To paraphrase what I wrote in my 2009 Best of.. List a few days ago, “here’s a list of Portland artists that I spent the most time with in 2009. This is not meant to be a ranked list..” Portland never ceases to delight, with fresh new music popping up every month or so. Here’s just a handful that meant something to me this year.

The Builders And The Butchers

I saw The Builders And The Butchers at the Sasquatch Festival this year and was amazed to see the audience spontaneously begin to sing along with the band. It turned out to be one of the best performances of the weekend. Buy Salvation Is A Deep Dark Well

When It Rains by The Builders & The Butchers

Alela Diane

Early this year Alela Diane delivered, To Be Still, a wonderfully elegiac follow up to her album, The Rifle. I reviewed it at the time. Although she moves to and fro between Portland and Northern California, we should claim her as our hometown girl, as there is no doubt she is moving steadily toward greater renown.
Buy To Be Still

White As Diamonds by Alela Diane

Ramona Falls

Brent Knopf steps out of his Menomena world to bring us a startlingly fresh solo album, Intuit, under the moniker Ramona Falls. The release was accompanied by an amazing video.
Buy Intuit

Russia By Ramona Falls

Lackthereof

For ten years or more, Danny Seim, also of Menomena, has been releasing his own work as Lackthereof. In 2009 Barsuk released a retrospective of his decade’s work. This is a must have collection that will help you catch up with the work of one of Portland’s more creative and experimental musicians.

Buy A Retrospective 1998-2008

Last November By Lackthereof

Nurses

I’ll let this music fan, who left a review of the Nurses album Apple’s Acre on Amazon, have her say:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best albums of 2009, August 10, 2009
By J. Marler “Trendkill” (Sacramento, CA) - See all my reviews

“This is a truly one of a kind album. I’ve never heard music like this before, not even from their first album. It’s an absolutely beautiful album, my personal favorite tracks are Mile After Mile, Technicolor, Man At Arms, Lita, Apple’s Acre… I guess I should just list the whole album every song is 5 stars. I can’t help but dance and sing with every track. My favorite album so far this year.”

Buy Apple’s Acre

Caterpillar Playground By Nurses

Panther

This is Portland’s loss. A word from Kill Rock Stars:

We are very sad to announce that Kill Rock Stars artists’ Panther are calling it quits. They have scheduled their last show for Dec 20 at Rontom’s in their hometown of Portland, OR. It will be a free show to thank their fans and friends for all their support.

Panther started out at the end of the 20th century as a solo project for Charlie Salas-Humara, then of the noisy prog band The Planet The. His shows were legendary - his signature falsetto over blown out beats making a bizarre form of damaged r&b along with his insane Merge Cunningham inspired dance moves and crowd heckling made for chaos that (mostly) won even the most uptight crowds over. He released a few records in this vein on local Fryk Beat records and made an AMAZING video before adding drummer Joe Kelly to the band and signing to KRS.

Buy Entropy

Love Is Sold [Lips and Ribs Remix] By Panther

Bobby Birdman

I love this video from Bobby Birdman and Audio Dregs and Fryk Beat Records. Click the image to play.

Buy New Moods

Thao And The Get Down Stay Down

Thao and her band had a busy year. There was the new album Know Better Learn Faster as well as her participation with the Portland Cello Project. I’ve a feeling that she will go far.

Buy Know Better Learn Faster

When We Swam By Thao And The Get Down Stay Down

Tallymarks By The Portland Cello Project feat. Thao

Bladen County Records

Bladen County Records continued to support and promote great music.

Pickathon and MusicFestNW

And it was another good year for two of our best music festivals. Pickathon and MusicFestNW.

Dr Dog at Pickathon

Crowd at Pickathon

Tu Fawning at MusicFestNW

OPB and WOXY iPhone Apps

And where would I be without my OPB Music and WOXY.com radio iPhone Apps?

Matt Haimovitz - Thursday @ Doug Fir Lounge
This world-class cellist’s schedule for the year includes performances of Shostakovitch’s Concerto No. 1 and a concert at New York’s famed Alice Tully Hall. And a stop at Sam Bond’s Garage in Eugene. No, this isn’t your typical classical performance; it’s in-your-face classical fare, in a perfectly in-your-face setting. The 38-year-old cellist recently released a playful album called Figment, which puts his playing up against programmed beats, turntable scratches and Balkan-inspired melodies. The pieces were composed by some of the most interesting modern voices in American music, including Elliott Carter and Gilles Tremblay.

The Yummy Fur - Wednesday @ Mississippi Studios
Formed in the early ’90s and inspired by the thriving indie music scene in their native Glasgow, The Yummy Fur lasted seven glorious years, making a beautiful and often unhinged racket. They poked at the mores of modern society and baited the law enforcement with their lyrics, and tried their hand at all manner of musical styles - from scratchy, Fall-like punk to electro pop. They broke up 1999, leaving front man John McKeown plenty of time to form the power trio 1990s and two of his bandmates to achieve stadium filling stardom with their new outfit, Franz Ferdinand. The Fur are flying again, but only for a short while to drum up interest in a best of compilation that a U.S. label is threatening to release this year.

White Hinterland - Thursday @ The Artistery
There seem to be a lot of former folk-leaning singer/songwriters dabbling in electronic music these days (Laura Gibson, Bon Iver, etc.), but there aren’t any doing it more dreamily and engagingly than Casey Dienel. Working with band mate Shawn Creeden and producer Alexis Gideon under the name White Hinterland, Dienel’s lilting voice is served well by these icy futuristic soundscapes, chilling its internal warmth and saving it from wilting. And Dienel and her collaborators all do an incredible job with the musical end, fashioning danceable beats that never seem to resolve and letting long pings of marimba float into a pixelated ether.

Bladen County Records Showcase at MFNW from bangsandblurry on Vimeo.

To kick off what is Portland’s finest music festival—we thought it would be a nice idea to list some of Indie Music Portland’s fave MFNW picks via a cute little playlist!

MFNW is great! And we are lucky kids to be able to see such incredible talent in our beloved PDX!

So to all the amazing bands and to all the amazing fans—play it well, have fun!

When the legendary hung-far-low sign in Chinatown suddenly disappeared, it was as if the neighborhood in which it was in had completely vanished along with it. Enter The Old Town Block Party which started raising money to resurrect the sign and bring this important area back to its true form. Tomorrow is a celebration of all things Portland—music, businesses, people and to revive the coolest sign this side of The Mississippi!

Be sure to check out special performances by The Fix DJs, M64, May Ling and Yacht!

Free!