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GRAB BAG book shelf • glimpse • wildlife • pop culture • words • q&a • food • fun Five Minutes With ... RICHARD TILLINGHAST Q&A by RYAN HUME Spend some time with singer/songwriter Richard Tillinghast, who is coming to Cannon Beach from White Salmon, Washington, with his wife and cellist, Tova Tillinghast, to play songs from their new record “The Door is Open,” at the Lumberyard Rotisserie & Grill at 7 p.m. Saturday, April 25. “The Door is Open” is your second record with OneHum. For you, how does collabo- rating with other musicians change the songwriting and recording process? The songs on this album were written solo, so collab- oration didn’t change the writing process, but recording is a social event, collaborative by nature, so input and actual change (in sound, mix, mood) is invaluable and a big part of what comes out on the record. We were really honored to work with Rick Hulet at his studio in Bingen, WA on this record. Rick has since passed due to cancer. Creative exchange between people can really spur growth, and our new music focuses more on the process than the output. I love writing new songs with other people and changing my old ones due to other people’s input or the events of the minute. You are originally a Southern boy, but the Pacifi c Northwest and its inhabi- tants seem to exert a strong infl uence over your songs. How does this landscape and the people who live in it inspire you? There’s a freedom here. This is the fi rst place I settled as an adult. I was in my late 20s, on my way to California (I thought) to live and kayak. I drove through the Columbia River Gorge on a broken sunny day and thought, “I’m going to stay here.” I’d been through the area twice before on cross-country kayaking trips and each time I’d felt a unique connection to the place, especially the Little White Salmon River drainage. There’s a freedom here; I’m not sure how much of it is Western “live and let live” versus personal growth and my ability to expand in this particular en- vironment. Regardless, I love it here. I’ve sown my oats, made and lost friends, worked with a piece of land. We’re growing roots, living the heart of our lives in the place we’ve chosen to be, and that’s what these songs are about. Some of the songs on “The Door is Open” cover momentous life events: meeting your wife, Tova, be- coming a father. These songs are complimented by others that are purely reminiscent — like “Still,” about the wilds of youth — and some older songs to boot — like “Town in the Distance,” which was written 17 years ago. When you step back and look at the whole picture the album paints, what do you see? I see it as a group of songs that represent, or describe, special episodes of a life. The al- bum defi nitely covers a period of time fi lled with momentous events, beginning just before my son was born. Life is a continuous thing, and we’re moving into new material, new growth, all the time, but this album will always be special to me because it paints a picture of some very good days. You’ve been known to banter with an audience between songs: tell stories and off er comic relief. How does performing live — like you will at The Lumberyard on April 25 — fuel you and the band? 28 | April 23, 2015 | coastweekend.com I’ve always considered my- self more of a songwriter than a performer, but playing live allows one to get his kicks out one way or another. You can be a rock star or try to convey subtle feelings through music’s wonderful mixture of sound and ideas. I have a silly sense of humor, so that comes out in one goofy way or another. Also, a performing night is a night out for Tova and me, or the whole band, and we like to have fun. What the performer feels is what the audience feels. My brother is a sculptor and we often talk about our diff erent art forms. He does his work alone in a studio, whereas with music, sharing is part of the art. It’s all really ironic because I’m not much of a thespian. I’d rather be gardening or cutting fi rewood. I do like to have a good time, though, and doing fun shows allows one to meet people, experiment with sound and travel. What’s next for Richard Tillinghast and OneHum? I’ve been playing a lot of distorted electric guitar lately. I’ve always played acoustic for the honesty and “realness” of it. Electric instruments don’t do much when there’s no power. So real, acoustic vibrations have been