The Stranger

I Saw U: Hugging Outside La Dive, Buying Soup at Trader Joe’s, and Giving a Rectal Exam in the ER

Anonymous — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 15:14:00 -0800

Did you see someone? Say something! by Anonymous

three friends on the one line

you and your friends hopped on the packed 1 line yesterday as i was heading home, but your black/blond hair combo got me, hmu?

huggers outside la dive 1/5

Seattle, we don’t hug enough. Or at least not like the two I saw last Thursday night. That was an EMBRACE. TY for keeping romance and whimsy alive.

Drugged up and down bad

Me: I’m the ER for a broken back. You: hot doctor who had to give me a rectal exam. Let’s break HIPPA?

u know how to whistle don't you steve

to have and have not @ SIFF. same stop on D line. i regret not saying hi! u have good taste in clothes & movies. thin man @ central cinema next month?

My heart stopped in the soup aisle

Cap Hill TJ’s 2/11 6pm. You: Dark ponytail, glasses, 2 black panniers, rolled up pant leg Me: Blue coat, short brown beard, wishing I paused when we locked eyes by your bike

Compliments @ st. Bread 2/6

you, blonde cutie w/ a blue bag and “mt. st. helens pin” me: wearing an orange knitted hat. You complimented my hat and name. Baked goods on me?

Is it a match? Leave a comment here or on our Instagram post to connect!

Did you see someone? Say something! Submit your own I Saw U message here and maybe we'll include it in the next roundup!

In This House We Believe in Goblins, Gondal, Björk, and Hildegard of Bingen

Audrey Vann — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Mt Fog on the Making of Their New Album, Every Stone Is Green

by Audrey Vann

If a Washington rainforest started a band, it would sound something like Mt Fog. Carolyn B.’s playful whispers are like a sprite luring you into a mossy forest; the rhythm section—Andy Sells and Casey Rosebridge—like raindrops plopping into a mushroom; the electronics shimmer like a ray of light through the trees. The Seattle-based trio whimsically marries the vocal stylings of Kate Bush, Björk, and Siouxsie Sioux with sparse electronics, evocative of CAN and Mort Garson, and a free jazz song structure. Ahead of releasing their new album, Every Stone Is Green (out Mar 13), and accompanying release show at the Tractor Tavern, I spoke to the band about the medieval mystics, cosmic jazz albums, and psychedelic dreams that inspired them.

One thing that is really unique about Mt Fog is that you don’t use six-string guitars. Was this a conscious choice or something that happened by accident?
CAROLYN: Well, I started Mt Fog as my solo project, and I don't play guitar—I’ve never been that into guitars. So, in the beginning, all the music I was writing was oriented towards voice and a drum machine. It has just evolved from that. Also, I think a trio is the most powerful, stable form. If we had a guitarist, they wouldn't be included in our throuple scenarios. [Laughs]

ANDY: Carolyn covers a lot of ground with the various synth patches and her voice. We play around with all kinds of textures as well, with the drum and bass. It's full enough without having a guitar. Although I like the guitar sometimes. It's either guitar, or I’m like, hey, we should put some congas on this thing!

CAROLYN: No guitar. No shaker. No slap bass.

ANDY: There are a lot of rules in Mt Fog [laughs]. It’s not a democracy, and that's cool.

Every Stone Is Green has an improvisational feel to it, especially on songs like “Trees in Conversation.” Were spontaneous decisions made while recording?
ANDY: There's not a whole lot to say about the drums on “Trees in Conversation,” but it was improvised. We kind of built that into the song that's right after it, so it starts with the drum solo, then goes into “Eyes in Buildings.” I have a jazz background, so that song has that improvisational character to it. I was surprised when Carolyn said, “Yeah, the drum solo should be this long!”

CAROLYN: Side B is more spontaneous because we recorded it live together in the studio. My instincts on this album were to capture a fleeting, whimsical, curious feeling, so I'm really happy to hear that comes across. The song started as these rough ideas, as songs do, and then we worked on them together, and things would come up just naturally, spontaneously. For example, “Imperfect Machine” was something Casey came up with while I was taking a break during rehearsal. I came in, and he was playing this really cool thing. I made a voice memo of it, and then he and Andy expounded upon that idea at the studio. Then, I had a realization that the song sounded like a caravan full of giggling goblins with a little ratty flag coming through the desert, that’s like, getting closer and closer, then goes off into the distance.

What media were you consuming while writing or recording the album?
CAROLYN: ECM’s ’70s jazz records were a big influence, particularly Gateway [the trio of John Abercrombie, Dave Holland, and Jack DeJohnette]. It’s hard to describe, but they create these portals in time that you could spend a million years in—it's really beautiful cosmic jazz. One of the records we have by them had a skip in it during Dave Holland’s bass playing that was really cool. I recorded it, and then while learning bass, I tried to replicate that baseline skip. That became the basis for “Grimelda’s Cave.” It was an immediate reflection of the things we were listening to. We were also listening to a lot of prog—Yes’s Fragile, and a lot of other weird 1970s jazz. I was just thinking a lot about the different textures you can make and how music can be fractal; there are micro moments that can be really special, but how do we turn them into a whole song?

I was also inspired by mystics of the medieval times, especially Hildegard of Bingen. I've always loved her—I organized a mini music festival last year inspired by her, which got me to delve deeper into her concept of “viriditas,” about the green energy that's within us all. One of the songs, “Life as a Window,” is from Hildegard’s perspective.

ANDY: We all have musical backgrounds, but it's all filtered through Carolyn’s vision. Carolyn has concepts for a lot of the songs, like “Hey, this sounds like goblins!”

CASEY: Yeah, it’s usually goblins.

You also mentioned the Brontës in your album description. Do you have a favorite Brontë sister or a favorite Brontë novel?
CAROLYN: Definitely Jane Eyre. While thinking about how to describe the album, I was like, “It's Gothic with a capital G, like Gothic literature.” Andy was like, “No one will know what that means; they’ll think it means dark wave.” So I described it as “a Gothic tale, in the Brontë sisters’ sense.”

I think, too, that there are feminine aspects to the music, reminiscent of a journey that might get scary at times. You might encounter big landscapes and ghosts. You may not be able to entirely understand what's going on, and there is a lot of heightened emotion. The Brontë sisters created huge worlds, even though their worlds were actually really small. They were governesses; they didn't traverse that much area, yet they were able to build these magnificent emotional universes.

My friend actually asked me recently which Brontë sister each member of Mt Fog is. I was like, “We're not the sisters, we’re actually long-lost characters from the Brontë sisters' imagined world of Gondal. [Laughs]

Do you think seclusion is necessary for making art?
CAROLYN: Actually, Björk was recently talking about how streaming is the worst thing for artists because of the pressure of constantly being visible and making things. Björk is on our wall. [Points at poster] We love Björk in this household. “In this house we believe…” [Laughs]

It’s a great thing to think about, because being able to retreat, hide, and explore things without being looked at is really, really important. It’s also really important for artists to be original. When you're out in the world, you're like a sponge absorbing information, and you need time to go home and dream about it. I think isolation is the sleeping/dreaming aspect of being an artist—you have to go to sleep so you can learn things. I think being alone is important as an artist, so you can synthesize the world that you're experiencing. Throw your computer into the sea, metaphorically (don’t cause environmental pollution!).

Is the band’s relationship to the internet something you guys think about often?
CAROLYN: Definitely. We're all involved with Seattle Artists Against Spotify. As artists, we have a responsibility to be leaders and help create the world that we want to see. Our music is not on Spotify, but people are still listening to it. I don’t think these corporate-owned platforms have our best interests in mind. It’s a losing game for artists to try to succeed on these platforms. I'd rather have 100 people listen to our record and cry than a million people streaming on Spotify while they're doing five other things and paying their taxes.

What are your personal favorite tracks on the album?
CASEY: “Look Inside” really resonates with me lyrically and musically. I like the melody, the bass line, and the shape of the song—it’s fun to play. Every element is individually catchy, the energy is infectious, and the message is really positive.

CAROLYN: My favorite track is “A Single Green Strand Emerges,” because the idea came from the most vivid dream I've ever had. In this dream, I was looking for someone and came upon this vintage camera with a single green strand emerging from the aperture. I knew I had to crawl into the camera to find the person I was looking for. When I crawled inside, the middle of the camera was a dirt tunnel. I could feel that I was climbing through this tight space, and then, I emerged into a green, soft world that was very childlike. I found the person I was looking for, but I also knew I had to leave soon. It was one of the most psychedelic experiences I've ever had. So, the song is about that dream, and also about the feeling of working really hard to get someone to love you, which is a sad feeling that I've experienced before.

ANDY: “Green Strand Emerges” is also my favorite. I just love the feel and the power of it. I think it's a nice representation of what the band has morphed into. Plus, we recorded it live in the studio together, which is a testament to what the band can do. We were able to pull it off, and we surprised ourselves when we finished recording it. We were like, “Holy shit, this is it!”

Can you guys tell me a little bit more about the album artwork? Did the artist make it before listening to the album, or after? How did it come about?
CAROLYN: Yeah, we actually have the original oil painting right here. [Points at wall] It was done by our friend Nico Lund. She came to one of our shows, and we just connected like mad. Then, I reached out to her to see if she would make an original painting for our album art. It turns out she was about to reach out to me about the same thing! We were both in each other's heads. So, I shared all of the earliest recordings of the album, before we had fully recorded everything.

We had a lot of conversations, but she is a fan of our music, so she already knew the vibe. When I first saw the concept sketch, I started crying because it was just so perfect. Then she took that original concept and made this beautiful painting. She's an amazing artist. Her work is really cool in person, too.

Let’s end with a fun question! Can you each share an artist, album, or song that you love but that other people hate? What music needs to be reevaluated?
CAROLYN: I like Björk’s 2007 album Volta, and I know some people really don't like that one. I love the song “Earth Intruders”—the very beginning sounds like gross, muddy footsteps. I actually like tried to recreate it for one of our other songs, and I wasn't able to come close. I also like that weird costume she wears on the cover.

ANDY: Maybe the third Duran Duran record, Seven and the Ragged Tiger—I think it's a really cool record. I also like the Accüsed a lot, which is a pretty far stretch from Mt Fog. Martha Splatterhead's Maddest Stories Ever Told is one of my favorite records that's ever been put out.

CASEY: I’ll say Muse—people always told me that they were a poser band to like when I was like 18. They’d say, “Oh, you like Muse? That’s so lame!” But I thought they were so cool, and I still think they have cool musical ideas—they seem like fucking dorks, but whatever.

See Mt Fog at Tractor Tavern on Thursday, March 12, 8 pm, 21+

The Best Bang for Your Buck Events in Seattle This Weekend: Mar 6–8, 2026

EverOut Staff — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 10:04:00 -0800

Seattle Women's March, Ai Weiwei: Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads, and More Cheap & Easy Events Under $20

by EverOut Staff

Ready for the time jump that is spring forward this Sunday? Before Monday's rough wake up call, spend time at weekend events from the Seattle Women's March to Seattle Fat Mall's Big Love Social + Market and from Chinatown-International District's Lunar New Year Celebration to the opening of Ai Weiwei: Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads. For more ideas, check out our top picks of the week.

FRIDAY LIVE MUSIC

Echo Ravine (Album Release,) VuVu & Black Nite Crash
Local band Echo Ravine joked on Instagram that though two of its members are originally from Massachusetts, their friendship survived the Super Bowl. The group is used to bridging divides; their alt-rock song "Tumbling Wall" is about breaking down literal and metaphorical barriers between countries and people. The track is off their third album, Taking Up Space, which they put out last month and are celebrating with a release show at Seattle's own community-owned cooperative venue this Friday. Pick up a one-of-a-kind record at the show—the band hand-stamped images and track names onto the vinyl covers for a perfectly DIY feel. Fellow shoegaze bands Black Nite Crash and VuVu open the night with their layered, guitar-driven rock. SHANNON LUBETICH
(Conor Byrne Pub, Ballard, $15)

Slog AM: Layoffs at the 5th Avenue Theater, Kristi Noem Gets the Boot, Swiss Canton Lets Coat of Arms Keep Its Red Bear Penis

Nathalie Graham — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 09:30:00 -0800

The Stranger's morning news roundup. by Nathalie Graham

Layoffs at the 5th: The 5th Avenue Theatre Company is laying off 14 employees, cutting staff from 55 people to 41. The 5th is mired in the $7.5 million budget deficit it’s accumulated since the pandemic. Subscription rates haven’t recovered since COVID-era slowdowns. So, the theater is cutting jobs in "marketing, box office, education, and artistic departments," according to the Seattle Times. If you care about live theater in Seattle, you better go see their production of Jesus Christ Superstar this May. Don’t be a Judas.

We're Doing Slurs Now? During a House debate in Olympia over a bill that would “eliminate the Community Protection Program, a service for people with developmental disabilities who have a history of sexually aggressive behavior" Sen. Leonard Christian, R-Spokane Valley said this: "The folks that we’re responsible for, we’re putting rapists in with retarded people," reports the Seattle Times. It's not 2007 anymore, Leonard. He later defended his use of the r-word, saying it emphasized that the bill would be "feeding these people to the wolves." He has not apologized.

School District Sued: Makena Simonsen, a special needs student in the Edmonds School District (ESD), graduated from Lynnwood High School with a 3.87 GPA and a first-grade reading level. Four years after getting her diploma, Simonsen's family is suing ESD claiming it was "benevolent discrimination" to hand their daughter a diploma. Because if she hadn’t gotten one, she would’ve been eligible for a free vocational program in the district that helps special needs students make the transition to adult life. Simonsen had to pay more than $40,000 for a similar program at Bellevue College.

Big News for like 20 People: The walking, rolling, and biking advocacy group Seattle Neighborhood Greenways has rebranded to Seattle Streets Alliance. Just thought some of you might care, idk.

The Weather: Drizzly, rainy. What did you expect?

The Time: And say goodbye to an hour of sleep starting Sunday. Clocks skip forward this weekend.

Security. We’re On It: Donald Trump has removed Kristi Noem as Secretary of Homeland Security and replaced her with Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Oklahoma). Her new role is “Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas,” head of a new security initiative. The purpose of this very real job will be announced tomorrow at an event in Florida.

It’s Tornado Season: Warm Gulf air is mixing with cold air from Canada. Millions of Americans from Iowa to Texas could be hit by strong tornados, the AP reports. Taking precautions could be the difference between life and death, experts say.

Water Is Wet: Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. The Pope is from Chicago. And the Florida International University college republicans are racist. Leaked WhatsApp group chats showed—surprise, surprise—the young conservatives are sending slurs, sexist and homophobic comments, and Nazi references back and forth. I can't wait until they graduate into high-level roles at Palantir.

I Don't Know Who I Am Anymore: For some reason, I care about Shohei Ohtani hitting a grand slam in his first game with team Japan at the World Baseball Classic.

