CONTENTS
PAGE 2 • GO! MAGAZINE
talent
THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 2021 • THE BULLETIN
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and creative workers — by offering grants and a platform to bring attention to local
amazing talent. This is a crowdfunding effort with a first-round fundraising goal of $40,000.
To make a tax-deductible donation or apply for a grant, go to bendbulletin.com/talent
Songwriter Perez puts energy into activism
BY DAVID JASPER
The Bulletin
K
ourtni Perez had been writing songs
since she was a kid, but it was a
few years after the Salinas, Califor-
nia-born musician moved to Central Ore-
gon in 2012 that she got serious about her
craft.
“I’ve actually known how to kind of play
by ear since I was young, but I just kind of
sat down and made myself do it,” she said.
“I taught myself to play keyboard just with
iPhone apps and Googling stuff online.”
Perez, who bills herself by her first name
in her music, is this week’s featured Central
Oregon Creative Artists Relief Effort art-
ist. Also known as CO CAREs, the grant
program seeks to provide financial relief to
creatives such as Perez whose incomes have
been adversely affected by the COVID-19
pandemic.
In addition to learning keys, she also took
voice lessons with Cascade School of Music
CO CARE s
in the last few
years, she said.
The fruits of
her labors can
be heard on her
2020 EP “Kourtni,”
available on Spotify. She describes her
sound as “sad-girl bedroom pop,” and cites
as influences female artists such as Lana Del
Rey, Taylor Swift and Halsey.
Prior to the pandemic, Perez was per-
forming regularly at open mics along with
a few monthly paying gigs, “and that all
ended,” she said. “I was on my way to do a
self-guided tour from Washington to San
Diego. I had merch … almost printed, and
yeah, that just put a screeching halt to it.
But with things reopening and live en-
tertainment again a possibility, Perez has a
July 18 show in
the works at 10
Barrel (east) and
recently recorded
Kourtni Perez
several songs for
her next album at
JamSpace Bend.
If a theme to the new songs is emerging,
it’s “still a lot of boy hate,” she said. “That’s
about what it is, just broken-heart sort of
vibes. My last two ex-boyfriends are going
to get a lot of face time on this next album.
I mean, never date a musician unless you’re
ready to have songs written about you.”
Her energies, musical and otherwise, are
not just directed toward nursing broken
hearts: Perez does social media and mar-
keting for the Healing Justice Collective,
“which sources BIPOC community
members with nontraditional heal-
ing methods such as acupuncture and
mental health services, holistic health
services — things that are not able to
be afforded by those communities,” she
explained, using a term that stands for
Black, Indigenous and people of color.
“With everything going on post-pan-
demic, post-George Floyd, I got really into
the activism scene, and so music took an
absolute backseat to that because that just
felt more important,” she said. “I was orga-
nizing the protests. I was there at every sin-
gle protest in Central Oregon last summer.”
That activism turned up in the col-
laborative September 2020 single “Great
Again,” featuring music and production by
Theclectik. Over a deceptively chill beat, she
decries systemic violence and sings/pledges,
“We won’t stop until it’s justice for all.”
find what’s inside
read: Librarians’ recommendations, p.7
listen: Concert announcements, p.4
staff
watch: Movies starring the moon, p.19
about this magazine
editor Jody Lawrence-Turner | 541-383-0308, jlawrence-turner@bendbulletin.com
events specialist Makenzie Whittle | 541-383-0304, mwhittle@bendbulletin.com
GO! Magazine publishes Thursdays. Find us online at bendbulletin.com/go
editor & fine arts David Jasper | 541-383-0349, djasper@bendbulletin.com
page designer Jenny Johnston | jjohnston@bendbulletin.com
address: 320 SW Upper Terrace Drive, Suite 200, Bend, OR 97702
outdoors writer Mark Morical | 541-383-0318, mmorical@bendbulletin.com
Cover image: 123RF
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