Nolan Parker by Nolan Parker Well, well, well... back again I see. Interested in availing yourself of Portland's music news of the day, are we? Needing to fill your early February dance cards, or wanting insight on new releases here in Portland? And you've returned to Mercury Music Picks knowing you'll satiate all your music knowledge desires within these words. Your cunning precedes you, gentle reader.  Take care of yourselves and your communities out there, y'all. This includes our unhoused and immigrant neighbors, our Palestinian and trans siblings, community members experiencing disabilities, and more. The government isn't going to tend your fields, but it will harvest your crops. Build bonds and frameworks of care for one another and for yourself. I love you.   Friday, February 6 Arrington de Dionyso / Cliffwalker / Tai Woodville  For fans of Soriah, Be Present Art Group, Experimental Dental School If you seek a beacon of light in the PNW’s many DIY scenes, look no further than Arrington de Dionyso. The evergreen champion of sound exploration is a music elder, having founded the K Records band Old Time Relijun in the '90s, of which Phil Elverum was at one point a member. Outside of OTR, which is already a freaky force to be reckoned with, de Dionyso’s solo research has taken him to new dimensions. Tuvan throat singing, Eastern drones, and circular breath work are but pieces of the Dionysian puzzle. The serene mallet work of Cliffwalker, and acoustic meanderings of Tai Woodville swaddle us in preparation of the powerful mystery that is an Arrington performance. (Turn! Turn! Turn!, 8 pm, more info here, 21+) Dante’s 26th Anniversary ft. The Mummies / Nasalrod / Hopeless Jack For fans of King Khan, Murder City Devils, Dead Moon After their 25th anniversary shows last year with Satan’s Pilgrims and Guantanamo Baywatch, Dante’s needed another feral lineup for their 26th to keep the energy going. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the surfy garage rockers in The Mummies make feral look domesticated. WE NEED MORE THEMED BANDS! Up Sam the Sham! Up The Locust! Up Unga Dunga! Anyways, Chairman and the Nasalrod gang are about to kick higher than the Sinferno dancers in the middle slot, with Hopeless Jack strumming us in the right direction as the opener. Don’t blow a gasket daddy-o, get down to the new sound at Dante’s swingin’ 26th! (Dante’s, 9 pm, more info here, 21+) Friday, February 6 - Thursday, February 12 You Got Gold For fans of Justin Townes Earle, Emmylou Harris, Willie Nelson It is one of my greatest personal disappointments not to have seen John Prine live before he split for that great juke joint in the sky in 2020 due to complications from COVID-19. You Got Gold is a celebration of life concert film, filmed at the Ryman Auditorium in 2022. Featuring just a few of Prine’s admirers and collaborators: Bonnie Raitt, Lucinda Williams, and Dwight Yoakam, among others. His duet album In Spite of Ourselves is one of the the most moving pieces of recorded music in music history, on which Lucinda Williams is a featured duettist. This should be a special run at the westside favorite. (Cinema 21, various times, more info here, all ages) Saturday, February 7 Self Group Collective 16th BDay Bash For fans of Throbbing Gristle, Arrington de Dionyso, Unwound The anarcho-DIY punks behind Self Group Collective have been doing it for 16 years! Where does the time go? Releasing albums by Sama Dams, Modern Folk, and Self Group comrade Kelli Schaefer, Self Group Collective is also deeply embedded in the mutual aid landscape of Portland. In fact, on top of Yardsss’ post-everything experimentation, the acid freakout-jazz that is Halfbird, and the newly minted mathy post-hardcore of Mids that will all be on stage this night, Self Group is also hosting a bunch of mutual aid and direct action orgs tabling the event AND screening It's Revolution or Death Part III: Reclaiming the World Wherever We Stand. How TF do they do it all? Don’t forget to bring cold weather supply items for our unhoused and housing-insecure neighbors, collected by Sunnyside Shower Project (Blackwater, 7 pm, more info here, all ages) Gouge Away / Dry Socket / Violencia / Tolls / The Names of Our Friends / Cherub Chains For fans of Mannequin Pussy, Labrat, Cerce Did y’all see Gouge Away tear it the fuck up at Project Pabst last year? They opened the entire festival, perfectly setting the weekend’s dial to LFG. Now half Portland-based, Gouge Away are one of the city’s most powerful hardcore bands. Oh, you knew that already…. Well then, try tucking into “Rigged Survival,” the new single from another of our toughest acts, Dry Socket. Hopefully the single is heralding a new Dry Socket LP, it’s been a couple years since we’ve been destroyed by one of their full lengths. Tijuana’s Violencia are undoubtedly the power violence shredders of our dreams, and be prepared to pay the fee when post-hardcore juggernauts Tolls take the stage. Because this is a hardcore show, there are six bands on the bill. Coming in first place are Portland screamo punishers The Names of Our Friends, and Seattle's hardest bruisers, Cherub Chains. (High Limit Room, 7 pm, more info here, all ages) MJ Nebreda / Leah York / Meowhouse / Patrona  For fans of Ms Nina / La Goony Chonga / Safety Trance  When the real ones at Portland’s premiere Latinx booking crew Global Based brought MJ Nebreda through town a couple years ago, it was all reggaetón and sweat and so many huns (non-gendered) throwing so much ass. I had trouble walking home at 2 am because I left my cheeks at Holocene. The Miami-based, Peruvian-Venezuelan producer and DJ serves a deep dancefloor dish, no utensils needed—and the shes, gays, and theys plan to eat. Seattle’s champion of