SCOOP MITTENS OFF: Sorta a big week in local music. Portland soul/dance/electro/pop outfit Dirty Mittens has called it quits...sorta.   More

Music Utah is long—perhaps too long. You think about these things while driving through endless deserts and plains. It took us what seemed like forever to get across the state. That day’s companions: Das Racist (Noah’s hypothesis: It’s a joke band; If you like the joke, you like the band. I just love that someone semi famous is shedding a little light on ethnic studies as a discipline. I have ...   More

Music Eating Dicks has been our go-to unfunny joke since Patrick and Paul bailed on a night of drinking in favor of hamburgers and sleep. How much Dicks can they eat? Five. They eat five Dicks between the two of them. Seattle was awesome. Weird show at the Vera project, but AWESOME bands. Strong Killings have incredible energy and bring it hard. Ships are, in addition to prolific drinkers, rock solid ...   More

Music It's gonna be awful, I keep telling myself—managing expectations. We will sleep on hard floors and eat bad food. What shows aren't canceled will be for five people in a rec center basement and we won't be paid. We will get robbed, beaten up, snowed in, pulled over, and made fun of. When we finally pull into Portland two weeks from now, it will be beaten and ragged Mittens that emerge from a fully ...   More

Music This city is huge. It stretches forever. From the top of this hill, I can see maybe 220 degrees of solid sprawl, and I know behind me is another 140. Stayed with the illustrious Adam Stamp last night, and he lives a block from the bottom of Runyon Canyon park, where supposedly the stars are to be seen, so I head up to see what I can. I'm pretty sure I see Mark Duplass doing pushups, but I'm not entirely ...   More

Music After Margie's, the drive today feels like it takes no time at all. Either that or we go through some kind of time warp by the Winchester Mystery House and the drive literally takes no time at all. Oh San Francisco, oh you city of swells and smells. Everything is on top of itself here, buildings and freeways and people all piled up into incredible piles, and my memories seem to pile up the same ...   More

Music No April Fools' Day jokes here, folks: we have a second Cut of the Day! Ben Hubbird of Dirty Mittens just sent over a demo of the song "Arcadia" from the band's upcoming debut full-length record, and it's a pure gem. Recorded by Jim Brunberg at the Temple and the Falcon and featuring Laura Gibson and Matt Sheehy on backup vocals, "Arcadia" is a bit of a shift from Dirty Mittens' recent Motown-influenced ...   More

Music Everyone knows that the record industry is dying a slow, painful death. The problem is that no one has a solution. While the Radiohead "pay as much as you want" model might work for bigger bands, it certainly can't help young, developing outfits that don't have the same established fan base. Nowadays artists have to find a way to sell something more than a tangible, physical album, and it's led to ...   More

Music From the beginning, Dirty Mittens always sounded good. The band—led by singer (and, for the record, ex-WW intern) Chelsea Morrissey—has evolved over the years, from its humble beginnings as a cutesy indie-pop quartet to its current incarnation as a retro soul-pop powerhouse. But rarely—in concert, or even on record—has the group sounded this good playing the handclap jam "Arcadia." ...   More