Wonderful Wednesday: Put A Bird On It!

Last night in my talk here at Big Break, I mentioned Portland and our "local" version of Saturday Night Live, Portlandia. Specifically, this sketch, which is by far their greatest and has become a sort of unofficial tagline for the city of Portland (whose official tagline is "Keep Portland Weird"). I was shocked, shocked I say, to discover that only a few people in the audience knew what I was talking about. And so, as a public service to them (and because it does my heart good as an old man to be explaining pop culture to college students), I've provided the video below for your viewing enjoyment:

Wonderful Wednesday: my baby drinking coffee

She's even cuter in person. And yes, apparently she prefers Peets.

 

We met Donald Glover from Community today in Portland!

Shasta and I were downtown today to meet with some co-workers from New Zealand, when Shasta pointed out that Donald Glover happened to be standing in the sitting area of the coffee shop/hotel that we were meeting in.

As you can see in this picture, one of our friendly Portlanders snuck into the back of the picture to give Donald some rabbit ears. Nice. Thanks for that, Portland.

Anyway, we asked if we could get a picture because Tifah and Reid from the Autumn Film kept sending us all these pictures, bragging about how they met Danny Pudi a while back. Anyway, they gave Danny a copy of their CD, so I gave Donald a copy of Imaginary Jesus. I am guessing he is using it as a coaster in his hotel room at this very minute.

I told Donald that we had watched the season finale of Community last night, but it turns out that wasn't the finale. He told us that (SPOILER) the finale this year is a gigantic, epic paintball episode. I'm looking forward to that... the first episode of Community we ever saw was the paintball episode. And YES, The Autumn Film introduced us to the show. I know they'll want credit for that. ARE YOU SATISFIED NOW, TIFAH?

Anyway, I know you all want to know all the juicy details. But basically they are these: Donald was cool. He was in town for his comedy/music show. He's doing a couple shows in California and then headed to Las Vegas. He's probably lurking the streets of Portland right now.

It's only rock and roll but I like it

An interesting article in the Oregonian yesterday about Portland-based artists who specialize in rock and roll poster art, including people like Mike King, Guy Burwell and Emek.

I want one of these guys to make a cool rock show type poster for the release of Imaginary Jesus and then I'll ship them out to people and we'll put them up on telephone poles. It will be awesome. Now I just have to steel myself for the inevitable discovery that it costs lots and lots of money to get one of these posters made. Right?

In other cool art news, Sarah from Tyndale (she will be famous by the time my book finally gets published) sent me some cover ideas for Imaginary Jesus. There are five concept covers right now, one of which is my hands down, all around, can't see how other people wouldn't pick it first favorite. Krista would choose that one as number four or five.

Anyway, sometime this week we'll spend some time discussing the cover concepts and hopefully move toward some sort of consensus between me, Sarah From Tyndale, Wes The Agent, Nancy The Publicity Person and Whomever Else gets a say.

Fiction Family in Portland last night

Let's start off by admitting that the picture on left is totally ripped off from the Fiction Family blog. The pictures that Krista and I took were more, um, artistic. But the smears of color were certainly beautiful.

Yesterday was one of those days where it seems like everything goes right. I took seven-year-old Z in for an MRI and she performed well, looking at the doctor in strained disbelief when he kep asking her if she was scared. "Why should I be scared?" she asked. She appeared to have fun and told me she almost fell asleep during it (Doc says all is well and nothing to worry about).

Then Krista and I met up and went into Portland where she had a couple of appointments, and I worked, with a brief break in a sunlit park to eat a street food burrito. Then we checked into a ridiculously fancy hotel that is having a sale because of the economy, so the overall price was about how much it costs to keep our house warm overnight. We grabbed some Lebanese food and then headed over to the Aladdin theater to see Fiction Family!

Molly Jenson opened the show. She did a fine job, she has an easy way of interacting with the audience and setting us up for what would come later. Sean Watkins came out and joined her on one song, and she ended her set with "You Are My Sunshine" which involved perhaps the funniest moment of the night when the sound/light guy made a shining sun appear on stage behind her and we all burst into laughter while she tried to sing the song in a serious, mournful way. She made good sport of it and we had a big sing along.

Then our fictional family took the stage, and I will say that the whole concert had a bit of the feeling of a very talented family hanging out together and doing an impromptu talent show. "Jon-boy, go get your banjo!"

Krista and I were talking last night and we both admitted that this show was better than the last Switchfoot show we went to (I KNOW... sacrilege... put down those rocks, my friends, do not kill me over this brief lapse). It was just fun, and you could tell the musicians were having fun, too. They sang some FF songs (this is from memory and not in order, folks... When She's Near, War In My Blood, Closer Than You Think, Betrayal, Throw It Away, Mostly Prove Me Wrong, and one they haven't recorded yet that made me laugh out loud and sit there with a goofy grin on my face called, I think, Rob Me or something along those lines). Sean sang a couple of songs as well, and (special treat!) his sister Sara was there, too, and they sang one of the best of the Nickel Creek songs, Somebody More Like You. Jon sang Resurrect Me and also Your Love Is Strong. the whole gang also teamed up for a fascinating, stripped down version of Radiohead's Idioteque.

Overall, it was a great mix. The Watkins siblings are superior musicians, and watching Sean play guitar was amazing, and of course Sara is ridiculously good on the fiddle. And Jon's vocals are always exceptional. I'm interested to see how this all plays out on the next Switchfoot album, as it's pretty clear that Jon is picking up some tricks from Sean.

It was a concert that made you feel good. It was a concert where you walked away thinking, it was fun to sit there and listen to my friends make music, and sing along and have a little conversation, and you were sad at the end of the night to say goodbye and it felt almost rude to walk out the back door instead of hanging around to say good night to all your friends on stage.

So goodnight Jon, Sean and Sara... and yes, Drummer Guy and Bass Player, Jon never introduced us but I assume we would be friends also. Good job everyone, and I hope that the next time you all are in Portland you'll stay with Krista and I. She'll get out her guitar and A will play piano and Z will sing and I will stand around with a goofy smile on my face or something.

I mean it... you guys better call us.

Adios!

As for the rest of you, you still have a chance to catch the end of the tour if you're on the west coast. Here are the shows yet to play:

TONIGHT at 7-- San Francisco

FRIDAY at 7-- San Diego

SATURDAY at 7-- West Hollywood

Keep Portland Weird

A common bumper sticker (I'm going to get one eventually) in this area says KEEP PORTLAND WEIRD. You might think that's just a silly slogan. But the video below from Weird America will show you that, yes, Portland is weird.

The Sort of Thing Krista and I Talk About When We're Out on a Date (paraphrased)

Krista: Back when there weren't a lot of people living there, I bet the [San Francisco] Bay Area was a nicer place to live than here [Portland, OR].

Me: On the other hand there was a lot more to eat here.

Krista: I don't know. I'm sure there was plenty of food in the Bay Area, too.

Me: You know, the Native Americans near Mount Diablo lived on acorns.

Krista: I wasn't talking about back when there was nothing. I'm talking about something more like thirty years ago.

Me: Oh. I guess there would have been restaurants then.

Krista: The Natives in the Bay Area lived on boiled bark and acorn mash. The Natives here lived on salmon and berries.

Me: Yeah. It would have been better to live up here.