SHOHEI OHTANI GRAND SLAM

[image or embed]
— MLB Daily News (@insidemlbnews.bsky.social) March 6, 2026 at 2:35 AM

Meanwhile, the Mariners Blew Chunks in Their Latest Spring Training Game: As Lookout Landing put it, Seattle's favorite only baseball team "gave up three touchdowns and two field goals" to the Padres yesterday. Yep, they lost 27-6.

An Update from Job Land: It's no good out there in Job Land. Employers axed 92,000 jobs in February and unemployment climbed to 4.4 percent. The unemployment rate isn’t bad, but the fact that it's rising is worrisome. The report paints a bleak picture of stagnant job growth. Hang onto your job if you have one.

Congrats to everyone who voted for Trump and a Republican Congress "for the economy." This is what you get, a sputtering job creation engine that can't make progress like before and keeps rolling backwards.

www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

[image or embed]
— Max Kennerly (@maxkennerly.bsky.social) March 6, 2026 at 7:20 AM

We are the Baddies: According to Reuters, US military investigators are pretty sure the US is responsible for the apparent strike on an Iranian girls school that killed 150 children. The investigation hasn't been concluded yet.

War Continues: On Friday, Israel warplanes barraged Tehran and Beirut. Iran launched retaliatory strikes against Israel. President Trump made it clear he wants "complete surrender" from Iran. He made this statement in a Truth Social post.

Pass Gas: China is pressing Tehran to allow crude oil and Qatari gas safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, Reuters reports. The war has all but shut the Straight, which makes China unhappy, because China gets 45 percent of its oil from the Straight. Meanwhile, crude oil prices are up 15 percent and US gas prices rose 11 percent in one week, hitting their highest point in the last year-and-a-half. Will this radicalize the normies?

Don't Forget about the Real Threat to Humanity: While everyone is worried about the rise of fascism, global warfare, and AI, climate change is still chugging away and spelling our doom. Researchers found that we are heating the earth faster than ever before. The heating rate has almost doubled. From 1970 and 2015, global heating increased by a rate less than 0.2 celsius per decade. In this most recent decade, that number jumped to 0.35 celcius. Scientists say that's the highest jump in warming since anyone started keeping track of temperature back in 1880. We are so boned.

Huge News: The Swiss Canton of Bern has chosen to keep the bear penis on its coat of arms after the government rejected a proposal to erase his junk. This bear will continue to hang dong as he has proudly for 600 years.

A Song for your Friday: I didn't know what to pick, so I scrolled randomly in my library and stopped on this. Enjoy.

News editor Vivian McCall poured a bit of blood and sweat into this slog.

Meats and Cheeses

Meg van Huygen — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 15:00:00 -0800

After opening Outsider BBQ last March, self-taught pitmaster Onur Gulbay quickly built himself a cult following in Seattle. by Meg van Huygen

Hard to believe it’s been a whole year since Seattle, frequently bemoaned by Southerners as a barbecue wasteland, finally got some legit Texas-style barbecue. And made by a Turkish guy, no less. After opening Outsider BBQ last March, self-taught pitmaster Onur Gulbay quickly built himself a cult following with the authentic Central Texas-ass barbecue chops that he picked up while living in Austin.

“I went to Franklin Barbecue and just fell in love,” Gulbay says, “and kept going back over and over, talking to the guys there, until I could learn how they were doing it.”

What started out as a pop-up, which the former IBM salesman ran from a portable smoker on wheels, re-manifested last year in the massive ex-Frelard Pizza Company space on Leary. Gulbay has since transformed the place into a sprawling smoked-meats compound, replete with fire pits, retractable garage-door walls, a play area for kids, a separate little house for his TWO gigantic smokers, and a huge outdoor beer garden. (Guess he learned that part from Texas, too. Oops, haha, it is cold here.)

If this style and caliber of barbecue weren’t rare enough in the Northwest, Gulbay next-levels it with his gently Turkified versions of classic Southern sides: sumac-dusted potato salad, lemon–poppyseed coleslaw, a cinnamony rice pudding called sütlaç that’s similar to the American version except it's taken a ride in the smoker. The flavorful “street corn,” is a thick, creamy scoop of grilled esquites that’s loaded with fresh herbs and black pepper and shares architectural properties with Beecher’s mac. When asked what he puts it in, Gulbay pauses, then says, “Lots and lots of cheese. Like six cheeses.”

As for the meats, y’all can’t miss the snappy jalapeno-cheddar sausage, made in-house from pork and brisket trimmings, or the buttery meltaway brisket that disintegrates as soon as you breathe on it. Gulbay himself can’t get enough of the succulent beef rib, which is just flamboyantly enormous and always makes me think of the chunk of dino ribs that makes the runny footmobile fall over in the opener from The Flintstones. “My very favorite,” Gulbay proclaims. “It’s a whole meal by itself.”

On Saturday, March 7, Outsider BBQ will be celebrating its first birthday with live music, specials, new menu items, and an all-day indoor/outdoor party. Guests should make sure to say hi to Gulbay, who is a goddang character and will be holding court all day. As our local barbecue prescriptivists bitch on Reddit about grill marks and bark tones, Gulbay’s creative take on a very pious category of American cuisine is at once faithful and playful, and it's refreshing as hell to see. It's also a great example of what makes Seattle’s restaurant scene so vivacious and unique. Something to celebrate for sure.

Said it before, but this town is a rough place to open a new restaurant, especially if you’re new to the area—and to say nothing of it being your first restaurant!—so a year in biz is no small feat. Congrats to Gulbay and the Outsider team, who are clearly elite insiders now. We’re so glad you’re here.

Local Music You Shouldn’t Miss

Dave Segal — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 15:00:00 -0800

New Albums From Sax Explorer Kate Olson and Ex-TAD Front Man Thomas Andrew Doyle

by Dave Segal

Kate Olson
So It Goes
(OA2)

Saxophonist/composer Kate Olson has excelled in Seattle’s jazz and experimental scenes for about 15 years as a solo artist, bandleader, and member of Syrinx Effect, Royal Room Collective Music Ensemble, and Battlestar Kalakala. She’s especially shown an affinity for minimalist works that exhibit a deep spirituality, à la Terry Riley, Pauline Oliveros, and Don Cherry. Olson’s last album, 2020’s Homeland, pushed her into new territory: funereal post-rock, industrial music recalling the Bug’s iciest and most ominous moments, and discombobulating IDM.

Olson returns to jazz on her new LP, So It Goes, joined by Conner Eisenmenger (trombone, trumpet), Tim Carey (electric bass, electric guitar), and Evan Woodle (drums, percussion). With Olson playing soprano sax, the album zips out of the gate with “Bumbling Thumbs Blues,” bustling bebop full of thrilling dynamics, with Woodle devoting acute attention to the tom-toms. Which makes the transition to the sly “Take Five” homage of “ShouldaCoulda” a brilliant change of pace. Olson finesses a quietly ecstatic and rococo solo in this utterly beguiling and introspective tune. The burrowing, mesmerizing bebop sorcery of “All Pear-Shaped” continues So It Goes’s hot streak.

But Olson also excels at cooler temperatures; her ballad game is strong. “Nominally Challenged” is beautiful, serpentine jazz for late nights or early mornings, while “Pink Mountain”—a delicate, bittersweet ballad—displays Olson’s playing at its most tender. Dedicated to Billy Pilgrim, protagonist of Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, “So It Goes” is a languorous, melancholy ballad with scene stalwarts Wayne Horvitz on piano and Geoff Harper on double bass. And showing immaculate taste, Olson and company—with Horvitz and Harper again lending stellar support—do justice to the legend Alice Coltrane’s questing astral-jazz composition “Translinear Light,” the title track from her final studio album. Real recognize real.

Thomas Andrew Doyle
Twilight
(Incineration Ceremony)

It’s crazy that Thomas Andrew Doyle’s synth-based music from 2017 onward flies so far under the radar, even though it ranks among his best output. The man best known as the leader of Sub Pop grunge brutes TAD has undergone a radical transformation in this century, and maybe fans of that band and critics just can’t get their heads around this new and improved musician/composer.

These days, Doyle’s into creating soundtracks in search of film directors who revel in transporting viewers to profoundly disturbing places. Twilight is Doyle’s latest excursion into the vast bleak. The epic title track begins with a subdued, solemn organ drone poised between hope and distress, creating a paradoxical tension. Eventually, ceremonial male chants enter and lend a wafting gravitas to proceedings. It would sound infernally grand in a theater. “1 over 137” is a bass-heavy dirge of deep suspense, cut with fluid synth motifs that suggest an appreciation for Dune-loving keyboard sorcerer Bernard Szajner. On “Decimated,” Doyle coaxes out the interstellar eeriness of Brian Eno’s best ’80s ambient releases. The despairing drones of “Dormant Complexities” approximate the sound of E.M. Cioran’s brain waves as he was writing A Short History of Decay. Dedicated to Doyle’s late friend, and friend of the paper (and entire city), Bradley Sweek, Twilight epitomizes the art of darkness.

Seattle-area musicians can send music to NewSeattleMusic@thestranger.com for possible coverage.

Ticket Alert: Joji, Gorillaz, and More Seattle Events Going On Sale

EverOut Staff — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 14:00:00 -0800

Plus, The Guess Who and More Event Updates for March 5

by EverOut Staff

We’re serving up another fresh batch of tickets. Lo-fi R&B singer Joji supports his recently released album, Piss in the Wind, at Climate Pledge this summer. English virtual band Gorillaz closes out the North American leg of their Mountain Tour in Seattle. Plus, “American Woman” rockers The Guess Who are takin’ it back on their reunion tour. Read on for details on those and other newly announced events, plus some news you can use.

ON SALE FRIDAY, MARCH 6

MUSIC

Belle & Sebastian: 30th Anniversary Tour, Performing "Tigermilk"
Neptune Theatre (Sat June 13)

Charley Crockett – Age of the Ram Tour
Northern Quest Resort & Casino (Wed July 15)

Concrete Boys
Neumos (Mon May 11)

Night Moves

Michael Wong — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 13:00:00 -0800

Inside a Mahjong Social Club

by Michael Wong

Seattle’s hottest nightclub doesn’t have velvet ropes, bottle service, or a bouncer. Instead, it has folding tables. It has name tags. It has four people to a table, all playing mahjong. A year ago, this kicked off with two borrowed sets. Tonight, Emerald City Tile Club is standing room only.

An Unexpected Friday Night
On a recent Friday night, when I’d usually be confronting my shortcomings as both a home cook and a human, I instead found myself craving connection. For many these days, “socializing” means forwarding each other Reels… and not replying. Which is why it felt somewhat revolutionary to get dressed, hop in my car, and brave the parking situation of Capitol Hill. All to play mahjong with strangers.

I was at Stoup Brewing wearing a name tag, in a small room upstairs—high above the Carhartt-clad product managers and their Patagonia-donning dogs. The room was rocking, and it felt like a fashion show: gold and jade jewelry brushing against Chrome Hearts hoodies, ruched halter tops, and mock neck sweaters. Perfect mahjong fits: dressed for a game their grandparents played, styled like they might end up at a warehouse party after.

Fifteen tables were in play and not one empty. At some, the mood was loose, alternating between silly and flirtatious. At others, players leaned in without speaking, eyes fixed on the pile of engraved ivory tiles in front of them, focused like they were refining macrodata in Severance. Hong Kong, Taiwanese, and Filipino gameplay ensued, with rule sheets open between beer glasses. Onlookers, myself included, crowded around especially interesting games like a Vegas craps table.

I met a white man celebrating his 26th birthday wearing a magnificent custom felt crown like a malevolent mahjong monarch. I dapped him up. At another table, I saw a guy on crutches and another with a boot on. People planned their night around this event—insurance claims included. In the middle of Seattle’s winter, here were over a hundred people voluntarily sitting knee to knee, Labubu to Labubu, for hours, all sharing the understanding that if you sit down long enough, something great might happen.

Community Is Table Stakes
At the center of this room—though he would probably object to that phrasing—was Sean Herrera, the humble proprietor of Emerald City Tile Club.

A year ago, almost to the date, Sean was sipping a beer at Stoup, contemplating his future while doing trivia. He looked up to see folks playing board games, and the idea for Emerald City Tile Club formed all at once. He envisioned an accessible and welcoming social night surrounding the game his dad taught him to play. As a Filipino kid growing up in Alabama, Sean used mahjong as a magnet to find his people. He parlayed that energy when he moved to Seattle, hosting small mahjong nights with friends during COVID. Then they stopped being small. “It got too big at my place,” Sean told me, yelling over the DJs. “And I was like, how do I transform this into something bigger than myself?”

Around that time, he noticed mahjong social nights taking off in New York and Los Angeles, with editorial shots of young Asians framing the game as cool again. Some of the clubs in LA even charged membership or event fees, but that never sat right with Sean. “I don’t want someone moving to Seattle thinking they have to pay to meet friends,” he said. “I hate the idea of having a physical barrier to coming in and hanging out.”

When Sean decided to pitch Stoup on a mahjong night, he went full-out honor student. He shared MLA citations on the resurgence of mahjong among Asian American youth. He included a deck with mockups of attendance. He made a business case for foot traffic and sales. He said please. Stoup obliged, and ECTC was born. Forty people showed up to night one, blowing Sean away and earning more buy-in from Stoup. Tonight, and most nights, ECTC is hosting hundreds of folks.

“I hear about people meeting here and then going on dates,” Sean told me. “Someone came up to me and was like, ‘I met my girl here.’” He laughed, still slightly stunned by it. “I see people hanging out elsewhere and I’m like, ‘I didn’t know y’all were friends.’ And they’re like, ‘Oh, we met through ECTC.’ That’s crazy.”

One night, walking through Capitol Hill, he overheard a group of 20-somethings ahead of him debating whether they were going to “mahjong night” that week. They didn’t know he was behind them. “That’s when I knew this was real.”

Flipping the Script
For decades, mahjong lived in kitchens and garages, in the background of family parties, in rooms that smelled faintly of vapor rub and pork. It was something you inherited. A game you aged into. Now it’s something people line up for.

Across America, mahjong nights are quietly filling restaurants and backrooms. Young people are showing up dressed for a night out and are learning that the romantic prospects are better at the mahjong table than the bars. What used to signal retirement now signals arrival. “The traditional view about mahjong,” Sean said, “is that it’s an old man’s game.” He gestured to the brimming room. “Here in Seattle, we’re flipping that script.”

It’s definitely happening in Seattle, headlined by ECTC and supported by budding nights including Mahjong Mondays at Kilig and QT Mahjong Nights—a community for queer/BIPOC folks to learn mahjong together. At each of these events, community is table stakes, but knowing how to play is not.

So Why Now?
Part of the appeal is structural. Mahjong is analog. You can’t scroll through it, you can’t multitask. In a time where you see more AI slop on your timeline than pictures of actual human beings, the youth yearn for something real. And mahjong provides, not only with tangible tiles and real-life conversations, but also an invitation to unplug. To lean in. To pay attention. In an economy of distraction, that feels radical.

