The Best Gloomy Bands

Kyle Bates, who performs as Drowse, recently talked to the City Cast Portland podcast about Portland’s music, its rainy winters, and the possible connections between the two. We also asked for Kyle’s recommendations for Portland’s best gloomy bands right now. Here they are to round out your winter listening.

Being Awone
“Part of why I like his stuff is that it is all home recorded, and it has this really unique atmosphere that comes from him using a lot of sounds that are traditionally considered maybe cheesy or culturally camp — like eighties Casio sounds. He weaves them into his music in this way where they take on this really sad atmosphere and wistful feeling like a childhood memory.“And then I also just love his songwriting, and I really love the way that he combines electronics with these sad low-fi guitar parts and stuff. I definitely think Taylor [Malsey]'s a totally underrated genius of Portland.” 

Folian
“They also play solo, mostly home recorded music. It's much more in that lineage of Pacific Northwest Metal. It's not black metal, but it has that doom-and-gloom atmosphere to it. It’s very dark, but then it has an almost uplifting appeal to the vocals. “Devan [Stefáni Fylstra] also creates these video collages when they play live and they perform while watching them and sync their sounds to them in a way and improvise spontaneously to the visuals. And a lot of the video collage material is just taken from scenes of Portland and surrounding areas and beautiful nature shots. Their recordings are great, but as a live performer, they're really amazing.”

Yellow Room
“I guess you would call it indie, more traditional but pretty downcast. They're drawing from other bands that have lived in and around Portland, like Duster or Grouper, but then making it a bit more poppy and accessible. They have really driving songs. Annie [Fifer]'s voice — the singer — is just really beautiful and has this melancholy to it.”