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Seattle Times Writes About Portland’s Film Industry

May 25, 2008 10:25 am

by Mike Burnett

The Seattle Times has a fairly in-depth writeup today on Portland’s film industry.

Thomas Phillipson of the venerable Portland-based Northwest Film Center, which organizes the city’s international film festival and more offbeat series, comes close to capturing the local industry’s essence.

“The area where Portland is really strong is ‘superindependent films,’ ” he says. “Or un-dependent. Independent doesn’t come nearly low enough to the budgets we’re talking about.”

A prime example is a 2006 movie by Portland’s James Westby, “Film Geek.” “The film looks like it cost 10 cents, but a lot of the jokes are gold,” a New York Post review praised.

Link to article.

Mil Años

May 23, 2008 3:06 am

by Mike Burnett

A little while ago I Youtubed upon some curious videos of a small, charismatic Peruvian (Ecuadorian? Bolivian?) singer who appeared to be in his 50s or older. His voice was immediately catching, and the accompaniment — usually a nylon string guitar, sometimes a harp or strings — was traditional but somehow always odd. His leisurely, colorful garb (rainbow scarf!) and awkward cuts to women dancing in bright, skimpy clothing was more surreal than off-putting.

I took a second to try and understand the lyrics from one of his songs… Paloma blanco de ojos azules, por qué tu quieres matarme? Or… White dove with blue eyes, why do you want to kill me? I kept watching the videos.

It paid off with this brutal love song called “Mil Años” or “A Thousand Years”. I don’t think you need a translation to understand the meaning.

Because there is contact info for Señor Hito embedded in the videos and Youtube.com, I wrote him an email telling him I liked his music and asking a little more about him. It took him a week or so, but he responded enthusiastically that he would soon be traveling to Bolivia and had recently been in London to make a DVD. He asked where I was writing from and told me that perhaps I could be his representative in my town. Apparently I am filling that role in some capacity because I am now listed as a promoter on the info on “Mil Años” on Youtube. Bring it on!

Biography of Braulio Hito on Youtube.com (in Spanish)

Geoff Soule Video – “A Dirge” Live at Valentine’s

May 16, 2008 2:23 pm

by Mike Burnett

I caught Geoff Soule of the excellent band Fuck playing solo at Valentine’s on Monday. I got a little footage on my Flip Camera. The song is called “A Dirge” from the album A Diologue…, which is available at Supermegacorporation.com.

Interstate Farmers Market

May 15, 2008 12:57 am

by Mike Burnett

The first weekly Interstate Farmers Market was today in Overlook Park. It was pretty tame when I was there (from about 3 to 4), with about a dozen merchants and local “Klezmer, Balkan, Gypsy jazz” 5-piece Underscore Orkestra playing to a couple dozen visitors. Maybe it turned into an orgiastic festival of consumption right after I walked home? It ran from 3:00 PM to 7:00 PM.

There were a couple really cool vendors I visited though, including my favorite, Micro-Mercantes and their legit pork tamales topped with salsas verde and roja and crema. It was a mind blowing bargain at $2.50 a tamale.

Mind blowing bargains could be higher on the list for the organizers of Portland Farmers Markets. The produce I took home from Sweet Leaf Farm was excellent, but it cost $7 for two bunches of carrots and three onions. I think I’m a little spoiled by having grown up in Central California, where farmer’s markets meant farmers selling produce from a few miles away. I found booths selling avocados for 50 cents on more than one occasion. Of course, Sweet Leaf Farm’s signage boasted that they’re soon to be certified organic.

I also visited Boyco Foods and bought some habanero honey cooking sauce for $8. They must have had a dozen varieties of honey including carrot and fireweed flower. The habanero (cousin to but not the same thing as the Scotch bonnet) cooking sauce owned our mouths at dinner tonight on some baked chicken thighs. The carrots and sweet onions I cooked with some Yukon gold potatoes and added dried cherry tomatoes I purchased from whom I believe was Carol of Carol’s Nuts And Candies. Those $4 dried cherry tomatoes might have been my favorite find, with a sweeter flavor and more enjoyable texture than standard sun-dried tomatoes. They were incredible with the potatoes, carrots, and sweet onions. If you’re curious, I boiled the potatoes, then cooked everything in olive oil with some salt, pepper, and dried thyme. I finished it in the microwave for a couple minutes because of time constraints.

On my way out I bought a couple pounds of Buffalo from Pine Mountain Ranch. I still don’t know what I’m going to do with it, but I’m either thinking stew or stir-fry. It wasn’t cheap, but a night spent cooking is a night not spent drinking in a bar. $16 for the buffalo which according to the business card I snagged has “68% Less Fat Than Chicken” and “35% More Protein Than Beef”. Not sure how that will affect your Atkins diet.

I didn’t see a couple of the vendors listed on the Interstate Farmers Market’s vendor list, so I’m hoping next week there is some more produce and hopefully those gluten-free baked goods.

Kids In The Hall – May 11, 2008 Recap

May 11, 2008 10:03 pm

by Mike Burnett

What can I say, it was great. The show opened with footage of the troupe discussing how to start the show, and then coming to the conclusion that the other four members should rape Kevin McDonald. Lots of new material for many of the great old characters. Scott Thompson graced the stage with his Buddy Cole character and delivered a monologue complete with obscure Portland references and a convincing argument for Jesus’ homosexuality. Bruce McCulloch set his hilarious little kid character against two proselytizing Jehovah’s Witnesses. The chicken lady made an apperance as well.

It dawned on me that Dave Foley is hilarious but probably has fewer standout characters. He’s a little more versatile than the rest of the Kids, and you might even call him the straight man (if there has to be one).

