Those that enjoy indelible indie pop with a fuzzy, psychedelic flare need to be aware of Radio Macbeth, the new duo comprised of Darien Campo and Declan Hertel. Inspired by bands like Neutral Milk Hotel and Apples In Stereo, Radio Macbeth fashion fun and lively tracks with emotive and at times deep lyrics with poppy yet thick instrumentation. Bubblegum Wasteland is their debut, and it shows much promise for the new twosome.

Radio Macbeth went into recording Bubblegum Wasteland from an entirely DIY perspective. With about a $7 budget, the pair recorded their debut entirely in their apartment. The freedom of relying solely on themselves resulted in a truly lo-fi and enjoyable record.

Stream Radio Macbeth’s debut below and be sure to keep an eye on what they’ve got going on next.

 Guaranteed you’ve heard their name or seem them play by now. They’ve taken the stage in so many spots around town, from The Firkin Tavern to various house shows to even Solae’s Lounge up on Alberta, all with only a demo officially released. But post-glam grit rockers Star Club have honed in on the vibes they want to give off, and their new album Sixth Avenue Motel is their way of showing it.

Naming Romeo Void, Au Pairs and Delta 5 as some of the influence for the record, Nate Lown and Marcus Pizotchi, the driving forces behind Star Club, are mainly out to do one thing and on thing only – make the people dance. We sat down with them to talk to new record, their process and how they came to be to begin with… 

 

The Deli Portland: Why did you both start the band and when?

Nate: It started a little over a year ago. In May, we started jamming and playing. Me and Ben used to live together and Marcus was over all the time.

Marcus: Let’s go back to the backstory – he [Nate] was playing jazz music in a swing band locally, and I’m a swing dancer. That’s how I met Nate and that’s how Star Club formed, because basically the band is us and we get fill players. I was swing dancing to his music. We knew each other for about a year before we started hanging out. There was some shit that went down and we ended up bonding. We hung out for nearly a year and didn’t play music at all, he wouldn’t play music with me.

Why not?

Marcus: Well, I’m not trained. I didn’t know how to play, how to jam, apparently. I was just hanging out swing dancing and one day, Nate mentioned how he was so sick of jazz and how he wanted to play something fun, rock out and front a band. 

Nate: I had been thinking about starting a new band myself for awhile, at least six months or so. I needed another project, something that was more simple and fun.

Marcus: He grew up around rock music.

Nate: I played in different bands in high school and I wasn’t sure what I was looking for, exactly. I didn’t know what I wanted it to be like but I kind of came to the conclusion that whatever band I’m going to have, it has to just be with homies. People that are ride or die and going to be there all the time and going to want to practice whenever, make every show and go on tour. Eventually I was like, Marcus doesn’t really know how to play music but I know he’s going to be there.

Marcus: We also share some of the same interests, a lot of crossovers. A lot of soul.

Nate: Yeah, we’re into a lot of the same music, too. He already had a bass, so I was like ‘yeah, let’s play.’ I started writing simple songs and we started jamming on them. That’s how it started.

Marcus: It was kind of more punk in the early days, just a three piece. After a few times of practicing, we were looking at the stars one night and trying to come up with a name. We had a previous name that was really trashy.

What was the old name?

Nate: Coke Dick. 

(laughter)

Marcus: You don’t forget that name, that’s the thing about that.

Is that from personal experience or something?

(laughter)

Nate: No, not really.

Marcus: It just sounded right. It’s two four letter words.

Nate: It was a joke. We’d just sit around and come up with bullshit band names, but none of the other ones really stuck.

Marcus: Even as we booked shows we kept thinking of new band names and then that one night when we were looking up at the stars, I came up with the name Star Club. I just said it and everyone liked it. It’s so elementary and basic, but we found out it hadn’t really been used. I realized maybe a month later that I had taken this Beatles class. I learned about their roots and their up and coming time in Hamburg, Germany at this club called The Star Club, so I had kind of unconsciously pulled it up from Beatles’ history. But it just clicked.

