pampelmoose Dave Allen of Gang of Four’s Music and Media Blog

Meg, 1/2ALIVE’s resident photographer. ©Nilina Mason-Campbell

A post from Nilina Mason-Campbell. It’s Vancouver B.C theme week for me this week! I spent much of last week up in B.C. with but one question on my mind: is Vancouver, BC the next Portland? It seriously seems to be a city on the verge of exploding. There are so many things pointing to B.C. as the next big scene - not only my first-person observations, but right now it also appears to be the internet’s “Next Big Thing.”

Carles, the man behind Hipster Runoff who I enjoy referring to as Carlismo, walks a fine line between deriding and generating hype on Hipster Runoff. One of my favorite shows as a kid was Where in the World is Carmen San Diego? and it seems like internet users around the world enjoy playing the same game with him. So many people thought that he was a Portland resident (even though he claims Brooklyn, NY as his borough on MySpace) due to his obsession with Portland in his posts. One day it’d be a post triumphing Easter Egg and the next it’d be a contest of looks between Glass Candy’s Ida No and Ruth of the Chromatics. Not only is he plugged into the hipster pulse of Portland, but future trends across the world, mostly be way of the party pics he posts and skewers; now he’s turned his gaze to Vancouver - big time. Last week Carles told me by email: “My bl0g is a metaphor 4 consumer perception in middle America.” And I’d agree. So is his paying endless attention to B.C. an indication that people elsewhere are too?

Whereas Portland has an abundance of bands, Vancouver’s musical talent lies mostly in its DJs. Yes, Portland has DJs, but not of international caliber that go on tours and are a huge draw just on their DJ name. While I was there, Vancouver resident My!Gay!Husband! of the 1/2ALIVE club night flew down to Mexico. On the menu? A couple of headline MySpace gigs, booked due to his MySpace Top Artists position. I can’t imagine Portland’s crop of DJ talent ever placing in any of those columns. Avant-dance French-Canadian outfit, Dandi Wind, have just moved to B.C, so could an influx of band talent be on the horizon for the territory?

And though Vancouver’s party scene does have a lot in common with New York and Los Angeles, the charming gray NW weather it shares with Portland cancels out those connections…. hahahaha…… And while New York and Los Angeles are the right coast, left coast axis of the States, Portland is a bit of a geographical outpost on the grid in relation to them just as Vancouver is to Canada’s hubs of Montreal and Toronto.

I’m well aware that if you search for parallels you’ll always find them. Still, it’s the everyone’s-an-artist reality, the fact that so many things are trending towards Vancouver and the fact that everyone there seems excited for what’s happening there sparked the comparison between the NW cities. There’s the same everyone-knows-everyone, small-town vibe and a key support system in place within the community for those who are doing something artistically. Being there gave me the impression that it’s only a matter of time before more and more young people start packing up their bags and heading towards Vancouver’s drug riddled streets to party it up and make their own mark on the art scene.

Based on my own experiences in Berlin and Portland before, during and after they’ve each been declared “scenes,” it seems like Vancouver may be making inroads in joining those ranks. Who knows, it just may be coming up from behind. People certainly have their eyes set on it. Vancouver’s a darkhorse, but it has its possibilities.

So what does it take to make a scene/city explode? Get tons of people moving there? Word of mouth? Press? Hype? The talent it produces? Live-ableness? (if so, Vancouver is screwed though they do have health care!) The potential it offers? That question actually interests me alot. Over the next few days I’ll be besieging you with some of B.C.’s talent. You ready?