Tha Angry Liberal

Ever had hasenpfeffer?

2007-04-08T21:59:00.000-07:00

Neither had I. In fact, I wasn't even sure it was real. I suspected that it only existed in Bugs Bunny cartoons and the Laverne and Shirley theme song. But it is, in fact, a traditional german stew of rabbit (hence the Bugs Bunny reference), historically prepared with wine and vinegar. I'd never eaten rabbit, as it happens. It definitely reminds me of poultry, but it's not particularly chicken-like, much more... lush. I'd describe it as almost a white meat version of duck. At any rate, it was excellent. The green sauce you see on top of the rabbit leg is a pesto made with a very liberal amount of vinegar, which is in keeping with the traditional preparation, but it overpowered the rabbit. It was very tasty on its own, however, and paired very well with the fava beans, and to a lesser extent, the potatoes.

I'm ashamed to say that I didn't eat the asparagus. I'm not fond of asparagus. I'm trying, I'm just not there yet. But it didn't go to waste. It's on its way to the compost pile.

My housemate Robert brought this back from his Easter potluck party this evening in a Tupperware container (forgive my amateurish plating). Many thanks, Robert, for expanding my culinary horizons!

Witness the Bounty!

2007-04-08T19:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a big day, my friends! It was the opening day of the downtown Portland Farmers' Market (an important thing to remember about the Portland Farmers' Market: Yes, you DO have to feed the meters on Saturday. Found this out the hard way...)! I didn't think I'd be able to control myself, but I actually came away with an amount of stuff that I could carry back to the car in one trip. Let's see, what have we got there... Looks like some leeks, shallot greens, a quarter pound of Juniper Grove Redmondo (aged about 9 months, mildly goaty, slightly pungent, nutty flavor), broccoli rabe, Rogue Creamery pesto cheese curds, a couple of Nikola potatoes, some runty early season carrots, stinging nettle and yellowfoot mushrooms. What am I going to do with all this, you ask? Well, when I got home yesterday I julienned one of the leeks, sauteed it with the mushrooms, added a little cream, reduced, tossed it with some whole wheat fettucine and topped it all with some grilled chicken for lunch (downing most of the pesto curds in the process). Right now I'm about to make some pesto with the nettles. I'm making inroads on the Redmondo (perfect, sliced thinly, with some crusty bread and good olive oil), and the rest is sitting in my crisper drawer awaiting future projects.

And speaking of future projects, allow me to show off my new toy:

I found this on Craigslist. It's the big one, the 500-watt, 6 qt model. I've been wanting one of these for a while now, but they're way too expensive new. I got a pretty good deal on this guy (thank you, Craig!). Sort of dwarfs the cordless drill, wouldn't you say?

Going Blackwater

2007-03-20T17:20:00.000-07:00

Great interview with my boy Jeremy Scahill on yesterday's Fresh Air. You probably don't need to be reminded that the neocons are privatizing every last dark corner of America, but this is worth a listen. Find it here.

My first culinary review

2007-01-29T03:43:00.000-08:00

The following commentary is courtesy of my roommate, Robert, upon tasting the rough-draft version of the creole (not cajun, as he describes) chili I'll be entering in Greg and Bonnie's annual Chili/Cornbread Cook-off next weekend. To wit, Robert's assessment:

Winter Warmth Assessed by an Amateur

Nice and meaty it was, with cajun flavor enough. It burns not the lips, nor the probing tongue, only a pleasant tingle in the throat, but then... The head and upper body warm, the skin flushes, and we can say - Yes! Excellent!

Probing tongue? Pleasant tingle? Huh, sounds like he really enjoyed it. Anyway, this is a work in progress, and I have almost a week to work it out. Cross your fingers for me, friends, and with any luck this year I will CRUSH the competition!!!

Baguettes, y'all!

2007-01-29T02:28:00.000-08:00

As some of you may know, I've been experimenting with bread lately. I've been cutting my teeth, for the last few weeks, on a pretty basic Italian bread recipe, and I've decided to branch out a bit. I made baguettes the other day, with, get this... very considerable success! I have to say, I'm pretty proud of myself here, folks. Baguettes, while not exactly difficult, per se, are one of the more technically demanding forms of bread to make, and I'm happy to reiterate that mine came out really quite well. Now, they can't be technically considered baguettes, as they're not quite long enough (hold the jokes, people). You need a professional oven to make true baguettes. They were, rather, miniature versions of the same. But the dough was true, and that's the real test.

Baguette dough, or for that matter any traditional french bread dough, involves two pre-ferments (pate fermentee, or "scrap dough," and poolish, so named for the Polish bakers who supposedly invented it), which distinguishes this kind of bread from a more simple one-day bake, such as the aforementioned basic Italian bread. Creating the pre-ferments involved really nothing more than mixing some flour, water and yeast the day before, the pate fermentee being refrigerated overnight, while the poolish was fermented overnight at room temperature. Both of these pre-ferments are really quite impressive once they're ready to incorporate into the dough the next day, the yeast having produced some pretty aggressive bubbling.

Why bother with the pre-ferments, you ask? Well, the purpose of the pate fermentee is to impart a slightly sour flavor (somewhat akin to a sourdough starter, the sour flavor being the result of the acetic acid which develops during refrigeration), while the poolish develops gluten, which gives the final dough its extensibility, which helps in shaping the loaves.

On the baking day, the pre-ferments are incorporated into the rest of the dough, and it's pretty smooth sailing from there on out, although I have to say that the end result is a very sticky dough which can be a bit tricky to work with. I, myself, don't yet have the skills to knead this dough by hand, and relied heavily on my pastry scraper, so at this point I'm still a bit of a candy-ass, I suppose. But after baking the loaves in my newly-acquired baguette pan (yes, you DO need a baguette pan to really do this right), my baguettes turned out as well as any I've ever bought at a bakery, so I'm considering this endeavor to have been a success!

The Heat Can Melt Your Brain...

2007-01-29T02:06:00.000-08:00

At Jenni's suggestion, we went to see local husband-and-wife rockers Viva Voce at Dante's this past Thursday. And to boot, it was a $5 "low dough show."

The first opener was the Caves, a band which seems to draw a lot of comparisons to early U2 and the Cure. Well, I love early U2 ("October," "Boy," and "War" being some of the best albums ever made), and I hate the Cure. I'm happy to say that this band embodied much more of the former than they did of the latter. Good poppy hooks, fantastic musicianship, and not a trace of whiny Robert Smith vocals!

The second band was The Village Green, a Kinks-inspired (hence the name) punk-pop outfit that didn't offend, but didn't exactly impress either.

Viva Voce, it must be said, blew us all away. Somewhat reminiscent of Quasi or Point Juncture, Kevin Robinson, playing drums, and his very lovely better half Anita Robinson, on guitar (and occasionally bass), rocked the place! They must have had a few pre-recorded tracks, as a two-piece like this simply could not flesh out a full-band sound otherwise (even Quasi employs extra musicians for live shows), but I didn't mind a bit. They were superb. They're heading out on tour with the Shins here in a bit, so y'all in other parts do check 'em out when they come to your town!

HOLY MALKMUS!

