The Blender

Every time I hear Fort Collins, Colorado-based bluegrass band Head for the Hills, who are playing tonight for free at McMenamin’s Old St. Francis School, is coming to town I kinda get creeped out.

I just got word that Poor Man’s Whiskey, the Bay Area band that’s secured Bend as its home away from home over the past three years, is coming back to the Domino Room on March 13.
The last time the PMW came through town was in October when the band played its “Dark Side of the Moonshine” – an Americana version of the Pink Floyd classic – and sold out the Domino Room, packing it full of lasers and stage lights, and of course a few hundred dancing Bendites.

John Cruz, the Grammy winning guitarist and songwriter from Honolulu, is making a stop in Bend this week, playing the Silver Moon Brewing Co. on Wednesday night.

Once again, the rural Indiana country blues rockers of Rev. Peyton’s Big Damn Band are stopping off at the Domino Room tonight (Monday), making that — by my count — the band’s third appearance in just over a year.

I’ve been working on a profile of local ska-punk-funk band Necktie Killer this week and in the process, I learned that the band is in the process of helping to build their very own ska scene here in Bend by bringing in some huge names from the genre to Mountain’s Edge Bar (formerly Timber’s South): The Toasters and The Slackers.
This is all in addition to next weekend’s show featuring Florida ska punks The Supervillains.

Tonight, Seattle’s deliciously danceable Redwood Plan plays at Players Bar and Grill and in doing so, introduces our town to a style that as far I as know, has never been heard here: Dance Punk.
Here’s my profile of the Redwood Plan from this week’s Source.

We’re all aware of punk rock and surf rock and indie rock and alternative rock, but there’s plenty of other rock genres out there, one of which has recently come to my attention: pirate rock. And yes, the music sounds exactly like the name suggests — lots of angry growls and talks of planks and such.

The kind and always hip folks at PoetHouse Art are hosting a screening of the acclaimed documentary Beautiful Losers, which tells the story of the evolution of street art in the US.
The film covers graffiti art and other mediums influenced by the punk, hip-hop and anti-establishment movements found in many American cities beginning in the 1980s and continuing today.

Boise’s Finn Riggins played McMenamins Old St. Francis School last night here in Bend to a mostly subdued and seated, yet still numerous and attentive crowd.

If there’s one band that I’ve been pleased to see make return appearances in Bend over the past year, it’s Finn Riggins (read our profile of the band from this summer), the sometimes goofy but always tight Boise indie rock trio.
The band is playing tonight at McMenamin’s Old St.