SE 49th and Hawthorne

At first I was fooled by this wild and weird decoy party on the actual intersection stated above where freaky hipsters were jamming to WHAM! wearing crazy costumes and pinned up with name tags. No booze. Questionable cool level. Dubious patrons. But then I saw the friend who had told me about the party walking by outside and went to talk to her. She let me in on the fact that the real party was right next door and so I ditched out of that sham fest. I stepped onto the porch and knew immediately that this would be a strange and anxious pre-party crowd. They had already cliqued off and were having whisper jams while eyeing the other guests who were doing the same thing. Willie, my friend from Oakland, and just come up to visit his brother and so he was down here packing some downers and buying me a forty. Thanks Willie, vicodin always spices up a night. There was black bean dip on the snack table and the house was well carpeted…it was clean which I’ve realized is a regional staple that frankly I’m not completely used to yet. I still sometimes bottle a disturbed urge to spit on floors. Save it for the basement D.C. and so I did. Captured by Porches was serving up the pricey DIY brews and though I didn’t buy one this time due to an extreme state of wallet decadence I’ve come to know as my life I will still wholly recommend the venture because honestly: that’s damn good beer and it’ll get you more drunk than that case of Pabst you’ll be buying regardless. I could hear the music. Eighties jams. Typical, but I suppose not yet out of trend. Though really folks let’s just let the future be now and start getting back to 2 Live Crew and The 69 Boyz because we all know that deep down we really do want to just Scrub Da Ground. The basement was a crazy land of equality where frat-boys, punks, estranged weirdos and predominant hipsters could share the dance floor with glass-shattering freedom. By that I mean people were breaking glasses left and right thus forcing the few hippies who had walked barefoot from their South Eastern adobe castles to the upper domicile where they could stand in peace. Rejoice. All of the sudden however the speakers became propaganda machines for the sad nostalgia held by aging ravers and the incessant trance grooves drove me out and into the night to scout out the next party:

35th and Knott

Fashionable, rude, and fueled by cocaine. The cliques were cordial but generally jittering jaws and beady eyes made aggressive hellos half masking the paranoid sort of tight lipped tantrum just waiting to rage out into the dance floor (which in the mean while was tyrannically besieged by cell phones and laptops permanently set on myspace like an 8 track fused with the last Niel Diamond piece ever released on that medium). The hosts were very nice and one of them even sketched a portrait of me on the dining room wall! Immortalized baby! Hot! Best pass out award goes to that dude laying on the back patio with his head hanging off the edge half slumped over a rusty Old Smoky grill. When questioned on the level of comfort he was experiencing he had this to say: “Yeah…I’m great here.” I then asked him if he had puked before passing out to which he replied no. In actuality however I’d been outside when he toppled through the masses and tripped over the grill while the puke was spewing forth from his lips. The end result was this giant lump of dude that I have just describe. It was cold. I was tired. I went home. But on a separate note Portland. Allow me to make a call. A call for kegs. I don’t know. Maybe there’s some sort of taboo against them that I just haven’t heard of yet. Honestly though if you can get ten people together and they all throw ten bucks down you can get a keg, which brings what I like to call: The Backyard Rage Jam! Better yet, get your ten people and all throw fifteen to twenty then you can get two kegs. One of which is the reserve and the other is out in the open. When the first keg dies you go around and be like we need money for another keg! In my experience people will throw down if you have a pretty lady hassle them enough…or a drunken bro dawg, for that matter has a similar effect, then you just bring out your reserve and it’s like you only bought one! Awesome. Maybe when I get some funds together I’ll throw a nice kegger just to show ya’ll how it’s done. Once we get that did we can work on bringing back “theme” parties which every kid in town seems to be down with but just don’t work when you can’t supply a gross amount of FREE beer. Kisses and love kids. I’m out.