But part of it is cultural. For a generation of Asian Americans, mahjong is less about preserving tradition and more about reclaiming it. It’s taking something your parents played and deciding it belongs in public. It belongs under DJ lights. It belongs in breweries.

It belongs to us.

Same Time Next Week
Back at Stoup, my wife had just won her first game, thanks to three new friends she just met, thrilled to be beaten by their new padawan. The DJs were getting crunk, backed by the comforting cacophony of shuffling tiles. Someone just found a roommate.

In a city designed to keep you alone—in your car, in your apartment, in your feed—the kids are choosing something older. Something slower. Something you can’t swipe away.

I stepped outside into the cold and immediately saw three people I recognized from upstairs arguing about game strategies on the sidewalk.

They’ll be back next week. So will I.

Emerald City Comic Con Has Connections to ICE

Nathalie Graham — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 12:00:00 -0800

A group of unhappy cosplayers penned a petition to Emerald City Comic Con's parent company asking them to do something about it. by Nathalie Graham

There’s a cloud over Emerald City Comic Con (ECCC) this year and, no, it’s not pissing rain. It’s pissing ICE.

Back in January, con-goers discovered that ECCC’s parent company, ReedPop—which acquired the con in 2015 and runs a variety of cons including New York City Comic Con and BookCon—has a not-so-distant connection to the immigration enforcement agency.

The problem lies in a rotten, corporate family tree. Reed Pop is part of the entertainment group RX which is owned by RELX, and RELX owns LexisNexis, a data broker that holds a $22.1 million contract to be ICE’s precogs, helping the agency track people who may potentially commit a crime (and their cars, according to The Intercept) before they’ve actually broken the law.

So a group of unhappy cosplayers penned a petition asking Reedpop, which purports to “promote inclusion and diversity,” to force their parent company to divest from LexisNexis. ReedPop responded with a boilerplate statement, saying “RX, ReedPop and our event brands operate independently from other RELX businesses on an arm's length basis. RX, ReedPop and our event brands do not sell any information or data to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security or U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”

The petition reads: "How can event attendees feel safe, supported, or included when they are deliberately choosing to support the equivalent of the Empire in Star Wars, the Fire Nation in Avatar: The Last Airbender, and other oppressive forces that fans consistently support the dismantling of on-screen and in the pages?”

Elizabeth Sweet, a Korean immigrant known in the cosplay world as Cosmic Reys, co-organized the petition with her friend group of cosplayers and Romantasy lovers (Fourth Wing, A Court of Thorns and Roses, the fanfiction that warped your sexuality) that Mallory Shoemaker, a Disney cosplayer, and Jenna Karr, who primarily cosplays romantasy book characters. (Sidenote, while this group doesn’t have a name, they’ve done panels together as The Bookish Baddies).

Shoemaker (left), Karr, and Sweet think revolutions aren't just for sexy book protagonists.

They wanted to send a message that “Seattle does not eff with ICE,” Sweet says, omitting the cuss word. Nearly 1,300 have signed since late January, and the Baddies have since written to electeds like Mayor Katie Wilson.

Though they aren’t advertising it, they’re tying ECCC’s relationship with ICE into their planned “Smash or Pass” panel about sexy Romantasy characters and tropes.

It’ll be much, much more about fascism than a steamy book panel usually would be (less monsterfucking, more fucking monsters). Sweet gave an example: “We find it attractive when the heroes we root for may have wings or horns or something, but what’s sexier is what they’re standing up for.”

And another: “A smashable trait is standing up for what you believe in and is advocating strongly for critiquing systems of power.”

“We’re putting pressure on our local officials, our city, and reminding nerds, ‘You could be the hero in the story that you're reading about,” Shoemaker says. “You could be Rey, you could be Katniss.”

It’s another gorgeous Spring Arts issue of The Stranger!

Emily Nokes — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Sorry to immediately be a bummer, but I can’t stop thinking about the state of technology. by Emily Nokes

Sorry to immediately be a bummer, but I can’t stop thinking about the state of technology. About how we could have done anything in the world with it at this point, and yet this is where we landed.

Waist-deep in a slop gauntlet run by the most corrupt/least cool (in every sense of the word) grifters imaginable. An internet that currently looks like shit and works like shit, in service of shareholders who will monetize it until there is nothing left to extract. I won’t belabor the point.

Except of course I will. We are supposedly inching toward an era of AI grandiosity beyond our wildest dreams/nightmares, but until that happens, can we make one website function correctly? It would be incredible, if in the year of our 2026, I could look up what time a show starts without being led to a third-party ticket site, bloated with ads, with some out-of-date map widget that blocks the screen while their glitchy AI asks if you want whatever the fuck. Anything but the information you’re looking for. You will never find it; you will forget what you came here for.

Woman yells at [the] Cloud, I know. But if you are a venture capitalist reading this (hiiii), let me whisper my incredible idea, then: Make the internet work again.

Beyond its current janky state, AI’s insidious seep into the arts raises genuine concerns around labor displacement, authorship, surveillance capitalism, and the slow evaporation of expertise. Another concern is simpler: The people pushing AI are fucking dweebs. Mikey Shulman (of generative AI start-up Suno) literally said, out loud, in an interview: “It’s not really enjoyable to make music now. It takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of practice, you need to get really good at an instrument or really good at a piece of production software.” Concluding that this is a problem to be solved (by him, for money) rather than, you know, the entire point.

Finally. We are so close to solving the problem of having a creative process.

Okay that is enough rain! The days are getting longer, my friend, and I am once again trying to keep it weird around here. What are the interesting people of Seattle doing with their one precious life?

My moodboard for this issue was ARTS, of course, with a special interest in: anti-slop, DIY out of ethical necessity, weird/cool/fun, hands-on, physical media, in real life. We may not be able to escape algo-driven toxicity entirely at this point, but I was curious about the people and places operating outside of all that. People dedicated to the value of physical experience, or people doing strange or difficult or specific things with a lot of dedication. Some as a deliberate statement, some just because it’s what they’re into, or it’s what they’ve always done. I’m tickled by the results. People are making such neat things!

In these pages you’ll find artists who deal in physical media—less because the aesthetic still fucks (it does), but because every other option sucks. We make the case for recession-era art, repairing your own clothes, and the joy and frustration of a dumber phone.

Elsewhere, what’s more analog than a baroque flutist? An opera singer, perhaps—did you know they are just belting it out without amplification up there? We also learn about the ancient techniques like the Korean paper art of hanji, and Turkish meat-carving with giant blades.

We also envision something better. A city with a healthy bodega culture, a city that invests in the arts, a city with unique arts spaces, and a city that envisions something better for a neat old building in a queer/arts neighborhood than a… McDonald’s.

Spring is coming.
— Emily Nokes

COVER ART

Samantha Yun Wall
Diaspore No.15 (2026)
From Let There Be Light at Cannonball Arts

This Issue Brought to You By…

The same intensity with which Spencer Pratt reads the audiobook of his memoir The Guy You Loved to Hate

Hot Slog Buns

Zoloft

Gabapentin

The weight of the world

Gun soup

Chappell Roan’s nipples

Alexander Skarsgård’s slutty little glasses

The community fig leaf

Realizing I’ve been wearing my carabiner on the wrong side

Season two of The Boyfriend on Netflix

Joy sobbing to videos of Alysa Liu

Hilary Knight refusing to make excuses for men’s behavior

“Regular Rabbit” by Stephen Spencer

Keri Russell’s wigs on The Americans

Puppy anticipation

A powder day, finally

My last fried nerve

Chu Minh Tofu and Vegan Deli

Ex-Lax

LITERALLY MAKING PHYSICAL MEDIA

Cold red wine

Lightrailers is a real word, Henry

The Kissenger Pocket Pussy for Kissing

Ring, the dogcatching company

Being Chinese before Chinamaxxing made being Chinese cool

Sparkle kicks in Las Vegas

Urbanist Ron Davis Hungers for the House

Nathalie Graham — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 10:00:00 -0800

Davis has heard grumblings about his decision to run against an established Democrat incumbent, but he thinks he's the right choice for the seat. by Nathalie Graham

I sat across from Ron Davis—dad, urbanist, bald—at Tailwind Cafe in Capitol Hill. He wasn’t going to eat during our interview, but then he saw the menu: the “finest” avocado toast in the city. He had to try it. But we weren’t here to discuss toast. We were here to discuss his latest candidacy.

Voters may remember the former tech start-up CEO from his 2023 city council campaign. He ran for the District 4 seat as a density champion, a progressive—aka everything 2023 voters rejected. Outspent by corporate PACs, he lost to Maritza Rivera. He’s been a constant poster since—skeets, TikToks, Reels, and Substacks (or just stacks?). Raise your hands, Rondezvous readers.

Even if you haven’t seen Davis, you’ve probably sensed him. He’s become a progressive mainstay in local politics. He even flirted with a mayoral run before Katie Wilson jumped in. A believer in the cause—and a casualty of corporate fundraising—he fundraised with Progressive People Power PAC (P3) which helped unseat Sara Nelson and kickstarted the PAC that supported Wilson with political consultant Stephen Paolini. (“He and I, together basically raised all the individual contributor money between the two of us,” says Paolini, the director of the Katie Wilson for an Affordable Seattle PAC.)

Now he’s hoping to knock Rep. Gerry Pollet out of Washington’s 46th District, the Northeast Seattle region he’s represented for 15 years.

Davis says he’s heard grumblings about this decision. Taking on a 15-year incumbent is expensive and there are actual swing districts where people want to put their energy and their dollars. But “good enough is not good enough, especially right now,” Davis says.

Pollet may be fine on taxes and education, but he’s also a NIMBY firmly standing in the way of change, Davis says. “There's no suburb left in the district, it’s time to act like it,” he says, citing Pollet’s vote against an environmental review exemption to speed along patching the missing link in the Burke Gilman trail, and Pollet’s watering down of the “missing middle” housing bill back in 2022, which could have allowed denser buildings in more places.

Davis wants to build more housing, improve transportation, stick it to Donald Trump, pass progressive revenue. Even if it ruffles some feathers, he thinks he’s the better person for the job.

While writing this story, Pollet’s communications consultant Erik Houser texted me to say he heard I was writing about Davis, and Pollet wanted to respond to anything negative Davis said about him.

Pollet rejects Davis’ characterization. In a statement, Pollet said “he has long advocated for increasing density in Seattle and the 46th district” and has sponsored legislation to make that happen, including 2025’s “middle housing and transit oriented development bills.” He did vote against suspending the environmental review for the Burke Gilman Trail, but maintains “the legislature has put these environmental reviews in place for an important purpose.”

Paolini and Tiffani McCoy, the interim CEO of the Seattle Social Housing Developer, agree that Davis is a housing juggernaut. He’s already been in Olympia advocating for housing bills, like last year’s Parking Reform and Modernization Act which restricts how much parking cities and counties can require for new housing. Davis says he put together the coalition that got the bill passed.

“I realized this is a place I could really make a difference,” he says.

Davis is persistent to the point of being professionally annoying, he says. “It's kind of a personality flaw, but it turns out, like in enterprise sales where I come from, and politics it has proven very, very useful, even if it drives some people nuts.”

Effective, but is that the personality of a guaranteed collaborator, or a pusher hungry for credit and adoration?

Wait. Hold on. Davis’ avocado toast arrived. He paused to take a photo. Two juicy fried eggs sat on the green bed of fluffed avocado, dusted with cracked pepper and spices.

“Oh, the lighting is bad,” he says, and readjusted, leaning back and lowering his body in the chair, twisting his phone to the landscape position.

“Do you always take photos of your food?”

“Not always but when I go—” he gasps— “then I get really excited about it,” he says. The pictures often go nowhere.

He pressed his knife into one fried egg. Yolk spilled over the toast.

He dug in the toast and his loftier goals: 1,000 miles of new bus-only lanes across the state, taxes on the rich to pay for universal child care (the millionaires' tax doesn’t go far enough, he says), and myriad wonky housing proposals.

And then there’s that damn President and his gooners. Davis supports several of the anti-ICE bills making their way through the Legislature—a potentially unenforceable bill to unmask ICE, and another prohibiting agents from becoming cops in Washington. Though the latter doesn’t go far enough, he says.

“It should be a permanent ban from working for any state or locally-funded organization.”

“We should punish companies that collaborate [with ICE],” he says, waving his fork with a perfect bite of fried egg and avocado toast. This could mean taxing them more or, at the state level, cutting any contracts with businesses that are also working with ICE in any capacity.

Davis wants there to be a state run “office of people” to disrupt ICE operations. People “who are trained in interruption and de-escalation, and who have an understanding of the ways to maximize the difficulty for ICE.” He wants the people “ready and deployable” to make ICE operations more difficult and costlier in Washington.

That’s kind of fucking crazy. All I could say was, “Wow, I can only imagine the Truth Social posts.”

“[Conservatives] say all that shit about paid protesters—they make all that shit up anyway—why not do it?” Davis says.

“That was fucking amazing,” he says of his avocado toast. “Be sure to get the extra egg. I just love runny yolk. I had a whole spiritual experience while we were talking.”

Ed's Note: This story has been updated to clarify that Davis fundraised for individual campaign contributions.

Slog AM: Republicans Want Unconstitutional War, Mayor Wilson Wants 1,000 Shelter Units, and Dems Argue Over Millionaires' Tax

Micah Yip — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 09:30:00 -0800

The Stranger's morning news roundup. by Micah Yip

Constitution? I Hardly Know Him: Senate Republicans voted down a war powers resolution that would’ve halted the attacks on Iran and allowed time for Congress to authorize the war. That’s the Constitutional way to go to war, anyway—only Congress has the power to declare war. The president does not (despite this, we haven’t declared any of our wars since World War II, and we’ve waged many). The House will vote today on a similar measure, but it’s expected to fail.

Also: The US government is dodging responsibility for the deadly strike on the Iranian girls’ school, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth only saying they’re “investigating” the incident. The incident killed at least 165 students and injured 96 others.

And Also: President Donald Trump says he must be involved in choosing Iran’s next leader. Replacing Ayatollah Ali Khamenei with Mojtaba Khamenei, his son and likely successor, would be “unacceptable,” Trump said.

Trespassing/Occupying, Tomayto/Tomahto: Last May, 33 protesters broke into and occupied the University of Washington’s Interdisciplinary Engineering Building, smashing windows, spray painting walls, breaking equipment and setting dumpsters on fire to protest the university’s ties to Boeing, which sells weapons to Israel. Twenty-three of them were UW students. Yesterday, King County prosecutors charged them with misdemeanor criminal trespassing—a downgrade from the original felony charges they got in June, which were dropped for lack of evidence. They’ll be arraigned on March 25.

Another Day, Another Anti-Trans Effort: An initiative to keep trans girls out of sports will appear on November’s statewide ballot. Backed by Brian Heywood, the conservative hedge fund manager who founded Let’s Go Washington, Initiative IL26-638 would require girls to “verify their biological sex” with a health care provider to play school sports. Verification could include blood draws and genital exams.

