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CK Dolan
Formerly a senior editor and the music editor at the Mercury, CK Dolan writes about music, movies, TV, the death industry, and pickles.
Posted inMusic
Kissing Comes Up a Lot on Mitski’s New Album, Be the Cowboy
MITSKI Thurs 11/1 Crystal Ballroom Bao Ngo When Mitski Miyawaki’s new record Be the Cowboy came out in August, my friend wondered, “Is this a concept album about kissing?” Upon closer inspection, kissing does come up a lot: On “Nobody,” an electrifying ode to loneliness, Mitski pleads, “I know no one will save me/I’m just […]
Posted inFood and Drink
A Tour of Portland’s Pickle-Sphere
I love pickles for several reasons: Firstly, the way they taste, and the way acid hits your tongue with cold electricity and fires up your salivary glands. Some people dislike this sensation, but I think it rules. Secondly, the science behind the culinary art of pickling is wild. Cucumbers—which typically decay within a few days—are […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Bad Times at the El Royale Is an Okay Time
If a computer algorithm were to generate a movie about the late 1960s and early ’70s, using information solely gleaned from the films of Quentin Tarantino, the result might look something like Bad Times at the El Royale. A femme fatale with a dark secret? A scary-sexy cult leader? Muscle cars? Fringe jackets? Hot dog, […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Bad Times at the El Royale Review: Okay Times at the El Royale
If a computer algorithm were to generate a movie about the late 1960s and early ’70s, using information solely gleaned from the films of Quentin Tarantino, the result might look something like Bad Times at the El Royale. A femme fatale with a dark secret? A scary-sexy cult leader? Muscle cars? Fringe jackets? Hot dog, […]
Posted inBooks
Death-Positive Mortician Caitlin Doughty Wants You to Know the Grim Reaper’s Hand Is Up Your Butt
For the past several years, Caitlin Doughty’s delightful Ask a Mortician YouTube series has addressed everything from viking funerals to modern embalming practices to the corpse flower (AKA amorphophallus titanum, which is Latin for “giant, formless penis”). The self-described “funeral industry rabble-rouser” runs a nonprofit funeral home in Los Angeles and, in 2011, founded the […]
Posted inMovies & TV
A Star Is Born Review: Hahah, Nope!
I considered leaving A Star Is Born several times. For his directorial debut, Bradley Cooper remade the 1954 musical drama with himself playing the grizzled, alcoholic country rock star Jackson Maine and Lady Gaga as Ally, an unknown singer he discovers in a drag bar (her lack of a surname hints at just how much […]
Posted inMusic
Feast Your Ears on These 31 Songs for October
Feast your ears on the Mercury‘s October playlist, a selection of songs from bands playing in town this month, which I will hereafter refer to as “Rocktober” because, put simply, it will rock. The proof is in the pudding: Ty Segall—the mystical warlock of garage rock—comes to town twice this month, first with White Fence […]
Posted inMusic
Japanese Breakfast’s Michelle Zauner Talks Teen Dreams, Coping with Grief, and Her Oregon Roots
Ebru Yildiz At her last Portland show, Japanese Breakfast frontwoman Michelle Zauner actualized a teenage dream. From the stage of the Crystal Ballroom, Zauner—who was opening for Parquet Courts at Sabertooth Micro Fest—paused between songs to share memories of being 16 years old and traveling from her hometown of Eugene to attend concerts in Portland. […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Lizzie Review: Grisly Murder and Queer Romance, Together at Last
In a revealing interview with the Huffington Post, Chloë Sevigny said she’d hoped Lizzie—the new film in which she portrays Lizzie Borden, who was accused of murdering her father and stepmother with an ax in 1892 Massachusetts—would be a “rousing, smash-the-patriarchy piece,” and admitted that director Craig William Macneill’s final product isn’t what she’d imagined. […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Ethan Hawke Biopics Singer/Songwriter Blaze Foley with Blaze
Directed by Ethan Hawke, Blaze explores the legacy of country singer/songwriter Blaze Foley, who belonged to the same scene as Townes Van Zandt, but was murdered before many people got to know his name. There’s plenty of mythology surrounding Foley and his hillbilly charm—he was known for wearing duct tape on the tips of his […]
Posted inMusic
Remembering Super Groovy Cosmic Bus Photographer Heather Hanson
VIA THE SUPER GROOVY COSMIC BUS ENTERTAINMENT Portland concert photographer Heather Hanson—who was known for her Super Groovy Cosmic Bus project, which centered “around the travels of a toy VW bus, the places it goes, music it hears, art it experiences, and people it meets”—died last week. She religiously supported and documented the Portland music […]