Au Revoir Simone Tour Diary: Portland, OR

Brooklyn trio Au Revoir Simone recently took to the road to promote its latest pop confection, the keyboard-buzzing beauty Still Night, Still Light. Annie Hart reports:

After Austin, my favorite place in the country to visit is Portland, Ore. It is pretty much an Annie Hart nearly perfect fantasy land. Bike lanes, excellent mass transit, pretty gardens, fresh produce aplenty, coffee that makes me salivate and the ultimate bookstore, Powell’s. I have a hard time with Powell’s. Usually I get in trouble whenever I come to Portland with whatever band I happen to be playing with, because I tend to bail as soon as soundcheck is over, the kind of bailing where cymbal stands get knocked over and brief mumbles are goodbyes, all in an effort to be able to spend as much time as possible gently perusing the aisles, getting lost in every section, admiring fonts and book cover designs, reading paragraphs off every 10th random book I see and ending up with a heavy pile of books that I can only manage to carry because years ago my kindly children’s librarian consistently saw me struggling with piles of books when I was a kid and taught me how to properly stack a bunch of books in my hands—in other words, a pile unwieldy to most normal humans. However, on this particular occasion, I had planned my purchases in long daydreams through the desert and up the coast of California and ended up with a concise, easy-to-find variety:
1. Houseplant care guide
2. Interesting magazine/zine (easy to read in car when bored)
3. Serious political American history (difficult to read in the car when bored)
4. Needlepoint encyclopedia (to get ideas for projects I will never finish)
5. Quality Agatha Christie books (I hate fiction in general but stick to the classics for culture’s sake)

For the latter, I spent what felt like an hour in the “C” section of the mystery department, stalking multiple white-haired ladies, asking for advice on which book to buy. I don’t know if it is my New York accent coming out more strongly than usual these days, or maybe elderly women are not used to being accosted whilst shopping, but every one denies having read any Agatha Christie, which sends my stereotypes right out the window and leave me guessing which book to get based purely on casual familiarity with the title and the best-looking cover. In the end, I either made the right decision, or all her books are excellent. Perfect tour reading. I’ve been recommending her to all my touring band friends looking for a read in the car. More after the jump.

“Sad Song (RAC Mix)” (download):
https://magnetmagazine.com/audio/SadSongRACMix.mp3 

Here’s another shot of me, a chicken and my old friend from homeschooling who put us up in his house that night. Quite a trio. Or quartet, since he had a chicken, too.