THURSDAY 2/4

PUBLIC INTEREST LAW PROJECT BENEFIT: EVAN CHURCHILL, IOA, AAN , BAZILLIONAIRE

(Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison) See My, What a Busy Week!

LOCH LOMOND, SHELLEY SHORT, BILLYGOAT

(Doug Fir, 830 E Burnside) Loch Lomond are in a bit of a holding pattern right now. Before the chamber popsters tighten up their scarves, batten down the hatches, and blow away your tender little world with a new recording, they need to tie up a few loose ends. To start, they need to actually finish polishing the finer details of the record. With final mixing slated to be finished this month, the long-awaited 10-song follow-up to their splendid Night Bats EP has a nifty title (Little Me Will Start a Storm), and will grace record store shelves in a few months. While rumor has it that there are more than a few potential record label suitors vying for space on the band's dance card, no word yet on which label will have the honor. Until then, enjoy this early glimpse of a recording that is sure to become your late-summer obsession. EZRA ACE CARAEFF

DO MAKE SAY THINK, THE HAPPINESS PROJECT, YEARS

(Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi) Here's the year's first contender for most incestuous indie-rock bill. The headliners are Do Make Say Think, which features card-carrying Broken Social Scenesters Charles Spearin and Ohad Benchetrit. Opening the show are Years (Benchetrit's solo project) and the Happiness Project (Spearin's). Good thing those dudes have enough talent that they can afford to divvy it up among these different avenues, all of which vary beautifully while never hewing too far from a common appreciation of instrumental majesty. DMST have been cranking out some sweeping post-rock jams lately, and Years' stuff has the range and emotional persuasiveness of a great film score. The Happiness Project, however, are not to be overlooked. Their self-titled 2009 album, an admirably experimental venture, featured conversations synced to accompanying jazz instrumentals. Don't be late. This show may be 100 percent interrelated Canadian indie musicians, but it's also going to be 100 percent awesome. JASON BAXTER

CULL, MEGATON LEVIATHAN, THE ELECTRIC

(Branx, 320 SE 2nd) Sometimes the sonic pissing contest that is doom metal can be a bit much. It seems that most everyone wants to perform the slowest, be the loudest, play three chords the longest, or just bore their live audience the fastest. For those of us looking for doom that is multifaceted and (according to the band) "un-machoing," look no further than Portland's Cull. With a sense of slight rhythm changes and harmony, Cull delivers vast landscapes of sound that are atypical to the doom genre. As each instrument builds upon the other, their layered riffs could be played forever without turning your mind into mush, and they never become one big indistinguishable blob of sound. Cull's music evokes feelings of solitude and desolation, but their onstage smiles are warming. Seeing them live is an emotional experience, and I bet if you ask nicely they'll even hug you afterward. ARIS WALES

PAINT AND COPTER , SUSTENTACULA

(The Knife Shop at Kelly's Olympian, 426 SW Washington) If you can look past the odd space-Jesus artwork and use of the dreaded font Papyrus (just like the Na'vi!), the latest from Paint and Copter is a welcome escape. Lunar Galleon is pieced together via a "process of continued improvisations," which allows the hazy sound of the local trio to switch directions with casual ease (going from swirling shoegaze to introspective rock, and finally into ambient noise—all within the framework of a single song). Delayed for close to two years, Galleon is the aural equivalent of an astronaut breaking tether with a ship in orbit. If you can get past the initial panic, you'll take comfort in the calm sensation of softly floating into the darkening abyss. EAC

LES ÉTRANGERS, SOFT PAWS, AMOREE LOVELL

(Ash Street Saloon, 225 SW Ash) For some, living in the present world is torture, knowing that 1960s France was the time for them. Berets. Cigarettes. Striped shirts, disregard of bras, and that swinging, sophisticated aesthetic of film and music. To these Francophiles, Serge Gainsbourg and Françoise Hardy are the ultimate performers, and to make music that resembles this style is to unearth the Holy Grail of sound. Portland group Les Étrangers strike me as such, with five members mixing French and English ditties and male/female vocals to create a perfect throwback sound. Their music fits in nicely with the modern-retro trend, and with their niche, Pink Martini-esque appeal, I can see them reaching a larger audience. For now, these musicians seem content to party like it's Paris, 1969. MARANDA BISH

FRIDAY 2/5

ART PARTY: PERMANENT WAVE, GOTTESFINGER, DJ MIKE MCGONIGAL, TARA JANE O'NEIL, MARISA ANDERSON, TENDER FOREVER

(Branx, 320 SE 2nd) See My, What a Busy Week!, and Arts.

SLABTOWN BENDER: HEAD, BARE WIRES, THE COCONUT COOLOUTS, TY SEGALL, THE GIRLS, & MORE

(Slabtown, 1033 NW 16th) See My, What a Busy Week!

