» portugal

Jan
23rdPortugal. The Man & This Is The Now

We travel from Alaska to Brooklyn for this edition of A-Sides, but not literally. That said, it’d be cool if I could somehow transport people via a blog post. Get on that, Google. All John Baldwin Gourley wants is to work hard on his craft and make music on his terms. Fame is so secondary for him and his band Portugal. The Man. That said, the frontman realized that by signing with Atlantic Records, the fame monster may rear its head now and again. While he understands it, it doesn’t mean he’s necessarily cool with it. “I never had any aspiration or goal to be a singer in a band. I never liked going up to people — I have social anxiety. I couldn’t even order food four or five years ago. When we did the Conan O’Brien show and it threw me back into it. He came up to me after the set, and thanked us. I couldn’t say anything. I think I just walked away. I was like ‘are you serious?’ We did the show because he’s a hero to us.” Ginger anxiety aside, Gourley said he has made peace with the success (he noted it helps that the label is extremely supportive and doesn’t “play mind games”) that has come to him and his Oregon/Alaska native band. It’s a good thing he is, because the band’s stature in the business has continued to rise since the release of their third album In the Mountain in the Cloud [...]
Oct
28thThe Gift in a NYC Bathroom and Graffiti6 Gets Solo and Stripped Down

You can accomplish a lot in a bathroom. Aside from doing your business, you can read an article, perhaps text your friends, or do as I do: play Angry Birds on your iPad. OK, that’s T.M.I. and gross, but it brings us to our next “A-Sides” session. Nuno Goncalves of the Portugal psych pop band The Gift used the trendy iPad tablet — specifically a keyboard App — earlier this month in a dressing room restroom located backstage of Le Poisson Rouge in NYC to perform a track with his band. Two hours before The Gift headlined a show at that city venue, they packed inside the private lavatory to perform an intimate version of their song “RGB.” The song is off their new album “Explode,” which was released late last month. Before we get “live in the can”, here’s a breakdown of the Portuguese music makers: The Gift formed in 1994 by Gonçalves and bandmate Miguel Ribeiro. They’d later be joined by Sónia Tavares, John Gonçalves, and Ricardo Braga and soon dominated the Portugal pop-rock scene. I could tell you more about them, but you’ll get a better sense watching this: The Gift — RGB [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZm7nr6-Mdo&w=460&h=315] Jamie Scott didn’t perform a pair of songs in any bathroom in New York City. Why would he honestly? The singer/songwriter, who along with UK producer TommyD make up the duo Graffiti6, sat down with guitar in hand in a city apartment to perform two tracks acoustically. Scott and TommyD are currently [...]