2007-01-21T02:06:00.000-08:00

Janet Weiss is the new Janeane Garafalo! Those of you who know me well will know what that means. Janet, if you're reading this, and you're single, call me ba... Oh wait, I'm kinda seeing someone right now, never mind... Sorry! (Like I'd have a shot...)

Janet Weiss, who is (make no mistake about this, people), a Rock God, was recently freed of her Sleater-Kinney duties and has signed on as the new drummer in Stephen Malkmus' band, the Jicks. I guess you could say that she's been Jickified. Or Jick-O-lated, perhaps. Or maybe just plain Jicked. At any rate, Jenni and I caught their show tonight at the Crystal Ballroom, and... Wow!

I wasn't really familiar at all with Malkmus' work, apart from some of the old Pavement records my friends used to play back about 10 years ago. I was pretty deep into a Dead/Allmans/Panic thing at the time (with a lot of Freddy Jones, Samples and Jayhawks thrown in for good measure), and I wasn't paying much attention to anything else. Those of you who know anything about music are shaking your heads at me right now, I'm sure. Basically, I went to this Malkmus show toinght with totally fresh ears.

I would describe what he played as... the Beatles, Stones, Kinks, Doors, Grateful Dead, Journey, REO Speedwagon, Boston, Knack, Echo and the Bunnymen, and Miami Sound Machine all rolled into one amazing mustachio-ed package. That is, of course, a ridiculous description and doesn't begin to cover it, but let it suffice to say that I could hear a pretty broad range of influences, reconstituted into something both familiar and new. And quite a bit jammier than I was expecting (hence the Doors/Dead comparison), which was a welcome surprise. In short, good stuff. I'll be diving into the Malkmus/Pavement back catalog here in the near future. I've got my homework cut out for me, you could say...

Bill Moyers for President!

2007-01-16T20:12:00.000-08:00

"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote."
-Benjamin Franklin

This is the quote Bill Moyers used to open his plenary address at this year's National Conference for Media Reform, held over this past weekend in Memphis, and it only got better from there. This was an absolutely electrifying speech. I've heard Bill Moyers speak before, and while he never fails to impress, I'd not heard him loaded for bear quite the way he was this time around. He is, after all, an ordained baptist minister, and that really comes through when he's on his game. If you have even a passing interest in net neutrality, I highly recommend giving this a listen. And if you don't have even a passing interest in net neutrality, then you NEED to give this a listen! Perhaps the best part is his announcement that he'll be reviving his old news documentary program, Bill Moyers' Journal, this spring. It's about an hour long, so grab yourself a snack and a tasty beverage, and enjoy!

http://www.freepress.net/conference/audio07/NCMR07_moyers.mp3

Mori's at long last Desperado AKA "Desi" August 1994-January 2007

2007-01-14T04:12:00.000-08:00

This is a sad day for Portland's canine community. My good friend Robin just lost one of her two akitas, Desi. Any of you who were lucky enough to have known Desi surely understand just how cool a dog she was. She will be deeply missed by us all, but especially by Robin, Tim and Desi's packmate Bronwyn. My deepest condolences go out to the three of them.

Sailing to the moon with Alice the goon

2007-01-06T03:37:00.001-08:00

Hope you all had a good New Years' Eve! I, for one, was working hard. Not working in the traditional sense, mind you, but bartending.

No, I haven't become a bartender. I've been doing some volunteering lately for a local "interdisciplinary arts" organization called Disjecta, and I signed on to help with their New Years show. Disjecta, located in a great old warehouse next to the Burnside Bridge, puts on visual arts exhibitions, as well as performance art pieces, and the occasional rock show upstairs. This particular event was of the latter variety, and featured local favorites Quasi (who are Janet Weiss of Sleater-Kinney and her ex-husband Sam Coomes, of Elliot Smith's old band, Heatmiser), the Joggers (who are, well, the freakin' Joggers!) and the Grails (who are the Grails). And Heather, the volunteer coordinator, fool that she is, put me behind the bar!

Actually, it wasn't such a bad move on her part. I have to say, I did a pretty good job, as did the rest of my compatriots. We schmoozed the gents, flirted with the ladies, and generally kept the crowd's buzz-on going strong. But don't think it was an easy gig. The three or four of us that were behind that bar at any given time got WORKED! The last show Disjecta put on, which was San Francisco's Xiu Xiu (see previous post), drew about 300 people, which is more or less the norm for this venue. The NYE show, on the other hand, drew nearly a thousand! It was crazy, we were moving the whole time! We literally ran out of booze during Quasi's set and had to drag a couple dusty kegs of Pabst out from the basement. The upside to all of this was that we had a clear sight-line to the stage, so we could at least look up and see the bands every once in a while. And of course, we made pretty significant bank in tips. If it can be said there was any downside, it was that the tap on the bands' keg was broken, and they kept hassling us for free drinks all night ("I'm with the band" gets old after a while, but we humored them; they were, after all, the night's entertainment).

And of course, I got to put a few of my friends on the guest list, which they appreciated. Unfortunately, my friend Zack had to leave during Quasi's set, as the buses were about to stop running. I offered to drive him home after the show (being hard at work behind the bar, I basically wasn't drinking at all), but he declined my offer, which I wish he hadn't done, as Quasi is his favorite band.

At any rate, a good time was had by all. The bands did a fine job. The Joggers, in addition to their originals, pulled out a few choice covers such as Yes' Long Distance Runaround (which I'd heard them do before), and of all things, the Dead's St. Stephen! That was a surprise. And Quasi were fantastic as well. They played mostly stuff from their latest record, "When the Going Gets Dark," which I highly recommend to any of you not familiar with their work. Great record (I'm listening to it as I write this).

Good stuff! I'll definitely be volunteering for Disjecta again in the future.

No Dead Moon for you!

2006-12-07T23:29:00.000-08:00

Well, this was a disappointing evening.

I went to Dante's tonight to see Portland's favorite punk band, Dead Moon. The legendary Dead Moon, that is. That would be the Dead Moon that sells out the biggest rooms in Belgium. And Germany. And France. And gets absolutely no credit here in the states, outside of Portland, anyway.

Dead Moon cancelled. Word on the (sorry...) blogosphere has it that "something bad happened on their European tour" and that they may be breaking up. This is an unconfirmed rumor, of course. It could just be that they need a break. That would stand to reason, as they usually do take some time off when they come back from overseas. And hey, they are in their fifties! They've been doing the punk rock thing since the days of the Kingsmen (interesting side note: Dead Moon's singer/guitarist Fred Cole actually owns the mono lathe on which the Kingsemen's "Louie, Louie" was mastered). But still, Dead Moon LIVE rock-n-roll, they don't cancel a show unless something is awry. I guess I should have known something was up when the doorman told me there was no cover.

Garage rockers Mora Tau filled in for them, and they were great. In fact, they were fantastic, definitely worth checking out again. But they weren't Dead Moon. I've put off seeing this band for too long, and I really hope the window hasn't closed! Let's all wish, as hard as we can, that the rumors aren't true!

Huzzah for Fractals!

2006-12-07T04:01:00.000-08:00

Okay, now I'm just blogging because I'm bored. Sorry. Go back to whatever it is you were doing.