PORTLAND FOLK FEST BENEFIT: DAN BERN, THE ROBINSONS

(The Woods, 6637 SE Milwaukie) There's no shortage of songwriters in this world, but one like Dan Bern is a rare thing indeed. It's tempting to use words like "Woody" and "Dylan" when describing him, although his songs are more personable than either. Bern has accumulated a vast discography in the past decade and a half, with more albums and EPs and downloads than you can keep track of, but you get the feeling that even if he didn't record or tour, he'd still be cranking out songs at a steady clip, like a tree compulsively bearing fruit. Bern's newest album is a collection of 38 short songs for kids, but his songs for grownups run the gamut from emotional to whimsically dirty minded; this is the man who, in the splendidly powerful "Black Tornado" from 2001's overlooked New American Language, sings about both visiting his father's grave and jerking off in the same song. With Bern's natural, fluid humor, putting these two things together isn't a stretch—it's warmly and honestly human. NED LANNAMANN

DWARVES, ZEKE, PROBLEMS, SPITTIN' COBRAS

(Dante's, 1 SW 3rd) To think that Northwest label Sub Pop, present-day purveyor of clean-cut indie rock, put out an album by the Dwarves in 1990 called Blood, Guts and Pussy tells you how much the label has changed since its inception. Dwarves, however, have not given up their antics one bit, carrying on their pioneering spirit of obscenity and chaos with music that revels in the most primal, guttural, and sometimes disturbing human impulses. Continuing to churn out albums on a messianic arc with 2004's The Dwarves Must Die and this year's The Dwarves Are Born Again, their music will never be as exciting and shocking as it once was, though their legacy keeps them popular: Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling must have been a fan to give one of her characters the same nickname as the Dwarves' guitarist, HeWhoCannotBeNamed (whose death the band once staged). MB

THE ALBUM LEAF, ANOMIE BELLE STRING QUARTET, SEA WOLF

(Doug Fir, 830 E Burnside) The Album Leaf's In a Safe Place is one of the only reasons why I ever got any work done in college; there's just something about the music of Jimmy LaValle that completely relaxes and focuses the mind. With that said, this isn't necessarily a sleeper of a show. It's more likely to coax you into a meditative trance, while sonically interesting and damned melodic ambient noise takes place around you. You might also spend a moment or two whimsically imagining that the Album Leaf has written the score to your life, and you'll think about all of the pensive frames that could be captured with their music playing in the background. And, in addition to the core group, the Anomie Belle String Quartet will make the trek down from Seattle and contribute to the beauty and epic potentiality of this set. RAQUEL NASSER

A WEATHER, TEAM EVIL, THE PIGEONS

(The Artistery, 4315 SE Division) They have a word for shows like this: tease. A Weather is sitting on the finest local album I've heard in quite some time (Everyday Balloons), but that recording won't see the light of day until the first week of March. We have little doubt that the hushed vulnerability of Everyday Balloons will absolutely consume your very existence—as it has ours—but it's a bit too early to sing its countless praises. So, for now, enjoy A Weather in the most intimate of settings and use every fiber of restraint to avoid running up onstage on hugging the band like they are four little Morrisseys. EAC

CHRIS ROBLEY AND THE FEAR OF HEIGHTS, HELLO MORNING, LITTLE BEIRUT

(Someday Lounge, 125 NW 5th) Lucky attendees of tonight's CD release show get to take home a free copy of Hello Morning's self-titled debut EP. It's a collection of brawny, accessible rock with epic flourishes, like a pre-ironic U2 or a more down-to-earth the Secret Machines. Each member of the band has done plenty of time in other outfits, including local bands like Jonas and Boy Eats Drum Machine, and this collective experience gives each song a sure-footed confidence that allows every song to be approached and appreciated at face value. Songs like "Come Home" or "Mercury (Once Again)" sit in that ear-pleasing valley between catchy and yearning, sounding familiar and new at the same time. NL

BASSNECTAR, ELIOT LIPP, EMANCIPATOR

(Roseland, 8 NW 6th) Bassnectar (AKA Lorin Ashton) started making beats in the mid-'90s with a goal of connecting youth culture and activism through bass music. Fifteen years on, his very accessible combination of glitch, hiphop, and increasingly aggressive wobble bass has attracted a massive following. His latest album, Cozza Frenzy, hit just about every top 10 list in 2009, no doubt with the help of a great remix of Fever Ray's "When I Grow Up." While Ashton is more likely in interviews to talk about corporate greed than the hottest new dubstep track, there's no overt political agenda in his music. Rather than hitting people over the head with his message of empathy and equality, he's created a party environment that encourages fans to visit nonprofit info tables at his concerts and stay informed through his online network. AVA HEGEDUS

SATURDAY 2/6

CARS & TRAINS, BENOIT PIOULARD, HELIOS, THE HARVEY GIRLS

(Backspace, 115 NW 5th) See Music.

