Eugene Weekly

Nobody’s quite like Lyle Lovett. The Muppet-faced singer-songwriter plays, for lack of a better term, country music. But it’s a country must for A Prairie Home Companion fans, for Texans who vote Democrat and insist Austin is just different. Or to put it another way: Lyle Lovett plays adult-contemporary-country. But if you’re a Lyle-head I don’t need to tell you this; you are well familiar with his gentle tenor and literate take on American music — referencing Leonard Cohen, Kris Kristofferson and Townes Van Zandt.  Continue reading →

When is a guy with a guitar just a guy with a guitar? There are a million of them out there — at coffee shops and open mics, picking, strumming and singing; heard one and you’ve heard them all. Well, sometimes that guy with a guitar is just different, like Bright Eyes, the Mountain Goats, Iron and Wine or even Bob Dylan. Continue reading →

It’s high time the county fair became hip again. As society changes, the annual celebration of all things rural faces well-documented challenges. But in the age of Etsy and Pinterest, when cross-stitch, pickling and DIY chicken coops are all the rage, the county fair seems to have its finger on the zeitgeist. I mean, where else can you find a table-setting competition?  Continue reading →

I’d love to have been a fly on the wall when the collaboration between perpetually cool David Byrne and doe-eyed avant-pop upstart St. Vincent was hatched. If you aren’t familiar with Byrne, let me first waggle a disapproving finger at you, and then list his resume: “Once in a Lifetime,” Stop Making Sense, “Burning Down the House” and “Psycho Killer” to only skim the surface.  Continue reading →

Imagine what a band called Diarrhea Planet sounds like. If you’re guessing juvenile pop-punk — an auditory equivalent of a Seth Rogen movie — you’re pretty spot-on. The Nashville, Tenn.-based group’s 2013 release Loose Jewels (out now on fellow Nashville garage-rockers JEFF The Brotherhood’s label Infinity Cat Recordings) is 10 blink-and-you’ll-miss-’em nuggets of Ramones-esque punk; each track on the record clocks in at 2 minutes or under, with shouted choruses and breakneck guitar solos delivered at breathless speed. Continue reading →

Whether you revere the red, white and blue, or just love a day off to drink a beer and eat a hot dog (real or tofu) — July 4 is a time to celebrate independence. And this year Eugene-based troublemakers PORK Magazine are putting the indie back in Independence Day with an all-day lineup of rock ‘n’ roll bands in The Whit. Continue reading →

Franco-American Madeleine Peyroux’s background is worthy of Edith Piaf: Raised in the arts by bohemian parents, Peyroux spent time in Southern California, Brooklyn and Paris. She toured Europe at the tender age of 15; inspired by street musicians in Paris’ Latin Quarter, Peyroux passed a hat through the crowd for spare change.  Continue reading →

Carrie Rodriguez is a raven-haired wildflower, an alt-country songstress too feisty for Nashville and too down-home for rock ‘n’ roll. Initially hyped as a virtuosic fiddle player, Rodriguez is a hardworking, constantly touring roots songwriter — exemplifying her hometown (Austin, Texas)’s reverence for traditional music while flipping it the bird at the same time.  Continue reading →

Corsets and top hats, handlebar moustaches and suspenders, petticoats and purple hair: enter the world of Portland’s neo-vaudevillian Vagabond Opera. A popular attraction on Northwest stages, Vagabond Opera mixes gypsy-jazz, Eastern European folk music, opera and Weimar cabaret into legendary, quirky and energetic live shows. You’ll hear accordions, Arabic flavors, Yiddish tunes and memorable themes from classical music, mixed together in a big steampunk spectacle. Continue reading →