24 Hours on Marquam Hill

2006-12-07T03:28:00.000-08:00

An interesting photo essay was recently put together chronicling a 24-hour period at my place of employment, OHSU. Somehow, I didn't make it into any of the photos. But it's still worth a look: http://www.ohsu.edu/oneday/

Burke's first week (and a half)

2006-12-06T22:52:00.000-08:00

Well, it's been an exciting week for the new dog. Jodi and Lisa drove up from Creswell on Nov. 25 to check out the house and the yard, and having determined that it was an appropriate environment for Burke, went back to Creswell without him.

He warmed up to me within the first day or two, and got the lay of the house down pretty quickly. He's established a couple of safety zones, one being my bedroom, the other being the corner of the kitchen, in front of the door that leads to the basement. He also has the basement, where he hangs out when I'm at work, or out someplace where I can't take him. I've got his crate down there, and he spends a lot of his basement time in there, although I know he comes out of it at least every once in a while. He's getting used to the neighborhood as well, although sudden noises still send him into a panicked crouch. He's gradually getting desensitized to all of the random stimulation of being in an urban environment. The main challenge is going to be getting him comfortable with the back yard. For whatever reason, he really doesn't seem to like it out there, which will need to change, as the back yard is to be his toilet. He's house trained, and he's done his thing out back a few times now, so I know he's capable of it, it's just a matter of getting him to make that association, I guess. We'll keep working on it.

Burke hasn't shown any interest in fetch yet, and in general he doesn't seem to be very toy motivated. He does have a rawhide chew toy he seems to like, but that's about it. He's not much for tug-of-war, either. Basically, he works really hard at relaxing. He does, however, like to go on hikes. He's been in Forest Park a couple times, and I'm going to try to get out into the Gorge with him sometime this weekend. Hiking notwithstanding, he's definitely a mellow dog, not nearly as intense as Copilot (and Cope wasn't really that intense to begin with, not by border collie standards anyway). He'll be a bit of a project, as he's got some kinks to work out, but he has a great personality, and he'll be a great dog.

Quiet Power!

2006-12-03T00:14:00.000-08:00

A couple of alternate titles to this blog might be: "Happy Birthday, Amy! Damn You!" or "Tonight I was rocked by Canadian rednecks!" But I think "Quiet Power!" says it best.

A buddy of mine went to see Flipper tonight at Dante's (Flipper, for those of you not familiar with them, are a San Francisco experimental noise/punk outfit from the 80s; they're one of those bands that are, as my friend John says, "referred to as 'seminal' in the press"), and honestly, I was tempted to go along. I also considered seeing New Model Army (another "seminal" 80s band, this time from England) at the Fez, which might very well have been a once in a lifetime show. But I turned both of those opportunities down to see Amy Millan (say "Mill-ANN") at the Doug Fir. Those of you who follow Canadian music will probably know her name from her work with Stars and Broken Social Scene. These days she's touring as a solo artist.

Now, many of you who know me here in Portland know that I've been bitching incessantly of late about the country/bluegrass curse that's befallen Stumptown over the past few years (thankfully, that curse is beginning to lift). Well, I have to say, tonight I saw that oft-mangled musical genre done right! Amy Millan made the Fir her own with her "anti-Tammy-Wynette" down home antics. "Kentuckified," the critics are saying about her. Now, I've never been to Kentucky, so I can't comment on that, but she's from Canada, I know that much, and I don't think there's a Kentucky up there... And at any rate, Slint and Love Jones were both from Kentcky, and there's really no comparison to either, so critics, I would say you need to fish around for a better word! Of course, I'm not a music critic myself, so I really don't know what else I can say about her other than that her voice is the perfect vehicle for her beautifully crafted songs, thin and plaintive at the right moments, fat and soaring the rest of the time. The band she's surrounded herself with back her up with equal parts subtlety and force, with the stand-outs being a lap steel player, a mandolinist (mandoliner?) and a multi-instrumentalist who switched from trombone to guitar to saw. Yes, the saw, more on that in a bit. You can check out her music at http://www.arts-crafts.ca/amymillan/. In doing so, you'll get the Amy Millan solo experience. Which is all well and good, but imagine those songs fleshed out by an astoundingly capable six-piece band, and you'll have a good idea of what we all experienced tonight at the Doug Fir.

I saw a couple of firsts at this show: One was a Thunderbird mandolin (I didn't know such a thing existed! This is of interest to me, as I play a Thunderbird bass). The other was a saw solo! Yes, that's right, the aforementioned multi-instrumentalist played a saw (just what it sounds like), with a bow, like a cello. Only it was a saw. Which of course we've all seen before on Hee Haw, but this guy soloed on the thing like he was Jimmy Page. Amazing!

And yes, it was Amy's birthday. Or rather tomorrow is. A few of us in the crowd tried to sing "Happy Birthday" to her at a couple points during the show, but she cut us off, determined not to be the center of attention (ironic, yes). If any of you happen to be at Amy's show in Eugene tomorrow night, don't let her wiggle out of it! And have fun, you will not be disappointed!

COPILOT! 1997-2006

2006-11-24T20:01:00.000-08:00

Well, my friends, the inevitable has come to pass, and the great Copilot is no more. He shuffled off his mortal coil today at approximately 4:00 pm. A vein was found, the sodium pentobarbitol was administered, and the rest went pretty quickly (thankfully). Once Cope stopped moving, the vet, who will remain nameless (we'll call him Dr. No-Bedside-Manner) listened with his stethoscope for a few minutes and proclaimed that "she's passed."

Now there are a couple things about this statement that don't sit that well with me. The first is perhaps a bit inconsequential, maybe even a little petty, but I'm grieving, so humor me. Copilot did not "pass." He died. There's nothing wrong with that word. Dogs die. Cats die. People die. Protozoa die. They do not "pass." They die. This euphemism has always been a pet peeve of mine (I also take issue with "bless you." I'm very solidly planted in the "gesundheit" camp. I am, however, very much in favor of the above-mentioned "shuffled off this mortal coil" euphemism), but I realize that I'm in the minority on this point, so well, there you have it. I digress.

The other problem is that COPILOT WAS NOT FEMALE!!! You're a doctor of veterinary medicine, for the love of Pete, have at least a cursory glance at the chart before dealing with your patients! Jeez! I know this, and I don't even have letters after my name! And to make matters worse, at one point, he called me "dude"!!! I should say though, in Dr. NBM's defense, that he did manage to complete the task quickly, and with the utmost competence. Copilot did not suffer in his last moments. And for that, I thank you, Dr. NBM!

Any of you who were acquainted with my dog surely know how wonderful a companion to me he was, and I can assure you that he loved and appreciated anybody unlucky enough to find themselves at the sharp end of his fetch obsession (Lowrey...).

And check out that techincolor neck fur! This wonderfully abstract photo was taken from way down on the floor of my kitchen, in some kind of weird afternoon light.

He was such a good dog! He is sorely, sorely missed.

Now soliciting snarky captions!

2006-11-19T16:14:00.000-08:00

"Hmmm... the democrats have congress, Rummy's history, and Karl's gone into hiding somewhere on Fire Island... I guess I'll call up that Putin fella and see if he wants to try out for Cirque du Soleil with me."

