere else in the world. Except for Germany. Fast forward to now and it feels like an EPCOT center futureland, where people are home-brewing biodiesel from bat guano and kiwi fruit, plucking banjos made from old PC circuit boards, and eating nuclear waste and shitting out diamonds.

Read the full thing here.

The Long Winters play at the Wonder Ballroom on Thursday, July 3. Also appearing are Portland’s own Builders and the Butchers. We don’t know at this time if the mustache will also be making an appearance.

NUDGE, EXTRA GOLDEN, COPACRESCENT, DJ ANJALI, THE INCREDIBLE KID, DJ E3
(Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison) Extra Golden were born from a three-hour international jam session in Nairobi between native musicians Otieno Jagwasi and Onyango Wuod Omari and American indie rockers Ian Eagleson—in Kenya to research a doctoral thesis on the country’s popular benga music—and Alex Minoff, both of the DC band Golden (Minoff also played in the Make-Up, Weird War, and Six Finger Satellite). The group released the results of that jam, Ok-Oyot System, shortly after Jagwasi’s death. The band recruited new members for live performances and to record follow-up album Hera Ma Nono but had difficulty getting the Kenyan musicians into the US (a difficulty that was ultimately resolved with an assist from Barack Obama, leading to perhaps the first non-embarrassing song bearing the presidential candidate’s name, Hera Ma Nono’s “Obama”). More than just a corrective to all the critical hand-wringing about Vampire Weekend’s alleged musical colonialism, Extra Golden are benga translated with little more interference than some English-language lyrics and the arrangement of visas. ERIC GRANDY

MP3:
Extra Golden - Obama

After last night’s excellent Au performance at Holocene, the band left various percussion instruments at the front of the stage (they were originally used by their in-crowd choir) which led to an impromptu drum circle of sorts.

It was nice.

I know, I know, a change of heart when it comes to drum circles is an unforgivable sin and a slippery slope to greater atrocities (Hey Broseph, know what this music needs? Some sweet digeriedo action!), but last night’s, um, “jam session” seemed a bit more innocent, and less Burning Man, than you might think. In fact, it sort of added to the open-ended community aspect of Au’s performance.

At least, that’s what I am telling myself. If you catch me on Hawthorne this afternoon strumming my berimbau, you’ll know what lead me down that path. Peace.

And the wait is now over.
Verbs, the splendid new record from experimental—and sometimes pop—outfit Au, is now officially out. The release party is set for tonight and will feature the usually restrained Au being back by a 20+ member vocal choir.

That’s a lot of people to fit on that Holocene stage, so it’s either going to look like a packed subway car (no groping!), or the singers will spillover into the crowd (again, no groping!). Can’t wait.

MP3:
Au - Summerheat

I’ve had a promo copy of Sigur Rós’ Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust sitting on my desk here for a week or two. I’d give it a listen when the time was right, I figured—that time being a slow, drowsy, big-sky’d, beautiful night. The later the better. Maybe on drugs. Full of wanderlust. Surrounded by swirling amour. Listless.

You see, Sigur Rós’ debut, Ágætis Byrjun has occupied this distinct real-estate in my head and heart for years. It’s a place I only visit at certain times—usually while deeply effervescent and in love, a honeymoon-type of period. Soft sheets and wind flowing through the curtains, lit by the moonlight. In between alert and dreams.

So I figured I’d get around to Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust. It was more of that grandiose, dream music, I assumed. But goddamn—while the new album is still grandiose, dreamy and swirling like a mainline of magic realism, this thing is daytime summer sunshine.

It’s ridiculous and great—Sigur Rós downbeat whomping on floor-toms! Chords whipping back and forth! My God!

The Miraculous Single: “gobbledigook”

The album comes out today, and more fitting weather to greet these sounds there could not be.

DYSRHYTHMIA, THE BETTER TO SEE YOU WITH, THE ABODOX
(Rotture, 315 SE 3rd) Chances are good that the three members of Dysrhythmia are better musicians than you, and they’ll spend the entirety of their set drilling that notion into your skull with their energized prog-metal instrumental compositions. For some folks, that kind of showmanship is completely satisfying. Others might find it engaging for about 45 seconds and then simply grating for the remainder of the performance. Nothing wrong with falling into either camp, but for those unfamiliar with the band, you can probably figure out where you stand, based on whether you prefer hyper-musicianship or subtlety. Fans of the latter: consider yourselves warned. BC

MP3:
Dysrhythmia - Seal/Breaker/Void

Photo: Shannon Corr

O joy! O rapture! O happy day! It’s time for a new episode of Your Radio Sucks, where your host Ned Lannamann injects “feel good” straight into your “bloodstream.” It only hurts for a second! And then, you ride the blissful wave of new music from Ponytail (pictured), the Impossible Shapes, the Saturday Knights, Mugison, Adem, the Low Lows, Typhoon, the Interiors, and the War on Drugs. It’s an explosion of delight!

