Support Smart, Local Journalism
Make a Small Monthly Donation
Ned Lannamann is a writer and editor in Portland, Oregon. He writes about film, music, TV, books, travel, tech, food, drink, outdoors, and other things.
A Rolls-Royce symbolizes capitalism! (And other self-evident truths.)
The lifespan of Buffalo Springfield barely lasted two years, but that short amount of time laid the groundwork for the careers of Neil Young, Stephen Stills, and Poco’s Richie Furay. And now, the three very good albums they made during their time together have been whipped up by Rhino Records into a five-disc box set. […]
If Three Identical Strangers were a book, it would be the kind of page-turner that you devour in a single weekend. Unlike most paperback potboilers, though, Three Identical Strangers’ bizarre, emotional rollercoaster lingers with you—and not merely because it all actually happened. Tim Wardle’s documentary ends up taking viewers to a very dark place, and, […]
It says a lot about the regressive state of America in 2018 that perhaps the only effective way to inject a pro-union theme into a movie is to cloak it in an outrageous, surrealist, science-fiction-tinged dark comedy. Not that Sorry to Bother You restricts itself to a single “message”—writer/director Boots Riley, of hip-hop group the […]
Neil Young and Stephen Stills’ first band has been reissued in mono and stereo.
Tim Wardle’s compulsively watchable documentary goes to some dark places.
Richard Swift at Pickathon in 2011. Portland Mercury A very sad post appeared on Facebook this morning, stating that singer, songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Richard Swift passed away today at the age of 41. Last month a GoFundMe was launched to aid Swift in his bills to combat a “serious medical condition.” Pitchfork reports that […]
Vikesh Kapoor Although Thirsty Monk opened its first pub in Asheville, North Carolina, its Northwest roots are strong. CEO Barry Bialik spent several years living in Seattle and Alaska, and some of his formative beer experiences came from writing about beer for the Anchorage Press, which he cofounded. Barry’s wife lived in Portland for 17 […]
Nick Greiner and Tobias Hahn of Rosenstadt Brewery. Rosenstadt Conventional wisdom might suggest that Tobias Hahn and Nick Greiner have gone about this whole brewing business backward. But in just a few short years, their German-inspired brewery, Rosenstadt (it’s German for “Rose City”), has grown from a fantasy held by two homebrewing friends into a […]
On March 6, 1963, the John Coltrane Quartet played a session at the famed Van Gelder Studios in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. They recorded for approximately five hours—they had a show at Birdland in midtown Manhattan to get to later that evening. The tape was never released and was thought to be lost after Coltrane’s […]
Vikesh Kapoor Things move fast for Little Beast. Not much more than a year after Charles Porter opened the brewery in February 2017, his envelope-pushing, mixed-culture beers have won fast acclaim from all corners of the beer world. It didn’t take long for Little Beast to outgrow its original production brewery behind the Westgate Bourbon […]
If you lived in Portland in 2004, you remember it: The discovery that, for years, a father and daughter had been living in Forest Park in an undetected campsite. They were eventually found and housed by the authorities, but soon disappeared again. The story inspired a novel, My Abandonment, written by Reed College creative writing […]
Sign up for our newsletter for news recaps, updates, and more!