Well, that's mine. Anyone else wanna take a crack at this?

No small victory for the sane...

2006-11-11T07:10:00.000-08:00

Paul Krugman and Tom Tomorrow put it best. Check it out:

I’m not feeling giddy as much as greatly relieved. O.K., maybe a little giddy.
–Paul Krugman

That about sums it up for me. It’s as if the biopsy results just came back and you don’t have cancer after all. You’re not giddy, exactly, but you can finally take a deep breath and maybe let some of the tension drain out of your shoulders. The future remains uncertain but you can begin to imagine it as something other than relentlessly bleak. As a general rule, I don’t have much faith in Democrats, having not fallen off any turnip trucks within recent memory, but I also think that we’re suddenly in an entirely new ball game. At the very least, I believe they will serve as a necessary bulwark against whatever residual craziness the Bushies may be harboring. They won’t be rubber stamping any plans to invade Iran this time around. And maybe they’ll even step up to the plate and hit one out of the park. They’re newly emboldened, and this is their moment. They no longer have to worry about appeasing the sort of people who believe that criticism of the president is an act of treason. Those people have been shunted aside. They’ve been put back in perspective. They were never anything more than marginal cranks, but for awhile there they managed to create their own reality, to create the illusion that they represented some sort of majority consensus in this country. Well, sorry, freaks. You can go back to typing your little manifestos and wanking over your war porn, and yelling at your mom to bring more cheetos down to the basement for you — but the country has seen you for the pathetic creatures you are, and moved on.

It’s time to have grownup conversations now. It goes without saying that the Democrats will disappoint us, one way or another. So what? The test results came back, and it’s not terminal. We got a little breathing room, and isn’t that all you can really ever hope for in life?
-Tom Tomorrow

!!!!EARTHQUAKE!!!!

2006-11-06T02:19:00.000-08:00

We had an earthquake here in Portland tonight, at approximately 9:35pm. And the really interesting thing about all of this is that the epicenter of this earthquake, according to the USGS, was literally FIFTY YARDS AWAY FROM MY HOUSE!!! 16 miles down into the earth, mind you, but 50 yards away nonetheless! Click the link, close out the irritating "thought bubble" thing by clicking the X in the upper right hand corner, zoom in all the way, and then pull down with the handy hand tool until you can see the red-roofed house, roughly in line with the green "epicenter" arrow, at the corner of the main street (Belmont St) and the dead end street (18th St). That house is where I live!

I've been on the west coast for 7 years now, and while we've had a number of earthquakes since I arrived, this is the first one I've actually felt. There was about 5 seconds of shaking, which was really more accurately described as a bouncing sensation, as though a very large explosion had taken place nearby. In fact, my roommate, Robert, didn't think it was an earthquake at all at first, because of the unusual bouncing sensation. But he is a fool, as it was indeed an earthquake! All of 2.6 in magnitude. Small by earthquake standards, but still, respectible enough, for one's first earthquake anyway!

An Evening with Xiu Xiu

2006-11-06T00:03:00.000-08:00

John the Irishman and I went to Disjecta last night to check out San Francisco's Xiu Xiu (say "shoe shoe"). I've been hearing a lot about these guys from a cat I work with named Zack, who ultimately convinced me to check them out. Neither John nor I had been to Disjecta before, so it was a bit of an adventure for the both of us. Disjecta is basically an arts organization/gallery space which arose from the ashes of the pretentiously-named Portland Center for the Advancement of Culture, best known for a huge project from a few years back called the Modern Zoo, which some of you here in Portland may remember. It's a pretty rough space, in an old warehouse right next to the Burnside Bridge. While Disjecta specializes in the visual arts, they occasionally host bands upstairs (the Shins have played there), which I imagine helps to pay the rent.

We arrived in time to see the third band of the night, Brooklyn's Dirty Projectors. The DPs are basically a six-piece experimental rock outfit with some occasional electronic experimentation. The singer had a sort of Davendra Banhart-ish freak-folk delivery, and the two gals to either side of him offered some very interesting back up vocals. They at times delved into dischordant nonsense, but it was clearly well rehearsed dischordant nonsense. John got fed up with it pretty quickly and wandered off to chat up a girl who'd caught his eye, but I was kind of digging what they were doing, so I hung around for the rest of their set, and was pleasantly surprised to run into an old co-worker from OHSU, Dave Neevel, who plays bass for Fells Acres (shameless name check, Sorry; what's even more shameless is that to this day I still haven't seen his band).

After the DPs were finished, Xiu Xiu's drummer took the stage and played both his drum kit, and a vibraphone, for about 15 minutes. Then we had to endure nearly a half hour of irritating sound-check type stuff, before Xiu Xiu finally went on. A more professional venue might have worked all of this out in advance, but as I said, Disjecta's not a music venue primarily, and they're apparently still new at the whole sound thing. It was worth the wait, however. Xiu Xiu immediately launched into a very compelling set of indie/emo/art rock, with bits of modern classical and post rock thrown in. Xiu Xiu are a sort of musical collective, and they have, at times, had as many as seven members, at other times only two. On this night there were three of them, Jamie Stewart, the only constant member and main creative force, his cousin Caralee McElroy, and drummer/vibraphonist Ches Smith. Jamie covered vocals and guitar, along with various percussion, Caralee played keys and Ches held down the drums, in a very aggressive fashion (nearly knocking over his cymbal stands on a number of occasions), along with the aforementioned vibraphone (which he never came close to knocking over; vibraphones have a fair amount of bulk to them). Our friend Jon the Architect showed up in time to catch their last song. Luckily, he managed to talk his way in without paying the cover charge ("My friends are in there, and I'm their ride!" A skillful liar, that Jon! And a fine architect as well).

Interestingly, I never did run into Zack at the show.

Copilot, meet Burke. Burke, meet Copilot!

2006-11-02T22:25:00.000-08:00

I've been perusing the Pacific Northwest Border Collie Rescue website lately in search of Copilot's successor, and there are a number of dogs that look like they might fit the bill. I drove down to Creswell today to meet the first of those dogs, Burke, a beautiful blue and white border collie. I took Copilot with me so he could make his assessment as well, and I'm glad to report that Cope gave Burke the thumbs-up. Or rather he would have, if he had thumbs. Perhaps "the dew-claws up" is a better way of saying it, but I digress...

Burke has a dicey history. He was found as a stray in Montana, and was possibly feral for a time. He could prove to be a bit of work. He's very uncomfortable with strangers and new situations, but he has a very good disposition and no aggression whatsoever, so he looks like a good candidate for the position of "Tommy's border collie" (Of course Copilot is at this point still very much in possession of that title). I have a number of other dogs to look at in the near future, but Burke shows promise.

By the way, in the photo it looks like Burke is much larger than Copilot. He's actually slightly smaller. Funny thing, perspective...

Wow.

2006-10-28T03:03:00.000-07:00

This weekend's musical event took place at the Doug Fir. No surprise there, eh?