Photo by Frank Hamilton.

Attention all indie rockers with lots of paid vacation days:
Why go to Hawaii on vacation? Their local bands suck.
Instead, why not come to Portland?

That’s more or less the concept behind the Travel Portland (a non-profit tourism board paid for by hotel taxes that encourages Portland travel) “Portland Rocks” offer. This tourism package has hotel discounts (at the Ace or Jupiter, definitely not at the Unicorn Inn on 82nd) and includes an “exclusive Stumptown Rock compilation CD and MP3 album download.”

The CD (titled Stumptown Rock, Vol. 1) was curated by Dave Allen and features the likes of Blitzen Trapper, Another Cynthia, Au, Loch Lomond, Boy Eats Drum Machine, Panther, and more. Since we live here, and don’t stay in hotels, we don’t have a copy of it. Damn tourists.

This idea—that our indie music culture is now a viable selling point for tourism—is pretty appealing, just so long no indie rockers from Germany come here. If they do, it’s on. Jets versus Sharks style, right in the middle of East Burnside.

I will so stab a Kraut outside Bombshell Vintage.

I know I said some mediocre things before about the live show from The Dodos. I think I may have been wrong, because every single person I’ve talked to who has seen them live is incapable of shutting up about how good they were. Maybe they had an off night. Maybe I did. Either way, I’m really hoping they’ll blow me away tonight, because their latest, Visiter, is one of my favorite records of the year.

I’m a little disappointed, though, because I was really hoping there would be a special guest appearance tonight by the nicest person in Portland, Laura Gibson, who contributed backing vocals to a few of the tracks on Visiter. She’s currently touring her way through Europe, which really sounds like no fun. No fun at all.

I’m a little hesitant to give this an “OMG! Go to this show!!”, just because I wasn’t blown away the first time I saw them, but Visiter really is that good, and as long as they play “Fools” (the above video), “Walking”, and “Jodi”, I can’t imagine this show being anything less than amazing.

The Dodos play Doug Fir tonight with Plants and Animals and The Ohsees.

As company policy dictates, if any member of the Wu comes to town, we have to be there. So when RZA, er Bobby Digital, rolled through Portland last night we had our photo champion Minh Tran on the scene to take these snaps. Enjoy!

Regular readers of this blog already know that from time to time I’m called upon to defend Celine Dion… AND TODAY WILL BE NO DIFFERENT! Total Guitar magazine has released their poll of the absolute worst cover songs of all time, and guess who’s at the tippy-top? Celine’s version of AC/DC’s “You Shook Me All Night Long.”

Now. I’m not saying this cover is the greatest (see her version of “River Deep-Mountain High” if you want to see the awesomest cover of all time), however, if nothing else it’s pretty freaking hilarious and I smiled all the way through it. Check it out below, and list your choices for worst covers in the comments!

RZA, STONE MECCA, ANIMAL FARM, THE HARD KNOX
(Hawthorne Theatre, 1507 SE 39th) When Wu-Tang Clan dropped 8 Diagrams last year, there was a lot of grumbling from members that it was way “too weird,” and that it was is all the handiwork of RZA; in the ensuing tour, the Abbott was nowhere to be found, and not a single Diagrams song was performed. I don’t know what that’s all about—Diagrams was brilliant, the most true to form they’d sounded in years… See, Wu-Tang was always weird, and RZA always understood that. So if you wanna see the true, bugged-out soul of the Wu, here’s your chance to “keep it digi.” Bong-bong, baby! LARRY MIZELL JR.

This morning, as I do every morning over coffee, I picked up the sports section first. As I did, I found myself asking why? Basketball season is over, and well, the rest of it bores me. But habits are what they are, and some are hard to break—plus it takes a certain amount of time to consume some 40oz of coffee and I’ve got to read something. I like to save the Arts section until I’ve got a buzz, and the front page is way to depressing to begin the day with. So yeah, sports. But without basketball… well… it stinks.

