Albums We Overlooked in 2014

By Pete Cottell

Bearcubbin' Girls With Fun Haircuts (Self-Released)

(pictured above)

[BUBBLE PROG] To relegate Bearcubbin' to the ghetto of "math rock" is a big mistake: Odd meters and frenetic rigging aside, what Girls With Fun Haircuts offers is a lesson in economics rather than long division. Armed with a loop pedal and an endless palette of bizarre tones, guitarist Chris Scott builds to one impossibly dense crescendo of nervous, twitchy fretwork after another, while the frenetic pace-keeping of Mike Byrne, former stand-in drummer for the Smashing Pumpkins, follows the zigzagging structures like a Ritalin-deprived middle-schooler. PETE COTTELL.

Jackson Boone Starlit (Self-Released)

[COSMIC PSYCH] Jackson Boone’s Starlit detaches from Earth about 50 seconds into opener “The Moon in You,” when the celestial strings float in, and proceeds to spend the remaining runtime drifting somewhere around Jupiter like Matthew McConaughey in Interstellar. Produced by Riley Geare of Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Starlit has the feel of classic Syd Barrett (and the last UMO album, actually), with drifting pop hooks carried by languid breezy guitars. If it isn’t the best psychedelic album to come out of Portland this year (and it just might be), it is certainly the most gorgeous. MATTHEW SINGER.

Shitty Weekend Shit Week (Useless State)

[SNOT ROCK] Andrew Link is a busy guy, working in a handful of ensembles and helming the Useless State imprint, but he still found time this year to conjure up Shitty Weekend’s full-length debut, Shit Week, a descent into a realm of snotty rock that’s mined too infrequently. Link is adept at distilling any lyrical idea—like, say, smoking weed every day—into about two efficient minutes. What makes the album so unique, though, is its ability to combine punk’s background in pop with first-wave hardcore and a fixation with the best adolescent trappings of the genre. And it features some hot sax, too. DAVE CANTOR.

Thomas Mudrick Abiqua (Ten Dollar)

[WEIRDO POP] In a town that boasts a burgeoning psychedelic scene and an interest in keeping itself weird, the fact that Thomas Mudrick's Abiqua wasn't the most esteemed album of the year is kind of mind-boggling. From the experimental loopiness of "Earth Nipple Ripple" to the melodious, hippie-happy "Over the Hills," the album is not only one of the catchiest Portland records of 2014 but also the most sonically diverse. Blending country twang, funk and psyched-out garage pop, Abiqua is a bizarre, creative and spiritual journey. ASHLEY JOCZ.


Underlords Take Acid Underlords Take Acid (Rat Planet)

[SLEAZECORE] Edited down from 11 hours of improvisatory jams recorded live to tape, the seven tracks of Underlords Take Acid's self-titled spring debut sharpen a riff-scape of staggered menace with the serrated sleazecore majesty of a Martian grindhouse epic. The so-called "stupor group" of Jonnie Ray Monroe (Fist Fite), Josh Hughes (Rabbits) and Captain John Monsen-Keene (Diesto) planned only a minimal vinyl release through Eolian Empire sister label Rat Planet. But for the face-melting faithful, the local legends' metal-tipped psych maelstrom layers an enrapturing cinematic allure with ballsy abandon and moments of quiet grace. JAY HORTON.

WWeek 2015

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