The opening band, Moonshine Hangover, are a country-rock outfit who are vaguely reminiscent of a cross between, maybe, 38 Special and the Black Crowes. I'm sort of done with the country-rock lately, but they were really good, better than most bands of this genre, here in Portland anyway. I think they'd play very well back in my home state of Michigan. The bass player, Will, has been best friends with my buddy Jim since their high school days in Beaverton, and we had a chance to chat him up after their set. He had the goods on Jim! Good cat.

Next up was a woman called Morgan Grace, who apparently just recently won a songwriting award on the on-line "underground" version of American Idol. Her band is a four-piece, with Morgan on vocals and guitar, a bass player, a drummer, and a sax player. They had a little bit of an edge to them, and at times really seemed to hit their stride. But on the whole, they didn't quite do it for me. Having a sax player is an interesting angle for a band like this, but he didn't really contribute much. It almost seemed like they'd just recruited a sax professor from Portland State to stand in for the night and improvise once in a while. And Morgan's voice was a bit off key from time to time (but yes, the songwriting is pretty solid). They could use some work, but I may give them a second chance sometime down the road. Oh, and I do have to say, their drummer, Sam Henry, was amazing. He's been playing around Portland since the late 70s, and was in the Wipers and Napalm Beach, both very influential Portland punk bands from (sorry...) back in the day. As my friend John noted, Sam displayed about as much musicianship as the other three combined. He had a very interesting way with the cymbals, sort of reminded me of Jeep MacNichol from the original Samples line-up.

The headlining band was the Heartless Bastards, a blues-rock trio from Cincinnati who've been getting a bit of attention in the music press lately. I don't know what it is with Ohio these days. First the Black Keys, now these guys. That Detroit garage rock thing must be creeping south, because the Buckeye state is producing good bands like nobody's business lately. The Heartless Bastards just tore the roof off the Fir. Portlanders tend to be a bit cynical when it comes to their music, and that seems to be especially true of the Doug Fir crowd, but these guys had the audience from the very first note! I've never seen a crowd at the Fir react to a band like they did tonight, not even at the Mission of Burma show. Singer/guitarist Erica Wennerstrom doesn't have a lot of range, she's very firmly planted in alto territory, but man, is her voice strong! Those are some very powerful lungs for such a petite gal! The folks at Pitchfork have said that Erica's limited range keeps the band from truly opening up, but I disagree. I don't think it limits them in the least. At any rate, the rhythm section more than kept up with her, and I should note that the bassist plays a Rickenbacker 3001 (as the more observant bass players among you may have noticed in the photo), which is noteworthy because it's such a rare thing to see. I can't think of anyone else who plays that bass other than the guy who played bass in the Posies back in the mid-90s. That's probably due to the fact that the 3001 is very, very heavy. I know, I used to have one. I do wish I'd kept that thing, but I'm really coming to like my Thunderbird. But enough about me, if the Heartless Bastards come to your town, make sure to check 'em out. You won't be disappointed.

Give our best to Derek and Wolfgang: Todd Skinner, 1958-2006

2006-10-26T03:02:00.000-07:00

Todd Skinner was a legend by the time I started climbing (all those years ago). It saddened me, as I'm sure it did many of you, to hear of his death from a 500-foot fall while rappelling off a project last Monday in Yosemite. Words will fail, but for what it's worth, he went out doing what he was meant to do. You can read the Denver Post article here.

This weekend's musical selection...by accident!

2006-10-22T01:20:00.000-07:00

I headed out to the Alberta Street Public House tonight for the first time with a friend of mine. I can't believe I'd never been to this place. It's a very charming little english/irish style pub which is apparently divided into two spaces when there's live music, one half being given over to the show, with no bar, and the other half retaining the function of pub. We went into the pub half to grab a couple pints and an order of fries, which according to Barfly magazine are some of the best in Portland. They were better than average, though far too skinny. Before the fries arrived, the last musician to go on, Seattle's Camille Bloom, came over into our half of the pub to invite us over to check out her set for a $2 donation in lieu of the cover charge. We missed most of her performance due to the enormity of the pile of fries which eventually showed up, but we managed to catch her last three songs. The basic idea seemed to be fairly aggressive DiFrancoesque folk. She handled her guitar well, and sang, with a very strong and clear voice, songs of unrequited lust and interpersonal struggle. She also covered "Sunglasses At Night." Good stuff.

"Yaki Taki Ooh-Wah" or... "You say hotdog, I say whisky!"

2006-10-19T03:04:00.000-07:00

My friend Jenni's had a bad week. So I talked her into seeing some music on Wednesday to take her mind off of things. The original plan was to see the Decemberists at the Crystal Ballroom, but upon perusing the Willamette Week music listings, I found that the Detroit Cobras were playing Sabala's, and being a big Cobras fan, insisted that we see them instead. And as it turned out, the Decemberists' show was sold out so this worked out just fine.

I'd never been to Sabala's, so I really had no idea of just how nasty a place this is. Now I do. We got ourselves a couple beers, and after making our way across the sticky floor to one of the booths along the back wall, I immediately had to head back to the bar to steal a bar towel to clean off our table. Considering the pathogens that must live in those bar towels, this may not have been a good idea, but at the very least we managed to rid our table of crusty ketchup residue. Sabala's is so disgusting that you barely notice the holes punched in the bathroom walls because you're distracted by the fleas hopping around on the toilets. You think I'm kidding. I'm not. In short, it's my kind of place!

The first band to go on was Portland's own Divining Rods, who play a sort of updated 60's style psychedelic garage rock. Their singer isn't winning any awards, but on the whole I'd say they pulled it off well enough.

Taylor Hollingsworth and the Spider Eaters, of Vegas, Alabama (that's right, Vegas, Alabama) were next. They were actually pretty good. Punkabilly is probably the word I would use to describe their sound. Well crafted, well directed songs played tight and precise. Taylor's a competent singer, and his guitar work is impressive, if a little derivative (somewhere between Johnny Ramone and Brian Setzer). And he has a good rhythm section backing things up.

The next band, if they can even be called a band, were terrible. There's really no word in the English language that can convey just how bad they were. I asked Jenni to try and come up with one, and all she could manage was "crap." But the problem with that word is that is doesn't have enough syllables to convey the message. If you could somehow combine the words heinous, horrendous and horrific into one big long unpronounceable diatribe, that might begin to do the trick. Basically, this was two singer/guitarists cruelly misusing a drum machine (or perhaps I should say a drum machine cruelly misusing two singer/guitarists), who for all of their effort could come up with nothing better than a horrible screeching noise reminiscent of the sound the fan belt in your car makes when it's about to give way and shred the electrical system. A couple songs into all of this one of them, bafflingly, changed into a dress and a purple wig. He presumably remained in the dress and wig, but I can't say for sure, as Jenni and I sat out the rest of their set in the hallway. It's pretty rare that I walk out on a band, but these guys were that bad. I don't know if they were going for irony or what, but I could find nothing to redeem what they were doing. They were an absolute waste of everybody's time. I didn't catch their name, but I wish I had so I could warn you all off of them. On the upside, Jenni and I managed to have a decent conversation out there in the hallway as we were waiting for the Cobras to go on.

