Scoop: Coal-Fired Pizza Is Still OK, Right?

Screen shot from new Hustle and Drone video.
By WW Culture Staff
  1. ON-COURT HUSTLE: You may have been too caught up in the Blazers’ playoff run to notice, but back in April a Portland band played the Moda Center—without having ever released an album. In between the second and third games of the Blazers’ first-round series against Houston, electro-pop duo Hustle and Drone spent four hours on the court inside the former Rose Garden, shooting a video for the lead single from its upcoming full-length debut. Keyboardist Ryan Neighbors (a former member of Portugal the Man) tells Scoop he had an idea for a “Smells Like Teen Spirit”-esque performance clip set in a gymnasium. After playing a Red Bull Sound Select concert, he brought it up to a representative at the energy-drink company, who offered to pull some strings and get the band and a small group of extras to film inside the arena. “We were shooting hoops on an NBA court during the playoffs,” Neighbors says. “It was kind of a childhood dream.” He declined to offer details of the video, but did share the corresponding still photo. The video, for a song titled “The Glow,” will premiere a month before the release of the corresponding album, Holyland, this summer.
  1. UN-AWFUL: Undateable, the long-delayed NBC sitcom co-starring former Portland comic Ron Funches, finally had its premiere with back-to-back episodes May 29, and its ratings were, to quote The Hollywood Reporter, “un-awful.” The show, helmed by Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence, garnered a 1.3 rating in the vaunted 18-to-49 age demographic—the highest summer debut for a major-network comedy in five years. (It still got beat by reruns of The Big Bang Theory on CBS.) As for its critical reception, reviews are mixed: Rotten Tomatoes’ consensus opinion says the show is “largely bereft of originality or humor.” But Alan Sepinwall, the dean of TV critics, wrote that, under the right circumstances, Undateable could grow “into something quite good.” He had kind words for Funches in particular, praising his “strange energy” and “soft-spoken, almost Southern delivery.”
  1. SUM GRUB: Fong Chong, which for decades was the best dim sum restaurant in Chinatown, closed at the end of May, leaving only House of Louie serving dim sum in the neighborhood. Chinatown was long ago replaced by 82nd Avenue as Portland’s center of Asian culture and food. As of May 28, Fong Chong had been cleared of furniture. >> A few blocks away, the space at 610 NW Couch St. once occupied by Casey’s—which hopped West Burnside Street to 412 SW 4th Ave.—might become a karaoke bar called Jolly Green Pirate. Bryan Hogan, president of the Northwest Pointing Dog Association, has applied for a liquor license.
  1. RUGBY CHAMPS: Oregon is home to the best women’s rugby club team in the nation. The Oregon Sports Union’s Jesters, based in West Linn, demolished Chicago North Shore 48-10 on May 31 in Madison, Wisc., to win the USA Rugby Division I club national title. This followed blowout playoff victories of 46-6 over the Austin Valkyries and 56-0 over the Denver Black Ice.

WWeek 2015

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