Well, folks, it’s the end of the west coast as we know it. Three earthquakes in Southern California, a big one up north, and today Mount Saint Helens sent out a plume visible from Portland, where the Hawks are comfortably ensconced (“ensconced” is not used without the accompanying “comfortably”) in their Red Roof Inn cubicles. Tomorrow we’re going to climb on the roof (it’s not really red) and look for the volcanic plume. We’ll report on its appearance and the likelihood of a major eruption.
Without going into a great deal of technical detail involving transverse fractures, reverse synclines, probability clusters, and subtectonic inferred temperature differentials: we believe a major west coast seismic event is imminent. If you are reading this: please, flee Southern California immediately. It’ll be safe to return in about 60 years.
Orange County is especially vulnerable to quake activity and should be completely abandoned. Please torch your gated community pastel home and that of your neighbor’s, break up all concrete surfaces with a sledgehammer, hop in the Expedition, and return to your parents in Phoenix to await the all clear (again, expected in about 60 years). Playa Vista is likewise in grave danger and should be leveled at once. We had a lightly attended but musically satisfying show at the intimate and tuned Mississippi Studios here in Portland, in the still gentrifying Mississippi district of Portland. Hipster begets hipster, and the new and hopeful Last Wave of American mercantilism has sprouted like mushrooms in a southward arc on this very groovy street, appealing shops that draw their mojo from the pioneering espresso purveyors east of the river.
An after gig powow in Rob and Paul L.’s Red Roof cubicle has made it official: Shawn Nourse and the Noursemen are going to make their musical debut soon, as an encore at a Hawks show. Our dynamic and charismatic drummer will take front and center stage, singing and drumming, as the front line Hawks retreat behind the drum kit, in braided blonde wigs and horned helmets, creating a lush soundscape behind Shawn’s percussion/vocal Nordic explosion, and we’ll even do some choreography.This first composition will be epic in scope and ambition, and we’ve already got an opening lyric:
“We come from the land of the ice and snow.”Stay tuned.