The War on Drugs Sugar: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants Dunkin’ and Starbucks to prove their sugary coffee drinks are “safe.” How about informing Americans of the risks of going unvaccinated?

Mayor Wilson Proposes 1,000 New Shelter Units: Mayor Katie Wilson sent legislation to City Council that would let the city more quickly secure space for 1,000 new units of shelter and emergency housing in Seattle this year. Her proposal would both allow the Finance and Administrative Services Department to sign lease agreements with property owners and temporarily increase the number of people allowed in most shelters from 100 to 150, while one shelter in each district could house up to 250.

Weather: Mostly cloudy with a high of 51 and a 50 percent chance of rain before noon. Tonight, temps drop to a low around 44 with rain falling after midnight.

Ouch: Republican Sen. Tim Sheehy tried to help Capitol police arrest Brian McGinnis, a Marine and Green Party candidate, protesting the war in Iran at a Senate hearing yesterday, and ended up snapping his arm as he clutched the door.

Here’s the video. Keep scrolling if you’re squeamish.

[TW: graphic fracture, sound of breaking bone]

Sen Tim Sheehy (R-Montana) badly breaking the arm of a Marine veteran protesting the war Iran.

[image or embed]
— Claire Zagorski, MSc, EMT-P (@clairezagorski.bsky.social) March 4, 2026 at 2:05 PM

Extreme County Makeover (Cont.): It looks like King County Executive Girmay Zahilay is continuing to reconfigure the county workforce. He just hired a new internal auditor and created a “subcabinet” focused on accountability, new internal grant fund controls and training employees on ethics and fraud prevention to “improve oversight of the county’s finances.”

Hurry Up: State lawmakers are running out of time to pass the millionaires' tax before the legislative session ends. Most Democrats support the bill, but intra-party division threatens to derail this much needed tax. If passed, the bill would still need Gov. Bob Ferguson’s signature, but he’s now said for the third time the measure still needs revisions before he’d sign. He said he’s hopeful they can reach an agreement but is committed to getting this “right,” even if that means pushing the issue to next year.

War in Iran Brings Higher Gas Prices: The state's average price climbed another two cents per gallon. The state’s average price is $4.40 per gallon, as of yesterday—43 cents more than a month ago and $1.20 above the national average.

FIFA Transit Money: Seattle is getting $8.4 million from the $100 million Federal Transit Administration to mitigate any strain on the city’s public transit system from the FIFA World Cup this summer. These funds can be used for event planning, hiring, security equipment, and more. The money is part of last month’s $1.2 trillion congressional spending package that prevented a government shutdown but stalled funding for the Department of Homeland Security.

Will Iran Send a Team? They’re scheduled to play against Egypt in Seattle on June 26, but after the US attacks, Iranian soccer federation President Mehdi Taj said they might not.

Ground Hum Fest Strives to Draw You into an Alternate Reality

Dave Segal — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 15:00:00 -0800

It's an 11-Hour Extravaganza of Experimental Music, Visual Art, and Workshops

by Dave Segal

In a mere four years, Ground Hum has risen from an experimental multimedia festival at makeshift warehouses with infrastructure issues and strictly local performers to a full-fledged Happening™ at a legit venue (Washington Hall) with international artists. That's due to organizers Hans Anderson, Bobby Azarbayejani ('nohup'), and Alex Markey (Archivist) being savvy electronic musicians with deep roots and connections in the Northwest rave scene—plus crucial 4Culture grants.

Azarbayejani views Ground Hum's lofty mission as a recontextualization of rave's "fantastical, transformative experiences that emerge over the course of a single night. You leave those events with a sense of community, of being transported somewhere outside of ordinary life, and the feeling that a different world is possible. A lot of us first encountered that translation when we went to Corridor (2016–2018) and wanted to carry that same ethos forward."

Markey elaborates, saying Ground Hum "is essentially about Deep Listening, in the sense of the concept developed by Pauline Oliveros. Listening as an active, engaged process as opposed to passively hearing. I think the concept extends to our installation and performance art pieces, too. We’re trying to create this... multisensory experience that draws people into an alternate reality and keeps them there for the duration of the evening."

This year's lineup includes mercurial Dutch IDM producer upsammy, NYC bassoonist Joy Guidry, whose unearthly, beatless music hits you like a ton of feathers, and Kirkland ambient-music legend Raica, whose two 2025 releases stand as her most inventive and emotionally resonant works. The fest's booking policy, Markey says, centers on "people whose work is engaging on that deep emotional/intellectual level that could have people listening thoughtfully to a 45-minute or one-hour set without talking. Ground Hum artists create their own worlds and invite our audience to enter and explore with them. We’re looking for that ability to create a suspension of disbelief and really draw people in." Azerbayejani adds, "That goes for visual artists, too. Gia Valente is our lead curator for visual art, and their focus is on art that feels like it is bringing you into another world."

The Ground Hum crew are also proud of the workshops, which happen in Washington Hall’s Lodge Room from noon to 3:30 pm on March 7. (Admission is free and open to the public.) "We’re really excited to be expanding the programming," Azarbayejani says. "The first is by duo i+eo, who will be presenting a workshop titled 'Worldbuilding & Live A/V For Performance,' which will touch on using experimentation and collaboration to bring a visual identity to a music performance. The second is 'Performance-oriented stochastic MIDI sequencing' by Bay Area artist CAMI FLAGE, who will be sharing the research and development of Quartermaster, her custom stochastic sequencer."

Don't let all this highfalutin talk spook you. Markey exclaims, "Ground Hum is fun! I think a lot of people think of 'experimental electronic music' or 'performance art' as pretentious or elitist, but we’re just a bunch of goofball music and art nerds, and I think that comes through."

Ground Hum happens March 7 at Washington Hall, noon–11 pm, all ages.

Negative Creep

Anonymous — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 14:00:00 -0800

Smoke anywhere else. by Anonymous

Hey, '90s throwback guy: Your cigarette smoke is gross. And I hate having to walk through it to get my coffee.

You’ve been asked—politely—by staff and customers to move. There is signage. There are coughs. There are stares. Yet you remain.

It’s peak Hill. A neighborhood that prides itself on being considerate—but when it comes to shared air, asking someone not to hotbox the doorway is apparently a controversial take.

We all share the sidewalk. We all share the air. The NO SMOKING sign is not a vibe check. It’s a rule. You are not bravely disrupting the system. You are just making everyone smell like 2003.

Newsflash: You are not the main character. Standing in the doorway, smoking like this? It’s giving entitled vibes—and that’s not a good look.

Please take an extra 20 steps. Smoke anywhere else. Capitol Hill is not short on corners.

Sincerely,

Someone Who Would Like Their Cortado Without a Side of Marlboros

Do you need to get something off your chest? Submit an I, Anonymous and we'll illustrate it! Send your unsigned rant, love letter, confession, or accusation to ianonymous@thestranger.com. Please remember to change the names of the innocent and the guilty.

A Cut Above

Meg van Huygen — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 13:00:00 -0800

Meaty finger waves. by Meg van Huygen

It’s prep shift at Hamdi, and the room smells like fire. Winter sunlight filters in, and there’s a faint hum of spices in the charred air. Chef Berk Güldal is giving a private tutorial on making Turkish Adana-style kebap—aka kebab—a meticulous, laborious two-day process that plumps up these peppery lamb skewers.

Hand-mincing kebap is considered an art form in Southwest Asia, but this time-consuming process is being practiced less and less these days—even in Turkey, and certainly here in Seattle. Güldal, however, has all the time in the world to practice this thousand-year-old culinary craft.

Hamdi opened in 2021 as a Turkish food truck and moved into its beautiful, simple fine-dining space on Leary Way the following year. Güldal and his partner, Katrina Schult, had spent their careers in Michelin-starred restaurants—in Güldal’s hometown of Istanbul as well as NYC and Healdsburg, California, among other places—before peacing out to starless, Michelin-free Seattle to do their own thing.

That thing is fire. “We don’t have gas ranges,” Güldal says. “It’s all fire—wood or charcoal.” Low flames and embers burn here and there under grills around the open kitchen. It’d be a waste to NOT make kebap here.

The artist’s tools are a butcher block, a scraper, and a giant medieval-looking Turkish zirh (“zuh-ruh”). Genetically somewhere between a machete and a Bowie knife, it looks like the weapon your orc-slaying half-paladin/half-rogue D&D character carries. A fantasy knife.

I ask him if he bought it in Turkey, and he says, “No. I got it on Etsy.”

Güldal holds his colossal knife with both hands. A few pieces of suet—the hard fat that surrounds a lamb’s kidneys—sit in a ninth pan. He utilizes the zirh as a parer, deftly removing the silverskin enclosing each parcel of fat. “In Turkey,” he says, “they use tail fat for kebap. But it’s a different kind of lamb with a much bigger tail. It’s like a second butt.” However, America’s lambs aren’t quite as caked up, so Hamdi uses suet instead.

It’s no compromise. “To be honest, this lamb right here is the best lamb ever,” Güldal boasts. “We don’t need the tail.” Hamdi sources lamb from Anderson Ranches, 30 minutes outside Eugene, Oregon. “I cooked a lot of lamb in New York and California, at Michelin restaurants? I never tasted any lamb like this lamb.”

Güldal adds that Hamdi only uses grass-fed lamb, so Anderson Ranches is a natural choice, where free-range sheep and lambs graze on pasture ryegrass, herbs, and flowering forbs. “I really believe that grass-fed meat is the best, most nutritious food for your body,” he says. “It’s more chewy. It’s not gonna melt in your mouth. That’s why it’s great for kebap.”

The artist’s canvas is a massive wooden butcher’s block. This one was custom-made by Lee Andrews, a woodcarver in Walla Walla. “This artist told us this block’s gonna survive like four generations,” Güldal says. “Plastic just breaks.”

He sets the snow-white suet chunks on the block, then places his two-foot blade alongside them. Carefully but powerfully, he lifts the knife’s handle up and out, like a crank on a water pump, pinching the back of the blade with his other hand. He slides it back and forth over the pile for what seems like 20 minutes but is probably like five.

After Güldal pulverizes the suet into a hill of crumbles, Schult brings over some rough-chopped lamb belly, cold from the fridge, where it’s been aged for 24 hours. He begins delicately smithereening it with the same precise skill: slicing motions, not crushing motions. Sounds simple, but it really is a complex physical performance, requiring minute movements to flick and flex this heavy sword. Controlled strength as art. I could watch him do this all day.

“The purpose of this knife is to slice,” Güldal says. “When you put meat in a grinder—how most people do kebap now—it smooshes it, and it becomes very sticky and soft and loses texture. But here, you use a very sharp knife like this one, moving it minimally to slice, not chop.”

He adds that a grinder creates a dry kebap. “Not as juicy. And the texture this way is gonna be very coarse. Not, like, smooshed.” That coarseness creates more edges and facets to be Maillarded later.

After mincing the meat and fat separately, Güldal does the same to a red bell pepper. Then he methodically kneads the pepper, lamb belly, and suet together to create binding protein structures. “Another thing,” he says, after wordlessly kebapping for a while, “is that you don’t wanna use gloves to do this. Because then it tastes like gloves. I believe the flavor of your hand needs to go in the food.”

Güldal produces a speckled loaf of mince. Now it’s time to season: paprika, Turkish pepper flakes, and salt. He pulls out a sheet pan of lined-up skewers, specifying that they must be iron, not aluminum, and starts fleshing out the metal skeletons.

The meat football gradually disappears as Güldal applies it to the skewers, punctilious, his fingers tantamount in his arsenal to his big-ass knife. We simmer in the piano lick from “Ms. Jackson” on the aux as he shapes the mince. Per tradition, he’s giving the kebap a subtly scalloped pattern, for both Mailliard reaction and artisanal reasons. Meaty finger waves.

And that’s it. They’re ready to hit the charcoal. The raw skewers look kinda pixelated, since unrendered suet is so brittle, but it’ll liquefy into nutty, golden, umami-tinged tallow on the grill, like lamby compound butter. It’s the art of suspense. A delicious future promise.

When asked if doing this makes him feel like an ancient person from a thousand years ago, Güldal frowns. “No! I believe we should still do these things today, not just in ancient history. I actually think everything has gotten too modern, too easy. I think we’re losing the fun part.”

Güldal takes a beat to admire his handiwork, then nods solemnly. “This is the fun part.”

Why Workers at One of Seattle’s Hottest Restaurants Went on Strike

Harry Cheadle — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Court documents show that behind the scenes, Sophon and chef Karuna Long struggled financially for years, resulting in bounced paychecks, late payments to vendors, unpaid rent, and lawsuits. by Harry Cheadle

On February 10, Sophon—one of Seattle’s hottest, hippest restaurants—announced on its Instagram stories that it would be canceling its dinner service that night. It stayed closed through Valentine’s Day weekend, one of the industry’s busiest stretches, because of financial difficulties and tensions between Sophon’s staff and owner, Karuna Long, that were spilling into public for the first time.

Employees were refusing to come to work because they hadn’t been paid. Long put up, and then deleted, an Instagram post admitting he owed money to staff and vendors. "I have no idea what I'm doing and cannot seem to figure what's up and what's down," he wrote. Days later, in a series of Instagram posts, general manager Moni Mitchell announced that the staff had resigned and accused Long of “documented financial mismanagement.”

This is a shocking turn of events for anyone who knows Sophon’s reputation. One of the only Khmer restaurants in Seattle, it is the kind of place that gets included on every “best of” list, renowned for its Cambodian-influenced cocktails and dedication to uplifting Khmer culture. But court documents, and interviews with Long and six of his former employees, show that behind the scenes, both Sophon and Long’s nearby, now closed bar Oliver’s Twist struggled financially for years, resulting in bounced paychecks, late payments to vendors, unpaid rent, and lawsuits. The former employees quoted in this article all asked to remain anonymous because of worries about professional repercussions.

Before Sophon, Long made a name for himself in the bar scene with Oliver’s Twist, a Phinney Ridge bar that he bought in 2017. During the COVID pandemic, he experimented with serving food influenced by his Khmer heritage. When that food was a hit, he announced Sophon, his dream project, which has been a pillar of the Seattle dining scene since it opened in 2024.

Long’s compelling vision for a restaurant drew the exceptional people to staff it, and soon his vision became a reality. He struck many of them initially as charismatic, funny, and progressive, former staff said. “He came off very kind and warm,” says one former employee. “A lot of us were really excited about Sophon’s story.”

But Long also had a way of “sugarcoating” things, as one former employee put it. Multiple employees say that he would often make excuses for missing scheduled meetings or why payments were late or why the refrigerators went out.

They were picking up on a pattern that Long himself was aware of. In an email to The Stranger, Long said that he’s dealt with “a personal internal battle for 30 years having to do with my clinical depression and ideations of suicide. When I’m overwhelmed, I unfortunately tuck my head in the sand and have avoided issues.”

