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Music Features

Regardless of the cost

Tony McNaboe testifies on sophomore release
If you were concerned that the return of Rustic Overtones would mean the ends of their various side projects, it’s clear now that was a fruitless worry.

By SAM PFEIFLE | July 22, 2009

Hutch Heelan goes solo
Because of Hutch Heelan, I've now heard of EFT, which stands for emotional freedom techniques, and, as far as I can tell, involves tapping on different parts of your body to relieve pain, anxiety, and other bad feelings.

By SAM PFEIFLE | July 22, 2009

Shoot the piano player

Robert Stillman returns with Master Box
Robert Stillman's music is like an anachronistic, sepia-toned spin on the fanciful film scores of Jon Brion (Punch-Drunk Love, I Heart Huckabees). Both make fleet-footed, extremely visual piano songs with trotting melodies, a natural fit for an old silent short.

By CHRISTOPHER GRAY | July 22, 2009

Born to rock

Deer Tick take it to the roadhouse
The last time Deer Tick were in Portland, at SPACE Gallery in November 2007, then-21-year-old frontman John McCauley decided to sing the national anthem. He sprung offstage and hit the floor belting the Tony Bennett standard "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" in a nasal voice soaked in equal parts whiskey, battery acid, and gravel.

By CHRISTOPHER GRAY | July 15, 2009

The Big Hurt: Oddest proposal

Music News in Brief
"Wasn't nothing strange about your daddy," said Al Sharpton to Michael Jackson's children. "It was strange what your daddy had to deal with."

By DAVID THORPE | July 14, 2009

VIDEO: Michael Jackson's memorial service

Watch video of Michael Jackson's memorial in LA
Thousands attend Michael Jackson's memorial inside the Staples Center in LA

By PHOENIX STAFF | July 10, 2009

America’s Best New Bands 2009

Our picks for the best new artist from each state in the union
Our picks for the best new artist from each state in the union

By PHOENIX STAFF | July 10, 2009

Reaction Jackson

How to mourn a mess
There was Michael the living, breathing, singing performer and Jackson the commercial spectacle. We surrendered to the former, he to the latter.

By MICHAEL BRODEUR | July 06, 2009

Interview: Michael Jackson's autobiographer

Stephen Davis, ghostwriter of Moon Walk, remembers the King of Pop. And his monkey.
"This was still a 30 year old black kid when I was working with him," Davis says, still incredulous at Jackson's death. "And the guy who just died looked kind of like a 60 year old white woman in garish lipstick. Kind of like the Joker."

By CARLY CARIOLI | July 06, 2009

The Big Hurt: Durst pantsed, Michaels smooshed

Music news in brief
"This isn't a reunion, this is a comeback," quibbled the red-hatted irrelephant in a BBC interview.

By DAVID THORPE | June 23, 2009

The Big Hurt: Parse and labor

The week in unhelpful headlines
I think music-news headlines are now officially my favorite part of pop music.

By DAVID THORPE | June 15, 2009

A decade of song

10 years of the Portland Music Awards
It’s been a decade since the Portland Phoenix and the Portland music scene first joined up to celebrate the best in local music. Here are some highlights from this year’s party, and some artifacts we dug up from the archives.

By MARGO ROY, CLIF GARBODEN, JOHN MARSHALL, LISA CRAIG, MATTHEW ROBBINS, SONYA TOMLINSON, JEFF INGLIS, AND JENNIFER KEARNS | June 11, 2009

Trail of tunes

Music al fresco at summer fests
The best summer music festivals take something from the season: the smell of the surf, the sight of the mountains, fireworks, lawn seating — or, at least, fried dough.

By CLEA SIMON | June 09, 2009

The Big Hurt: Pratt falls

Plus Ringo shills, Yanni sucks
Spencer Pratt, one of the vacuous props on MTV's realityesque moron drama The Hills , has his beady eyes set on a rap career.

By DAVID THORPE | June 08, 2009

Portland's Best Music Poll 2009 Results

The Results Are In!
Winners from this years' Portland Best Music Poll

By PORTLAND PHOENIX STAFF | June 05, 2009

Feel the beat

Odaiko New England turns 15, wails on huge drums
A single set of precise, thundering beats fills the modest rehearsal space of Woburn's American Chinese Art Society. The sound rattles the flooring and shakes my guts. It emanates from a petite woman holding two thick wooden sticks and walloping a pair of hip-high, double-headed wooden drums.

By ANNE VICKMAN | May 28, 2009

The Big Hurt: Rock in a hard place

The economy makes music its bitch
Fear not, broke American: the music industry feels your pain.

By DAVID THORPE | May 18, 2009

Manufactured landscapes

Highlights from a banner year in wordless music
Depending on our mood, most of us seek out albums that coddle our hopes, fears, and concerns; failing that, we want escapism, foreign environments that either take us where we want to be or startle us with the thrill of the new.

By CHRISTOPHER GRAY + ANDREW FREDERICK | May 13, 2009

No man is an island

Two rootsy discs, 20 rootsy players
Anybody who needs to be reminded of the musical talent that swirls around and intermingles throughout our fair city probably doesn't listen to a ton of local music.

By SAM PFEIFLE | May 06, 2009

Seeing Sparks

The Fearless release of Eyes to the Sun
Those hardcore fans among you already have much of Eyes to the Sun in your collection. Sparks the Rescue have been selling nine of these 12 songs on a disc they've brought to shows and mailed out from time to time.

By SAM PFEIFLE | April 29, 2009