And once they did finally take the stage, the Detroit Cobras were, of course, amazing! For those of you not familiar with the Cobras, their basic M.O. is this: take obscure R&B songs from the 50's and 60's, Otis Redding B-sides and the like, and give them a punked-up garage rock treatment. Frontwoman Rachel Nagy (who, as band lore has it, worked in the past as both a butcher and a stripper) is a boozy punk-burlesque torch singer who shows off her cleavage almost as well as she shows off her vocal chords, and the other "leader" of the band, Mary Ramirez, is a capable and engaging rhythm guitarist who I could easily see filling the Malcolm Young role in Helle's Belles. Most eyes were trained on Rachel for the way she's built, but my eyes were trained, for much of the show anyway, on Mary for the way she plays.

Jenni managed to stick it out for five or six songs of the Cobras' set, and I have to give her an enormous amount of credit for this, as she had to be at work early the next morning. As you're reading this, she is undoubtedly suffering in the office. You are a trooper, Jenni! Thanks for coming out and supporting the Cobras!

Copilot's blog

2006-10-15T21:47:00.000-07:00

I rocked the Lucky Labrador tonight! Not singlehandedly, mind you, I had some help from Mortimer and Porter the rottweiler this time around. Anyway, most of you reading this probably know by now that that there's something wrong with me, although I'm not really sure what it is (editor's note: Copilot's lungs are being colonized by a friendly and industrious family of cancer cells), so I talked Tommy into having a little get together for me at my favorite brewpub while I'm still in reasonably good shape. And believe me, I got a workout! Between showing off my extensive collection of tricks, chasing that tennis ball with a squirrel tail attached thing, and humping Mortimer's head, I'm beat! The photo, for those of you not familiar with my friends (Tommy likes to think they're his friends, but really, they're mine. We just sort of let him hang around), is of, left to right, back to front, Jim, Jenni, John, Adam, me (that's Tommy behind me), Sarah, Mortimer (with Lowrey behind him) and Robin. Off camera are Josh (taking the photo), my roomie Bill (off fielding a phone call) and Porter the rottweiler, who was at that moment hanging with his people. By the way, that mosaic behind us on the wall is a memorial to the dozen or so dogs that were poisoned by paraquat-laced meat in Laurelhurst Park a few years back. Tommy and I used to hang out in that park! Man, did I dodge a bullet there! Oh, and a big shout to Bronwyn! Take care of that spleen, my friend!

A fun time was had by all, and while I may not be at next year's Dogtoberfest, I assure you that this will not be my last trip to the Lab! Thanks for reading!

Crotch sniff,
Copilot

"My mother taught me three chords..."

2006-10-14T01:57:00.000-07:00

"...and the rest I just stole as I went along. I learned everything by ear or by watching people."

That, my friends, is James McMurtry! He's one of the best singer/songwriters to come out of Texas in the last couple decades, and he put on a very good show a couple weeks ago at the Alladin Theater (I'm a bit late in posting this, I know, buy hey...). Many thanks to John Mellencamp for "dicovering" this guy! He just blew each and every one of us in the Alladin away that night.

Bernie Sanders (D, VT) is currently using McMurtry's recent protest song in his campaign. Do check it out, it's pretty good!

House Show!

2006-10-08T05:09:00.000-07:00

...which is pretty much just what it sounds like (the photo, however, is not of a house show). We showed up at "The Pink House" at 8:00 to what would have been a run-of-the-mill North Portland twenty-something hipster party, which it was, I suppose, until the music started in the basement shortly after 9:00.

The first band to play were called Swim Swam Swum. Sort of a cross between Weezer and Pond (for those of you non-Portlanders who aren't familiar with Pond, well, google 'em), they're Portland's best-conjugated band, and able performers as well. Their rhythm section is VERY tight, though their singer/guitarist should stick to guitar (I must stress that he really is an impressive guitar player, but he does need to hand off the vocal duties to someone who can actually sing. If that ever happens, these guys may have something).

The next band, Deer or the Doe, I'm sorry to report, I pretty much missed. I did catch a couple of their songs, but for most of their set, I was hangin' out upstairs on the front porch, so I can't really offer any kind of description of their performance, other than to say that the two songs I heard were pretty good. A catchy, indie-pop sort of sound.

And finally, there was Point Juncture, Washington. It's definitely a treat to see this band in such an informal setting. They could well be the next band to "make it out of Portland" (they've got it all over the Decemberists, but don't tell anybody). They're just that good. I managed to schmooze them a little before they went on (my friend John knows Amanda, the singer/drummer), which is always cool, but the real fun was watching them play cheek-by-jowl in a basement which was itself about the size of an average stage. At one point Amanda remarked between songs that it was the most fun show they'd ever played, and I wouldn't doubt she was telling the truth. They looked like they were enjoying themselves.

So there you have it. Good bands, fifty-some-odd spectators, suprisingly good acoustics for a basement, and tasty IPA flowing upstairs in the kitchen. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday evening.

I've been published!

2006-09-26T18:25:00.000-07:00

Well, sorta. A letter I recently sent to the Portland Mercury's "I, Anonymous" column, which you can read here, concerning my recent experience on Fremont street (in my old hood, no less!) was printed this week. They edited it with what must have been a rusty nail file, just really hacked it to death. I figured they'd cut it down a bit, but I didn't think they'd mangle it like they did. I guess I've never dealt with editors, and that's probably a good thing. Read their version, then read mine a few posts down.

I do have to say, though, that I like the "repeat offender" graphic.

Amy Goodman and Mission of Burma... In one day!

2006-09-17T01:04:00.000-07:00

Well, today (yesterday really, it's after midnight) I got to see one of my heroes, Amy Goodman, at the Bagdad Theater (insert Amy Goodman in Baghdad joke here... and by the way, yes the theater's name is spelled without the "h"). She and her brother David have just written another book, called Static, and are on tour supporting it. They read some excerpts and spoke about the process of gathering the information and turning it into a book, typical stuff for a book tour. They also related a number of stories culled from their experiences as investigative journalists. David offered a particularly interesting story, of a historical nature, which goes roughly as follows:

Back in the days of slavery, there was a fellow in Eastern Maryland named (I think I'm getting this right) Edward Covey, who was a well known slave breaker. Plantation owners could send any particularly rebellious or troublemaking slaves to Mr. Covey's property, dubbed "Misery Mountain," where the slaves would be "broken." What that means, exactly, I'll leave to your imagination. One of the slaves sent to Misery Mountain was Frederick Douglas, who was very nearly broken, but managed to escape, made his way to Massachusetts via the Underground Railroad, and changed the course of history.

That's interesting. But it's not the end of the story. What's perhaps even more interesting is that this particular property was recently purchased, as a vacation retreat, by none other than Donald Rumsfeld. Now this doesn't say anything about Rumsfeld, of course, but it does seem oddly fitting, no?

Anyway, that was my afternoon. This evening, a friend and I went to see Mission of Burma at Portland's basement log cabin of rock, the Doug Fir. For those of you not familiar with Burma, they were one of the first bands to take the energy of punk rock and channel it into a more experimental and cerebral direction. Hailing from Boston, their milieu was the post-punk scene of the late 70s and early 80s. I would say they were a sort of musical bridge between the Stooges and Husker Du. They were never hugely successful, but they were a classic example of the critically acclaimed, "influential" band. Those of you who are familiar with Burma are probably thinking "Tommy, what are you a music critic? You're full of shit and I'm going to call you on it next time I see you." Yeah, well... At any rate, they were well in form. And LOUD (acoustics aside, the Fir is a relatively small room). These guys must be in their early fifties by now, and they haven't lost their edge one bit.