ST. VINCENT, WILDBIRDS AND PEACEDRUMS

(Doug Fir, 830 E Burnside) Musically, St. Vincent's Annie Clark is a mad scientist. Her songs are concoctions made from the potions of all sorts of musical influences, her wry smile hanging just above the bubbling beakers of potential symphonies. Her Williamsburg apartment/laboratory certainly has fire codes, though, so vintage amps replace Bunsen burners, and every so often Igor limps in and hands her a guitar from her massive collection, per her request. Her virtuosic breed of experimental indie rock arrangements tend to pulsate from coy and girlish melodies to big, skulking monsters of noise in no time flat. If nothing more, St. Vincent is guaranteed to keep you on your toes, but when you're not looking, she'll pull her goggles down and continue on with her plot to take over the world. RN Also see My, What a Busy Week!

SLABTOWN BENDER: THE TEUTONICS, CHEAP FLIGHT, KING LOUIE'S MISSING MONUMENTS, GREG ASHLEY, & MORE

(Slabtown, 1033 NW 16th) Day two of the Slabtown Bender is probably going to be a lost memory, especially if you did day one correctly. Some of the things that might not have a chance to get permanently etched in your booze-sopped brain today: The spiderweb acoustic psych-folk of Gris Gris' Greg Ashley. The spastic thrash-pop of the Teutonics, who claim to be a "Deutscherbeatgruppe" stranded in San Francisco, living hungrily in a cramped attic and desperate for money to get back home to their native Germany. The magnolia-scented garage-soul of New Orleans legend King Louie, and his current outfit the Missing Monuments. And—you might want to preserve some brain cells for this—the debut performance of Cheap Flight, a new band from Mudhoney's Steve Turner, whose sound is described as a cross between Swell Maps and Buck Owens. Both Saturday and Sunday feature a free matinee show at 1 pm—just late enough for you to gobble some eggs and coffee before getting back into the drunken swing of things. NL

CHRIS SHIFLETT, TONY SLY, LEONARD MYNX

(Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi) Tony Sly, the singer of the pop-punk band No Use for a Name (which I loved in 1997), has joined the ranks of the many former punk-rock frontmen who've grown up and moved on to play introspective acoustic tunes about growing up and moving on and other mature stuff like that. Sly's debut record, 12 Song Program (out on No Use's label, Fat Wreck Chords), isn't especially memorable, but it isn't bad, either. It's a modest collection of quiet, thoughtful songs about which you probably won't give a shit unless you're an old fan. Joining him tonight for this show is former No Use for a Name bandmate and current Foo Fighters guitarist Chris Shiflett, who also recently released his first solo record of, you guessed it, introspective (albeit country-tinged) acoustic songs. MEGAN SELING

ASTRONAUTALIS, SLEEP, RAFAEL VIGILANTICS, SHE'S ON DRUGS

(Rotture, 315 SE 3rd) The choir has been long preached to about the genre-blurring ways of Astronautalis—he of Scribble Jam fame, a snarling wolf amid the flock of hiphop sheep. But it's not too late to hitch a ride on the Seattle rhymer's bandwagon—space is plentiful, actually—and as any recent or longtime convert can attest, Astronautalis' live shows range from gushing sessions of jittery livewire flow to loose freestyles, where the sandpaper-throated emcee pieces together songs from random topics offered by the crowd. If you tire of the predictable hiphop genre exercises—and your arms are exhausted from waving them in the air without particular care—you will find salvation here, tonight. EAC

THE BEE EATERS, SCOTT LAW

(The Woods, 6637 SE Milwaukie) Since beginning their latest tour across the States and Canada, the Bee Eaters have generated a far-reaching buzz (GET IT?) for folkies looking for a quiet night out. A string band of four baby-faced virtuosos, the Bee Eaters not only feature a banjo and hammer dulcimer (!), but a twin fiddle assault by brother-sister duo Tristan and Tashina Clarridge, Grand National Fiddle Champions both. These kids take the repetitions and themes of Appalachian and Celtic music and infuse them with an orchestral pop sensibility fit for a rainy-day mixtape. DAVID BOW

SUNDAY 2/7

SLEEPY SUN, PETE INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

(East End, 203 SE Grand) See Music.

