Chain(saw)s and Synths Excite Me: My Introduction to the Portland Concert Scene
While I careen disturbingly farther past the halfway mark of my time at Reed (optimistically assuming I’ll graduate on time), I’ve decided it’s high time I get outside of the all-powerful Reed bubble. In my blissful and innocent pre-Reed life, I was a semi-regular concertgoer.I’ve tried to fit in a couple of shows here and there in my visits to home sweet Bay Area. However, I hadn’t been to a proper concert in Portland—not counting the odd house show for some of the very talented Reed student bands—until this past weekend.
After two years of letting “academic responsibilities” and “age restrictions” dissuade me from catching every band I like on their Portland tour stops, I finally capitalized on the opportunity to see Youth Code and Street Sects, among others, last Friday, as well as Sextile and Nuovo Testamento on Saturday. As bold as it may sound, the experience I had in those 48 earsplitting hours made the previous two years of comparative silence both worthwhile and retrospectively regretful.
Seeing Youth Code and Street Sects, in particular, was completely unexpected for me. It flew completely under my radar until I heard about it from my dad, who highly recommended the show from what he had seen on the Oakland leg of the same Industrial Worship tour a few days earlier. Out of respect for my dad’s superior and more left-of-the-dial music taste, combined with my gratitude for his continued readership of even my fluffiest Quest articles, I decided to go—a decision I wouldn’t regret.
The Friday night show, part of the Bleakfest program, was held at the High Limit Room in Central East Portland, a nondescript venue fittingly located in the industrial district. While the place itself was nothing to write home about and had a no-alcohol policy that left the usual grooveless squares gripping Liquid Death cans instead of their usual PBRs as they stood in the middle of the floor, it was conveniently located and completely functional.
The first act, Possible Jumper, was also nothing to write home about, in my inexperienced opinion. I can never really jive with people exuding negative levels of charisma, standing behind keyboards and playing generic samples. On the bright side, they were the opener, providing a suitable backing track for every goth girl’s basic boyfriend to perfect his motionless stance and stoic expression before the headliner.
The night improved with the next act: Insula Iscariot, a truly unique industrial artist from far-off Wisconsin. Insula had a powerful stage presence, skulking around as she uttered guttural tones over heavy noise. At one point, she descended into the audience to writhe on the floor in a bizarre but captivating moment. Everyone stood back with a sort of reverence, barring one individual who seemed to be trying to instigate a one-man mosh around her performance, but was held back from the planned spectacle.
The Texas-based industrial duo Street Sects was the only band I’d actually heard of, to be completely honest, and they held true to their reputation of delivering a killer live performance. Their intense rhythms were combined with a fog machine working overtime to create an exhilaratingly claustrophobic atmosphere on the floor, with a pretty robust mosh pit formed by the end of the set. This became all the more harrowing when frontman Leo Ashline pushed his way into the crowd wielding a very functional chainsaw, making for one of the more memorable concertgoing experiences I’ve had the pleasure of seeing.
Finally, the show ended on a high note with the performance of LA’s Youth Code, a highly iconic and influential modern industrial/EBM duo that I have the misfortune of not properly listening to until now. They delivered an amped-up show, which was mirrored by the energy of the crowd for an invigorating experience all around. I have to confess I was still a little in awe of the chainsaw, but Youth Code managed to follow that up with an exciting performance, leaving me pleasantly surprised and inspired to dig into their discography.
Still reeling and ready for more, I went out again the following night to see Nuovo Testamento and Sextile at Revolution Hall. I had planned this excursion in advance and was familiar with both artists beforehand, so I was highly anticipating this show. The venue was decent and filled up without being overly crowded. Nuovo Testamento, a synthpop/darkwave band from LA, began promptly on schedule and opened the night on a fun and energetic note. They were promoting their new EP, Trouble, which had been perfectly palatable if not groundbreaking in my previous listening experience, but the songs took on a new dimension live where their upbeat, danceable qualities could be expressed to the fullest. What stole the show for me, though, was hearing the bigger hits like “Heartbeat” and “Heaven” from Nuovo Testamento’s 2023 album Love Lines, which truly felt timeless.
The star attraction, electronic body music duo Sextile, also hailing from LA, delivered on all my expectations for a truly fire show. I had been playing their album yes, please on repeat since its release earlier this year and was almost at the point of being sick of it, but those months of dutiful listening paid off when I could instantly identify modern classics like “Kiss.” It was even nostalgic to hear the first of their songs I’d ever heard—”Contortion”—at max volume in an absolutely bumping crowd. I was even happy to hear “Women Respond to Bass,” one of the new album’s lesser hits for me, and only partly from obedience to sometime-vocalist Melissa Scaduto’s instruction that it was a song “for the girls, the gays, and the theys.” Scaduto and frontman Brady Keehn ate the scenery mercilessly, radiating an impressive aura that was both intimidatingly cool and infectiously energetic—at one point, Keehn even joined the mosh pit. I tend to be cynical and used to some pretty dead crowds, so it was a real treat to be able to participate in an audience that matched the energy of the music and performers so well.
Newly revived with audiophile verve, I have big plans to go to at least four more local shows in the next month; you might just see me out in the wild! If this kind of thing is up your alley, I’m always on the lookout for new music (potentially to review here!) so I’m open to recommendations, and I’ll also make a recommendation of my own to check out my KRRC show “songs from under the floorboards,” time TBD but coming soon.
The immensely talented artists who choose to grace our awkwardly-located metropole with their presence and tunes help to remind me that there is more creativity and potential in this world than can be dreamt of within the confines of Reed College, although these can also produce many worthwhile endeavors of their own. Music is so beautiful. Life is so beautiful.
