ramblings

portland music awards

Completely out of the blue. What a surprise.

My blues band won the “Outstanding Achievement in Blues” category at the Portland Music Awards. I got a call from the the people at Music Spectator Magazine telling me we’d been nominated for the category and asking if we would perform a month before the event. Knowing some of the nominated artists in our category, I didn’t think we had a chance, but playing the event sounded fun. Here’s a pic from the night:

Art Alexakis from Everclear played an acoustic version of I will buy you a new life, my buddy Pierre and his band The Dimes played a tune. The Decemberists and The Kingsmen (Louie Louie) were also nominated for categories. There were a few Spinal Tap moments as the stage hands were using long poles to pull the stage curtains open for bands (a pole was dropped twice almost hitting performers). All in all, about 15 performances and I have to say it went surprisingly smooth.

Dan, who plays upright bass in the band, was bemused as usual by “music competitions”. He rolled his eyes and cried “this isn’t a football game, there aren’t winners and losers in music!” Anyway, we won the category and took home some nice crystal.