How did Star Club get into playing house shows? Who helped you get into it? 

Marcus: No one. It was just me and Nate.

Nate: I had lived in this house just south of PSU with a bunch of jazz musicians. We played a couple of shows there, then Jose from Hush Yuppies asked up to play his house. We met him through Chris (Hermsen) from Sama Dams. He was my nextdoor neighbor and Chris wanted to go to the Firkin during the night of that big blizzard. We all went and Jose was there. I told Chris I was trying to find another band for a show we were having there and he said ‘Jose’s in a band, ask him.’ I walked up to him and did, and that’s how we met.

Marcus: Ultimately, we were just going out. That’s how we got involved in the scene. Nate communicated that to me early on about wanting to go to shows all the time. We were practicing everyday in the summertime, all day. Long hours, and then going out every night. We’ve just continued to do that for over a year now.

Yeah, y’all came up pretty quick from when I first heard of you last year. I can’t even remember how I found you, really, but I was trying to do some Deli stuff for you. I remember you didn’t have a Facebook and all I could find was your Bandcamp page with your demo on it. I’ve always been a fan.

Nate: Sweet! Awesome. We’ve come a long way.

Marcus: Instagram was our main platform, really. Before we had a Bandcamp, we had an Instagram. We wanted to combine our band with film photography.

Who does the shots? I like the aesthetic of your Instagram.

Marcus: Me and Nate.

Nate: Thank you.

Marcus: Yeah. I wanted to do something that wasn’t just one person in the band and their life. I wanted to combine art and music. Nate was shooting film. I had done it before and he got me into doing it again. We wanted to do all black and white pictures that we took, but now we’re starting to incorporate one other photographer friend and we’re going to start posting his stuff, too. It’s a collaboration, but a very curated selection of photos and posters. It’s just for the band. We all have our personal Instagrams but I felt like it could be one thing that represents us a little better.

Nate: That was the plan, not doing Facebook and only having Instagram. Eventually, people kept asking me about Facebook.

A lot of Portland does its booking through Facebook.

Nate: Yeah! We’ve gotten a few show offers from there. People connect on it. I don’t really like being on it but it’s part of just being involved with what’s involved. That’s where people find the shit they’re going to do now, is through Facebook.

Marcus: It shot us up a lot more than Instagram did. 

So why Sixth Avenue Motel? What is the significance of that?

Nate: I lived right behind Sixth Avenue Motel.

Marcus: That’s where we formed.

Nate: It’s right there in southwest, just south of PSU. We liked the aesthetic of it.

Marcus: The aesthetic of 70s motels in relation to 70s rock and proto-punk, and the vibes. We were calling ourselves ‘motel rock’ and we just like this idea of this shitty motel and the culture that’s there. It’s weird. People live there and it’s weird to us and we’re curious. We’d be walking by drunk and see something really weird happening in the motel.

Nate: A lot of strange shit would happen there.

Marcus: It’s definitely a drug slum motel.

Nate: Also, when the band was first starting people would ask us what we sound like. We had that common problem of saying ‘kinda like this, kinda like that,’ so we just started telling people ‘motel rock.’ That was our original genre. Picture yourself in a shitty 70s motel and there’s a band playing in the corner, that’s what we sound like. (laughs)

Marcus: It’s loungey, but a sexy, energetic motel room party? It’s kind of fancy free shit. It’s gritty, yet it’s glamorized. You have this motel that looks nice, but it’s dirty when you pull the sheet up. That’s the vibe. We were struggling with a name. The picture on the cover of the new album is of the Sixth Avenue Motel in the 50s. That picture is a black and white original photograph. We wanted to get our own but we just couldn’t get one as good as that one, with the old cars and the same sign.

Nate: Aesthetically, I love it. It’s not super deep. 

