Portland has become quite the popular place over the last few years. The influx of new residents has pretty much ruined what old locals have considered to be all that’s in the city, with all the condos going up and old haunts going down essentially serving as proof of that.

But no matter how much Portlandia may have skewed (somehow accurately and inaccurately all at once) their depiction of Portland, The Toads have written their own little ditty about this rainy city. It reigns incredibly true.

With lyrics touching on how open Portland is with nearly every type of social and individual freedom, "Portland, Or" shows how much The Toads love their town in a catchy, pop-punky way. If anything, it should be the city’s anthem. 

Give it a listen below and see how much of it sounds "so typically Portland."

*photo by RoseLeon

Rasheed Jamal is one of the leading voices in Portland hip hop, flowing about relevant, thought provoking subject matter over bumpin’ beats. Many flock to Jamal’s tracks for insight, and he just dropped a new one with a bomb beat and some quick rhymes.

"Better Off $$$" could be a club banger. Jamal goes in expressively hard with his words over the trappy beat. It even landed its own spot on Vortex Music Magazine’s 3rd anniversary collectible vinyl compilation.

Dive into it below.

Shadowlands know what’s up when it comes to brooding darkwave and post-punk. Their sonance aligns more with the horror-esque sounds of a more "traditional" ’80s style of post-punk while still remaining original, and definitely not coming off replicated. It’s for this reason they’re one of the first acts to come to mind when thinking of local bands of this genre in general, and why all of you voted them your favorite band to play the recent darkwave and post-punk festival Out From the Shadows Fest.

Another special victory for Shadowlands is that they’ve been chosen to play the next Brickbat Mansion night, Portland’s female-led goth and darkwave DJ night. Lead singer Amy Sabin will join resident spinners DJ Curatix and DJ Wednesday in being the premiere ladies of the night.

This edition of Brickbat Mansion is an RSVP event held at the steep and thorny way to heaven on May 5, so if you wish to attend, respond via the Facebook event or by sending an email to rsvp@thesteepandthornywaytoheaven.com. Listen to the Shadowlands track "Fade" below and be on the lookout for their video for "Liberation," coming soon.

Poppy indie rock trio The Loved sure know how create harmonious melody, especially out of the simplicity of just three chords.

Driven by Lael Alderman’s expressive vocals, The Loved balances galvanic rock with the tenderness of dulcet songwriting and rhythmic instrumentation from bassist Daven Hall and drummer Jake Endicott. They’re doing a staggered release of their debut album, by dropping a series of singles throughout the first half of the year. The first single, "Back to Me," has a video that coincides with it.

"Back to Me" as an idea seemingly came out of nowhere for the band, and within seven minutes was a finished song. The song has a lot of power and its video compliments it well. On the song, Hall said:

"There was a vision for this album going into the studio, where we could create an album that moved and would move you, that would sometimes rock you, and where there would still be plenty of space for things to breathe, and we walked out off there with all that."

Watch the video for "Back to Me" below.

 Clickit Ticket, a ticket resale marketplace that specializes in helping customers find sold out or otherwise hard to get tickets, has taken the time to compile a list of the 30 best places to catch live music in Portland. For locals, some of the names on the list aren’t surprising. Places like Mississippi Studios and Holocene are essentially household names and recurring weekend haunts at this point.

Where the gets interesting is with its featuring of certain less popular-to-the-masses spots. They’re not all by any means venues but certain diamonds in the rough, like Spinella’s Off the Wall or Andina Restaurant, where patrons can catch more varied arrays of music.

Part list for newscomers and tourists, part reminder of places that haven’t closed down yet for locals, Clickit Ticket’s list is fairly well rounded. Look at it in full and see all the ones you’ve been to HERE.

After a day spent rallying through the streets and partaking in what may be a contentious string of May Day events, march on over to the Know for some harsh sounds provided by Self Group.

What’s particularly intriguing about this show is the debut of the reformation of Yardsss (∅∀‡). What started as avant experiments with noise and multiimedia installations by Krist Krueger has now expanded to include Robin Levy and Paul Schaefer. Symbology wise, the characters break down as: ∅ – Krist Krueger, ∀ – Paul Schaefer, ‡ – Robin Levy.

Some of what Krueger created prior to the addition of Levy and Schaefer was inspired by the avant-garde composer John Cage, so seeing what the new trio can do live will be transcendentally intriguing.

Experience some visuals by Colin Manning, some alt-prog from Polygris and slightly folky doom rock from duo Glacial Fall. Tickets are only $8 and all proceeds are being donated to the ACLU.