Kinda gives one hope, doesn't it?

Ahh, life in the big city...

2006-09-15T01:42:00.000-07:00

Be careful when you're riding your bike at night, folks. Forthwith, a letter I just submitted to the Portland Mercury's "I, Anonymous" column (which, for you out-of-towners, is pretty much just what it sounds like):

To the would-be thug teenager who pulled me off my bike on Fremont street last night:

While I will give you and your friends props for your rudimentary tactical skills in the predationary arts, I'm a little disappointed in your follow-through. I would have thought that while yelling "You got money? You got money bitch?" while holding your foster parents' house keys to my head, you might have had the wherewithal to actually steal something from me. Say, my bike (worth about a grand). Or my messenger bag ($450 waterproof/breathable shell inside; the rainy season is coming, you know). Or at least my wallet ($16 and half a book of stamps. By the way, it's not hard to find. I keep it in my back pocket, approximately midway between my right shoulderblade and my right calf). That's $1469.70! Not bad for less than a minute's work. If you extrapolate that into a yearly salary, it works out to... well, a lot of money! But in the thirty seconds or so it took for my friend's hollering to summon some passersby, you managed to get...nothing. Now I'm sure you're good kids just out for some laughs, but if you keep up this hooliganish behavior, you will wind up in prison at some point, and what will you have to show for it? Not my bike, not my waterproof/breathable shell, not even my stamps. You'll have eight inches of throbbing repeat offender lust pumping you full of all manner of nasty diseases in the prison laundry room, that's what you'll have. I, on the other hand, will have my bike, my waterproof/breathable shell, and my wallet (although I'm sure I will have burned through the stamps by this point). All $1469.70 of it. And my freedom. Your future looks pretty bleak. Savor every second of it.

Three Metal Snaps: Thank You, Ann Richards, and rest in peace!

2006-09-14T18:07:00.000-07:00

For many of us on the left, it's easy to imagine the state of Texas as a place which has made at best a scant contribution to progessive politics of late. But we should remember that this is the state that gave us Kinky Friedman, Molly Ivins, Jim Hightower, Willie Nelson, and perhaps most importantly, Ann Richards, who died yesterday of esophageal cancer. Richards will be remembered for her commitment to prison reform, funding of education (she TRULY left no child behind), equality and gay rights. But she will likely be remembered most for her incredibly sharp wit. Have a look at her hilarious speech at the Texas Observer's 50th Anniversary event at the following link (click on "watch 128K stream" or "watch 256K stream"). The fun starts about a minute and a half into it.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/14/1351255

Turn down the AWESOME...

2006-09-03T01:34:00.000-07:00

...best fan shout I've heard in quite some time! No, it wasn't mine. Like I could've come up with something that good...

System and Station kicked off their national tour tonight at Holocene. They're not actually leaving town for a week or two. They're hanging around to play next weekend's MusicFest Northwest (My MFNW schedule is pretty crowded at this point, but I may just have to catch 'em once more before they head out into this big beautiful crazy nation of ours). But they'll soon be coming to your town, and when they do, you should pay yourself a favor and go see them. If you're lucky, they might play "Synchronicity II" as an encore. They arguably do a better job with this song than the Police themselves!

Point Juncture, WA opened tonight's show, and were amazing, as always. My only beef with these guys is that each of their songs needs to be at least a minute and a half longer.

YES! Bichlbaum & Bonanno take on Housing & Urban Development

2006-08-30T00:42:00.000-07:00

These guys are great! Check out the Reuters story, it's a riot. I'd say it was about time the Yes Men took on a federal agency. Who better to send up the injustice that's come to characterize the rebuilding of New Orleans?

Mmmm... Crow...

2006-08-28T16:59:00.000-07:00

Turns out that the music reviewer I so mercilessly flamed in that last post was actually quoting the opinion of another reviewer with regard to the Jolenes. So she doesn't owe me a beer after all. My apologies to you, anonymous WW reviewer! I was a fool to doubt you.

Live Music Review No. 3/The Upsidedown???

2006-08-27T00:36:00.000-07:00

Terrible name for a band! I mean really, why not call yourselves the Underneath? Or the Insideout? Or the We'reupstairs? But I'll get to that later.

This show, at the Wonder Ballroom (great venue, nice big cavernous room, decent acoustics, three bars), was put on by the folks at Pyramid Brewing in Seattle. It was a benefit of sorts. Bring 2 cans of food, pay six bucks, feed the hungry, drink good beer, see some bands. Good formula, as far as I'm concerned. I grew up in a middle-class household, and while I wouldn't necessarily call myself middle-class at this point in my life (how many of you can?), I'm doing all right. I feed myself, I pay the rent. I really have nothing to complain about. And if my government won't use my tax dollars to help the less fortunate, well, I'm glad to help somebody who's down on his or her luck, especially if it means I get to see some local musicians flaunting their chops.

Anyway, I came to this show to see a band called Blitzen Trapper, who are great. One of the best bands in Portland, as of this writing. I've been hassling everyone I know lately to come see this band. They're that good. So I got to the Wonder, right at the same time as my friend Jon the architect. We went inside, Jon bought the first round, and we settled in to see some music.

This was at around 9:30, and Point Juncture, Washington were about halfway through their set. Now for those of you outside of the general Pacific Northwest region, there is no "Point Juncture, Washington." At least not so far as I know. It's not a town. It's a band. And a good one at that. I hadn't seen these guys, but I'd heard a fair bit about them, and everything I'd heard led me to believe that their music was etherial, mellow, dreamy pop. I was pleasantly surprised to find that they were so much more than that. They were etherial, and mellow, and dreamy. They were also noisy. Brash. Anthemic. I'd been prepared to be impressed. I didn't know I'd be wowed. But wowed I was.

I was sure the next band would be Blitzen Trapper.

The next band was the Jolenes. Now, according to the Willamette Week, and in paricular, a reviewer whose opinion I usually trust, the Jolenes are "like the Donnas, but better." They were not like the Donnas. And they were most certainly not better than the Donnas. They were...searching for the right word here...awful. Jon the architect will back me up on this. They were able to play their instruments. They were well-choreographed. They had a guy who did nothing but play tambourine (he was probably the most talented member of the band). But other than that, they were, at best, uninspired. Wooden is probably the right word. They looked bored, like they'd rather be picking up an extra shift at Starbucks. I'm sure they're wonderful people, but as a band they were a waste of everybody's time. That Willamette Week reviewer owes me a beer simply for the fact that I was in the same room as that band. And I've told her so. They were that bad.

I was sure the next band would be Blitzen Trapper.