Long’s financial troubles started before Sophon. In 2021, Long brought in two business partners, Joel Robinson and Waylon Puckett, who invested tens of thousands of dollars into the newly reopened Oliver’s Twist and the opening of Sophon.

Last year, Robinson and Puckett sued Long for breach of contract and fraud. They allege that Long forged Robinson’s signature on contracts with restaurant vendors, failed to contribute promised money to the business (where Long was the majority owner), and used the business bank account to pay for his personal life, which, the suit alleges, “included withdrawals to pay for online gambling as well as paying his personal utilities.”

Long says he wasn’t taking any salary when Sophon opened and was in the habit of using Oliver’s Twist money to pay his expenses when he owned the bar by himself. He says he “failed to remember that I now have partners, therefore, any cost of living/personal utilities should go through proper processes.” Long also admitted to forging Robinson’s signature on contracts with vendors, however, writing in an email that “I made a lapse in judgment in doing so because my partners were unavailable.” But he denies lying to his partners or not contributing funds to the partnership. (Robinson and Puckett declined to comment on the contents of the suit.)

The suit also claims Long hid his debts from his partners. Attached to the lawsuit is a 2024 letter from a debt collection agency saying that the business owed $1.1 million as a result of an unpaid $879,000 COVID Economic Injury Disaster Loan that had accrued interest and fees. Among the other debts incurred by the business was the approximately $30,000 it owed to a financial services company after selling a portion of its future receipts; that company sued Oliver’s Twist for missed payments and won the case in 2023. In May 2024, according to the lawsuit, the three partners met and agreed that Oliver’s Twist should enter Chapter 11 bankruptcy, but it is unclear if that ever happened. Long declined to comment on the bankruptcy.

Robinson and Puckett attempted to settle the case through arbitration, according to court records, but are now seeking a default judgement against Long because they haven’t been able to schedule an arbitration sessions, the records show. Long declined to comment about the current status of the lawsuit or whether he is being represented by an attorney.

Oliver’s Twist had also fallen behind on its rent. By May 2024, the bar owed its landlord over $120,000, according to court records, and after Long renewed the lease he missed more payments. In December, the landlord initiated eviction proceedings against Oliver’s Twist. By then, the bar had been closed for two months.

According to Long, Oliver’s Twist closed because “business was too slow and rent was too high.” (He also characterized the closure as temporary in an interview with the Seattle Times, saying the bar was “on its way to closing” permanently.)

Former employees say the bar wasn’t paying vendors on time. More than one say that it went through stretches of not serving any food beyond popcorn, which they worried was against Seattle law.

One bartender says that after multiple missed paychecks, the Oliver’s Twist team began to leave until he was the only one left. He went over a month at a time without getting any pay himself, he says. “It ended up being kind of a social experiment for myself, because I had nothing better to do, to see what it's like to go work in the industry as a bartender without getting any compensation,” he says. “Because no more candles were being delivered, I was actually taking up candlemaking as a hobby and recycling the paraffin wax and making more candles. And I was actually having a pretty good time by myself.”

Long eventually paid him the wages he was owed, he says. Former employees say, and Long admits, that there were two cooks who had not been paid for their work as of February.

Despite Sophon’s high-profile success, it had similar problems.

In the spring of 2025, five former employees say, the restaurant switched from a direct deposit system to distributing checks every pay period. But workers soon began complaining their checks were bouncing or being placed on hold by their banks, according to screenshots of text messages and photos seen by The Stranger, and the complaints intensified into the summer.

“There was an extended period of time where by the time another two week pay period came to an end, multiple employees were still waiting for their previous paycheck to be deposited, or waiting for the hold placed on them to expire,” said one employee in a statement to The Stranger, adding that by August, workers were demanding cashier’s checks because they assumed regular checks wouldn’t clear. (Long says that the cashier's checks were costing him $8 apiece.) Former employees also said that Long was slow to repair broken fridges—including a CO2 leak in the keg cooler, two employees say—stopped paying for the city to pick up recycling, and that W-2 tax forms for the 2024 year didn’t reflect their correct hours. In one case, an employee emailed Long to say that she only made a third of the income that was listed on the W-2.

Mitchell, the general manager, has accused Long on Instagram of allowing employees’ health insurance coverage to lapse, even though they continued to have premiums taken out of their paychecks. In one instance, according to screenshots seen by The Stranger, an employee found out about the lapse from a letter from their insurance company, after they'd already sought medical care.

Tensions came to a head when Mitchell went on a trip to Cambodia in January, leaving it up to Long to process payroll. Two staffers say they did not get paid but worked the first weekend of February anyway; one former employee says that Long told them he wouldn’t have the money to pay them unless the restaurant re-opened. “At this point, we've been through so many things with him,” one employee says. “We're not feeling like we're going to get paid, and it's the last straw, and the communication is really bad.”

On February 10 and 11, Long decided to close Sophon, this employee says. He also told the staff that there was a hold on the business account, former employees say. When some employees tried to sign up for unemployment, they discovered that they couldn’t, because their hours had not been properly reported to the state. (Long says this resulted from a “lapse in taking care of my tasks accordingly.”)

In the midst of all of that, most of the staff went on “strike,” as they put it, demanding Long fix their paperwork so they could collect unemployment and pay employees what they were owed, including the two former cooks at Oliver’s Twist.

Long and his staff met on February 17, and he handed out about $20,000 in cash (so Long could avoid cashier’s checks fees). Long says that he has updated the paperwork with the Washington State Employment Security Department and that former employees should be able to collect unemployment. But with the cooks unpaid and Long not communicating with the employees to their satisfaction, most of the staff resigned February 20. “As far as we are concerned, the employment relationship is severed due to his breach of contract and labor laws,” Mitchell wrote in an email.

Long says that he is working on paying the Oliver’s Twist employees. He reopened Sophon last Tuesday with mostly new hires along with some employees who did not go on strike, he says. Mitchell describes the current staff as a “skeleton crew,” writing in an email that “the entire original team that built the restaurant’s reputation has walked away.”

Those who quit may not miss the chaos, but many will miss one another.

“We supported each other through a lot of hard, personal stuff,” says a former employee who began working at Sophon not long after it opened. “That’s a piece of it—this community and these beautiful relationships that I'm walking away with, which feels like the silver lining. And I think the other piece is a lot of sadness and a lot of anger and grief. I feel like we had something really special. This restaurant could have been perfect.”

Permanent Records

Todd Hamm — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Local Physical Media Producers Defy the Algorithmic Overlords

by Todd Hamm

In 1984, American science fiction writer William Gibson defined “cyberspace” (a term he coined) as “a consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators” in the near-future world of his novel, Neuromancer, where human consciousness drifts through a blinding data-world of corporate geometries.

More than three decades later, the English documentarian Adam Curtis traced how that hallucination became reality in his BBC documentary HyperNormalisation: “Over the past 40 years, politicians, financiers, and technological utopians—rather than face up to the real complexities of the world—retreated. Instead, they constructed a simpler version of the world in order to hang onto power, and as this fake world grew, all of us went along with it, because the simplicity was reassuring.”

Today, this “simpler version of the world” fits into our pockets. The average American now spends around five hours per day—about 2.5 months per year—on their smartphone. Most artists now depend on social media for visibility, and a small handful of tech companies now determine how culture is discovered and monetized. Whether you experience this moment as a dystopian technocratic existence, an interconnected digital wonderland, or some incredibly boring third thing, technology doesn’t just permeate most every facet of life, it intercepts substantial chunks of the day, warps tastes, and short-circuits human interaction.

It’s true that within many artistic fields, digital tools have made an extraordinary amount of art possible and accessible, but there is also the reality that the hyper-integration of technology has left the door open too wide for manipulation by powerful corporations, and has encouraged isolation between artists and audiences.

“Take Spotify, for example,” says Aaron C. Schroeder, owner and recording engineer of Pierced Ears Recording Co.—a tiny yet wondrous basement studio in the Ballard neighborhood. “They bury musicians that don’t pay them money to get promotions on playlists,” he says, referring to the streaming service’s forcing of lower royalty rates on artists to be included on “Discovery” playlists, a practice that bears striking resemblance to the radio “payola” schemes that were outlawed by Congress in 1960. “I just don’t like having someone else in control. And then how do you get people to hear you in a digital space? Well, now you have to promote in a digital space, so now we’re stuck on social media constantly. A false reality of a sort, or a second reality. And I’m analog.”

On a recent Sunday morning, Schroeder invited me to his studio to show me the workings of his Presto 8N vinyl lathe, an original from the 1940s. It “cuts” records in real time, a process in which a Van Eps Duotone cutter head—a needle-like device on an adjustable arm—carves sound vibrations into a soft vinyl disc (or record blank) in the form of the continuous spiral grooves, which your home record player needle then traces back into sound.

“You can really record any sound onto the record,” he explains. We discuss his ideas for hosting pop-ups around town where anyone can record anything they want on the spot and take home the record, and his ideas for bespoke groove patterns, like recording the record from the center outward, or in sequential spirals.

Schroeder uses a mix of digital and analog recording technologies, and maintains a website for his studio and business-only Instagram and TikTok accounts for minimalist marketing (“It’s like Backpage”), but he talks of tech devices and programs as though they are only one kind of tool among many, the amount of importance we have placed on them being unfortunate. The idea that a platform could change their business model or simply close shop if profits dried up, essentially deleting the most visible evidence of musicians’ artistic output, is also a possibility that haunts Schroeder. If that happens, “who’s to say you ever existed?”

Kelly Froh, executive director of Short Run Comix festival-turned-nonprofit, is among the many people I spoke with who think physical media—things like handmade books, visual art, hand-drawn comics and zines, vinyl records and cassette tapes—and the communities they spawn provide a necessary counterbalance to tech domination in the arts. “Why do any of these smaller festivals exist if we can just buy whatever we want online? It’s so you can show up, and you can actually look into the eyes of the artist, and talk to the artist, to the person that made these books.”

Froh is a firm believer in real-life settings where you can meet the artist at the point of purchase, and likely come away with personal artist recommendations, a newfound knowledge and appreciation for the time and techniques that go into the art form, and make any number of person-to-person connections—all weaknesses of the digital marketplace.

The online environment also gives the false sense of infinite choices and egalitarian platforming, when in reality, online algorithms (not to mention governments) suppress many artists and voices if you don’t follow their guidelines, both stated and unstated, before the general public even has a chance to click on them.

With physical media, however, “there’s no need to censor yourself,” Froh says. “If you were to promote something on the internet, you would have to block out certain words so the post doesn’t get buried. I don’t want to think about any of that shit. Just do your own thing.”

Froh also sees organizational potential in physical formats for off-the-grid information sharing in times of political or social turmoil: “Zines are untrackable in that way, and they’re not gonna be blocked by some evil algorithm.” She continues, “For people who feel helpless as our democracy is crumbling, guess what? They’re screen printing posters, they’re making pins and buttons, they’re making zines and fliers, posters on poles.” Indeed, at a recent anti-ICE rally on Capitol Hill, organizers were handing out keychain whistles packaged with a zine that outlined the whistle’s uses and whom to contact if officers are spotted; on a recent trip to Hex Enduction Records & Books in Lake City, I left with a tour guide zine for safe small-town queer hangouts, and leafed through an impressive hand-bound book about anarchism and “settler socialism.”

James Ballinger, who ran the influential heavy-rock-focused Seattle music zine The Seattle Passive Aggressive during its decade-long run in the 2010s, agrees that physical media is an important part of the social ecosystem. “It keeps things true, and it keeps things away from [that] kind of outside influence, or a fear of saying things that’ll make people upset, or [come off as too] political. I print it, I can’t go back and change it, or delete it. I can’t go back and edit that typo, it’s out there. Technology’s weird, and social media has made people weird as far as what they feel they’re free to say. So I think zine culture is important, because you can say what you need to say, get it out there.” Ballinger also takes issue with the thoughtlessness that social media rewards through ambiguous reposts and bandwagon “likes.” Conversely, physical media “allows you to not just say what you want to say because you’re passionate about it; you have to collect your thoughts and say things intelligently.”

Across town at Concuss Creations screen printing, local musician and artist Rob Castro prints band merch on the same press as protest swag. “Since I print my own shirts out of my own shop, I can basically print anything I dream of. If I want to flex a run of protest tees before a march, I can do that.”

Kay Redden, founder and operator of Seattle cassette-tape label Den Tapes, likens the choice to interact with physical media to shopping local, given the increasingly competitive attention economy of today: “It’s kind of like voting with your dollar, like when you’re opting to support a local business rather than go to Home Depot or whatever.” In this way, devoting time to the making or consuming of physical art can be seen as a net positive in the war over our time and data points—each non-technological activity we participate in has become an act of micro-revolution.

Back in the Pierced Ears studio, Schroeder is walking me through the process of folding a zine. Using scissors, he cuts a slit across the middle of a halved 8”x11” piece of paper, then accordions it into eighths. The result is a miniature flipbook complete with quirky yet informative diagrams showing the step-by-step process of recording a record on his equipment. He puts one in the sleeve of each record he cuts.

“It is a problem in every aspect of Western civilization,” he says. “We use tools to try and make things we consider to be beautiful, but I think we have corrupted the concept of beauty. The natural world is what’s actually beautiful, a manicured lawn, not so much… I’m a fan of music with edges.” I suggest that an ideal metaphor may be a Zen garden, where humans manipulate natural elements with tools, but the tools aren’t pesticides that are supposed to kill any imperfections.

After thinking for a moment, he answers, “We’re just doing an odd beautification ritual. I don’t think everything looking the same is the correct answer.”

Slog AM: Remembering Lilli Moreno, US Military Is Bloated With Overpriced Weapons, Beacon Hill Station’s Pigeon Has an Instagram Account

Charles Mudede — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 09:49:00 -0800

The Stranger's Morning News Roundup by Charles Mudede

Lilli Moreno, I did not know it was you who was killed by a car on February 16, 2026, until a friend showed me a photograph at a bar not far from where you died. I instantly saw the Lilli who once asked me to explain the actual meaning of Schrodinger’s cat. A few months later, I also saw you operating a table at the late night art market at Bad Bar. We were, in time, close to the final hour of August 11, 2024. I bought one of your small metal matchboxes (this one decorated with a picture of a flower) for $11. We talked a little, we laughed a little. And later I was in the psychedelic bar watching one of my favorite scenes in Star Wars on a very flat TV screen above the bottles of spirits: the setting of the two suns on the parched planet Tatooine. I will still have your matchbox. It will live among my books.

The world has not changed one bit since you left, Lilli Moreno. In fact, it’s getting worse.

We may be gutting our urban forestry program but fear not, Washington State is still funding the construction of new urban highways.

www.khq.com/legislature/...