Marcus: We like neon signs. It represents nightlife and excursions. It just had a nice ring to it, too. I like that whole David Lynch paradigm where on the surface everything seems normal, but underneath it’s not. Our music, we thought, was like that vibe. They’re pop songs, but then something isn’t quite right as well.

Nate: That’s a good way of putting it.

Marcus: Well and that’s the feeling we want people to thrive on. They like it and they feel like it’s catchy, but what is that other feeling? You can’t really put your finger on it. People compare us to other musicians to try to do that.

How do you feel like you incorporate that grittiness into the way you write your songs?

Marcus: No effects. We don’t drown out silence with post enhanced sounds. We want it to be raw. It’s better for us because we just plug in and we play. We don’t have as many technical problems. It’s risky.

Nate: Another part of my idea writing for this album is that I wanted a certain simplicity to it, and I wanted a lot of contrast. I wanted it to sound minimal. We have a lot of these freakout loud parts that I wanted to use as the contrast of intensity instead of pedals that you turn on all at once. I wanted to create that effect but manually, with our instruments. 

Marcus: It’s a lot of stuff. The lyrics that Nate writes are pretty concise, usually. It’s about a moment or a feeling that happened. All the songs are about a feeling, like “Can’t Get Anything Done” or “Breaking Down.” 

Nate: I try to keep the lyrics pretty simple as well. Sort of descriptive, but just enough to get the idea there. I don’t want to expand too much. I try to cut the fat as much as possible. 

Marcus: The vibe of the song should represent the feeling as much as the words. We can’t rely on the words, like singer-songwriter type music, to convey a point 100%. When you don’t hide anything or put on anything extra, you’re not glorifying anything.

Nate: “Rains in the Tropics” is about searching for a place that you’re going to find happiness in materialism.

Marcus: And you give up everything to get it.

Nate: But that place doesn’t exist.

Marcus, what is your favorite song to play on the album and why? 

Marcus: “Nightmare” for the longest time has been my favorite because of the energy. It’s so fun to play live and it’s one that’s more in the vein of my style. It’s more post-punk and drivey. My bass part is drivey and I get to play a lot of notes. It’s dark, because it’s about a nightmare. I’ve always had that darkness about me whereas Nate is much more colorful. We definitely like a lot of the same old music but contemporary music, like 80s and on, we part directions. The other one, upon listening to the record for awhile, is “Breaking Down.” It’s so minimal and trenchy. It’s the kind of song that you’d have to get to know Star Club to love. It’s where Nate’s weirdness is highlighted and not obscured by pop. It’s the music person’s song, though we also want to do accessible music.

Do you have the same view of what might be considered accessible?

Marcus: We’re pretty on the level about what’s accessible. When we write our more poppy songs, we almost always agree. We never play a long solo, ever. Period. And that’s part of what makes the accessibility. Those decisions we always agree on. We keep it minimal and that keeps it accessible.

What are some of the things you disagree on when it comes to the songs you make?

Nate: I feel like sometimes we’ll have disagreements but we work them out, like over chords.

Marcus: When it comes to music, we communicate really well, and that’s what’s good.

Nate: As soon as we finished the record, I started working on our new set. I want it to flow even better and I think it’s starting to. I’m always thinking about the next thing so it’s hard for me to back on the record.

Marcus: We had a set of like 14 songs that we were going to try to record. We chose 10 out of them. We’ve probably got like 20 to 30 songs that we’ve done away with. 

How did you choose the ones that you did for the record?

Marcus: Just talking every night, playing them and seeing the crowd’s responses. Nate would often feel uneasy about some of them. He’s really impulsive about those types of decisions. If either one of us decides that a song doesn’t work, it’s gone. We do away with it.

Nate: And just write a new one that’s better.

