It’s a band. It’s a Portland phenomenon. It’s a date.
Posted by: Aaron Scott and Anne Adams on Mar 03, 2011 at 08:00AM0 Comments
NOTE: MarchFourth will play two shows on MARCH 4, at 6 and 9pm. No show on March 5—unless you count the time after the Crystal clock strikes midnight.
Not content to merely throw down excellent samba-inspired marching jams (and in the process create a musical subgenre) this band also sports elaborate steampunk style, performs stilt-walkin’ tricks and burlesque numbers, and has been known to arrive at gigs piled on top of a fire truck. All this and more make this Portland institution a true original, and one of our town’s most compelling must-sees. If you’ve ever attended a MarchFourth show, you already know; and if you haven’t, you probably should. Tomorrow (uncoincidentally, March fourth) the band will celebrate its 8-year birthday at the Crystal Ballroom. Put “see MarchFourth live” on your metaphorical Portland punch-card.
Posted by: Anne Adams on Feb 22, 2011 at 03:00AM0 Comments
This Friday and Saturday, the Bicycle Film Festival , endearingly dubbed the “BFF,” will breeze through Portland with a curated selection of shorts, and a local opener: beach-punk band Guantanamo Baywatch. Not to be confused with Portland’s own Filmed By Bike , which screens in April, this annual showcase of bike-themed short films is headquartered in New York, and set to tour internationally in 2011. BFF was friendly enough to send along the following trailers:
RIDINGTHELONGWHITECLOUD
Seven professional skateboarders attempt to cycle New Zealand’s North Island in this beautiful documentary. They experience the Heaven and Hell of cycling New Zealand while traversing the island in search of skate spots.
LINE OF SIGHT: LUCASBRUNELLE (Dir. Benny Zenga)
His helmet-cam footage of unsanctioned street races around the globe gives us a unique perspective on the best urban riders in the world.
EMPIRE (Dir. Christian Thormann & Luke Stiles)
The long-awaited urban cycling feature following some of the best riders in New York City.
BIRTH OF BIGAIR (Dir by Jeff Tremaine, produced by Spike Jonze, Johnny Knoxville and Mark Lewman)
A documentary about BMX legend Mat Hoffman.
The new SNL-affiliated show saddles Portland with “The Dream Of The 90s,” but hopefully not the nightmare.
Posted by: Anne Adams on Dec 19, 2010 at 11:00PM9 Comments
UPDATE! Our neighbors to the North have responded to this post. Read Seattle Metropolitan Magazine’s take on Portlandia, and whether or not their original “dream of the 90’s” actually died.
This early glimpse of Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein’s Portlandia, reveals that the IFC/SNL show that bills itself as a comedy, actually seems more bent on sociological commentary. Brace yourself for the first Big Idea: “The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland.”
Let’s test this. Does Young Idealistic Portland:
…sleep ’til 11? Guilty.
…indulge childish or counterculturual whims? Indeed.
…wear cheap clothes? Posi-lutely.
Are these 90s values as well? Yes.
But there’s something else I remember about the early 90s: computers hadn’t quite “hit” yet. The internet, while it existed, was still in its infancy—the subject of intrigue and mystery. The idea that you could send “mail,” that was not tangible, that was called “e…mail,” was printed about in still-thriving glossy magazines. Little did we know then, that regular use of the internet had the potential to eventually legitimize the 90s slacker lifestyle into a viable M.O. These days, E-commerce and information jobs enable many of Portland’s crafty, “alternative” homebodies to make a sustainable living, even while they roost unshaven in the corner of a coffeeshop. The key word though, is sustainable. The Portland idealist/artist economy is not bountiful, by any means.
In the 90s, Seattle woke up (at eleven) in the new “hotbed of counterculture”—then immediately suffocated under the weight of a whole nation trying to pile on top of its mosh-mound. If Portland currently hosts the “dream of the 90s”, then it stands to reason that we’re about to endure the same rude awakening as our Seattle neighbors. And if Portlandia ’s smoke signals entice even slightly less-productive citizens into the welcoming flannel arms of Portland Proper, we may quickly run out of enough home-grown tomatoes to feed them.
A dream described is too often a dream destroyed, and a lot of Portland’s best art-punks are already skinny, poor and cold. Hopefully this show encourages the rest of the world to stay home, laugh at us, and buy things from our fine city’s many Bandcamp sites and Etsy stores. Because if everyone tries to move here and “retire early,” then the show’s over. Please, Portlandia, handle us with care.
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Arts and Culture Editor Aaron Scott has reported for Radiolab, This American Life, OPB, and others. He loves getting lost and finding his way out again.
Events Editor Anne Adams has spent 12 years in Portland and roughly 2 at Portland Monthly magazine. An avid arts appreciator who can zero in on a detail of gesture or craft, she’s also a major softie for music, humor, and philosophy.
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Culturephile chronicles the vibrant world of Portland arts & culture, along with its movers and makers.
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