my focus. There’s always been an underlying urge, though, to just go crazy with volume and distortion. I probably should have gotten it out when I was younger, but I didn’t. Now I’m merging melodic acoustic stuff with distorted, punk-like guitar at high volumes. Music usually strives to sound “musical”; now I’m interested in dis- cordance and power to tell more of the story. We’ve got good shows coming up and some regular local gigs. I hope to integrate the new ideas into a show that conceivably could go from kid-friendly music at the start to punk shattering windows by the end. Hopefully the kids would have gone home by that point. Wild Side Metacarcinus magister The Dungeness crab of its old shell and emerges in a fresh, green-colored shell, Dungeness crab, one of the ZKLFK UHPDLQV ÀH[LEOH IRU largest edible crabs, is native several days. To mate success- to the entire stretch of North fully, a female crab must be in $PHULFD¶V 3DFL¿F FRDVWOLQH this soft-shelled “post-molt” but, preferring cool water, phase, which usually occurs rarely ventures south of Santa during May or June. Male Barbara, California. Brown- crabs (who wait to molt until ish-purple in color, with dis- the fall), choose their partners tinguishing spots on its top- by wrapping them in a pro- side and two very large, pale tective embrace that may last fore-claws, this handsome for up to two weeks, at which crustacean typically grows time, in an ancient, romantic to between 7 and 8 inches in gesture of the sea, the female width, and can live for up to signals her readiness to mate 8 years. Named for the town by urinating on the male’s an- of Dungeness, Washington, tennae. If all goes according to ZKHUHLWZDV¿UVWFRPPHUFLDO plan, the female will carry 2.5 ly harvested in the 1880s, it million fertilized eggs, which UHPDLQVDVWDSOHLQWKH¿VKLQJ will hatch in the open sea al- economies of California, Ore- most six months later. gon, Washington and Alaska. Only male crabs of a cer- Five pairs of legs keep the tain size can be harvested Dungeness moving swiftly legally — a very successful through the eel-grass beds and method of management that sandy ocean bottoms that are its has earned Dungeness crab a home, and it can be found from sustainability rating of “Best the shallows of the inter-tidal Choice” from Seafood Watch, zone all the way to depths of an advisory program of the about 800 feet. Equipped with Monterey Bay Aquarium. powerful pincers to both de- That’s good news for the cr- fend itself and capture prey, it ab’s biggest fans: those who favors a diet of clams and small prize it for its sweet, delicate ¿VKEXWLVDOVRNQRZQDVDQHI ÀDYRU DQG FDQ¶W ZDLW WR H[ ¿FLHQWVFDYHQJHU press their devotion through M. Magister wears a hard the merits of melted butter. exoskeleton, which it sheds during its annual “molt” — a Deservedly, the Dungeness time when the crab steps out crab became Oregon’s “state crustacean” in 2009. By LYNETTE RAE McADAMS NW word nerd By RYAN HUME Velella >YԥOܭOԥ@ noun 1. Velella Velella: the only known member of the genus Velella; a small, bluish marine hydrozoan fixed with a transparent, vertical growth or float that resembles and acts like a sail. Velella drift in colonies on the open ocean’s sur- face and are subject to the whims of the wind ve•lel•li•dous, adj. Of or relating to the species Velella Origin: New Latin from around 1830. A taxonomic classi- fication combining vēlum, meaning “sail,” with the Italian suffix –ella, which is often applied to de- scribe bacteria. Velella are commonly called “purple sailors” or “by-the-wind sailors.” “Velella velellas don’t show up on the beach every year, and this year’s accumulation is especially heavy: Some Oregon beaches are covered in an inch of the dying jellyfish.” —Meg Wagner, “SEE IT: Scores of daz- zling blue jellyfish-like creatures wash up on West Coast beaches,” New York Daily News, Tuesday, April 14, 2015 “A fringe of lighter blue tentacles, used for feeding, dangle from the edge of the Sailor’s underside. These tentacles, like those of Velella’s relatives, sea anem- ones, coral and jellyfish, contain micro- scopic harpoon guns called nematocysts that stab, poison and lasso the Sailor’s plankton prey.” —Darrel E. Ward, “By-the-wind-sailors victims of their environment,” The Sunday Oregonian, Sunday, Aug. 16, 1981, Northwest Magazine, p. 19 Calling all word nerds: Got a word you want us to feature? Email your ideas to editor@coastweekend.com