Marcus: That’s the motto. With our new set, we know what we want to go for. But when we wrote Sixth Avenue Motel, we were still trying to figure it out. It’s a pretty early record. The demo was brutally early, we didn’t know what we were doing at all. On Sixth Avenue Motel we have “Nightmare” and “Saturday Night” and a couple songs we knew were good. Also, a lot filler and that’s the record. With our new set, every song has already been designed with that frame of mind. We’ve figured out the vibe now.

Nate: It’s easier to decipher if it’s going to work or not. We had more disagreements when we were first trying to get stuff ready for the record.

Marcus: The band figured out its vibe and now we have to do it that way. It’s like there’s another power in control. We made the music and it’s hit the ground running and we have to keep up with that image and that sound.

How does that work with Tony (drummer) and Peter (aka PQB, sax) who aren’t really a part of the songwriting process?

Nate: I write most of the sax lines and we tell PQB how to play it. Tony writes the drum parts.

Marcus: We’ve been trying to beat the jazz out of him this whole time.

Nate: Yeah, I don’t want it to sound jazzy at all. People see a saxophone and in their head they think jazz.

Marcus: Or blues.

Nate: I’m definitely influenced by jazz, but I don’t want anything we make to sound like jazz.

Marcus: Jazz people don’t think we do though, it’s the rock n’ roll people that do. 

Nate: Peter is getting more and more understanding of how minimal we want it, though.

Marcus: It should be more of a texture. We want the tones and the lines in there. It was a hard decision adding sax in the first place. We went back and forth trying to decide whether we should do it or not. It was either add nothing or add a sax.

Nate: And if we wanted to deal with adding another person for scheduling and figuring out how to work with them. It had crossed my mind to add keys, but the sax just seemed more raw.

And I feel like that sets Star Club more apart from what’s already flooding Portland’s scene.

Nate: Yeah! That was one of the main goals, to do something that is new.

Marcus: The number one goal, above having fun or creating something new, was to make people dance. We love to dance, we go dancing, and we want to see people dance. We want to see people move in this town. 

Portland is a kind of hard place to get people to do that, though.

Marcus: The sax makes people dance. It’s like the calling to dance. 

Nate: Still trying to make that work though, making people dance.

 

That’s what Star Club boys will of course be trying to do at the release show Friday, 9.1 at Bunk Bar along with Wave Action and Boink. Grab a copy of Sixth Avenue Motel there, but listen to "Nightmare" below.

[NOTE: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.]

Fans of pleasantly loopy, exploratory type rock have got an opportunity to catch some great under-the-radar acts at a showcase tonight for free at the Turn Turn Turn.

What tonight’s three billed bands share, though coming from somewhat different corners of it, is an experimental fuzziness that makes them all the more appealing. Clawfoot Slumber, who are releasing their new album The Stars Within You Beckon To Be Carried Forth From The Dark in mid-September, have got a dreamy, psych folk tinge to them. It’s fairly different from the heavy loop play coming from Other Lights, who lean more towards a mathy, progressive post-rock side of creation that is entirely too easy to get sucked into. Gladness finds their way almost in the middle, except with the shoegaze characteristics of My Bloody Valentine meets Slowdive with a J. Mascis type vocality. All in all, this lineup touches perfectly on a few different bits of experimental fun.

The show is free, for the 21+ crowd and starts at 8pm, so head out and enjoy. 

 Infectiously poppy garage rock act Autonomics have been around for awhile now. There’s not really any band in Portland that sounds quite like them – fast paced garage wrapped in a delightful pop punk robe, with hooks as catchy and toe-tapping as the next. For a while now, their full length Debt Sounds has been in heavy circulation in Europe. It’s been highly anticipated over here in the States and it’s finally made its debut, with Autonomics having commissioned a couple bands to help them in the release show process.

Devy Metal and Ice Queens are slated to excite the crowd as they await to hear Autonomics’ new sounds in full. Aside from whatever they’ve shared of Debt Sounds on stage, "Superfuzz" and "Southern Funeral" have been the only ones available online to dive into. Hear the album live on 9.2 at the Doug Fir Lounge.

