Nick Jaina – Into The Woods

February 24, 2010 In News

“Sleep Child” from Nick Jaina’s A Bird In The Opera House

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Premiering today exclusively on magnetmagazine.com is “Sleep Child,” a thrilling folk number from Nick Jaina’s upcoming seventh solo release. A Bird In The Opera House is out April 13 on Hush Records and was apparently written in and inspired by a variety of locales ranging from sunny California to snowy Oregon. Since the album is so rooted in the West Coast, Jaina and his band will spend the month of April touring the left side of the country in support of the release.

“Sleep Child”

February 17, 2010 In Hosannas

Hosannas – “Then & Now & Then” To Drop May 11

Hosannas has been the talk of the town in ’09 and early ’10, so it brings us great pleasure to announce their upcoming May release Then & Now & Then:

Then & Now & Then captures Hosannas at a defining moment.  Collecting the first fruits of brothers Richard and Brandon Laws songwriting with the mellifluous accompaniment of Cristof Hendrickson, this is a slightly warmer and more comprehensive introduction to the band (formerly known as Church) than their well-received Song Force Crystal, which in addition to their intense tour ethic and consistent presence in the Portland scene, helped Hosannas amass a sizable following.

At the center, the brothers vocals dovetail with a rare sensitivity and tenderness, floating over a shifting landscape of warm, distorted guitar figures, found sounds, electric piano, analog synth squalls and the occasional tribal percussion rave up.  It’s a complex tapestry that revels in willful discord, textural juxtapositions,  and arrangements with intense mood swings.  Hosannas is experimental in the same way that the Beach Boys were experimental in their day: challenging assumptions and conventions of pop songwriting, while honoring the fundamentals:  melody, ethos, harmony, golden ratios, modulation, surprise.

But, it may come as no surprise Then & Now & Then was recorded to analog 4 track tape in the living room of an old Portland house.  One can almost hear the freedom of time and space in these songs, as if they were discovered, explored and mapped in the same place. Culling from two short-run CDR EP releases and adding 3 previously unreleased songs, this collection has been wholly reinvigorated with a much-needed mastering from Carl Saff,  and a song sequence that takes the listener on a journey with a beginning, middle and end.

Tracklist:

The Sea (alternate)
Hugs
Bee Cave
Cloud
Happiness
King Crow
Seen You But See Through
Islands
Walrus
Asleep In The Weeds
Catch Up To You
Onward With Bravery
Right As Rain
Song Force Crystal

Upcoming Dates

  • 02/18/10 in Portland, Or at PSU – Parkway North, Smith Student Union (7pm)
  • 03/13/10 in Seattle, Wa at University of Seattle [at The Bistro]
  • 03/14/10 in Portland, Or at Knife Shop
  • 04/06/10 in Davis, Ca at UC Davis Quad (Noon)
  • 04/07/10 in Palo Alto, Ca at Stanford (at the Coho)
  • 04/09/10 in Ashland, Or at Alex’s Restaurant
  • 04/10/10 in Portland, Or at Sunburn Music Festival at Lewis and Clark
February 9, 2010 In Laura Gibson

Laura Gibson & Ethan Rose – “Bridge Carols” Out Today, Dates.

Laura Gibson & Ethan Rose - Bridge Carols

Bridge Carols, the new project from Portland, OR friends Laura Gibson and Ethan Rose, takes the listener to a place that exists between the notes and behind the words of modern music. It’s music that feels intimately familiar, timeless; at its heart, quite natural and human.

Bridge Carols began as a conversation of mutual appreciation and curiosity – a shared desire to challenge old ways of working. Ethan had mostly distanced his music from words, while Laura had often felt bound by them.

Discover more, and stream the entire album at Holocene Music or the handsome micro-site bridgecarols.com.

See them live:
February 12, 2010
Portland, Oregon
CD Release at Holocene w/Benoit Pioulard **EARLY SHOW**
March 27, 2010
Boise, Idaho
Visual Arts Collective
March 28, 2010
Salt Lake City, Utah
Slowtrain Records
March 31, 2010
San Francisco, California
Rickshaw Stop
April 01, 2010
Valencia, California
Cal Arts
April 02, 2010
Los Angeles, California
Echo Curio
February 9, 2010 In News, Rauelsson

Rauelsson West Coast Tour

2/11 Portland OR, The Woods
2/12 Pendleton OR, Great Pacific
2/13 Spokane WA, Sunset Junction
2/14 Seattle WA, The Sunset
2/20 Sacramento CA, Luigi’s
2/21 San Francisco CA, Hemlock Tavern

February 2, 2010 In Loch Lomond

Loch Lomond: Luxury Wafers Session

Hop on over to Luxury Wafers for the latest in live in-studio goodness from Loch Lomond and over the horizon.

Led by Ritchie Young, Loch Lomond from the Pacific Northwest (Portland), has grown from a solo brianchild enjoying contributions from a vast array of friends to a full-time family of six committed bandmembers. Small in stature and grand in humility, Young quietly yet boldy concocts fascinating traipses through forest, wide open spaces, dark alleys and worlds of critters, subtly making a deep hook with his prodigious musical pieces.

Listen to the Exclusive Live Tracks (option/click to download):

Blue Lead Fences [mp3]

Night Bats [mp3]

Spine [mp3]

Wax and Wire [mp3]

Check out a bunch of photos of Loch Lomond’s visit with us HERE.

Loch Lomond – Ghost Of An Earthworm – Luxury Wafers Sessions from Luxury Wafers on Vimeo.

Loch Lomond – Holiday – Luxury Wafers Sessions from Luxury Wafers on Vimeo.

January 28, 2010 In Nick Jaina

Nick Jaina To Release “A Bird In The Opera House”

A Bird In The Opera House – April 13th

And now with this new record, A Bird In The Opera House. In a way it’s a spring in the opposite direction of A Narrow Way; A carefully crafted studio album. When the band got off of the road last year Nick moved into his friend Local Stuidio engineer Lee Howard’s house having been offered the opportunity to record in the studio he’d been building in the basement.” Nick moved into the little upstairs bedroom and started playing some of the electric guitars lying around the house, which ended up informing the pop-ier electric feel of the album. Later Lee gave Nick an old Kay guitar, the kind that Sears used to sell for fifty bucks and told him to keep it in his room for a week and write five new songs on it. Hence track two’s title, “Another Kay Song”

Nick made this album in the in-between moments, at the times that the studio was otherwise empty, or late at night when Lee wanted to try out a new amp or microphone. It was a gradual process, allowing Nick time to sit up in his room and think about the direction of the songs. To deconstruct them, and put them back together. To live in them without consequence. The result is an intimate album that is positive and upbeat but also rich and dark. It adventures, endeavors, reflects and drifts just like any great story.

Tracklist:

Sebastopol
Another Kay Song
Days In My Room
Sleep Child
I Don’t Believe You
Officer Schoppe
Theresa
Strawberry Man
Semoline
Matrimonial Bed
Asheville
Cincinnati