SLABTOWN BENDER: PIERCED ARROWS, THE SPIDER BABIES, THE MEAN JEANS, PURE COUNTRY GOLD , & MORE

(Slabtown, 1033 NW 16th) Almost two weeks ago the Mean Jeans played a mostly unannounced show at Angelo's, a little watering hole on SE Hawthorne that doesn't often host bands. It was late on a rainy Tuesday and the Jeans' bass player, Howie Doodat, was too sick to play. Undeterred, the Jeans brought the motherfucking party. A pit formed, full of flailing limbs and pumping fists. Beer cans were slung across the room as dancers crashed into the video poker machines. The crowd joined in, singing along with all the "whoas," "oh-ohs," and ridiculously catchy choruses the Jeans so effortlessly command. Angelo's wasn't ready for things to get so rad, and shut the show down early, proof the Jeans are quickly becoming the most fun band in Portland, if they aren't already there. And if they can do it at a dive on a Tuesday without their bass player, the Mean Jeans should be able turn the final day of the Slabtown Bender from a blaring hangover into something sweet. ANDREW R TONRY

EYEDEA & ABILITIES, DOSH, ANIMAL FARM

(Hawthorne Theatre, 1507 SE 39th) Stop me if you've heard this one before: Multi-instrumentalist goes from driving school buses to re-releasing his home recordings on Bay Area label specializing in hop-suffixed jams, and then becomes esteemed by some of the indie-rock fraternity's most salient artists. End of story? Not quite—Dosh (AKA Martin Luther King Chavez Dosh—really) has wisely stayed productive since his career took off at the start of the last decade. He's got a new album due out this spring and continues to make interesting career choices, like touring with Rhymesayers' heavy hitters Eyedea & Abilities (the former is an emcee, the latter is a DJ). Dosh has teased the possibility of some crossover between the acts, which means the crowd could be in for some radical freestyles courtesy Eyedea, atop some radical drumming courtesy of Dosh. JB

MONDAY 2/8

THE PARSON RED HEADS, SCOTT McCAUGHEY, PETER BUCK, MARTY MARQUIS

(White Eagle, 836 N Russell) See Music.

DAWES, CORY CHISEL AND THE WANDERING SONS, JASON BOESEL

(Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi) There is not a single unpleasant thing about the music of Dawes, but their gently ambling folk-rock doesn't contain any surprises either. The melodies wind up exactly where you'd expect them to, and each hook is repeated again and again just to make sure you got it. When a band's sound contains echoes of the Band, that's a very good thing indeed, and Dawes dwell in those storied shadows at times, but more frequently the band evokes memories of the Eagles, with their crystal-smooth harmonies, plodding country-road beats, and sterile sentiments. The band is suitably matched by opener and fellow Californian Jason Boesel, the drummer for Rilo Kiley, whose new solo record Hustler's Son lives comfortably in the sleek folk-pop realm of Rumours-era Fleetwood Mac. NL

NOSAJ THING, DAEDELUS, JOGGER, BOY MEETS CLUB

(Rotture, 315 SE 3rd) Los Angeles is teeming with innovative electronic musicians. Akin to the city's hardcore/punk scene in the 1980s, the current dance music community is turning out countless unique approaches, yet maintaining a distinct and unified underground SoCal sound. A remarkable enthusiasm for working together among the heavy hitters has produced impressive live lineups, interesting side projects, countless remixes, and a significant boost to the entire crop of performers. Repping Los Angeles tonight are four of said heavy hitters—Daedelus, Nosaj Thing, and the duo Jogger. This tour highlights the launch of Daedelus' new record label, Magical Properties, and the recent release of Jogger's spectacular debut full-length album This Great Pressure. Just because it's Monday doesn't mean you get to sit quietly and watch. Each one of these guys is notorious for putting on a raucous live performance, so expect to stand up and do some dancing. AVA

TUESDAY 2/9

WILCO, CALIFONE

(Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway) See My, What a Busy Week!

LESLIE AND THE BADGERS , QUIET LIFE

(Doug Fir, 830 E Burnside) The Badgers didn't really do themselves justice by taking the name of a stocky subterranean animal. Leslie Stevens and her backing group make sweet, jangly country with deep roots in the grounds tilled by Linda Ronstadt and Dolly Parton, calling to mind a sleeker, smarter creature. Stevens' voice is as strong and confident as her influences, and her Badgers ape mid-'70s Nashville pop to a T, providing a warm backdrop of slide guitars and fiddles for their singer's whiskey-soaked ballads. Obsessive nostalgia may be the death of country yet, but the Badgers make a good counterargument. DB

WEDNESDAY 2/10

TYPHOON, BREAKFAST MOUNTAIN, GUANTANAMO BAYWATCH, NOLAN FOSTER, DJ SEXY COUSIN, MAGIC IMPACT

(Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison) See My, What a Busy Week!.

VAN DYKE PARKS, CLARE AND THE REASONS, JOSH MEASE

(Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi) See Music.