Raucous foursome the Hot LZs actually do know how to make things hot with the energy they throw into their songs. Natural and unrefined, the boys are are a perfect choice for getting a crowd riled up and in the mood.

Just recently, the Hot LZs came out on top as who all the voters were looking most forward to seeing at midsummer’s Twilight Fest. That was their last performance up until tonight, where they’ve been booked along with Tiger Touch and The Ransom for a Belmont blowout party of sorts for hump day. 

If you missed them at Twilight Fest, be sure to check them out tonight. They’ll easily become a go-to for getting out some slightly aggro feelings in a catchily punky way.

 Dim Wit are the type of duo that command attention. The fun wigs, the sometimes immediate jarring of frontman Jeff Tuyay’s screeching guitar, drummer Tyler Verigin’s rhythmic and interesting time signatures. Many factors play into the particular, drawing effect that Dim Wit has. Recently, the duo (or sometimes trio, with Hadrian Kindt of Fire Nuns occasionally joining in) have released a new video that’s just as hypnotizing as their sounds.

The stop-motion animated visuals of "Suburbanal" were created by local visual artist Grayson Bear. Its visuals, much like the song’s vocals, start out with the spry innocence connected to the idea of the "American dream." As the song and video progress, the animations increase in their intensity before unleashing a creative hatred upon our unfortunate President. 

It’s incredibly entertaining, and well worth a few run-throughs. Watch "Surburbanal" below

It was just last year when a newly imagined Project Pabst made it’s debut down at the Tom McCall Waterfront Park. With a fairly eclectic lineup for the actual festival and the night shows as well, patrons flooded in and out of the entrance gates with the gears in their heads turning as to how they felt about the festival’s new style. It’s almost impossible to pull anything off without a couple hitches along the way, but Project Pabst soldiered through another year of big acts and big piles of beer cans. The same is still true for 2017, just a couple of things seeing changes.

This year’s fest is scaled down in a few ways, but has grown a lot in others. Unlike the Project Pabst’s of the past, the 2017 edition won’t have any night shows at all. These night shows were held at various locations around the city and gave more opportunities for local acts to participate in the festival. Last year, Kyle Craft was the only local to make it to festival’s main stages. Project Pabst night shows also offered more in genre variance, since many of the festival’s metal shows happened at night. Local support this year comes but from just one local artist each day, though the ones chosen are two of the best in the city and have both been voted our Deli Portland Artist of the Month in the past.

Opening up Saturday’s festivities is the Last Artful, Dodgr. She happened to have played one of the night sets last year, but her distinct vocal style and bomb beats are perfect for the bigger stage. For Sunday’s sets, harsh post-punk group Lithics will be kicking things off. They’ve become more of a common name around town over the last few months, especially after basically being named the best new band in Portland by Willamette Week and participating voters.

What sets this round of Project Pabst apart from the others are the headlining acts. This isn’t to say that Duran Duran, Ice Cube, Tame Impala and Ween didn’t totally kill it last year, or that Tears for Fears didn’t a few years back. But each day this year has a pretty damn good trifecta of artists to close out everything. 

Attendees will get a chance to see Spoon, Nas and Beck on Saturday, while Sunday patrons will get a little bit of good, old and controversial. South African "rap" duo Die Antwoord have been contentious musicians from the start, but the reasons that make them such could create problems for Portlanders at the festival. Die Antwoord is known for committing racial and homophobic acts under the guise of shock value, like using the n*word in their songs, dressing in blackface in music videos and referring to people as f***ts, so it will be interesting to see how the crowd will react if they pull anything go the sort on stage.

To detract from whatever potential drama that could happen, the coolness of singer-songwriter and all around pop culture jokester Father John Misty, along with the iconic existence of still-kicking-it rocker Iggy Pop guarantees the festival will end on a good note.

