From Boone Howard to a New Graphic Memoir by Nicole Georges, July's Pop Culture Hot List
Malian blues king Vieux Farka Touré plays the Waterfront Blues Festival this month.
The Book
If you’ve so far mostly digested Portland history through the standard male lens, try a palate cleanser: Tracy J. Prince and Zadie J. Schaffer’s Notable Women of Portland (Arcadia) is packed with women who helped make this city and state, from suffragist Abigail Scott Duniway to air force pilot Hazel Ying Lee to former governor Barbara Roberts.
Boone Howard
Image: Courtesy Todd Walberg
The Record
Former front man for the We Shared Milk, Boone Howard sings of drinking and spitting and messing things up, crafting his own bad choices into the lyrically smart, dark, and biting songs that form his debut solo record, The Other Side of Town. Less light summer pop than songs for the shade.
The Festival
The city’s annual riverside blues fest celebrates 30 years of bringing the likes of Buddy Guy, Solomon Burke, and Sharon Jones (among many others) to mark summer in Portland, while raising millions for the Oregon Food Bank. The lineup for this year’s Waterfront Blues Festival includes Malian blues king Vieux Farka Touré, rockabilly crooner Chris Isaak, and our own big band funk rockers MarchFourth.
Nicole Georges
Image: Courtesy Amos Mac
The Dog
Nicole J. Georges pays tribute to her “bad dog” Beija in her winning new graphic memoir. Fetch: How a Bad Dog Brought Me Home (Mariner) chronicles the author’s journey through her late teens, depression, and bad relationships alongside a socially dysfunctional, codependent canine. All that and effusive blurbs from Jill Soloway and Alison Bechdel make this a book to sit and stay with.
