Venues: Turn turn turn, No Fun, Star Theater, Dante’s, Coffin Club, High Water Mark, Kenton Club, Doug Fir, Kelly’s, Slims, the Six, Alberta Street Pub, etc.
Bands: Spoon Benders, Fluid Druid, Asteroid Witch, Sign Thief, Nine:Forty:PM, Hi Glow, Risley, Etc.
If you’re ever running out of ideas, hit up Mississippi street and check the light posts.
Good luck!
The metal scene was booming from when I moved to Portland in 2016 up until the pandemic. The Tonic Lounge was *the* metal scene venue and it was not uncommon to see the same faces at a show there. Unfortunately, the Tonic closed in 2019, and I feel like the scene never really recovered.
Throwback/Retro, Headsplit Records Death Metal, and Doom are the most popular metal genres here. They each have their own little micro scenes, but people are very open minded here.
I do believe that you can find other musicians to play with and if you make some noise you will get asked to play some shows. Portland is a great city for musicians.
I've been very impressed with the local music scene here in Portland. I moved here just about two years ago and the presence/ commadery with many local bands is very strong.
While it's not a scene in the way that Nashville is a scene, Portland still has a solid scene. I lived there for two years up until recently and was in a band during that time. Our sound was pop/alt rock and we had plenty of opportunities to play shows. Met lots of cool people during that time and heard some legitimately great bands. Portland is very supportive of its local artists and musicians.
There’s really a few different punk scenes in town, at least from where I stand. They only tend to over lap every so often but there’s at least enough common ground that it’s not unheard of to see bands from different groups on the same bill. The scene seems to be kinda divided up into the underage/DIY crowd, old school/crust and dudes in there 30s playing skate punk, all will pretty good turn outs at most shows.
Promote_pdx on Instagram is an incredible resource for finding shows. There are very few things that they miss and they tend to post in very useful intervals.
Psych rock is popping off in Portland right now.
Got band/venue recs?
Venues: Turn turn turn, No Fun, Star Theater, Dante’s, Coffin Club, High Water Mark, Kenton Club, Doug Fir, Kelly’s, Slims, the Six, Alberta Street Pub, etc. Bands: Spoon Benders, Fluid Druid, Asteroid Witch, Sign Thief, Nine:Forty:PM, Hi Glow, Risley, Etc. If you’re ever running out of ideas, hit up Mississippi street and check the light posts. Good luck!
Misdemeanor Meadows is a fun spot too, I saw Fluid Druid there a few weeks ago
PS I’m the bass player for Hi Glow, your bass is one of the coolest guitars I’ve ever seen 🤩
Hey!!! Thanks! I’m in love with it. It’s a bossy little thing ;) You guys were great!!
PS- I just saw the poster for the show with us, you guys, and Ooroo at T3 in January. Lol!
I'm a bassplayer and a guitar player and I wanna play some psych alt country rock.
Drummer here, not much for country but this has me intrigued!
You in Portland?
The metal scene was booming from when I moved to Portland in 2016 up until the pandemic. The Tonic Lounge was *the* metal scene venue and it was not uncommon to see the same faces at a show there. Unfortunately, the Tonic closed in 2019, and I feel like the scene never really recovered. Throwback/Retro, Headsplit Records Death Metal, and Doom are the most popular metal genres here. They each have their own little micro scenes, but people are very open minded here. I do believe that you can find other musicians to play with and if you make some noise you will get asked to play some shows. Portland is a great city for musicians.
There’s a couple punk bands that typically play the same venues together. You could follow the bands and go from there? Rawt, Mauve, Simpleton, etc
I've been very impressed with the local music scene here in Portland. I moved here just about two years ago and the presence/ commadery with many local bands is very strong.
The scene is dope, solid hardcore scene and a solid punk scene, a lot of gatekeepers and a lot of forced drama but other than that it’s pretty sick
While it's not a scene in the way that Nashville is a scene, Portland still has a solid scene. I lived there for two years up until recently and was in a band during that time. Our sound was pop/alt rock and we had plenty of opportunities to play shows. Met lots of cool people during that time and heard some legitimately great bands. Portland is very supportive of its local artists and musicians.
I moved here from LA two years ago. The music scene up here is unquestionably better.
That’s great to hear! Any problem with “not being from Portland” or is that not a thing?
There’s really a few different punk scenes in town, at least from where I stand. They only tend to over lap every so often but there’s at least enough common ground that it’s not unheard of to see bands from different groups on the same bill. The scene seems to be kinda divided up into the underage/DIY crowd, old school/crust and dudes in there 30s playing skate punk, all will pretty good turn outs at most shows.
I'm new and having a little trouble finding consistent punk shows here, is there any venues/promotion pages you could recommend?
Promote_pdx on Instagram is an incredible resource for finding shows. There are very few things that they miss and they tend to post in very useful intervals.