Premiere: Oh, Spirit Releases New Video, 7″
Dec29

Premiere: Oh, Spirit Releases New Video, 7″

With their latest 7″, the band parses styles and creates a tapestry that is marbled with both concrete bruising, Converse clapping rock and spectral, nighttime soul.

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The Fresh Brunettes Drop Debut, Set Release Party
Dec28

The Fresh Brunettes Drop Debut, Set Release Party

“Diverse, comedic, spirited, loud [and] raw,” is how The Fresh Brunettes’ lead singer, songwriter and guitarist Aleisha Burton describes the San Diego based band’s live shows.

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Passengers
Dec27

Passengers

Yes, “Passengers” is a sci-fi film, and it does star Academy Award winner Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt who have previously roamed in the Marvel Universe, but it’s more than that.

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10 Best Tracks of ’16
Dec24

10 Best Tracks of ’16

The expansive plethora of impressive music we’ve been given this year is an almost impossible thing to take in while it’s happening. Even the most dedicated, avid listener of current records should find themselves overwhelmed with their backed-up queue, but overwhelmed in the best possible way.

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Vince Staples: Gravel, Grit and Grief
Dec22

Vince Staples: Gravel, Grit and Grief

In a year where hip-hop kicked up tufts of multicolored chalk while celebrating Chance the Rapper’s fluorescent fun house of swelling choruses and syrupy intonations, we almost forgot about the yellowed sidewalks and hallowed Jordans of Vince Staples.

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The 10 Worst Performances of ’16
Dec21

The 10 Worst Performances of ’16

Many times I’ve run screaming from a theater, gasping for air, fighting off the effects of a terrible performance. Usually, the actor in question has done something worth watching and thinking about, even in a bad appearance. Below is a group of performances that stuck with me, for all of the wrong reasons, in 2016.

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Sharkmuffin Reveals Subscription Service: Shmoof
Dec18

Sharkmuffin Reveals Subscription Service: Shmoof

Sharkmuffin – Tarra Thiessen, Natalie Kirch, and Janet LaBelle – has long been my favorite band to listen to while punting empty beer cans, knocking over newspaper racks, and rolling my ankle while pretending to hike.

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La La Land
Dec17

La La Land

“La La Land” is brimming with nods to Gene Kelly and the days of MGM musicals. Chazelle clearly did his homework and loves the genre, the problem is that his stars may not be as in love with the subject or style as he wants them to be.

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Niki & The Dove: Broken Hearts and 2016
Dec16

Niki & The Dove: Broken Hearts and 2016

“What a fool was I to think that we were safe,” Malin Dahlström sings in the opening moments of Niki & The Dove’s exquisitely lovelorn and achingly prescient Everybody’s Heart Is Broken Now. It’s a devastating preamble to a calendar year that would not only lionize dishonesty and cultural ire but make an urgent proclamation for a regression of rights.

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Top 10 Films of ’16
Dec14

Top 10 Films of ’16

I spent a significant portion of 2016 unspooled in a heap of tears and saline smudged hospital paperwork. I witnessed my dad’s ashes being poured into a phlegmatic sea before tossing a single flower to meet him. I stomped my eggshell colored Converse around downtown Portland, easing a kitchen’s worth of pint glasses to my lips.

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