Latinx beats Leah York is in town for the throwdown, along with Portland’s Meowhouse and Patrona (Holocene, 9 pm, more info here, 21+) IM NOT PRETTY Listening Party Ahead of they/them/their album release party at Coffin Club on Friday the 13th, Portland’s angriest indie outfit, Nonbinary Girlfriend host a super secret listening party at new rock roll watering hole, Trouble Bar. The new album, IM NOT PRETTY has the experience of many lives lived and many understandings of self breathing through its songs—frontman James cracking himself open as a means to collective processing and healing. But shh, you didn’t hear it from us 🤫 (Trouble Bar, 7 pm, more info here, 21+) Also very worth it… Girl Chow / Trigger Fae / Dogs By Desgn / Perel Mother / Pavement Puppy / Michael Cera Bathroom Poster at High Limit Room - Feb 4, more info here House of Warmth / Veradas / Gvth Dvddy at The Six - Feb 6, more info here Byron the Aquarius / Dano / DJ Dissolve at Process - Feb 6, more info here Horsebag / Worm Commons / Punchin’ Onions at Wyrd Hut - Feb 6, more info here Hope Light: Mystical Choral Chamber Music by Arvo Pärt, Tikey Zes, Michael Adamis, Ivan Moody, and John Taverner at St. Mary’s Cathedral - Feb 7, more info here Robyn Hitchcock at Wonder Ballroom - Feb 7, more info here Pati Rojas / Bad Assets / Brooklyn Del The Revelators at Showdown Saloon - Feb 7, more info here Dyke Nite ft. DJ Aspen / Stas THEE Boss / DJ Ashe at Nova PDX - Feb 7, more info here  Tispur / Behalf / Stonecrop at Turn! Turn! Turn! - Feb 7, more info here DJ Dread at Alleyway - Feb 8, more info here  Tradie / Postrich Bear / Cowboys at Swan Dive - Feb 8, more info here Numbskull Revolution at Clinton Street Theater - Feb 10, more info here New Music Portland: In this house, we love a music video. Portland bands and artists, MAKE MORE MUSIC VIDEOS! Get absolutely unhinged with it. Ask your A/V friends to shoot something with you, DIY that shit and make it yourself! Have you seen Nasalrod's video for "The Maker" yet? 1) It rips so incredibly hard, and 2) It features shoot locations all over Portland, with cameos from some of our city's greatest rocka rollas. A perfect Portland music video. You've heard of the BBC, but do you know The Big Box Set? Reach out to BBS and play inside one of their incredible hand-built sets in NE Portland! Audio and visual go hang-in-hand, my loves. Let's get to gettin'! The fine folks in Ages and Ages are gearing up to release their new Fine Thanks and You album March 6. Lucky for us they've shared their charming video for "Wild Ride" as an appetizer to the full meal. Is parlour-pop a thing? It is now.  Not to be dramatic, but the new Barry Walker Jr. album Paleo Sol will absolutely be on my Best Portland Album's of 2026 list. Divinity delivered as ambient pedal steel. No vocals, only Sol.  Related: Read about the music author and Mercury writer Alison Jean Cole takes with her on her rockhouding expeditions. Hint: It's ambient pedal and lap steel.  Portland composer Derek Hunter Wilson is slated to share his sparsely gorgeous third solo record via Beacon Sound on February 20. Sculptures is the pianist's ode to the big water and shorelines of the PNW. I have it on good authority that Mercury staff writer Lindsay Costello will be sharing a full Sculptures album review with us shortly.   Emil Amos of Holy Sons, Grails, Om, Lilacs Champagne, et al. has collaborated with Steve Moore—AKA Zombi—for the Giallo inspired LP Zone Blue as a followup to Amos’ 2023 Zone Black. The new Zone drops March 27, grab some opium and enjoy.  Related: Read our reviews of Holy Sons' two 2025 albums, Lost Decade IV and Puritan Themes.  Ahead of his new Retribution album out later this month, Mic Crenshaw dropped a music video for "Afrika." Shot between Zanzibar, Arusha, Tanzania, and Portland, the video is a beautiful, wild ride through the stunning visuals and cultures of the respective shoot locations. Heads-up: GZA's February 9 Hawthorne Theatre date, for which Crenshaw is opening, has been rescheduled. New date TBA.  Portland space rock explorers Natural Magic released their new album II in late January. It grooves and flows along like so many Tangerine Dream songs. Get lost in the atmospherics with some mushroom tea and a sunny day.  Roman Norfleet Be Present Art Group have emerged in the last years as creators of sacred sounds and energy, bearing torches for ancestors past, present, and future. Lead by Norfleet, the living music collective share their new Unreleased EP February 16. There is, as of the writing of this article, now traces of Unreleased online, keep an eye on the Group's Bandcamp for updates.  Country rockers Silver Horse just dropped their sweet little four song EP, check it out!  Portland Music News:  Founder, owner, and smiling face behind the counter of Music Millennium, Terry Currier is calling it quits and heading into—hopefully—a life of leisure. But not before launching a search for the next owner of Portland's longest-running record store (57 years!). Currier, being the Portland music champion he is says, "It’s time to find a successor to keep Music Millennium going for many years to come. I’ve turned down every offer from developers that have called over the years wanting to buy the building. I want that building to [be] part of Portland’s landscape forever. Plus, I want Music Millennium to be in it for just as many years." A real ride-or-die Currier is. The Mercury wishes Currier all the best in whatever he gets up to in his post Music Millennium endeavors.  You think you got what it takes to join the PDX Pop Now! Listening Committee? Then do it! It's fun and you get to be part of shaping the festival and who ends up on this year's compilation. Join today!  ...read more read less