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If all you know of Soul Asylum is a touching little torch song called “Runaway Train,” listen up: Long before that unexpected hit was released in 1992, Soul Asylum had achieved a rare kind of cult status among fans of guitar-heavy alt-rock — a status founded largely on the soulful songwriting and indubitable white-boy groove of frontman Dave Pirner. Continue reading
Like something from your grandma’s collection of 45s, “10-gallon funnyman” Sourdough Slim harkens back to the days of the singin’, yodelin’, joke-tellin’ cowboy. You might be asking yourself: Is the world really waiting for a revival of the Burl Ives, Will Rogers and Gene Autry sound? The answer is: Probably not. But like a dusty little gem found in a secondhand shop, Slim (né Rick Crowder) shows that you didn’t know what you were missing the first time around. “My true calling as a cowboy was not on the range but, rather, on the stage,” Slim says on his website. Continue reading
Looking at lineups for some of the major local venues this summer, it appears that audiences and/or bookers want one prolonged and mostly vanilla sausage fest. For Cuthbert’s 2014 season, of the nearly 40 acts scheduled to grace the amphitheater stage, seven include women (counting the Eugene Symphony’s free concert July 19). The Lane County Fair does not fare better: Of the eight acts to hit the main stage, there will be one musician who’s a woman — Pat Benatar (July 26 with Neil Giraldo). Continue reading
Unlike previous efforts, Mike Last feels The Stagger and Sway’s latest release, Fun and Games, is a rock ‘n’ roll record — a sound the quartet has moved toward since adding Brian Schierenbeck on lead guitar. “Brian played our last CD-release show,” says Last, Stagger and Sway’s vocalist, rhythm guitarist and primary songwriter. “But he wasn’t on the record.” Last says Fun and Games has “a little more grit to it — a little more teeth. It’s more of a band record.” Continue reading
“We love Eugene,” says Ashley Edwards, vocalist and songwriter for Durango, Colorado-based Hello Dollface. “The vibrancy, the grit, the consciousness, the food.” The band’s bass player, Jesse Ogle, attended the UO, Edwards says, and this time ’round through Eugene, Hello Dollface’s “heart-quenching desert vagabond soul” will be backed up onstage by some local players: Ben Scharf, Matt Calkins and Brad Erichsen of local jazz-funk group Eleven Eyes. Continue reading
This time each year, Eugene respectfully steps back and offers the stage to the Oregon Bach Festival. And no wonder: The 44-year-old classical music institution abounds with so many attractive performances, workshops, lectures and other events that we couldn’t even begin to cover them all in last week’s issue. Here’s a rundown of some remaining top recommendations. Jonathan Manson, Cello Continue reading
It takes the right combination of craziness and courage to walk away from the fame game at its peak. But in 2007, Jurassic 5 did exactly that. Feedback (2006) reached No. 6 in Billboard’s U.S. rap record sales, securing Jurassic 5’s status as pioneers of alternative hip hop. Seven years later, the same cats known for jazz sampling, scatting, multiple live MCs and even the occasional kazoo solo are once again ready to take you “back to the concrete streets,” as they rap in their 1999 self-titled LP. Continue reading
The last bro standing from the ’90s jam band/groove-rock scene (Sublime, Dave Matthews, Blues Traveler et al.), Garrett Dutton, better known as G. Love of G. Love & Special Sauce, is way too chill to care much about superstardom. Instead, G. Love & Special Sauce continues to bring danceable, reggae- and hip-hop-inflected blues rock to the masses. G. Love’s latest, 2014’s Sugar, is more of the same. Continue reading
On record, San Francisco’s Geographer is somewhat blunted by an ambition to sound thoroughly “now,” to fit into whatever mold successful modern rock bands are expected to fit into in these wild and wooly days of making music. Live, Geographer is as raw as twiddling knobs on computer equipment can be, but vocalist Michael Deni adds interest by switching between guitar and loops, while Nathan Blaz supplies keyboards and electric cello and drummer Brian Ostreicher provides a needed punch and danceable energy. Continue reading
What would you do with a room full of 80 teenagers? Turn on the television? Order pizza? Lock the door and run for cover? At the Oregon Bach Festival, the standard approach to the younger set is treat them like musicians, and allow them to soar. OBF offers a number of kid-friendly events, but none is more moving than the renowned Stangeland Family Youth Choral Academy. Continue reading