For those that want to keep the party going, a Project Pabst Cooldown party will be happening back across the bridge at the Know. This bill is all local, featuring Blossom, Myke Bogan and Foreign Talks from Vancouver, Wa. 

This is one of the festival’s best bills yet and tickets are still available, so get yours before the chance is lost.

Portland has been known to be a good place for indie rock. With a wealth of bands that fulfill those sonic requirements there are certain ones that stand out from the rest. Melville is one of those bands.

The quartet just release their debut full length The New Zero, which is conceptually based around how the apex of past events in life lead to new beginnings. For one of the first tracks shared from The New Zero, titled "Televised," Melville also released a music video to go with it.

It follows a Madonna-in-the-80s dressed character on somewhat of a quest of trying to figure out what’s going on, it seems. Superimposed into some of the scenes are shots of Melville performing. At about three and a half minutes long, "Televised" is definitely an entertaining watch. 

Check it out below and stream The New Zero over at Melville’s Bandcamp page.

 Industrialgaze trio We Are Parasols are just like the rest of us – they see what’s happening in the world, who the main propagator of all that nonsense is, and have been wracking their brains as to how to cope with it all. Like many creative types, We Are Parasols took to their expressive outlet as a form of release, but it wasn’t what they originally had planned.

Today, they’re premiering a video for their newest track "dim" off their upcoming album Inertia. The song itself keeps on with their shoegazey electronic, but the video notes on a serious movements currently happening. We Are Parasols guitarist Jeremy Wilkins had this to say on the concept behind the video:

       This isn’t the video we intended to make but it’s the video we felt we had to make. The track, “dim,” is the first single from our new album, Inertia. It’s a concept album which follows an android sex worker through a dystopian future. We sought to make a video that explored the same themes of the record; anti-authoritarianism, oppression, violence, and human nature. Much as the themes and sound of our record were drastically effected and shaped by the election of Donald Trump, the events of the past few weeks took a toll on our ability to make the video we wanted. 

      After several attempts at creating something nuanced, subtle and thoughtful we realized we were hitting a wall. Due to the nature of our album’s story it’s hard to portray our protagonist’s journey without images of fascism. Unfortunately, our real world is currently filled with disgusting images of fascism inside our own country and others. Without the artistic space for nuance or the willingness to risk appearing at all sympathetic to fascists we realized, as all good people have to do at some point, that we needed to change course. 

     So, we made an anti-fascist protest video. We realize this is a performative protest. It is not a substitute for concrete action. We do not intend for it to be. We have been in the streets and we will continue to engage. We encourage you to get involved also. #RESIST. 

And there you have it. Watch the video for "dim" below. See We Are Parasols’ next show on 9.6 with Sex Park and Vacant Stares at White Owl Social Club. As always, #resist and #fucktrump.

Psycho Las Vegas is basically like the Coachella of metal, except it doesn’t totally and completely suck ass. If a band makes it to a Psycho stage, being held at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino this year, then they’re really doing something to speak of with their sound. And that’s exactly what Usnea is talented enough to be doing.

Usnea is one of Portland’s beloved sludgy doom acts and on top of playing Psycho, they have a whole new album of new material to share with their adoring doomers. They’re releasing Portals of Futility on Relapse Records September 8, and they’ve already shared a bit of what the album will sound like. First, fans got a taste with the almost 10 minute long official audio to "Lathe of Heaven" and now, the band have released a video for "Pyrrhic Victory." It’s everything you’d picture it to be and wonderfully so much more.

The band is having a release show for Portals of Futility 9.16 with Thrones, Hands of Thieves and Ninth Moon Black at the Tonic Lounge. They’ll be taking off for an extensive at the end of September and well through October so be sure to catch them before they hit the road. And if you happen to be at Psycho this weekend, well, you’re a lucky son of a bitch.

 Some weeks ago, the alternative indie rock band The Domestics began promotional efforts for their upcoming September release, a full length titled Little Darkness. At first, the band’s endeavors were just as normal and innocent as the next, but it was revealed yesterday and blown up today how wrong of a turn their promotion took.