The next band was the Upsidedown. A terrible name, as mentioned above. But names only tell you so much (I was in a very good garage band in high school called "The Unknown." Show me a worse name than that. We later changed it to the much better "The Young and the Useless"). What their name doesn't tell you is that these guys are the best Portland band I've seen in ages. They came out onto the stage, like they fuckin' OWNED it, six of them, dressed all in white, like The Polyphonic Spree minus the robes, french horns, and choral section, and subjected the crowd to a mericless three-guitar-attack that would put, um... uh... well, I can't really think of a band with three guitar players right here on the spot, but let's just say, for the sake of argument, Canadian rock gods April Wine. They would put April Wine to shame! And on top of that, they had a viola player! No sissy-ass violin for these guys, a motherfuckin' viola! If you live in Portland, you should check out the Upsidedown. And if you don't live in Portland, you should STILL check out the Upsidedown! They're that good.

And that was it. The show was over. I'd missed Blitzen Trapper all together! They went on before I even got there! I can understand how the Upsidedown could edge them out for the headlining spot, but the fact that these guys went on before the friggin' Jolenes is, to me, simply astounding. Well, go figure. Guess I'll just have to catch 'em next time around.

I've trained my dog to clean up the yard

2006-08-24T20:23:00.000-07:00

I don't actually have a photo of him cleaning up the yard, so this bathtub shot will have to do. Anyway, Copilot and I have a new routine. When I take him out back to play fetch, he's required to bring a stick (the yard is, or should I say was, littered with sticks) before I'll throw his tennis-ball-with-a-raccoon-tail-attached for him. I'm very proud of this. I'd like to think that it puts me in B.F. Skinner territory, but I'd probably be overestimating my positive reinforcement skills.

I do have to say, though, the yard is looking better these days.

I'd never worked in a building actively under a bomb scare...

2006-08-24T17:25:00.000-07:00

...until now!

I got to work yesterday a little after six, to find that the road in front of the hospital was blocked off and there were police cars everywhere. On the way in, I overheard somebody saying something about a bomb threat. So after settling in, I decided to head to the 10th floor conference room, which overlooks that section of road (the ER enterance is at street level, on what is not the first but rather the eighth floor. OHSU, for those of you outside of the Portland area, is built on a series of steep hills and ravines, and much of what is at street level is considered to be either the eighth or ninth floor) to have a look. Pretty quickly, I realized that the action was centered on a car (supposedly containing a "suspicious package") in front of the ER enterance, two floors down, directly below me, which I decided was a bad place to be standing in the event of an explosion (thank you, survival instinct!), so back to work I went, and that was pretty much the end of it.

The police detonated a small charge next to the car, which did not explode, and cleaned everything up in time for my patients to get to the clinic. Just when I was beginning to think I might get the night off due to terrorism...

Never a dull moment in the health care field!

Sleater-Kinney's Last Hurrah

2006-08-21T00:10:00.000-07:00

Well, it's a week after the fact, but I think Sleater-Kinney's "final show" (I don't believe for a second that they won't re-unite for a reunion tour, or perhaps the odd benefit show, at some point in the future) warrants at least a brief post.

The show was the second of two nights at the Crystal Ballroom. I'm told it sold out in less than ten minutes (I got my tickets on Craigslist; thank you Melena P!). A local band called the Thermals opened, which was a pleasant suprise, as I've been meaning to get out and see this band for a while. I wasn't blown away, but there were some pretty impressive moments.

Next up was Eddie Vedder, who kept it to just a couple of songs. The first was a version of Phil Ochs' Here's to the State of Mississippi, modified lyrically to reflect our current state of affairs. The second was a ukelele number with Janet Weiss joining in (on vocals, not drums).

And then the ladies went on. They opened with The Fox (I had a feeling that would be the case) and continued for a good hour and a half. They leaned pretty heavily on material from the last couple records during the set, but in their two encores they broke out some older stuff, notably (for me, anyway) Milkshake & Honey. All told, they just absolutely tore the place apart for a little over two hours, and went out on a good note. Great show, and of course a bittersweet moment in Rock & Roll history.

Janeane had a good time, too.

Tha Birth of Tha Blog/A Birthday Tale

2006-08-17T23:18:00.000-07:00

Today is (was, actually, as it's after midnight) my 35th birthday. I feel good about that. Really.

Got a call from my folks. One from my aunt Gwyn, as well. Couple of friends called to wish me the best. But it's a Thursday, not much of a night for celebrating. For most folks, it's a school night. Of course, I have a weird schedule, and Thursday night for me is analogous to Saturday morning for most people. Except that it's not morning. Well, somewhere it's morning. East Timor? Vanuatu? Anyway, that's beside the point. Not much was going on.

So around 8 :00 pm, feeling a little stir crazy, I decided it would be best to get out of the house and go see some live music.

This has been a preoccupation of mine as of late. I've been feeling a bit guilty over the past few months for not taking advantage of Portland's music scene like I should be, and with Music Fest Northwest coming up in early September (for those of you in other parts of the country, MFNw started as a companion festival to South By Southwest - yes, THAT South By Southwest), I can't help but feel like I need to get out there and shake off the rust a bit. So I checked the local listings, and found a free show at the Doug Fir Lounge (walking distance from the homestead here at Camp Belmont), the headliner being Ohmega Watts, openers being Copy and Alela Diane. Now, I didn't know Ohmega Watts or Alela Diane from Phil Collins, but I've been hearing a LOT about Copy lately. Hot new band of the year, according to the pundits at Willamette Week. So...why not? And off I went.

I got to the Doug Fir (again, for you out-of-towners: imagine the Jetsons' log cabin, converted to a music venue. That pretty much describes the Doug Fir. A bit high-concept, yeah, but a nice place to see a show, especially since it's one of the few non-smoking venues in Stumptown, and their booking agent is connected like Gotti) several songs into Alela's set. She was up there by herself, totally exposed and doing a great job. Really good acoustic folk, just totally pulling it off, and that means a lot coming from me, as I'm generally not a huge fan of folk singers.

And then came Copy. Now, a description is needed here. Copy is not a band per se, but rather a guy in a red suit with a Korg synthesizer and a laptop (Think Wayne Coyne, but instead of white, the suit is red. And there's no band behind him). The post-modern take on the one man band, you might say? Or perhaps it's just the wave of the future. Either way, I'm skeptical. Very skeptical. I may be showing my age here, but I really like that guitar-bass-drums paradigm. With maybe a piano/keyboard or fiddle (ala early Jayhawks, that is, before Mark Olson left the band) thrown in. Exile On Main Street, that sort of thing. But I try to be as open minded as possible, so all right, guy with a computer, convince me! And I have to say, a couple songs into his set, he was doing a pretty good job. But just then, something happened that really made the whole evening.

A very cute twenty-something hipster chick (imagine Janeane Garafalo's little sister) leaned over to me and said "Who's this?" So I said "Copy." She said "Who?" And I said "Uhh, he calls himself Copy." And she paused, and said "Oh... Yeah!" And just then, for a brief moment, I felt much cooler at 35 than I ever felt in my twenties. Thank you, hipster chick! That was the best birthday present ever!

Okay, yeah, it would have been cooler if I'd gotten her digits, but she was off before I could chat her up. Anyway, I really enjoyed the rest of Copy's set. I didn't stay for Ohmega Watts. I'll catch him next time around.

Thanks for reading,
Tommy