Ben Salmon

VIC MENSA Thurs 12/14 Moda Center Roc Nation There’s a very famous rapper, businessman, and husband performing at the Moda Center Thursday night, and considering the number of mega-popstars who pass through our fair burg, that’s something to be excited about. Jay-Z is a legend, plain and simple, and if you’d like to know more […]

JAMILA WOODS Mon 12/4 Holocene Courtesy of the artist Over the past few years, the great American city of Chicago has churned out a whole bunch of visionary artists working, generally, within the hip-hop/soul/R&B side of music. Most visible (by far) is Chance the Rapper, but there’s also Vic Mensa, Noname, Saba, Mick Jenkins, Smino, […]

Full disclosure right from the jump: Mo Troper frequently contributes to the Mercury. But I don’t know the guy—we’ve never communicated. So with a clear conscience and no conflict of interest, I can tell you that his new album, Exposure and Response, is an exquisite example of classic, well-crafted power pop. It’s the best work […]

JULIA JACKLIN President and founder of the “Quarter-Life Crisis Club.” Nick Mckinlay Julia Jacklin’s 2016 debut, Don’t Let the Kids Win, is a remarkably clear-eyed chronicle of the unease and uncertainty of being in your 20s. “I had a life in my head/I’d be pushing up that hill until those toes bled,” the Australian singer/songwriter […]

Julia Jacklin’s 2016 debut, Don’t Let the Kids Win, chronicles a quarter-life crisis.

Veronica Rose Veronica Rose There’s a fine line between being a no-nonsense live band and seeming disinterested in performing and disconnected from your audience. Alvvays walks that line expertly. The Canadian indie-pop band isn’t stone-faced onstage, but they’re not exactly effusive, either. They go about their business: playing songs, cracking a couple of jokes, thanking […]

NURSES “You know what? I don’t think this Godot fellow is going to show up.” CHANTAL ANDERSON After years of intense dedication to making music in every crappy van, cramped attic, and waking moment that presented itself, John Bowers and Aaron Chapman—core duo of the Portland-based avant-pop band Nurses—decided to get busy living life for […]

Nurses’ new album confronts the beauty and terror of life.

STRANGE RANGER Cuddle puddle! Mike Hoderman Strange Ranger’s lovely new album Daymoon begins with a low, fuzzy, electrified hum, streaked with one skinny ribbon of guitar feedback. Then a pump organ fades in, wheezing back and forth between a couple of chords like a sleepy driver trying to stay awake on the road. When the […]

Strange Ranger’s sophomore record features less screaming and more fuzz.

There’s a moment on Months’ new album Black Hats for War that epitomizes the Portland post-punk quartet. That moment is a split second between songs. The album’s seventh track, “Golden,” spends 199 seconds building and building, from gently strummed guitar and whispered voice to a roar of thick, distorted riffs. Then, with almost no break […]