A few key players in the music scene began posting to social media on Wednesday, 8.17 about how they received a tape in the mail, marked as confidential "Trump/Comey Recordings" with Russian script in the background. The actual audio on the tape wasn’t much but audio from Little Darkness betwixt ramblings from Trump and clips of someone speaking in Russian. What was on the tape wasn’t really the issue, it was the return postage that’s caused much of the stir.

The 60-63 sent out tapes were marked with return addresses to some of the most troublesome organizations currently active – the KKK, Westboro Baptist Church and InfoWars, the somehow popular media site ran by Alex Jones. Some of the posts circulating claimed that all of the tapes were sent to Jewish members of the music community.

The Domestics took to their Facebook page to address the issue, with their record label, local Tender Loving Empire (TLE) and Silver Morning Management sending a statement to music outlets. Having many larger scale media sites covering the story, including Pitchfork, Vulture and the first to report it, Paste Magazine, meant the band had to respond quickly and effectively. A collective run-through of the statements concludes that the tapes were predominately sent to "right wing media" as a means of trolling them. "The mysterious packages were marked with the return addresses of Info Wars, The KKK’s headquarters, and The Westboro Baptist church in hopes that any tape that bounced back in the mail would end up flooding the mailboxes of these bigots," part of The Domestics’ statement reads.

Frontman Michael Finn also told Paste that he and the rest of the band were unaware of the exact return addresses used, placing blame on TLE and its Sync-Licensing And Operations Coordinator Jed Overly, also of the band Astro Tan. 

Overly, who is African American and Jewish, released his own statement on the TLE purchased domain trumpcomeytapes.com. "It was never my intention to alarm or frighten people," part of Overly’s statement read. "Our sole objective was to pique interest in The Domestics. No one at The Domestics, Silver Morning Management, or TLE knew about the chosen return addresses. I had made a last minute decision to change return addresses and thought it was obvious that this was a gag, and I could not have been more wrong." 

He goes on to say how the addresses he used were bogus and how he thought because the tapes were postmarked from Portland, the return addresses and concern surrounding them would make the whole thing "humorous or mysterious at worst." 

Overly takes the complete fall for the PR mishap, saying how he had no idea many of the tapes’ recipients were Jewish. "To reiterate. This was a marketing campaign that was trying to get press for a really great band that I believe in. It was in poor taste to use those return addresses without thinking through the possible outcomes," says Overly. "A lot of people are saying that The Domestics or TLE are dumb for carrying out this campaign, when in reality it was just me who made a dumb mistake. Again, The Domestics, Silver Morning Management and TLE had no knowledge of the return addresses. I am sorry for any anguish and pain I caused."

It’s clear that this marketing campaign worked in some sort of way, as the band has gotten much attention for the stunt. But, as what should have been learned from Yacht’s PR flub last year, not all press is necessarily good press, and this may not work out the best for the band or label in the end.

Little Darkness is out on September 1.

 Last year, the first round of Jeff’s Plasma Blast rolled out to overwhelming success. Its venue, the American Legion up on Alberta, filled to capacity as tickets sold like the hottest of cakes. The mini fest was started by the surfy psych band Skelevision, formally known as Thong. Since the second installment happens this Friday, we exchanged some words with Skelevision drummer Philip Zevenbergen on names, lineups and Plasma Blast details, like how it’ll also be the band’s release show for their new full length Inside The Horror and tour kickoff…

 

The Deli Portland: How did the band end up settling on Skelevision for the name change, from the former name Thong?

Philip Zevenbergen: It kind of just became this name that got thrown around in our desperate attempt to ditch Thong. Some weird names were considered. Chemical X (like the powerpuff girls), Warped Tape, and The Shrimpers were all top contenders for a while, but ultimately Skelevision just rolled off the tongue better and was more fitting to our sound.