I did, however, find a sweet little bit of basketball and music related sweetness: a Shaq freestyle. Hot damn. Dude is TERRIBLE! And totally fucking hilarious. I don’t want to spoil all his best jokes, but at one point the Bio Diesel works in a mention of his VASECTOMY (which is probably the smartest thing in the world for any professional athlete…)

The video doesn’t embed, and you’ll have to watch some dumb-ass commercial about smores, but it’s totally worth it! Get down with Shaq’s freestyle here.

After you do, you’ll be wishing even harder that this sucker would’ve come out:

It’s certainly time for a response, loser! RAP BATTLE!

A lot has been made of the recent AP piece on how the gas price increase is effecting the wallets of touring musicians. The article points out that a west coast trip will cost a band about $2500, which is just downright insane. Portland’s very own Ken Cheppaikode (of Dirtnap Records and the Green Noise shop on Clinton) is quoted as well:

“We do have two bands, The Revisions and The Estranged, out on tour together right now who have decided to share a van to save on gas costs,” said Ken Cheppaikode, who operates Dirtnap Records, a Portland, Oregon, independent label and record shop.

The O ran a similar piece last week, and theirs touches on local band Blind Pilot who toured via bicycle. Not a bad idea, but this coming from the guy who gets winded just watching Rad. I know Nick Jaina once toured via Greyhound, I wonder if any other band has used other methods? Hot air balloon? Segway?

THE BLAKES, THE BROKEN WEST
(Doug Fir, 830 E Burnside) Following a hasty name change (they were originally the Brokedown) and a high-profile Merge Records debut, the Broken West established themselves as the latest purveyors of the sunny California sound, with pleasing pop kernels like “Down in the Valley” and “Hale Sunrise” drawing from classic rock’s past while staking out a tiny claim of new territory. Their second album, Now or Heaven, comes out on Merge in September, and I haven’t heard a note of it. So, I shall make a completely unfair and groundless judgment based solely on its song titles and the band’s most recent press photo, in which they are wearing coats and neckties: It will NOT be a prog-concept opus. It will NOT contain experimental forays into electronica. Lil Wayne will NOT make a guest appearance. Instead, it’ll be much like their first record, maybe slicker, more accessible, less gritty, less spontaneous, generally unsurprising, intermittently great, and wholly tuneful. NL

MP3:
Broken West - Down in the Valley

From McMenamins Edgefield Concerts’ website:

An Evening with YES
Sunday, August 17, 2008
CANCELLED, due to illness

Aw crap. Laugh if you want, but after seeing the Joggers tear “Long Distance Runaround” a new one a few weeks back, I was looking forward to seeing the prog legends live.
Tell me this doesn’t look sweet.

An official press release from the band states:

Legendary rock band Yes announced that the group will unfortunately be canceling their 2008 40th Anniversary Tour. Said Jon Anderson, “In the wake of my recent respiratory attack, doctors have advised me to spend the coming months resting and recovering. Unfortunately, this means I won’t be able to tour with Yes this summer as originally planned.”

Leave your best “Owner of a Lonely Heart” joke in the comments!

Like boozing? Yeah, me too. So it’s probably safe to say that you also enjoy Steve Buscemi’s masterful/depressing-as-fuck movie Trees Lounge. Drinking, ice cream trucks, a teenage Chloë Sevigny, and more drinking—need I say more? Anyway, the film’s soundtrack featured a breezy number from Hayden, who used lines from the movie to construct the song:

You have a pretty name
Pretty like your name
Lets play a drinking game
And If I win I get to take you home
and if you win you go home with me

I have a feeling that he, to this day, still regrets wearing that godawful cowboy hat.

But the Canadian singer-songwriter—who, in the wake of Beck’s quick success on Geffen, was primed to be a major label darling (it never happened)—is primarily known for his delicate folk songs that center around his deep drawl and introspective songwriting. I’ve always been a fan of the simple setup of “Home by Saturday,” with the all-too-honest line of:

Last night in New York City
I met a girl almost as pretty
And if I had one more whiskey
Everything would have all just slipped away

His latest, In Field & Town, is more restrained folk from an artist who seems very content in his role as a performer. Here’s hoping tonight’s show at the Aladdin lives up to a few of his stellar past Portland shows.