[image or embed]

— Anna Zivarts (@nondriver.bsky.social) March 2, 2026 at 2:55 PM

Today will be cool (low of 42) and rainy. It’s the kind of day that’s made for the charmingly melancholy jazz of Bill Evans. At this point, however, we can forget about any kind of snow falling upon the living and the dead. We can also expect, when summer temperatures arrive, which might be as soon as next month, an explosion of rats and bugs because winter proved to be hospitable. Indeed, I can remember when Seattle winters were so cold that rats would climb into car engines for warmth or shelter only to freeze to death. Those days are more and more receding into the past in our warming world.

Dem superstar Rep. Jasmine Crockett lost Texas’ Democratic Senate primary to populist and God-loving Rep. James Talarico (and it wasn’t even close—53% to 46%). The race between Attorney General Ken Paxton and incumbent Sen. John Cornyn was close and, as a consequence, is headed to a runoff election on May 26. Expect the battle between these hyenas to get very, very ugly.

Greedy defense contractors have sold the US government very expensive and clumsy interceptor weapon systems. The whole dismal story is in a report posted this week by Bloomberg: “Iran's Missile Math: $20,000 Drones Take on $4 Million Patriots.” The drones are called Shahed-136, which are basically “small, rudimentary cruise missiles.” It’s estimated that Iran has about 80,000 of these weapons, and can manufacture about 500 of them a day. Also, Shaheds can be transported by a conventional truck to any launch site in the country. The US, on other hand, uses cumbersome missiles that cost millions to hit just one of these cheap-ass drones. The fear on the US side is that, because our defence contractors can produce only 600 or so of these expensive weapons a year, their stock will soon be depleted by the constant swarm of inexpensive drones, which have the power to destroy buildings or badly damage military bases.

Qatar's Patriot interceptor missiles will last four days at the current rate of use, Bloomberg reported. Qatar has requested help countering drones, which have proven a greater threat than ballistic missiles, while the UAE has requested medium-range air defense assistance. #MiddleEast

[image or embed]
— NOELREPORTS (@noelreports.com) March 2, 2026 at 9:58 AM

The US has known about these Iranian drones for years but failed to make needed cost-effective adjustments because, arguably, there’s no money in making and selling cheap stuff to US taxpayers. Defense contractors want the US to buy state-of-the-art shit, even if they are impractical and ineffective.

Realizing the great disadvantage the Iranian drones present, the US is now making an exact copy of the Shahed, called LUCAS, in Arizona at $35,000 a pop. The factory began operation last year; meaning, the US had until then no idea how to make cheap missiles. They had to steal the technology from the Iranians. And what can we conclude from this fiasco? The US’s military certainly has the biggest budget in the world by far ($1 trillion annually), but it might be filled with expensive junk. China, on the other hand, has the second-largest budget ($250 billion annually), but that money might purchase or manufacture weapons at reasonable or state-controlled prices. If this is the case, then China has, due to a lack of super-greedy defense contractors, the superior arsenal.

If the Iranian drones do the trick, if they hit regional American military bases and oil production sites on the regular, then the US consumer can kiss goodbye to cheap oil forever. It will take years to repair the damaged infrastructure, busted bases, and restore confidence in the US’s ability to protect Gulf assets.

I read somewhere that some ants send their elderly to fight wars. Apparently, the young are too precious to waste on deadly conflicts. With humans, the old tend to start wars and send their youth to fight them. It seems we humans have it backwards. Those who declare war must be handed the guns and armour (or an exoskeleton developed by Elon Musk) and head straight to the battlefield. That includes Captain Bone Spurs.

Who knew? The pigeon that hangs out in Beacon Hill Station actually has an Instagram account. Presently, the bird only has 27 followers. All humans. I have seen this pigeon several times while waiting for a train in one of America’s deepest subways. The bird walks around with an air of total calm. No predators down here. No rain. Some food. And generally nice people going this way and that.

View this post on Instagram
A post shared by @beaconhillbird

Let’s end AM with a compilation that was released 30 years ago and launched Seattle’s post-Sir Mix-a-Lot hiphop, Tribal Music’s Do the Math.

What We Can Fix

Nathalie Graham — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 15:00:00 -0800

Hanging on by a Thread with the Capitol Hill Tool Library’s Mending Circle

by Nathalie Graham

The four people at my table had their heads down, needles and threads in their hands. Behind me, books like How to Fix Almost Everything, Basic Electricity, and, fittingly, Successful Shelves and Built-ins filled one shelf in a shelving unit full of everything from surge protectors and spare keyboards to at least four different types of inductors. Down the lime-green wall, sewing machines weighed down another shelf.

Across the room, more people sat around tables next to woodsaws and clamps. They weren’t working with wood, but on shirts and pants.

This was the Capitol Hill Tool Library’s monthly mending circle. On the first Sunday of each month, anyone can bring any textile items that need fixing into the workshop. Volunteers are on hand to show you what to do. No experience required.

I went to the mending circle armed with zero sewing knowledge and an armful of clothes. I left with a sense of self-reliance previously foreign to me.

“So,” I said to my tablemates, “the knot in the thread? I just tie a knot?”

In spite of having a mother who once handmade my baby blankets and at least one Halloween catsuit, I never learned to sew. According to Clare, the mending circle’s founder, only 50 years ago many people sewed their own clothes. Not anymore. The skill isn’t as universal anymore.

Clare started the mending circle in 2022 as a way for her to meet sewing friends. It became more than that. Under her stewardship, the mending circle grew to a monthly mainstay where she could equip people with real life skills. Except, most of the people who showed up didn’t know how to sew. That didn’t bother Clare. “The most important part of that work we’re doing is giving people skills,” Clare says.

Clare’s no longer part of it—not for any reason other than she moved to Ballard, which is basically dying in Capitol Hill terms. She now helps with Sustainable Ballard’s mending group and one at the Ballard Food Bank.

The act of mending clothes is radical to her. “Because it doesn’t make financial sense,” Clare says. “You could just buy a new jacket for 20 bucks. It’s almost antiestablishment.”

I suppose I have been very “establishment.” When my clothes fall apart, I throw them to the back of my closet, or throw them away. Then, the pocket on my favorite jacket ripped. It’s an article of clothing—a vintage denim chore jacket—I’m certain I won’t be able to find again. But I’m not preservation-minded. I can’t stop wearing it. Hence the mending circle.

The other people were also trying to save their clothes: Marco sewed a patch into his new shoes because they were slightly too big. Will’s favorite shirt—an eight-year-old flannel—split down the entire armpit. He could fit his head in the hole with room to spare. “Does anyone know how to choose a needle?” he asked. Vanessa, who sat at the end of my table, started coming to the mending circle a few months ago and is now a regular. She learned to sew there, which is helpful since she has “the bad habit of wearing clothes probably long after I should have gotten rid of them,” she says. Today, she coerced her friend Thyme to come so she could mend their clothes. She’d run out of her own things to mend.

They both sewed holes shut in two matching pairs of Thyme’s sweatpants. “I have to specifically buy athletic-cut pants because my butt is too big,” they said. Their butt is always busting holes into their pants. (According to mending circle volunteers, the dreaded groin rip is the most common mending project.) Thyme was new to sewing. Learning the skill excited them. They’re a furry and often have to ask their mom to fix their two fursuits when things fall apart.

Most people had a passing familiarity with needles and thread. I stared blankly at the threaded needle in my hand. Where do I go from here? Katherine, who had sat down across from me, busy with her own clothes, lent her expertise. “My grandmother always told me to do two knots,” she said, demonstrating how to tie a double knot. She learned to sew from two different grandmothers. “They didn’t talk to each other at all,” she says.

Following Katherine’s lead, I attempted a double knot. Except I really didn’t grasp what she’d shown me, and I felt bad asking again, so I pretended I’d gotten it.

A seat down from me, Thyme interrupted. “I heard the knot question, but I didn’t hear the answer. How many times did you go around?”

“So, I ended up making three little knots,” I said, examining my now-bumpy thread. “I’m hoping they’ll go on top of each other to make one big knot, but they haven’t done that yet.” Katherine demonstrated again for both of us. I got it that time.

Overseeing this exchange, the volunteer coordinator, Saralyn, commented on it to another volunteer: “I always love when people come in not as volunteers, but they end up helping other people. One of my goals for [the] mending circle is to bring people together.” And she had.

Katherine came here today because she’d had “a brief crisis” in December. “My younger sister sat down and was like, ‘Here’s a list of things in your area. Go to them,’” she told me. “I think this might be legitimately the first thing that I’ve gone to—which is sad.” Vanessa and Thyme jumped in. “It’s only been two months!” Thyme said. “Don’t worry, I only started getting out of the house for realsies a few weeks ago,” Vanessa said.

We all chatted for the three hours the mending circle spanned—which is about how long it took me to sew my pocket back together, as well as a ripped armpit hole on another shirt. Other people came in with their worn clothes, picked up the supplied needles and thread, and set to work. One person came in to make anti-ICE whistle packets. She took a break to darn a sock.

“I always feel like I get worn down [by the world],” Saralyn said, over the hum of conversation and the occasional buzz of a sewing machine. “Then I come to mending circle. On a large scale, things are stressful. On a small scale, I remember, ‘I can fix this.’”

The patch I sewed to bolster my jacket is not beautiful. So far, the patch is holding and the jacket functions, but the lines are uneven and the stitches are wonky. I feel proud nonetheless. I like that even though it’s imperfect, I can see the passage of time on this garment I love. I like that I did it myself. And I feel comfortable knowing there is a place I can go when the patch inevitably falls off, and next time I will sew it on even better.

For her column Play Date, Nathalie Graham immerses herself in Seattle's subcultures. Got a fun group? Invite her: PlayDate@thestranger.com!

Drag Race Episode Nine: A Rusical with Voguing Orphans

Mike Kohfeld — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 13:27:00 -0800

The Rusical (the Musical) is back, but first, after a seven-episode drought, we (I) finally got a Mini Challenge. It brought silliness and actual story development, with the queens doing something together rather than loitering around the werkroom. Keep the minis coming, please. by Mike Kohfeld

The queens were tested on how well they knew each other with “Grindr, I Hardly Knew Her.” Athena was ranked as the queen most likely to hook up in drag and lie about her age on the apps. Kenya was voted most likely to be on Grindr at a funeral. “There’s a lot of rich people at funerals, girl,” she justified. Get that money, Kenya.

For the final question, the queens voted Kenya as the most likely to sashay away next. With her track record of three bottom placements and zero wins, this didn’t come as a surprise. But Kenya was still savvy enough in her social game to win the mini challenge alongside Discord Addams, and she didn’t let the other queens’ judgment get into her head. Queen of confidence, or delusion?

Category Is: Voguing Orphans

Onwards to the main challenge. Like Snatch Game, the Rusical has become a perennial challenge in Drag Race, testing the queens’ skills in singing, acting, dancing, and comedy. We’ve had regular Rusicals since Season 6, and not all of them have been good. (Remember the Trump-themed one in Season 11? Gross.) However, the challenge brings out star potential: more than half of past Rusical winners placed in the top three in their seasons.

This season’s Rusical was a mashup of the 1977 Broadway classic Annie and the legendary 1990 documentary Paris is Burning. In other words: voguing orphans.

For the uninitiated: ballroom is a Black and Latinx queer subculture rooted in urban spaces in the United States. It is both a powerful expression of community and a vehicle for queer creativity and expression. The ballroom scene of 1980s New York City was featured in Paris is Burning, introducing the world to queer slang, dance, fashion, and music. Go watch it.

Drag Race is intrinsically indebted to ballroom culture, so it felt correct to see a direct nod to it with Fannie: The Hard Knock Ball Rusical, with Bronx-based ballroom legend Carlos Basquiat joining choreographer Jamal Sims in teaching the queens how to vogue.

View this post on Instagram
A post shared by RuPaul's Drag Race (@rupaulsdragrace)

Give My Regards to Myki Meeks

When it came time for casting, the queens landed roles that fit their schticks well. Chronically indecisive Nini Coco butted heads with Myki over the lead part, but ultimately settled for a role that didn’t require as much singing.

It was meant to be: Myki Meeks pulled out an exceptional performance as Fannie. After demurely introducing herself as having “retired” from musical theater, she impressed Drag Race music producers Leland and Gabe Lopez (RIP) during the recording session. “I didn’t realize that we had Sutton Foster in the building,” Jane remarked. However far Myki Meeks gets in Drag Race—and her recent upswing suggests a top three trajectory—Broadway is waiting for her.

Miss Shenanigans

Jane Don’t knew exactly how to play the Rusical, claiming the part of Miss Shenanigans, a stumbling drunk with vaudeville vibes and “a low chance of having to vogue.” Her savvy vocal stylings left plenty of room for comedy on stage. During the performance, she channeled the legendary Carol Burnett while keeping it quintessentially Jane, brilliantly blending physical comedy into the choreography. (I loved her makeup callback to Lil’ Poundcake, too.)

Myki and Jane were neck and neck when it came down to the win, but Jane shone a hair brighter this week. Maybe it was her extravagant, fur-lined, Mae West-inspired look for this week’s “Beige Against the Machine” runway category, or perhaps it was because she made RuPaul laugh more when she was literally rolling around the stage. Whatever the case, Jane earned her second win of the season. I would not have been mad about a double win, though. These queens are that good.

View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Jane Don’t (@heyjanedont)

Hard Knocks, Tough Calls

Jane and Myki were clear tops for the Rusical, but it wasn’t easy to figure out how the rest of the cast would stack up-–everyone else did a solid job. Darlene chose a safe role as Fannie’s loyal canine sidekick, Brandy. Her exquisitely-structured beige tweed suit on the runway was my favorite of the week.

Nini and Discord were paired together as Lil’ Salty and Big Peppa, an orphan duo versed in old-school hip hop (hello, Salt-N-Pepa!). Their dancing was “awfully white,” according to Kenya, but their synergy kept them safe. (I thought their dancing was cute. It reminded me of the kids from Peanuts.)

Kenya was the most excited about a voguing Rusical, and her performance as Grace Gaultier was a joy to witness. She looked, sounded, and moved like a ballroom queen, and she got *almost* all of her words, dropping some here and there during the more intense vogueing sequences. Given how many times she’s been called out for sloppy lip-syncing, I wondered if this would tank her, but she earned a well-deserved safe placement.

As Kenya’s scene partner, Juicy was not so fortunate. The kid is born to dance, yes, but her energy and presence as Cecile Cartier didn’t measure up to what the other queens were giving. During judging, RuPaul critiqued Juicy’s characterization as “lacking a point of view.” She landed in the bottom two.

Athena typecasted herself as the rich and ruthless Mama Bigbux. She played the part well, but it wasn’t consistent enough for the judges. Jamal Sims pointed out that her face betrayed her uncertainty with the ballroom choreo. Athena’s performance didn’t scream “bottom two” to me, but I knew what was coming.

The Fall of the House of Dion

Heavy are the hands that edit RuPaul’s Drag Race. It was time for the mother-daughter showdown that was promised the day Athena and Juicy walked into the werkroom. It was way more emotional than I expected.