The name Skelevision specifically came about out of my boredom of working at Wunderland Nickle Arcade. I would often combine random prefixes with objects I’d see around the room, "skele" and an arcade game with "vision" in the title stuck out one day and I wrote it down.

Speaking of names, how did the name for Jeff’s Plasma Blast itself come about?

I am a huge fan of David Cronenberg’s The Fly (1986). Throughout the film Jeff Goldblum, who plays the lead role of a scientist who becomes a gross monster fly, refers to jumping into the "plasma pool". I found that to be real silly and Jeff’s celebration of the plasma pool just seemed like a good name for a music fest for some reason. Originally, it was Jeff’s New Years Plasma Blast when we did it in December of 2016. We just dropped the "New Years" and picked up the "2.0" and there ya have it.

What was your process for selecting the lineup for Plasma Blast 2.0?

Well, it started with just asking some bands I am close with about hopping on so I could have a good baseline of acts before reaching out to headliners. Once I had my baseline, I reached out to some more of the scene leaders about getting on, people who have been around longer in the Portland scene and have some street cred from touring or having a notable label. Once that was taken care of, I shifted into getting the headliners which was easily the hardest, most time consuming, and stressful part of the whole show. A lot of agents will lead you on and throw you back and forth on how the likely the headliner you want will take the money you’ve offered. However Mean Jeans and Walter TV have both been pleasures to work with and so have their agents. We are stoked to have them playing the festival and even more stoked that we get to hit Eugene the next day with Walter TV again.

Is there any particular artist(s) whose sets you’re really looking forward to?

I’m most excited to see The Fabulous Downey Brothers. We played with them at the BIG BLDG BASH this year and we were totally blown away. They are going to have a crowd of totally fresh faces and I know they’ll tear the house down.

I’m also stoked to see Mannequin, who are opening the festival as this will be their first show. They look like some girls who are gonna kick some serious ass.

Why did you decide to have the event be all-ages and one day long, versus spanning over two days?

When you span it over two days, you have to get the twice the artists. I see it this way only because I am a believer in the short, around 20 minute long set. Show us what you got and get off. To have the amount of artists we are having in Jeff’s 2.0 would require 40 minute sets from each band over the two days. I think less people would pay attention to entire sets and the show would move a lot slower. I love this set up because it’s going to pack a punch. The music will just keep going and changing rapidly, which is great for a young, unfocused mind like mine. Plus, having it be all ages was a no brainer. You don’t have to be 21 to love good music, that’s just silly.

You’ve mentioned to me how Skelevision is now a three piece. How did losing Carlo affect the writing process?

After our first tour the band came to the agreement that we wanted to move forward as a three piece without Carlo. While having to seperate ourselves from him was not something we were super happy to have to do, it really tightened us a band. Our writing sessions feel tighter and more focused on making the core structures of our songs more interesting and I think people have been really appreciating it. People are always telling us how much better of a band we are since we waddled into the Analog over a year ago for our first show. We all wish Carlo could have stuck around, but ultimately our separation with him has been better for both him and us.

What inspired some of the songs/the concept of the new album?

The lyric "Inside The Horror" specifically comes from the second track on the album, "The Sheets." The whole idea of being surrounded by horror but that we’re maybe safe if we hide under our bed sheets is the visual we are playing with on our album cover. The whole album holds our psychedelic lo-fi beginnings but also mixes in our newer more punk and horror influence. I think the blend of it all came out really nicely. 

What city are you most looking forward to playing on tour and why?

Tijuana! Derek H. of On Drugs told me that it would be the most stressful and thrilling city to play, but also the most memorable and exciting too. That has me really pumped. Also, just getting to go play in Mexico is such a treat!

Doors for Jeff’s Plasma Blast 2.0 are at 2:30, with music starting sharply at 3pm. Tickets are still available and reentry to the fest is allowed all day, so be sure to come early!