FRIDAYEXTRA !
The Daily Astorian
Friday, July 3, 2015
Weekend Edition
ROCKIN’
PICKLED
FISH
58 STIC 9EN8 E ATT5 ACTS BI * NA 0 ES
Photos by JOSHUA BESSEX — The Daily Astorian
ABOVE: The musical duo Luke and Kati, of Astoria, perform at Pickled Fish at the Adrift Hotel and Spa in Long Beach, Wash., in early June. TOP: Pickled Fish is
located on the top floor of the four-story hotel.
Claborn wrote in an email. She
and Ydstie, a couple from Asto
ria, have been active members of
Blind Pilot since 200. “It is inti
mate and casual.”
And the venue — which can
hold 150 people and usually draws
between 80 and 120 for dinner
shows — doesn’t charge for tick
ets, either.
By ERICK BENGEL
The Daily Astorian
W
ithout rush or fanfare,
the Australian guitarist
Blake Noble and his
three bandmates take the stage at
Pickled Fish on a recent Friday
evening.
Even with the shades partly
drawn, the cozy, rustic space on
the top À oor of the fourstory Adrift
Hotel and Spa in Long Beach,
Wash., is saturated with sunlight.
Couples perched at the windows
gaze out at the e[pansive ocean
front view.
7he musicians ready their in
struments — guitars, Dobro, drums
and didgeridoo — and check their
volume levels amid the clattering
of silverware and the drone of con
versation.
“We’re doing our best not to
blast your eardrums while you’re
¿ nishing dinner, because that would
be really unfortunate,” Noble tells
an audience sipping beer and craft
cocktails with their cuisine.
F or the next two hours, the
group lays down a set of funky,
bluesy rock numbers charged with
Aboriginal elements.
Atmosphere
Noble was among the ¿ rst per
formers to play Pickled Fish when
the hotel’s owners, Tiffany and
Americana
ERICK BENGEL — The Daily Astorian
Ezra Holbrook, left, the music booker for Pickled Fish and one of the founding members of The
Decemberists, chats with venue co-owners Tiffany Turner, center, and her husband, Brady Turner.
Brady Turner, chose to add live mu
sic at the restaurant in winter 2013.
A Seattlebased musician, Noble is
used to playing dark, downstairs
venues packed with lighting rigs
and short on atmosphere.
“At a normal venue, you are the
atmosphere, and that’s it. And if
you’re not, then it’s a boring show,”
he said. “Here, it’s all about the at
mosphere. So rather than try and
compete with the atmosphere, you
try and become a part of it instead.”
Noble has now performed at
Pickled Fish almost 10 times . “It’s
nice to play down at the beach,
that’s for sure, ” he said.
Kati Claborn, a guitarist and
banMo player who, with her part
ner, Luke Ydstie, an upright bass
player, has performed at Pickled
Fish the ¿ rst 0onday, Tuesday and
Wednesday of each month for al
most a year.
“The room encourages the
breaking down of the wall be
tween performer and audience,”
The music booker is Ezra Hol
brook, a founding member of The
Decemberists who has produced al
bums for about 20 years and played
in approximately 40 bands.
He reckons that about 60 to 70
percent of the musicians that play
Pickled Fish tour nationally, includ
ing Fernando, Jerry Joseph, Scott
0cCaughey, Tony Furtado, The
0aldives, 5abbit Wilde, and The
Wild Ones . Whenever possible,
he tries to attract artists working in
folk, country, blue grass, rock ‘n’
roll, vintage swing and other classic
American genres.
That someone like 0cCaughey
— the current leader of The 0inus
5, a former guitarist for 5.E.0.,
and a big ¿ sh in the alternative rock
community — would play such a
small venue testi¿ es to how well
the owners treat the talent, Hol
brook said.
See VENUE, Page 4C
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