Steve's Portland Music Awards Synopsis

The quick, brief synopsis:

Likes:
A. Daniel Balwin hosting. Let him do most of the show next time.
B. Deen Castronovo, Drummer for Journey, Bad English, Hardline as a presenter.
C. The variation of genres for the actual performances.
D. The fact that (some of) Portland's musicians get recognized.
E. Some quality nominations for the Jazz and Blues categories and the Legends awards.

Dislikes:
A. The voting process.
B. The sponsor and lack of vendors.
C. The lack of winners to claim their awards. A lot of them weren't even there!
D. Repetition of winners from previous years.
E. Not enough appropriate categories and equality among the nominees.




The Portland PMA's started as a promising premise, unfortunately, it may have been started by the wrong man, Craig Marquado. If you're not aware of Craig's past exploits, you should start by Googling what the Portland Mercury has to say about his business and personality traits. The Mercury, in particular, has adamantly announced they do not support him, nor the PMA’s, which started three year ago in conjunction with Marquado's now defunct publication “The Music Spectator.” The Portland Mercury has gone so far as to print and ask the general public “please do not attend this event,” which is tragic, because had the Portland Mercury or the Oregonian sponsored this event, it may have proven to be the managed event everyone hoped it could be (though, I argue the Mercury would not have been as receptive (or knowledgable) towards other genres of music outside the typical indie-hipster for which both it and the Willamette Week are notorious for promoting religiously). I don't know Craig personally, but seeing that I play in three locally ignored bands here in town, (none-of-which were even aware of when the awards take place or how to get nominated) I thought it best to be proactive in learning more about this event. Like I said, I like the premise considering the musically rich town in which we live.

I arrived a skosh late and walked in as Three Leg Torso was playing to a fairly packed Crystal Ballroom. I dig world music. A good start, I thought to myself. At the entrance there were a few booths set up, but I quickly ascertained they only represented one new local record label out of Salem, Lucky Dog Records???, who, with questionable ties to any quality physical distribution, also set up the only other booth promoting merch from their one-and-only band Holly Pollack?, like it was the king and queen at the high school prom. No other local labels were set up. No other artists merch. No Hush Records. Nothing from any musical PR firms or local music distributors, music publications or radio stations. How was it this one label was able to set up a booth to promote itself and it's one band?

The gala juxtaposed announcements of winners with music performances by additional groups of classical musicians, the pop hooks of Geoff Byrd, the Pogue-like influence of Amadan, Alt rockers Holly Pollack, an Astor Piazzolla-esque tango by harmonica wizard Joe Powers, rock and blues of The Dennis Mitchell Band and Hip Hop by Cool Nuts. I liked the diversity and the bands were very entertaining and professional. For all the hipsters, a member from Boy Eats Drum Machine was there, and, although he was touted as playing numerous instruments which were onstage, failed to impress me with even a mediocre virtuosity on any of them, and his solo enthusiasm, though entertaining, could be compared to a little spaz pug dog, who greets you at the door by humping the shit out of your leg wildly until exhaustion. It was good for him, but I didn't really get anything out of it. I heard the full trio is something to see, however, and that could change my mind about the act.

I really enjoyed the Jazz nominations. I spend a lot of time attending local jazz concerts and was very impressed to see that the nominations for Jazz and Blues were handled by their respective organizations and board members. Kate Davis, a young jazz vocalist and bass prodigy just out of high school, won for both Best Jazz Artist and Best New Artist. Nice job! She's had a legit reason for not attending as she's studying at Berkelee College of Music this year, I think? Kudos for acknowledging her abilities. Well played sir! (Someday, though, Darrell Grant will be given his due!)

