Want an autographed Of Montreal album? Here’s how to get one.
Ethan Maffey
Both a writer and a fan of vinyl records since age 5, it wasn't until nearly three decades later that Oregon Native Ethan Maffey derived a plan to marry the two passions by writing about music. From blogging on MySpace in 2007 and then Blogspot, to launching his own website, 83Music, and eventually freelancing for publications in the Pacific Northwest, like Spokane’s alt-weekly Inlander, Ethan’s aim has been to provide fans of music alternatives to the mundane and overplayed. This included a nearly two year stint as the music editor for the Source, where he scoured the Bend music scene drawing attention to local talent and notable touring acts as they passed through town. In addition to deep knowledge of the local music scene, Ethan has an uncanny ability to quote lines from the television show “Friends.” He also has an eye for women’s fashion and feels a kinship with Lucky Day, Steve Martin’s character in ¡Three Amigos!
Lousy with Sylvianbriar
Lousy with Sylvianbriar Of Montreal Polyvinyl If anyone can blend honky tonk and '70s acid rock, it is Of Montreal front man Kevin Barnes. Listen to “Hegira Émigré” from the band's latest album for proof. The Athens, Ga. band is known for evolving its sound faster than hyenas devouring a wildebeest, and with the same […]
Spreading Wings
All singer-songwriter JT Nero ever saw of America growing up was the 540-mile stretch of highway between where he lived in Toledo, Ohio and Washington Island, Wis., where his family has a cabin. A far cry from the tens of thousands of miles he’s traveled touring solo or in the band Birds of Chicago with […]
Worth Living
Stephen Sondheim’s musical Company—about a man’s pre-emptive midlife crisis—landed Christopher Worth right in the middle of where he never thought he’d be: a career as a singer/songwriter rather than an actor. But in this case life did not imitate art: Unlike the production’s central character Bobby, who questions some decisions he’s made, Worth—who was cast […]
Music Makes the Movie
It takes the right music accompanying a scene to transform a movie from stirring to absolutely riveting, or to deepen the sentimentality or humor or serenity. Imagine the difference between Iron Man swooping into the scene with a full-stringed orchestra or a thumping heavy metal anthem. Different, right? Here are three examples from this year’s […]
Two Centimeters
The width of an index finger: that’s all the distance that remained between the bullet planted in contemporary singer Marc Cohn’s temple and his brain. Two more centimeters, and he wouldn’t have had his fourth son Samuel; his other three children would have been fatherless and his music legacy would have rested solely on his […]
Water Pop
Super Water Sympathy calls their music “water pop.” The self-invented genre invites at least as many—if not more—questions about the band’s sound as it was meant to answer. A quick definition: The Louisiana five-piece sounds like Regina Spektor mixed in the wash with Florence and the Machine. After several previous attempts in college, brother duo […]
An Unlikely Pair
One has been a king among comedians since first hosting Saturday Night Live in 1976. The other was queen of alternative pop on VH1 when the music video for her song “What I Am” dominated the station for much of 1988, and ruled college airwaves from coast to coast. Somehow, in 2013, Steve Martin and […]
Come to Roots, Score Some Music
The Source Weekly SOUND editor will be roaming Bend Roots with some free CDs.

