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What Were the Six Greatest Themed Bars to Open in Portland in 2018?
1. Rose City Book Pub. Craft beers, poetry readings and rows and rows of old, obscure books—if Portland had to be summed up in a single bar, this one on Northeast Fremont Street might be it.
2. Benedictine Brewery. A taproom at a monastery outside Mount Angel—just the third monastic beer producer in the country.
3. Bargarten. Oktoberfest. All year round. In Beaverton.
4. Poison's Rainbow. Owned by Modest Mouse frontman Isaac Brock, this establishment on Northeast 28th Avenue is what you imagine is inside Brock's brain—terrariums, beaded lamps, a carved snow tiger, and a psychedelic purple chandelier Brock made himself.
5. Psychic Bar. Housed inside a converted Victorian home on North Mississippi Avenue, dedicated to the paranormal. The restroom has surreal illusion mirrors.
6. Outrage. Portland's first hangout dedicated to esports. On TK_Southwest Third Avenue, you can watch live-streaming tournaments or beat a stranger bloody in Street Fighter V. ANDI PREWITT.
What Were the Five Greatest Moments of 2018 for Portugal the Man?
1. Winning a Grammy. After their most commercially successful year in their decade as a band, Portugal the Man was handed a Grammy in January for "Feel It Still." In the band's acceptance speech, bassist Zach Carothers gave shout-outs to the Trail Blazers and Satan.
2. Nearly headlining Coachella. The band played the festival's main stage just before Eminem's headlining set on April 15, filling the stage with Blazers jerseys and projecting Portland iconography onto the Jumbotron. Their Spotify banner is now a photo of frontman John Gourley gulping a bottle of Jameson with the Palm Springs crowd in the background.
3. Playing with Springsteen. In June, the Boss played a semi-impromptu set of covers at the reopening of New Jersey bowling alley and music venue Asbury Lanes. Portugal the Man headlined the show.
4. Playing a free show supporting student protests again gun violence. It's incredibly easy to rag on "Feel It Still," their bro-funk hit single, but the band's March for Our Lives concert was pretty much faultless—particularly when they were joined by rapper Black Thought from the Roots.
5. Defending Portland's livability an Esquire op-ed. Apparently, we're a town of scrappy yet affable misfits who get to enjoy a plentiful selection of quality food and cheap concerts, according to Gourley's article. SHANNON GORMLEY.
What Were the Seven Greatest Portland Shows That Never Happened?
1. Fuck You, Mister President at One Grand Gallery. Technically, it did happen, but only briefly. A few days after the opening of a July show of anti-Trump art, One Grand Gallery was bombarded with angry phone calls over a large illustration in their window facing East Burnside depicting the president having his throat slit with a knife. The show was quickly shut down.
2. Nas and Santigold's opening sets for Lauryn Hill at Veterans Memorial Coliseum. We all expected Lauryn Hill to show up either very late or not at all to the Portland stop of her Miseducation of Lauryn Hill anniversary tour. We did not expect her to drop her opening acts without any advance notice to ticket holders, replace them with a DJ who played for two hours and pretend like nothing happened when she finally took the stage.
3. Justin Timberlake at Moda Center. The Man of the Woods postponed his November show due to bruised vocal chords until February.
4. Nicki Minaj and Future at Moda Center. In the wake of multiple beefs and a disappointing album, the rapper indefinitely postponed her double header tour with Future.
5. The Avett Brothers at Edgefield. In early July, the Avetts cut the third night of their sold-out three-evening stand short, after a man allegedly entered the venue with a gun and then disappeared into the crowd. The Americana revivalists came back in September to make up for it.
6. Lil Xan at the Roseland. The same week in November that the SoundCloud rapper was set to perform in Portland, TMZ released an interview in which Xan announced that he was canceling his tour dates to recover from drug addiction. He says he's out of rehab and sober—but no word on a Portland show.
7. MusicfestNW. After 17 years—and four in partnership with Project Pabst—Portland's largest music festival went on hiatus in 2018. MFNW did sponsor a two-day mini-festival in the parking lot of the downtown Doc Martens show, highlighted by rebellious rapper Princess Nokia. SHANNON GORMLEY.
What Were the 24 Greatest Findings in WW in 2018?
Each edition of WW opens with a hanful of strange but true facts from that week's paper. Here were the two dozen best ones this year.
1. "A man with a machete can really put a damper on a clown show."
2. "You can blame Ronald Reagan for homelessness, but you can't sue him."
3. "Tom Hanks isn't Portland's dad."
4. "If you were the king, maybe you got shit on you once a week."
5. "Turkey Boy's master is the biggest player in Portland house flipping."
6. "Toilet bowls can grow an array of weaponized watermelons."
7. "Getting drunk is an art."
8. "Play music too loud at gay speed dating and you may get hit with a bag of lube."
9. "America's sick obsession with guns has nothing to do with bears."
10. "Sheep are just sweater-wearing goats."
11. "It's not easy to find a venue that will display photographs of vulvas. But try the Ace Hotel."
12. "One senator remembers his dad threatening to throw him off a bridge for talking too much."
13. "The Dutch enjoy little headbutts."
14. "Making a realistic Bigfoot requires a lot of yak hair."
15. "Fanny packs are back—or as some call them, 'uterus bags.'"
16. "The dream of sending homeless people to live in a jail is alive in Portland."
17. "Oregon isn't the only place crawling with 20-pound water rodents."
18. "The secret of life is to smile, says unsmiling Portland man."
19. "The Pacific Ocean really let us all down this summer."
20. "The fear of Portland is alive in Coos Bay."
21. "The coolest cornucopia in Portland includes CBD, mangos and a black rose."
22. "WW's departing food writer will miss fighting elderly Taiwanese men."
23. "Cryptocurrency could keep pot farmers from being tortured by men dressed as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles."
24. "Sir, this is a McDonald's."
Next: What Were the Five Greatest Trolls of Portlanders in 2018?