Juicy started strong but has floundered over the last few weeks, with RuPaul consistently critiquing Juicy’s lack of a clear point of view in her performances. “At this point in the competition, we need to see you. Who are you?”

As the queens processed last week’s critiques and auntie Mia’s elimination, Juicy revealed she had struggled with drug addiction in the past, and that she was still figuring out who she is. Athena helped get her back on her feet, and Juicy’s drag family has been her biggest source of support.

When Juicy and Athena squared up to lip-sync-for-their-lives, it was a somber moment. Juicy kept the game in mind, but Athena struggled to balance her desire to win with sending home the person that means most to her.

The song chosen was “Call Me When You Break Up” by Selena Gomez, Gracie Abrams, and music producer/guest judge Benny Blanco. It wasn’t a great choice for a lip-sync battle, as it didn’t inspire a particularly energetic show from the queens. But it was memorable nonetheless.

By the end of the lip-sync, the two had locked hands and sang directly to each other. Athena sank to her knees in front of Juicy, who followed suit and finished the song curled up in Athena’s arms. “I love you,” Athena whispered as the track wrapped, and Juicy sobbed. (We also got a choice shot from behind the queens during this tender moment of RuPaul staring hungrily at her next Emmy.)

Juicy was saved, and Athena sashayed away. I was surprised given how prominent Athena has been in the edit. Who will take on all the narration we’ve been getting from her? Well, we’ve got more options than you’d think: a queen (or queens?) will be returning to the competition next week. My bet’s on Vita.

Until next time!

Vote on Seattle’s Detention Moratorium Delayed

Hannah Murphy Winter — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 13:00:00 -0800

The bill was allowed to skip the Land Use Committee and go straight to a full Seattle city council vote today, but Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck hit a snag. by Hannah Murphy Winter

If you planned to tell your council members to pass the detention moratorium at City Hall this afternoon, change your calendars—the vote has been pushed to next week, March 10.

Last month, Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck introduced a bill to establish a one year moratorium on new permits “related to detention centers or jails.” Meant to stall any possible immigration detention within the city limits, the bill was allowed to skip the Land Use Committee and go straight to a full council vote today.

But Rinck hit a snag on the word “jail.” Someone didn’t want that word in the bill. “In order to get this over the finish line, we needed to make some changes,” she said, but declined to say who requested those changes on the record. She reintroduced the bill without the word “jail” in its body or title.

“The bill remains focused on instituting that moratorium on detention centers,” Rinck told The Stranger.

Meanwhile, other jurisdictions are chugging ahead on similar legislation. Last week, the Tukwila City Council unanimously passed a six month moratorium on “a correctional institution or any detention or related facility for the detention, transportation, and food services for people detained by state, local, or federal law enforcement.” SeaTac passed theirs in early February. And today, the King County Council will hold an emergency vote on Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda’s detention moratorium.

If you want to say your piece about this detention moratorium, public comment for Seattle’s moratorium will be at 2 p.m. on March 10, before the full council vote.

And if you want to know how Councilmember Rinck feels about the delay, she made a video about it.

View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Alexis Mercedes Rinck (@councilmember.amr)

Dear Hendrix

Eva Walker — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 11:28:00 -0800

I don’t remember a time in my life when daydreaming didn’t take up a big portion of my day, if not all of it. by Eva Walker

Dear Hendrix,

As I write this, you are sleeping soundly on the sofa, maybe dreaming about the alphabet or perhaps Peppa Pig. When you grow up, I can’t wait to fill your head with my stories about touring the world with my rock band, playing at a soccer stadium filled with 40,000 people, and sharing the stage with some mind-bending musicians like Mavis Staples, Weezer, and Death Cab for Cutie.

But none of that would have been possible if I hadn’t learned the value of staring blankly at a wall. It might actually be my favorite activity. Because Henny, I have a confession: I love a blank screen, a bare wall, growing grass, and drying paint. To some, they’re mind-numbingly boring. To me, they sparkle, and they always have.

I don’t remember a time in my life when daydreaming didn’t take up a big portion of my day, if not all of it. Your grandma probably still has my old school report cards to prove it. I spent most of my school days drifting in and out of imaginary worlds. My teachers sounded like Charlie Brown’s—all mumbly and fragmented. As they’d talk in the background of my daydreams, I’d pop back into reality from time to time, wondering Who? What’s a Plymouth Rock? Fractions? Wait, what’s going on outside the window…?

There are others like me, too.

My favorite YouTuber, Michael Stevens, said, “Boredom compels us to try new things; a propensity to boredom is a sign of a healthy mind.” People have invented and discovered amazing things because they were bored. When you allow your thoughts to wander, when your mind becomes a blank page, you can conjure up images and ideas and futures. Some of the songs I’m most proud of writing have come from sitting and staring.

My band, the Black Tones, have a song called “Striped Walls.” I was inspired to write it while, you guessed it, staring at my bedroom wall. I had been gazing at the black-and-white stripes I’d painted a few months before, and then a lyric came to me—“Two chords for two colors / Don’t lose its touch / Feeling happy, feeling lousy / It makes you feel like you’re downtown.”

I picked up my secondhand banjo and began to strum the only two chords I knew. I’d never written a song on banjo before; the Black Tones traditionally play blues-rock. But fast-forward a year later, and there we were, tracking “Striped Walls” with super producer Jack Endino (!), and the song ended up on our debut album.

Just like that. Boredom, man.

That said, my hobby can catch some people off guard. There were times when your father would walk into our bedroom and see me sitting, staring, thinking. “You okay?” he’d ask. I’d turn to look at him and smile calmly, happily, like we were on a dinner date over candlelight. “Yeah, I’m great!” Early on, he may have given me a puzzled look—I know that look. It’s the look that says, Are you needing a straitjacket?

But it’s quite the opposite. Silence, peace, tranquility—these aren’t signs of illness, burnout, or mental exhaustion. To me, they are signs of health. Of course, your dad gets it now. He understands it’s just me exercising my imagination. It’s something I’ve done since childhood, and something I’ve continued to lean into, even into my thirties. I hope to be staring at blank walls until the day I die.

So dear, if you’re ever feeling stuck, uninspired, or restless, try this:

1. Sit down in front of a wall in a quiet room.

2. Stare, think.

3. Make up a world, a story, or an event you could be doing in a parallel universe.

4. Make sure it stirs you.

Embrace a blank page, Henny. A bare day, an unplanned road. Boredom is the perfect canvas upon which to draw with every tool of your imagination.

I love you,

Mom

Eva Walker is a writer, a KEXP DJ, one-half of the rock duo the Black Tones, and mom to her baby girl, Hendrix. She also cowrote the book The Sound of Seattle: 101 Songs That Shaped a City, which was released in 2024. Every month for The Stranger, she writes a letter to Hendrix to share wisdom learned from her experiences—and her mistakes. Read all installments here.

Quickies

Dan Savage — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 10:50:00 -0800

Got problems? Yes, you do! Email your question for the column to mailbox@savage.love! by Dan Savage 1. My boyfriend swears he’s cut. I say he’s totally uncut. He insists he was circumcised as an infant. How do I convince him? Some circumcisions are “tight” (all of the foreskin removed) and others are “loose” (most of the foreskin left intact). The looser the circumcision, the more “uncut” a man’s cock might appear. So, it’s entirely possible your boyfriend was circumcised as an infant but that his cock — if his circumcision was loose — more closely resembles uncut cocks you’ve admired in porn and encountered IRL. P.S. For the record: Your boyfriend should not have been circumcised in infancy. No infant should be. 2. What’s the best song about cheating? I nominate “One Way Out” by the Allman Brothers. There are so many greats — “Heard It Through the Grapevine,” “The Piña Colada Song,” “Don’t Hurt Yourself” — but in the category of “Best Song About Cheating,”…

[ Read more ]

Slog AM: Our War With Iran Spirals, Clintons Questioned About Epstein, British Columbia Adopts Permanent Daylight Saving

Vivian McCall — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 09:30:00 -0800

The Stranger's morning news roundup. by Vivian McCall

Iran: Israel and US strikes have killed 787 people in Iran. Washington warned the “hardest hits” are to come. What? Combined forces have already killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, hit the state broadcaster, and damaged Golestan Palace in Tehran, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Overnight, the US and Israel bombed Tehran. This morning, Iran struck the US Embassy in Saudi Arabia; Israel hit Beirut, Lebanon in answer to yesterday’s strikes from the Iranian-backed Hezbollah. The US and Israel say this descending spiral into wider war is necessary to end Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

What did a girl’s school have to do with those nuclear ambitions? The roof collapsed when missiles hit Shajareh Tayyebeh (The Good Tree) on Saturday, killing 165 and wounding 95, according to Iranian media. Social media accounts and websites linked to Israel claimed the school was part of an “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps base.” However, a report from Al Jazeera’s digital investigations unit determined the school had been clearly separate from the adjacent military site for at least a decade, throwing into question the accuracy of the intelligence that led to this bombing.

New Bus News: Sound Transit broke ground on the Stride S3 line, a rapid bus line connecting the north end of Lake Washington from Bothell to Shoreline, writes The Urbanist. The S3 is one of three lines under construction, upgrades to existing express routes. Doors are expected to pop open in 2028. See? The suburbs can have nice things, too.

Behind in Getting Ahead: British Columbia is adopting permanent daylight saving time on March 8. We’ll be in sync with Vancouver until November 1, when we fall back an hour once again. We want the same—Washington passed that law in 2019—but we need Congressional approval. British Columbia has had the ability to do this since 2019, and has been dutifully waiting for us, but nobody can wait forever with all these “recent actions from the US” going on.

Candidate Alert: Ordained minister, community organizer and Lavender Rights Project executive director Jaelynn Scott is running for a seat in the state house. The opportunity came by way of musical chairs: When State Sen. Rebecca Saldaña announced her run for King County Council, 37th District Rep. Chipalo Street told the Washington State Standard he was running for her seat, leaving his own vacant. Micah interviewed Scott ahead of her announcement.

Where’s Rep. The Lorax? Budget legislation in the House could dismantle a state program to plant and sustain trees in Washington.

Epstein Intrigue: The House Oversight Committee released video of the Clintons testifying in closed door depositions for its Epstein investigation. Did they burst this thing wide open? No.

Bill: Bill described his relationship with Epstein, the convicted sex offender and “information-hungry person,” as “cordial,” not a true friendship (though who would admit to that now?). During questioning, he recalled talking with Trump about Epstein at one of the president’s golf courses about 20 years ago (Trump told Bill they’d fallen out over a property deal). Bill Clinton is the first former president forced to testify in Congress, which Democrats hope will set a precedent that makes it easier to call President Trump to the stand. But, when asked if Trump should testify, Bill replied “that’s for you to decide,” adding nothing Trump said to him made him think Trump was involved in anything “improper.” Bill did not, however, “exonerate” Trump as Rep. James R. Comer of Kentucky claimed.

Hillary: Rep. Nancy Mace, the transphobe from South Carolina, took the lead questioning Hillary, who considered the deposition over a person “that I don’t believe I ever even met” a waste of her time. Mace pressed Hillary for her feelings about photos in the Epstein files of her husband with young women. “I am not going to speculate,” Hillary responded. Rep. Lauren Boebert, the fool from Colorado, pressed Hillary about Pizzagate, the 2015 conspiracy theory that Democrats were running a child sex ring in the basement of a D.C. pizzeria that inspired a man to “investigate” with his AR-15 in hand, firing several shots. Hillary said she couldn’t believe Boebert was mentioning it. (I can—she’s Lauren Boebert? Besides, pizzagate is piping hot at the moment. The Epstein files contain 900 odd references to pizza.)

Deadliest Catch Star Dead at 25: Todd Meadows, the newest deckhand aboard the Aleutian Lady, died while filming the show on the Bering Sea. Captain Rick Shelford announced Meadows’ death on Facebook yesterday, writing that it was the most tragic day in the crabbing boat’s history. Meadows had three sons.

Fire: About 40 people were displaced when an apartment building caught fire in Everett yesterday morning.

Ida-Holy Shit: Republican Governor Brad Little cares little for the disabled people in his state. After Trump’s Big Beautiful cuts to Medicaid, Little released a budget that would all but dissolve home care for people with disabilities. Home care is not a luxury, it is a need. Meanwhile, Idaho legislators want to make it a crime for any organization to help undocumented immigrants, churches included. Next on the agenda, puppy mills that really mill puppies.

Let the monthslong stomachache commence. Primaries for midterms in Texas, North Carolina, and Arkansas are underway. For some reason, the Associated Press is teaming up with the prediction market site Kalshi so people can bet on the outcome. Kalshi struck a similar deal to become CNN’s “official prediction market partner” in December. Surely, this can only be good for democracy.

Wet: Rain is pitter-pattering between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., followed by one mysterious hour of patchy fog. Tonight, more rain. Tomorrow, even more rain. Thursday, you guessed it, rain. Friday? Rain again. Saturday and Sunday, rain is likely, but not for sure. Monday, rain, straight-up.

Last Month This Month

The Stranger's Slog AM™️ Specialists — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 17:20:00 -0800

All the headlines you may have missed in February. by The Stranger's Slog AM™️ Specialists

Ugh, Epstein. Props to the conspiracy theorists, it turns out there is a secret pedophilia cabal using pizza-coded language (maybe). The scale of it, and just who did what, is still murky (no thanks to the redactin’ feds), but some of the world’s richest people were involved with the financier. People like Bill Gates and the Andrew formerly known as Prince, whom British police arrested for possibly sharing trade secrets with Jeffrey Epstein. The files also implicated Hyatt Hotels heir Thomas Pritzker, who has since stepped down as the chain’s executive chairman. The files implicated another hotelier, but the president has yet to face any repercussions for allegedly molesting a child, allegedly participating in a sex-trafficking ring, or anything else. Though the Supreme Court did hang his tariffs out to dry, which is something.

* * *

Onto our bread and circuses: The Seahawks won the Super Bowl. To celebrate, fans climbed on top of the Pioneer Square pergola and broke it. The city asked each resident to donate $12 to fix it. The Stranger staff did not do this, and doubt you did either. Someone dig up Paul Allen!

* * *

After the Super Bowl win, the Seahawks’ stock rose to a new level. Jody Allen, Paul’s sister, announced she’ll give the boys and their bird to the highest bidder. For sale: football team, lightly used. Seriously, someone dig up Paul Allen. He’d say, “This is exactly what I wanted,” and we’d all smile.

* * *

At his Governor’s Mansion, Bob Ferguson is scheming for an NBA team. Or, at least, Zooming with NBA commissioner Adam Silver about it. Bruce Harrell’s veins are about to pop out of his neck and strangle him to death.

* * *

Speaking of things you can buy, there’s a waterfall up for grabs in Oregon. If you’ve got enough liquid, you can slurp up Abiqua Falls.

