Truckerspeed » The Penny Jam

Reporter at Metro’s Ecoroof

Scott — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:57:13 +0000

Check out episode 28 of the Portland music series directed by fellow Truckerspeed author Sean Whiteman, produced by me (Scott) with sound done by our talented friends at Dexterous Productions, plus a couple of other cool dudes, Jov Luke and Matt Huiskamp. We’d been talking to the band Reporter for awhile trying to set up a location. Luckily we were put into contact with some fine people who work for Portland Metro’s Ecoroof program. That’s how it works folks, if you have a great location in Portland feel free to holler at us via the Penny Jam website.

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Fogatron Gets Mouthy at Acme Donuts

Scott — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 19:43:55 +0000

Check out episode 27 of the podcast that Sean and I produce, The Penny Jam in association with our Sound Engineer friends at Dexterous Productions. If I haven’t already explained it to you, it’s a video series that chronicles Portland musicians performing in unusual locations. This episode featured Fogatron at Acme Donuts. Fogotron often accompanies other musicians, aside from performing alone. As a result, you might find him on stage sometime with some rappers and other musicians if you keep an eye out for his upcoming shows.

Loch Lomond performs “Ghost of an Earthworm” at the Ace Hotel in Episode 26 of the Penny Jam

Scott — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 00:41:15 +0000

Sometimes we’re so busy fawning over other people’s work that we forget to post our own. Worry no more as I present episode 26 of our ongoing Portland music video series, The Penny Jam with Loch Lomond.

This was shot on June 28, 2009 and I remember the day very vividly because I was feeling under the weather. It was a generally care-free shoot though and I credit our sound guys James Jacobsen and Matt Huiskamp for keeping all the details in check. The sun was setting and thankfully we captured that gorgeous evening light as it bounced off of downtown buildings and into the Ace Hotel lobby where we’d set up. There are photos from the shoot by Joe Mansfield on Flickr. And of course, definitely check out the band, Loch Lomond who has an EP called “Night Bats” out on November 10 with Hush Records. The video above features the song “Ghost of an Earthworm” which is part of the 4-song EP.

The Dimes and the Penny Jam visit St. Cupcake

Scott — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 18:10:21 +0000

Episode 25 of our Portland music video series The Penny Jam with the Dimes is out now! The gentleman from the band don’t normally wear British military uniforms but in a stroke of good luck we caught them on the same day they had done some promotional photography and they already had the costumes. The song, “Abigail Don’t Be Long” is about Abigail Adams, the wife of John Adams (the second President of the United States). This song, like many from the Dimes, mixes sunshine and pop hooks with historically-inspired stories; a perfect formula for our location.

When we started the podcast a year and a half ago it would have been hard to imagine that one day we would have 25 episodes out. It makes me remember the days spent trying to convince people that it was a good idea to set a band up in their store. At this point it’s basically just “check out the website” and they get it. In this case, the band’s manager Ryan, over at Pet Marmoset PR helped arrange the use of St. Cupcake, a little cafe that makes the fanciest cupcakes in the entire freaking world.

This one was mixed by our resident acoustical engineer Clem Abercrombie.

Explode into Colors Explodes in the Portland Art Museum

Scott — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:17:37 +0000

As we started to polish up the next episode of the Penny Jam (our ongoing video series), it occurred to me that we hadn’t posted the most recent episode, number 24 featuring Explode into Colors.

It’s been getting some loving on the internet, and for good reason. Explode into Colors brings the energy like a bobcat in a burlap sack – and in this case they brought it four or five times over the course of the shoot – and from what they told us it’s one of their more technically and physically challenging songs. We filmed it in the Grand Ballroom at the Portland Art Museum, where just the night before John Scofield played during the Portland Jazz Festival. I couldn’t help feel really lucky to have access to such a great space. Then I cried. Then I stopped and we filmed this great video. Enjoy!

Panther, Live from a bookstore display window in downtown Portland

Scott — Fri, 01 May 2009 08:19:23 +0000

Behold, the long awaited episode 23 the Penny Jam! It’s featuring Panther playing in a window display at Cameron’s Books in downtown Portland. We caught Panther before they took off on an international expedition including some coverage on Russian television and from the looks of their Myspace page they are playing at the Strawberry Music Festival in Beijing on Saturday May 2. More links at Rhinestone Neckbrace.

Celilo at Ken’s Workshop

Scott — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 04:43:22 +0000

Check out episode 21 of The Penny Jam, filmed in a woodshop near 17th and Powell in Portland Oregon. Our friend Ken Tomita hosted, allowing a band and crew to set up in his place. Ken is a woodworker who works mostly with bamboo, and has some really great peices. His blog is also a great resource for the indie scoop on whats going on in the world of furniture design in Portland.

The band we featured was Celilo, a Sasparilla-drenched Alt-Psych-Americana outfit who sound something like Neil Young dropped in Oregon country. They performed “Little Coquette” off of their recently released album Bending Mirrors, which is available on CD Baby. I’ve listened to it 8 times at work in the last few weeks. I can already tell it’s going to be one of those albums that came out of nowhere and stuck to me. Spoiler! It may be one of my new favorite local albums