Teton - Holocene, Portland, OR - March 14, 2019

[from Portland OR] I’d bene trying to accomplish my H venues Forever. That’s the only reason I was at this show and the only reason I stayed longer than 20 minutes at this show. They have a lot of DJ shows or super young pop shows and I’d narrowed in on one where I wouldn’t stick out to much. I still did. It was a bizarre crowd of fringe nerds, the kind you’d also see at a prog metal show: mostly men, long curly hair, dressed in to be prepared for a sword fight just in case. Old people too – university music department types. It smelled like black licorice and alcohol. The music was horrifying. Atonal no-wave jazz. There were four electric guitar, a drumset – lots of bass. And a woman who sang tenor while playing keyboard. She set up a microphone that distorted her voice into a deep growl, laughing gleefully, knowing it was the cherry on top of their crowd-torture. More annoying were the band members and crowd members nodding their heads to the beatless music, counting off to start a song with no clear beginning or end. They brought one of the head bobbers from the crowd onstage for their last song (of course he’s in the band) as well as a flautist who was placed center stage and I found myself starting to like them. I left promptly. They’re new age crossed with goth, the film score for a fantasy 80s movie.