There were two standing ovations on each side of the encore, which consisted of Mark McKinney’s “I’m crushing your head” character turning a camera on the audience and crushing their heads. He zoomed in on a couple audience members, including one nice old lady upon whom he bestowed a rose, which he then crushed because “romance is dead.” She looked like a deer in the headlights on the 20-foot screen at back of the stage.

But the post-series material was also awesome, including the all-in-one solution to America’s two biggest problems of obesity and dependence on foreign oil — the gut spicket. It’s a faucet stuck into the belly with an attachment hose that goes straight to the tank of an SUV. There was a good deal of that kind of close-to-home ribbing, which was probably pretty satisfying material for the five Canadians. The audience took it with glee.

Obama And Clinton Percentages in NC and IN

May 7, 2008 10:24 pm

by Mike Burnett

Here are some interesting numbers from Daily Kos:

IN and NC 08 Primary Percentages

(*) North Carolina is only the fourth state in which Clinton has won the independent vote.

The Vaselines Reunite And Will Play In Redmond, WA

3:39 pm

by Mike Burnett

In 1992 Sub Pop released 19 songs by a Scottish group named The Vaselines. The collection, called The Way of The Vaselines: A Complete History, is full of so much pop brilliance and touching humor that it’s now easy to see why Kurt Cobain hyped The Vaselines as his favorite songwriters.

The Way of The Vaselines Cover

16 years later the Vaselines will reunite to play Scotland’s Tigerfest. Later this summer they’ll play Sub Pop’s 20th anniversary party 184 miles to the north of Portland in Redmond, WA.

Pitchforkmedia.com has the whole story.

Sub Pop’s page about their party.

Tigerfest

Will Academic Penalties Further Tarnish Vikings Athletics?

May 6, 2008 10:43 pm

by Jon Baldari

Today the NCAA released their annual APR, aka the Academic Progress Rate to be precise. Typically, this is more often than not, a non-event. But today the APR made headlines here in the Rose City. The reason being Portland State, our little commuter school, received penalties or warnings in four different sports. According to the NCAA, PSU men’s basketball, football, indoor track, and wrestling, simply are not making the grade.

According to http://www.ncaa.org/, Portland State received the 4th most penalties, trailing the likes of Cal State Sacramento, San Jose State, and Alabama Birmingham. Personally, a few thoughts came immediately to mind. The first was that it’s obvious that the major universities athletically speaking, your Ohio State’s and your LSU’s, are much more schooled in the ways of graduating students that might otherwise have problems in a high school chemistry class. Whether that entails hours of personal tutoring, or enrollment in cupcake classes like basket weaving etc. The other thought being that this is the second piece of bad press that PSU has gotten in about a month. For a school that rarely makes national news, this can’t be sending a positive message.

Of course most of us have heard the story of the two PSU basketball players involved in a scuffle in Mexico shortly after their Big Sky Championship and cinderella run to the NCAA tournament. Although the incident could mostly be chalked up to a case of boys being boys, the fact remains that college athletics is not rock and roll, and bad press is never good press.

PSU Berserkers

It’s no secret that Portland State is not a top draw for blue chip prospects. And obviously, it’s not a priority for the university, which has seemingly always tried to put academics first. But that my friends, is the point exactly. How could a small, urban, commuter college that focuses mostly on academic not athletic achievement, fail to graduate football players at a higher rate than that of schools that have reputations as “Football Factories?” Are they just better at beating the system, or are the Portland State officials just simply not interested in the endeavors of the men’s basketball team which just brought them priceless exposure on a national stage?

Now, we as Portlanders shouldn’t really be all that concerned. This is the first slap on the wrist for the Vikings. And, to be honest I don’t know of anyone who’ll lose sleep over PSU men’s indoor track receiving 0.08 of a scholarship reduction. But if not anything else it’s just a little bit of a disappointment. For a moment it appeared as if perhaps with a football program headed in a new direction, and a championship basketball team, that maybe Portland sports were ready to take another step forward and legitimize ourselves in the college arena. And granted, most people in town are Ducks or Beavers fans, it would still be nice to see Portland in a different spotlight.

Now it might be best for the Viks to make no headlines at all, to maintain their usual low profile. Take the summer to rest and reflect. Stay in the weight room, and out of bars in Cabo. But most of all in the name of Jerry Glanville, hit the books. Either that or make some different headlines this fall to make us forget these recent mishaps. Starting with winning more games.

Gang of Four Minus Two

8:49 pm

by Mike Burnett

Dave Allen and Hugo Burnham, the bass and drums of post-punk progenitors Gang of Four, announced today on Allen’s Portland music blog, Papelmoose.com, that they will no longer continue their roles in the band.

All four original members (Allen, Burnham, John King, and Andy Gill) reunited to tour and release Return The Gift in 2004/2005 after everyone and their mother had listened to Gang of Four’s early recordings and formed dance punk bands. Now they’ll go on to do things like run Portland’s best music blog or get a PhD, but making music looks to remain an important part of each member’s future.

Here’s the link, which contains words from each departing member.

The Portland Tribune Gets The Kevin Allman Treatment

May 5, 2008 1:00 am

by Mike Burnett

Kevin Allman addresses the Tribune’s recent announcement that they’re going to a daily online / weekly print format.

“Sustainable,” in Portlandese, is like “family values” — it’s an amorphous, commonly recognized Good Thing that no one can quite define; it means whatever you want it to mean at the moment. In this case, it seems that the Trib is trying to say that going weekly has its upside because it’s Kind To Trees.

Link to Allman’s post