Person People

When I got back to my house at half-past midnight on Saturday night,
I walked in with one hand full of local hip-hop collective Person
People’s new CD, “heARTbeats,” and one hand full of local painter Mark
Räda’s “heARTbeats”-inspired artwork.

Plus a head full of appreciation for my town’s vibrant arts scene.It
was that kind of night. Person People (heretofore known as “PP”) filled
the Domino Room not only with forward-thinking, full-band-powered
hip-hop and a near-capacity 500 fans (many of them quite young), but
also a carnival of culture that showcased much of what’s cool about
living in Bend.I was there mainly for the music, of course.
After an opening set of weird, wandering acid-jazz by Eugene’s Eleven
Eyes, PP’s five MCs and DJ A-Bomb took the stage for an old-school set
focused on beats and rhymes.It was fun, but marred by technical
difficulties. Namely, the tracks kept skipping, zigging when the
rappers zagged, and vice versa. No matter. When a Sorski verse was cut
short by a track that just wouldn’t cooperate, he called for a beatbox
from one of his mates, and finished his part anyway, to triumphant
applause.Still, when the instrumentalists began to wander onto
the stage, I could feel the anticipation rising in the room. As the
recorded beat to PP’s signature song, “Oregonize,” wafted through the
air, you could see the band stealing glances at each other and tensing
their muscles in preparation to play.And then, they joined in.
Aaron-Andre Miller plunked out the mournful piano line in “Oregonize.”
Jared Forqueran pounded the drums for the first time. The energy on the
stage immediately jumped several notches.It was clear the main event had arrived.For
the next 90 minutes, PP put on a clinic on making 11 moving parts work
together. The MCs took turns doing solo tracks — highlights included
Mez’s “Build” and Herin Rookery’s “Birthday Suit” — and in between,
they’d tear through their collaborations from “heARTbeats.”I
should’ve taken better notes, but I was taken aback by the vibe of it
all. Here were 11 buddies from Bend, their bonds forged by a love not
just of hip-hop, but of music, and art in general, ringleading a
packed-house celebration of Bend’s creative class.They performed
against a projected image of the Räda painting that adorns their
album’s cover. They shouted out The Grove, and local writer Jonathan
Ludwig, and artists’ collective PoetHouse Art, and Camp Tumalo.The
PP band hopped from jazz to funk to full-on rock ’n’ roll with ease,
incorporating fiddle as the night wore on. All the while, five MCs did
a hip-hop ballet, taking turns in the spotlight, or stepping to the
side of the stage for a sip of beer, or crouching behind a speaker to
just sit and watch their friends perform.Smiles and back-slaps were abundant.The
show was fun early on but picked up serious momentum near the end, just
like a good show should. “Smoke” was a joyous hip-hop hoedown. The
sing-song chorus of “Bottle Lips” forced the folks around me into
frenzied dance mode.And my favorite track from the new record,
“Tsst,” was a perfect closer. Its slow-burning crescendo felt somehow
like a proper send-off, a wave goodbye from artist to audience.But
it was the penultimate song that provided my favorite moment of the
evening. As the intro to the new album’s title track thudded through
the Domino Room, Person People's KP became an MC in the
traditional sense of the word, thanking the crowd for coming and
introducing the band one by one.And then he said something that
drove home what for me was the theme of the night: Local artists. Local
art. Local people supporting these efforts, feeling pride in the things
being created here.“We are Person People,” he said, “from Bend, Oregon.”Honestly, I got the chills right then.Not from Portland. Not from Seattle. Not from California. Not from anywhere else. From Bend, Oregon.

-Ben Salmon can be reached at 541-383-0377 or bsalmon@bendbulletin.com. - Bend Bulletin