Sean Flinn - The Pageantry from Live From Your City on Vimeo.

You may think you don’t know Sean Flinn & The Royal We, but trust me, you know more about this band than you think. If you are a fan of the local indie darlings, Y La Bamba, I guarantee you are a fan of Sean Flinn, for they are one in the same…almost.

Sean Flinn & The Royal We comprises all of the Y La Bamba members, excluding percussionist Mike Kitson, and adds three other members on pedal steel, organ, percussion and drums. The beautiful Y La Bamba front lady, Luzelena Mendoza, takes a step down in this project, with the roll of backup vocals and percussionist, allowing Flinn, lead guitarist in Y La Bamba, to flex his vocal muscles.

Flinn and Mendoza’s vocal harmonies are ethereal in “Patient Heart,” the title track of the band’s first release, a digital E.P. Morose minor chords and waves of percussion fill all of the empty space, giving the song a full yet fragile sound. The rest of the songs on the Portlanders’ Myspace are in the same vein. The band does a good job of incorporating every instrument to create solid, emotive music.

The octet expects to release its debut LP, Write Me a Novel, this June and is playing shows around town in the meantime, including Mississippi Studio’s one-year anniversary in March. You can check out Sean Flinn & The Royal We tonight at Doug Fir, and if you like what you hear, make sure to give them your vote on our Band of the Month poll. Show starts at 9 p.m. $10.

-Katrina Nattress

We'll let the video for Bodhi's "Warm Side" speak for itself. If, for some odd goddamn reason, you had not heard or seen the band before, here's your chance. This is part of the ongoing rad film featurettes over at Into the Woods. These series' are fast becoming the talk of the indie-rock film game, and I'm glad to see them representing such a vibrant, diverse scene like Portland's.

I'm almost tempted to write more about how awesome this song is, too. But, well, you've got eyes and ears, right? Besides, I'm pretty sure Bodhi knows we love them at the Deli Portland already.

Apologies to those deaf, dumb, blind kids who stumbled onto this site all willy-nilly. We're sure you play a mean pinball.

- Ryan J. Prado

Deli readers who play in bands,

The Deli has reserved 3 showcase slots at Music Tech Mashup during SXSW, which will take place at Rusty Spurs in Austin, TX on 7th St. on March 17. Rusty Spurs features 3 stages with an 800 person capacity in the middle of it all and is an official SXSW venue. During SXSW it will host shows by heavy hitters like Echo and the Bunnymen, Vega (Neon Light side project) and Semi Precious Weapons (recently on tour with Lady Gaga) amongst others.

To apply to play this SXSW show all you need to do is fill in this form HERE and click on the confirmation email you'll receive (this will simply add you to our mailing list and enter your band in our fabulous charts organized by genre and region - one day we'll also create band profiles!). 3 artists will be selected by the organizers (one of them will be a local Austin, TX artist). Any band that is available to travel to Austin is eligible. Submission deadeline is Monday 02.22 at 11.59 pm.

Music Tech Mashup Showcase (hosted by Coast to Coast Models & Events and presented by The Deli, Hunnypot, GreenShoeLace) will celebrate the convergence of music and technology and the opportunities it presents for everyone involved just as SXSW itself switches gears from Interactive Week to Music Week.This is a list of some of the artists already booked: Jada - Universal Motown Records (Boston, MA) - Bamboo Shoots - Epic Records (New York) - Shinobi Ninja - (Brooklyn, NY) - McAlister Drive - (Boston, MA) - Odd Modern - (Los Angeles, CA) - Keys and Crates (Toronto, Canada) - Curtis Santiago (Toronto, Canada) - Keith Masters (Chicago, IL) - FutureCop! (UK) - Mark Foster (Los Angles, CA).

The Deli's Staff

If you are anything like me - a total attention whore - you would jump at any opportunity to get your name and/or face shown to the public. Instead of spending countless hours trying to make a video to be on the soul-sucking, brain-numbing Real World, why not be a part of something local and that doesn’t require utter humiliation?

Portland's Archeology is looking for extras for their video shoot for “By the By,” which is a single off their new album Memorial due out next month. The shoot will be this Saturday, February 20th. The locale is Sauvie’s Island and St. Helens. The feel of the video is creepy mixed with celebratory angst, and the band asks that everyone dresses in '30s-'60s period clothes.

Meeting time is 12 p.m. on Saturday at the parking garage under the NW Burnside Fred Meyers. This sounds like a ridiculously fun time and a great chance to support a local band. If I wasn’t whoring myself out somewhere else this Saturday I would be there fo’sho’. Oh, and don’t forget to come out for Archeology’s show at Mississippi Studios this Wednesday, February 17th with fellow Portland mellow-rockers Oh Captain, My Captain, and Seattle's The Globes. Doors at 8 p.m., show at 9 p.m. $8

- Deanna Uutela

To put it mildly, Tu Fawning is a force of nature - a pulsing, bubbling, organic quartet of able-bodied musical sponges wading in the suds of Portland's post-rock puddles. To get serious about prodding their muses and defining their sound would take the combined efforts of a self-writing quill, an encyclopedic understanding of synergy and the language of trees, and the tears of a Cherokee raindancer. So I'll try to keep it mild.

Tu Fawning is the spawn of Portland musical luminaries Corrina Repp (of Corrina Repp and Viva Voce fame) and Joel Haege (the explosive force behind art-punk-funk trio 31 Knots). The duo recently became a foursome, inviting in the key-tinklin' talents of Liza Rietz (also a popular PDX fashion designer), and multi-instrumentalist/mostly brass-ist Toussaint Perrault. The quartet unhinges a fluid, tribal, melancholy melange using tambourines, samples, shadowy percussion, modest guitar, trumpets, layered vocals and more to stitch together a hollow, holistic version of minimalist orchestral rock. It's hypnotic, to say the least; and a goddamn religious experience live. 

Here, Haege's spastic, choppy guitar squalls - so patented within the carnival realm of 31 Knots - are replaced by plaintive, subtle notation. His secondary presence is due foremost to the equally engaging aura of Repp, whose fluffy-gruff vocal melodies drive the songs to parts unknown, while Perrault's brass and percussive elements mix with the shaky-hands of Rietz and her generous key contributions.

"Multiply A House" sounds like a neo-Squanto day trip recorded in an empty jail cell with Glenn Miller's Orchestra tripping on LSD and playing the same, echoing lines forever and ever. For clarification: This is amazing.

Go see this band right now. Even if they're not playing. And vote for them in our Band of the Month poll to the top right of this blog if you dig.

- Ryan J. Prado