9/15 Party on Bryant

A chilly night. All around people are prophesizing the end of summer here in Portland- Being a foreigner I must ask one question: Will this be an end of the terrific string of parties I’ve experienced since relocating from Austin? Well…I hope not. And in we go through the wooden fence, a fire pit burns to the right but that cloud of smoke smells too skunky to be pieces of hippie house furniture debris. On the inside one will note the artfully strung severed doll heads and reaching doll arms that line the upper trim of the den. Free Pabst in the kitchen and enough salsa to quell the hungry masses of a small country, or more in suit the impoverished many that make up the North East Portland party industry. The Marsupials are mid-set with wig worn Casio tone girl grooves, rocking as they were the vocal confidence was lacking and though I felt a slight need to shake down to the dance floor their timid stylings seemed mirrored in the crowd before them. The cakewalk was a saving grace as it was an actual cakewalk sans cake for prizes. For the next half hour I wandered around in the damp yonder felling more than slightly out of place within these dready habitations. Many pipes were passed and Carlo Rossi joined me in a classic country jug dance until finally the next band was set up and ready to rock. Melodic prog pop punk by their own admission, Upshit Creek seemed like a screaming break riff version of Polaris-you know…That band from Pete & Pete? Good job gentlemen you hiked up the mood and got the grooves warmed and ready for tonight’s most fatal of attractions: A sexy naked lady meets below the border mex-archist revolution who call themselves Adelitas (The name comes from a revolutionary women’s group that followed in the footsteps of the Zapatistas (honestly that’s just what a Mexican dude at the party told me so I’m ultimately unsure of the validity but he seemed wise enough)) They raged. They quaked. They hugged and puffed and kicked the shit out of all three of those pussy little swine in consecutive construction analogy order. The crowd was clutching their bellies with violent bouts of explosive punk rock whiskey shits caused by the drinking of heavy 5ths of kickass bass drums with a beer back of a dastardly brewed punk string electric renegade ensemble. I posed the question: Can tonight get any better? The answer there was No. It cannot and this party ended around the fire pit. Even the smoldering embers seemed like they wanted to go home at that point. Though I will give the reward for best pass out of the weekend to the dude who had supplied the Rossi for my previous tryst who fell asleep sitting up on a kid’s chair leaning dangerously close to the fire and yes. Still holding the jug with his sleepy little trigger finger. We left satisfied at least, and I look forward to tomorrow but tonight I have a basement and a sleeping bag waiting for my tired brown body in somebody else’s house.

Cook Street. A while ago

Nice house, tall and well kept. The general mood was welcoming once we joined the back yard through the bike lined side fence. In no time the crowd was settling into the early industry feel and with the onset of darkness magnum malt, the fourth member of our crew that night urged me to sit back, relax and just enjoy the time. Cause it was that kind of night: Smooth. Hey tiger played a half band half set showcasing promising vocals and jiggy strum by Walt it was a pleaant duet tryst with female counterpart and budding tamborinist Brianna. The as-advertised free vegan gumbo was a great luxury(though wouldn’t it be clever to name your band Free Vegan Gumbo just to have all those hippies and peace punx jump and riot thus adding more fire to the mosh pit…you know…Or for that matter more melancholy to the emo hum fest, depending on your musical fly stylings.) The people in attendance were at least cordial if not altogether nice and friendly. On the edge of tipsy I began to hear a strange and electrical tone of commotion from the basement. Oh shit. Setting it down and knocking one in her jar for all the cool shoes and hair-do’s shaking out their working stiff woes to the full and heavy wall of plugged in glam rocked thriller chord pandemonium that was this creeped out piece: Here Comes a Big Black Cloud. Fun dance tyranny and resonant vocals by the enticing crowd involvement duo that played a neverland shadow to the lead guitar/vocal power house positioned center left to the pop show. Shit lit on fire. It was a spectacular manifesto of fascist rock propaganda; Well done ya’ll. Next to play was popitilopitilus courageously treading through the gory blood soaked carnage following The Cloud’s most recent massacre. They were costumed, they were loud, and they had at the very least intriguing lyrics…if only they’d switched out of the basic punk drum kick pop snare snare ride every once in a while they may have been on par and might have been a good bridge to the next set. Guao Guao brought a good kick in with a sweet country punch of vocals and a lead drawl that soaked into the marrow of us all. Horsey Poney followed and I believe Hey Tiger closed up the menagerie with a full set but by then Magnum had long since left me drunk and frenzied. I pranced hazy and stumbling through good conversations and questionable decisions. A plus Portland the promise is voluminous and the volume is pumped up. The night was long. It was good. I woke up deservedly hungover.