Music, Arts, Food, Events

Music

Another huge mark in the PLUS column, Portland boasts a phenomenal music scene, along with plenty of arts, theater, and public performances. The opportunities to see original live music are many.

“[The Portland] metro area’s population may rank only 25th in the U.S., but it claims at least 1,100 music businesses, around 2,000 performing acts, nearly 300 live venues and 200-plus promoted concerts a week — putting it near the top of any of these categories on a per-capita basis.”
— Oregon Business Magazine

Every night of the week there is music, everything from experimental noise to bluegrass, string quartet to hip hop.

There are numerous open mics, and a monthly event dedicated to showcasing new singer-songwriters, the Songwriter Soirée.

The brilliant NearHear website provides a dead simple means of previewing artists' music and finding local shows.

Artichoke Community Music, a nonprofit venue in Southeast Portland, offers live shows, open mics, classes, and instrument sales. Genre focus is folk, jazz, blues, bluegrass and less loud styles.

Now, cities like Austin, Texas have good music scenes of their own. But there's a key difference here: on a beautiful summer evening, you and your friends can safely ride your bikes a few miles to a venue, catch a show, and ride home again, singing the chorus out loud. No highways, no traffic jams.

Arts & Events

Check them out:

• Portland Winter Lights Festival - downtown Portland fills with every color of light in an array of art installations.
• Tomorrow Movie Theater - promotes the idea of “cinema unbound” through a mix of artist-driven signature screenings, events, happenings, performances, and discussions changing for whom, by whom, and how cinematic stories are told now — and tomorrow.
• Portland Art Museum. Free on the first Thursday of each month.
• Hopscotch - an interactive art exhibit, i.e., psychedelic trampolines.
• Portland Rose Festival. Parades, tours of visiting ships, carnival rides, and more.
• New Year in the Park. Southeast Asian cultural festival.

More stuff to do

• WWeek events calendar.
• Portland Living on the Cheap. Does what it says on the tin.
• DoPDX. Events website - beware their emails, they get overwhelming.
• Sidewalk Joy. A map of whimsical things.

Food

Portland is a foodie town. There's so much to choose from - from food carts (solo or in "pods"), restaurants, bars. A law that requires bars with "full on premises" liquor sales to also serve food encourages bars to offer a handful of quality items, instead of deep frying everything.

• Travel Portland offers a guide to city food cart pods
• Endless Distances has a guide to gluten-free spots (if you're part of the GF4L cult)

Farmers Markets

Running year round at various locations around Portland.

Portland Farmers Market

Groceries

Groceries out here can range from Wow! So cheap, these bulk bins to holy mother of God how much for a handful of pecans?!?

Cheaper

• Winco. No style, no Muzak or 1980s hits (someone quipped they don't play it because they're too cheap), best prices in town on a wide array of stuff. No stores in close in Portland, but worth the schlep to the East or South. Suburban stores may have more selection. Amazing selection of super cheap bulk foods, from coarse salt to gummy worms, granola to cashews.
• Trader Joe's. The national cult favorite chain.
• Grocery Outlet, a.k.a., Gross Out. Some seemingly random remaindered/expired/failed product experiment, i.e., Cool Ranch Twizzlers. Some very good deals. Best nickname of all time.
• Everyday Deals. Two stores in East Portland. No review yet.
• Chef'Store, 731 SE Stephens. Lots of restaurant-sized items, like 136 oz. Sambal Oelek chilly paste. Pretty good prices on bulk meats and fish. I bought 5 pounds of trout.

More expensive

• New Seasons. Despite being a B-Corp, prices are pretty high. Better quality produce and meats. Often, but not always, better music. No nickname coined, yet.
• Natural Grocers. Kind of pricey, but can beat New Seasons on some items. Lots of good bulk foods, organic stuff. Check the sale items.
• Whole Foods, a.k.a., Whole Paycheck. National chain, high quality, prices reflected in the nickname. Bezos can French kiss a goat, but hey, sometimes you want a $5 gluten-free 1.5oz mochi.
• QFC, a.k.a., Quick, Find Cash! High prices. No review yet.

Lottery money

• Zupan's Markets. Hella expensive! Best to shop when a wealthy relative is paying. Proposed Halloween costume: Zupan's receipt.

Specialty

• Hong Phat Asian Market on 82nd St. Competitive prices on an array of common stuff, and lots of less common goods (unless you're a master of Asian cooking, then it's just another day at the market).
• Asian Family Market. Way out in Beaverton, but worth the trip for 1 gallon kimchi(!) and unique snacks.
• Fiji Emporium. Carries Fijian and Indian specialties, spices, cassette tapes. Charmingly disheveled. In North Portland.