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Local musicians never make at home what they can on the road. This is true in every city. I'm sure that if I wanted to see Lloyd Jones someplace other than Portland it'll cost me closer to $15. At home, I can see him weekly at venues with no cover charge. There are many more reasons why a musician decides to live in one city over another and Portland must have something right about and I have heard several reasons. The situation is no different in The Emerald City (Seattle) I'm sure than anywhere else.

But back to BluesSlave's thread here. What I like about Portland is the fact that there are a number of clubs around town, that if something doesn't appeal to you at one, there's always another up the road.

Last night is a perfect example of this. I like to check out acts that I have never heard of before or may be someone that I just haven't gotten around to seeing. I looked in the Cascade Blues Association's BluesNotes calendar and noticed that nothing had been reported at a club fairly close to home, called Monty's, so I drove over to check it out. The band playing there was called Jelly Roll. They appeared to be a group of younger musicians so my girlfriend Sue and I found a place to sit and ordered a couple beers. The band started up and the first thing that took us aback was the volume, way too loud for the room. The opening song was "One Way Out" and the lead vocalist made it sound like The Allman Brothers fronted by Captain Beefheart, with harmonica work going through too many notes. The next several songs were so loud, they could not be distinguished one from another, though I have to admit whoever was playing the keys was pretty good and the drummer was solid in the pocket. A female vocalist came up and went into Del Shannon's "Runaway." She had a decent voice, but the volume had grown to be too much and we decided to move on to another club. This band given time may amount to something, but they're still young and will learn to tone things down. I'm still not sure if they were trying to be a blues band or a rock band since the songs couldn't be made out.

We took a short drive from Beaverton to Lake Oswego to Out of the Blues where we caught the classic rock band Bad Motor Scooter, featuring BBFer Zot Rocker on guitar. Not blues, but by God they were doing some really good covers of songs that you may not usually hear from most bands like this. I appreciated the fact that none of the band members overplayed their instruments and they worked very well together. The only complaint was the bass was a little overpowering and drowned some of the others at times. But the selections we heard went through people like The Who, SRV, Doobie Brothers, Aerosmith among others with ZZ Top finishing the night out. Unfortunately we got there only in time to see the last set, so once again we were on the road as it was only midnight.

We drove up the road to nearby Tualatin to the Country Inn Bar & Grill, another venue that usually has blues acts but had not reported their calendar to the BluesNotes. Boy were we glad that we decided to go here! One of Portland's most terrific vocalists Rae Gordon was in full swing, with an outstanding band behind here including Ben Partain on keys, Julian Brogia on drums and guitarist Wad Martin, another of Portland's truly unsung guitar slingers. Rae is one of those powerful blues shouter vocalists who can easily fill a room with her voice. Absolutely fiery and trading vocal licks with guitar between her and Wad. That is when she wasn't on the dance floor shaking her body with the crowd while carrying a cordless mic. Needless to say, we closed the night out here and it was a short drive home as we traveled maybe about ten miles or so total between the three clubs.