Kelsey Johnson

PDX Pop Now!

PDX Pop Now! is a volunteer-driven nonprofit organization dedicated to celebrating, promoting, and enhancing Portland's vital and diverse music community. We also strive to connect this community, in various ways, to the public. Begun in 2004 in true DIY fashion by a dozen or so members of the PDX-POP mailing list, the group has produced three music compilations and FREE, ALL AGES multi-day music festivals, to which The Shins, The Thermals, Sleater-Kinney, The Decemberists, Viva Voce, Stephen Malkmus, Lifesavas, Quasi, M. Ward, Menomena, The Blow, Mirah, Talkdemonic, The Gossip, Helio Sequence, and dozens more Portland artists – nationally-heralded and little-known alike – contributed recordings or performances. The PDX Pop Now! festivals,which have provided the public the opportunity to see up to 50 of Portland's finest bands in one safe venue, have drawn audiences in the thousands. The compilations have generated considerable play from local FM radio and have sold thousands of combined copies, mostly through local independent record stores, and helped fund the festivals. Artists, businesses, and individual volunteers all donate their time and resources to produce an annual truly stellar grassroots event.