I was hanging in the back for a spell and noticed Keegan Smith and the Fam nearby. Keegan is no newbie to this show and won another award, Male Artist of the Year. I dig the crap out of Keegan and his band, they are all very talented and I've enjoyed their performances immensely. That said, next year if he wins again and there are no new nominations to replace out the worn out and repetitive winners in all the categories this show will get old fast. Yeah, yeah... we know, Storm Large, Pink Martini, Decemberists, blah, blah, blah. There are other bands out there so how about some of the music critics and booking agents at the clubs pick the bands instead of who can get more of their friends to vote. Major acts should be separate from local aspiring artists in nominations. Who do you think is going to have a bigger fan base, Chris Margolin or Pink Martini... Keegan Smith or Modest Mouse. I mean, c'mon! The category for best classical artist was a joke! Their were a few individual names and small chamber groups I have never heard of before, and then the final nomination - The Portland Symphony! Who do you think won??? The categories need to be better managed and determined. They need to have better balance so as not to pair newbies with big star acts.

The tribute to Paul Delay was well deserved and well done. The same for Pioneer award winner, Les Sarnoff, which were projected onto a big screen. I just couldn't hear the commentary over the din of constant chatter of the crowd, who didn't seem to interested, unfortunately.

[SIDE NOTE: Steve's personal lists of bands or musicians that should have been nominated this year for something but weren't. This is a short portion of the list]
Bands: Kleveland, Intervision, Jacob Merlin, The Dimes, Jake Oken-Berg, Throwback Suburbia, Tapwater, Patrick Lamb, Bryan Flannery, Amanda Richards, Amelia, Dirty Martini, The Stolen Sweets, Derby, Jasmine Ash, Justin Jude, Justin Klump. Individual Musicians: Damien Erskine (bass), Alan Jones (Drums), Sandin Wilson(bass), Mike Snyder (drums), Terry Robb (guitar), Reinhardt Melz (drums)... etc. etc...]

Steve's Personal List for future categories:
Majors (all genres combined so we don't run out in 5 years):
Best Major Label Act from Portland
Best Major Label Artist of the Year
Best Major Label Album of the Year
Best Song of the Year
(that's it... this is about the local level artists)

Local artists: (these EXCLUDE any artist/band on a major label or who has sold in excess of 20,000 albums)
Local Band Of The Year
Local Artist of the Year
Local Album of the Year
Local Song of the Year
Best emerging Artist/Band

Local acts According to Genre:
Best Heavy Metal
Best Alternative Rock
Best Blues
Best Jazz
Best Classical
Best Bluegrass
Best Big Band
Best Folk
Best Adult Contemporary
Best Country
Best World Music
Best Electronica
Best Indie

Keep their Legends Awards for people who spent a lifetime building the musical community here in Portland. That was a nice tribute this year.

Acknowledge achievment/merit awards for indivdual musicians (But don't categorize by saying: Best Vocalist. At that level there's no point in saying whose better, you can't quanitfy the word "best", just acknowledge that an artist is technically proficient, popular, playing gigs regularly and contributing to the musical community at large.) These Achievement awards could follow and possibly even be sorted out by gender:
Vocalist
Guitarist
Bass Player
Piano player
Keyboard Player
Sax player
Percussionist
Harmonica player
Non-traditional instrument
Classical or Jazz Composer
Composer in Film or Television

Any finally, individual awards for people involved with music production. Achievement awards for:
Recording Studio
Producer of the Year
Engineer of the Year
Mastering Engineer of the Year
Music Stores
Instrument Stores
PR fims
Managers
Distributors
etc...etc...

Also, the price is too high to get enough people to this event. Knock it down to $10 and there will be more attendance.

Next year, get the Oregonian or some non-partisan publication to sponsor the event. I applaud Craig for doing this... it's a big challenge to coordinate and promote, but it's bigger than one man. I enjoyed the fact that his Music Spectator magazine actually garnished attention for the pop acts and talented musicians that often get passed up by both the Mercury and Willamette Week. There's a lot of us out there, many whom Craig, the Mercury, and the Willamette don't know even exist that are working diligently and playing countless shows a year and benefiting the community. A lot of us were not even aware of this awards ceremony or how to get nominated. That said, I really enjoyed the bands that played for this year's Portland Music Awards. Very talented acts and artists. Now it's time to look to the future and start investigating and acknowledging some of the great NEW talents emerging in this wonderful musical city of ours.

Steve