* * *

If you’re feeling generous, Oregon needs some cheddar for its public defenders. The situation is so dire that 1,400 cases could be thrown out for a lack of lawyers. You could also take the Oregon State Bar if you’re looking for a low-pay, high-stress vocation.

* * *

Mayor Katie Wilson swept a Ballard homeless encampment, fooling us once; she isn’t taking down the city’s police CCTV surveillance cameras, fooling us twice.

* * *

A report on the Seattle Police Department’s handling of last summer’s May Day USA anti-trans rally showed that SPD was biased against the counter-protesters, aka the people they’re sworn to protect. They also didn’t realize the neighborhood with rainbow crosswalks was gay. Boys, sit down. We have something to tell you about Freddie Mercury, Liberace, and Glee.

* * *

Seattle must cough up $29 million in a settlement to the family of Jaahnavi Kandula, the 23-year-old Indian graduate student whom Seattle officer Kevin Dave slammed into at 50 miles over the speed limit, something he was miraculously never charged for.

* * *

Money-laundering scheme Melania only scraped together $15.4 million at the box office—far less than the $75 million Amazon paid for it. Perhaps that’s why Bezos laid off a third of the Washington Post newsroom. Or, maybe he wanted Democracy Dies in Darkness to become a directive.

* * *

Fortunately, our enemies are the stupidest people alive. A Louisiana National Guard soldier left his AR-15 in a hotel bathroom on Bourbon Street while on patrol in the French Quarter. “I kind of feel bad for him because that’s one of the main rules of being in the Army, I would think, is you’re always supposed to have your weapon in your hands and not in somebody else’s,” said French Quarter performer Nervous Duane. You said it Duane, that must be one of the main rules of the army.

* * *

In an attempt to appease Trump’s calls for action against the fentanyl trade in exchange for lighter tariffs, the Mexican army killed cartel leader “El Mencho.” Cartel members did not take well to this. They incited violence across multiple Mexican states. They set fire to vehicles, blocked roads, and killed at least 25 Mexican National Guardsmen in six separate attacks. American tourists were advised to hunker down in their all-inclusive resorts.

* * *

Border czar and future federal inmate Tom Homan announced he’s reducing chud numbers in Minnesota. A quarter of the ICE agents out on the ice will get to warm their sackless junk by the fire. The whistles and the optics—try not murdering people or kidnapping children in broad daylight—proved to be too much.

* * *

Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security is in a funding freeze. Brr?

* * *

The cold got to the Olympians. Ski jumpers are injecting acid into their penises. Not for fun or pleasure, but for ski suits. The extra girth gives them extra room, which gives them more lift and just a little athletic advantage. It’s a physics thing, and a cheating thing.

* * *

For one cheater, it was a sex thing. Immediately after winning the bronze medal, a Norwegian biathlete confessed to his worst mistake: cheating on his beautiful girlfriend of three months. He hoped his podiumside remorse would win her back. It did not.

* * *

The men’s and women’s US hockey teams both won gold. Guess which game FBI Director Kash Patel flew to while his agency is searching for an 84-year-old woman kidnapped from her home?

* * *

Everywhere in the country froze over last month except the West Coast. This is not bad news, because, according to the Trump administration, climate change is not real and neither are the dangers of greenhouse gases. To celebrate, we’re eating raw, unrefrigerated pork and sharing needles.

* * *

Perhaps someone can save us. Someone like Vince “ShamWow” Shlomi. The infomercial star who hawked super absorbent pads to handle spills and messes has got his eye on “soaking up the swamp.” Don’t get it twisted, Shlomi is an anti-woke warrior whose slogan is “Make America Grow Some Balls Again.” His campaign promises to “slap chop the nuts out of the ‘woke,’ making less blue-haired commies and more red-blooded Americans.” That’s not going to fit on the baseball caps.

* * *

Seeing as we’re on our own, we must remain vigilant. Or else our whistling Olympic marmots will continue to die off, and people will keep snatching our morning show hosts’ mothers from their Arizona mansions. Luckily, Ring cameras are here to help! In their 30-second Super Bowl ad, Ring highlighted “Search Party,” a way to trigger all of your neighbors’ cameras to look for a dog if it’s gone missing. Sweet, right? They’ve pinky-promised to limit this technology to dog-finding only.

* * *

Here is who died this month: Dawson’s Creek’s James Van Der Beek at 48, Harold and Maude’s Bud Cort at 77, and Rev. Jesse Jackson at 84. The Boeing IMAX theater isn’t totally dead, but it got sold to the Space Needle Corporation, and the big screen as we know it seems dead as a doornail.

* * *

Anderson Cooper is also dead. Well, his gig at CBS’s 60 Minutes is, at least, as well as 60 Minutes’s reputation. The gay dad of news said in a statement that he wanted to spend more time with his children. But reading between the lines, we suspect he wanted to spend less time with CBS News’ Bari Weiss.

* * *

Clearly, we need a hero, and his name is Punch. Because he is only a baby, and a monkey in a Japanese zoo being bullied by other monkeys while he clings to his surrogate mother (a stuffed orangutan toy from IKEA), he cannot comprehend fascism or sex crimes. But he understands the meaning of perseverance. And maybe he’ll do a Curious George thing and figure this out for us. Or, maybe something sad will happen. Probably that.

Where to Scream

Megan Seling — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 14:30:00 -0800

Protests, rallies, and other ways to get involved in March. by Megan Seling Stand Up for Science

Mar 7

Seattle’s chapter of Stand Up for Science will host a rally at the Mural Amphitheatre at Seattle Center to fight the Trump administration’s “well-funded, well-platformed anti-science attacks” and call for the removal of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Speakers will include Congresswoman Dr. Kim Schrier, Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck, WA Public Lands Commissioner Dave Upthegrove, and Will Daugherty, the CEO of the Pacific Science Center. Find more details at standupforscience.net/march7. (Seattle Center Mural Amphitheatre, noon–3 pm)

Seattle Women’s March

Mar 8

Evergreen Resistance and the Defund Musk Women’s Group—who often protest around town dressed as handmaids—will host a rally and march at Cal Anderson Park for International Women’s Day. Details were still coming together at press time—find more information at defundmusk.com. (Cal Anderson, 11 am, all ages, free)

Resistance Training with Pramila Jayapal

Mar 8

You could tune in to Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal’s virtual Resistance Lab training from the comfort of your own home—or you could congregate with fellow activists at Central Cinema, where they’ll be streaming the presentation on their big screen. No tickets or RSVPs required, and the event will include breakout discussions and a Q&A session. Find more info at pramilaforcongress.com. (Central Cinema, 11 am–1 pm, all ages, free)

Speaking of Seattle: Immigrant Rights Are Human Rights

Mar 19

Stranger contributor Marcus Harrison Green will lead a discussion with Angelina Snodgrass Godoy (the Director at the Center for Human Rights at the University of Washington), Roxana Norouzi (the Executive Director of OneAmerica), Councilmember Alexis Mercedes-Rinck, and Seattle City Attorney Erika Evans about how the city is responding to ICE and what Seattleites can do to advocate for immigrant rights in Seattle. (Town Hall, 7:30 pm, $10–$35 sliding scale)

No Kings

Mar 28

No Kings has announced March 28 as their next nationwide day of protest. Thousands of events are being planned across the country. Seattle Indivisible is organizing the event in Seattle, which will begin at noon at Cal Anderson Park with a march to the Seattle Center starting at 1:15 p.m. Keep an eye on Seattle Indivisible’s Instagram (@seattleindivisible) for updates. No Kings organizers said more than seven million people attended at least 2,700 rallies across the country for their October 18 demonstrations. Here in Seattle, an estimated 90,000 people gathered at the Seattle Center. That’s almost 10 percent of the city! Seattle Indivisible will also host a No Kings volunteer fair on March 4. (Cal Anderson, noon, visit seattleindivisible.com for updates)

Protest ICE Terror

Every Friday

Every Friday morning, Southend Indivisible gathers in front of the Department of Homeland Security building at 12500 Tukwila International Boulevard to “demand an end to the kidnappings of our neighbors, separation of families, and terrorizing of our community.” Bring a sign, or make one on-site with provided materials. (Department of Homeland Security, Tukwila, 9 am–10:30 am)

Riff Raff League

Every Sunday

Every Sunday, Seattle’s most punk-rock art shop, Push/Pull, hosts free Riff Raff League meetings, where folks can talk about political action and mutual aid while making zines, posters, buttons, and whistle kits for their neighbors. While you’re there, grab a free ABOLISH ICE poster and sign up for one of their monthly zine-making workshops. Masks are required. (Push/Pull, 7:15 pm–8:15 pm)

Stranger Suggests: Lunar New Year Lion Dances, a PNW Punk Legend, and Nerdy Cosplay on Display

Shannon Lubetich — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 12:30:00 -0800

One really great thing to do every day of the week. by Shannon Lubetich MONDAY 3/2

Michael Pollan: A Journey Into Consciousness

Mull over the mystery of consciousness with Michael Pollan at Town Hall on Monday, March 2. CHRISTOPHER MICHEL

(BOOKS) I fucking love Michael Pollan. Does it feel super nerdy to live and die for the words of a bald white man? Oh yeah. But to me, few contemporary writers have reshaped public conversations about the mind quite like he has. His 2018 bestseller How to Change Your Mind remains a landmark work (and one of my favorite books) for its reframing of psychedelics from countercultural taboo to scientific inquiry and therapeutic possibility. But in 2026, Pollan has turned his attention even deeper inward with A World Appears: A Journey Into Consciousness. Released just last month, it’s an ambitious exploration of consciousness itself, blending neuroscience, philosophy, literature, and psychedelic research, to investigate one of humanity’s oldest mysteries: why it feels like something to be alive at all. Learn all about it straight from him at this Town Hall talk! (Town Hall Seattle, 7:30 pm, all ages) LANGSTON THOMAS

TUESDAY 3/3

Esther Rose

New Orleans native Esther Rose will show off her range at Sunset Tavern on Tuesday, March 3. ASH WRIGHT

(MUSIC) I discovered Esther Rose in 2017 when she released her debut, This Time Last Night, an intimate country/folk album that feels like she’s playing for you around a campfire. Now on her fifth studio album, Want, the New Orleans native defies the expectations of what an Esther Rose album can be with bold indie rock arrangements and fuzzed-out guitars. As it’s depicted on the album’s cover, with Rose in a gauzy white cotton dress beside a Rose in a black pleather catsuit, the album balances hard and soft, juxtaposing songs like the Liz Phair–esque track “Ketamine” with the stripped-down piano ballad “Color Wheel.” The album also includes “Scars,” a duet with Seattle-based troubadour Dean Johnson—we love to see it! For this local date, Rose will be joined by fellow New Orleans singer-songwriter Thomas Dollbaum. (Sunset Tavern, 8 pm, 21+) AUDREY VANN

WEDNESDAY 3/4

Tigran Hamasyan - Manifeste

Tigran Hamasyan brings his experimental brand of contemporary jazz to Neptune Theatre on Wednesday, March 4. ARNOS MARTIROSYAN

(MUSIC) Armenian pianist and composer Tigran Hamasyan makes arthouse contemporary jazz; like the film genre I'm stealing the name from, it's independent, experimental, and thought-provoking. His unique combination of jazz improvisation, prog rock, and Armenian folk music has gained him recognition around the world: Hamasyan earned the top spot at Switzerland's Montreux Jazz Festival’s piano competition as a teen, winning the prestigious Thelonious Monk International Jazz Piano Competition a few years later. He released his 13th full-length record, Manifeste, last month, which takes the listener on a cinematic journey both sonically and literally—he recorded it across studios in Athens, Moscow, LA, and Yerevan, Armenia. Get swept up in an evening of music that jumps, twists, and turns in lively and unexpected ways under Hamasyan's inspired direction. (Neptune Theatre, 8 pm, all ages) SHANNON LUBETICH

THURSDAY 3/5

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once

View works like "The Echo Chamber" by artist Eric Louie at Foster/White Gallery's group exhibition "Everything, Everywhere, All at Once." ERIC LOUIE

(ART) This spring marks the 60th anniversary of Foster/White, one of Pioneer Square’s longest-standing fine art galleries. To mark the occasion, they’re bringing out a little bit of everything: works by some 55 represented artists, installed salon-style throughout the space. Alongside pieces by local legends such as Alden Mason and artists associated with the Northwest School, Foster/White’s roster spans a wide range of contemporary practices—from George Rodriguez’s ponderous ornamental ceramics and Ilana Zweschi’s algorithmic dances on canvas, to Eric Louie’s sheening metallic landscapes, and Casey McGlynn’s rough-hewn, punk poems gushing color. Word has it there will be cake on First Thursday. (Foster/White Gallery, 6–8 pm) AMANDA MANITACH

FRIDAY 3/6

Toody Cole

PNW punk legend Toody Cole will grace the stage at Tractor Tavern on Friday, March 6. HEATHER MACDONALD

(MUSIC) I once found myself sitting at a bar beside Toody Cole and told her that she was my all-time favorite bassist, to which she blushed and said, “Thank you, I’m trying really hard, and I practice a lot.” A telling response from a humble punk veteran who is far too cool to play it cool. Over the past five decades, Toody and her dearly departed husband, Fred, have kept Portland's music scene alive with their bands—Dead Moon, the Rats, Pierced Arrows, and several others—self-recording and self-releasing music in their self-built Clackamas County home. While it’s easy to take one look at Dead Moon’s drippy font and iconic skull logo and assume that their music is raucous, dark, and speedy, you might be surprised to find the tenderness that runs beneath, exemplified on vulnerable, slow-paced tracks like “Where Did I Go Wrong” and “It’s O.K.” At the center of Toody and Fred’s projects has always been love: love for the community, love of music, and love for one another. (Tractor Tavern, 8:30 pm, 21+) AUDREY VANN

SATURDAY 3/7

Lunar New Year Celebration 2026

(CULTURE) The Chinatown–International District Business Improvement Area’s annual Lunar New Year party returns this year, and so does its signature food walk. While the list of which restaurants will be participating wasn’t out before our publication date, you can count on neighborhood staples like Dim Sum King and Kau Kau BBQ to be included. The best part of the food walk? Too many choices. Last year, there were more than 40 businesses. Each one will offer $6 specials ranging from snacks like wings to drinks like boba. One time, I went with a friend and created a whole spreadsheet so we could maximize our time, stomachs, and money spent. Once you’re stuffed from all the food, you can head over to Hing Hay Park, where there will be a main stage with dragon and lion dance performances. And, hey, if you’ve got some of that lucky money to spend after feasting your way through the neighborhood, there will also be arts and crafts vendors. (Hing Hay Park, 11 am–5 pm, all ages, free) GRACE MADIGAN

SUNDAY 3/8

Emerald City Comic Con 2026

Connect with other fans at Emerald City Comic Con, March 5–8. WEST SMITH

(GEEK & GAMING) Whether you're an anime adorer, cosplay crafter, or all-around certified geek, Emerald City Comic Con transcends a typical convention, transforming the Seattle Convention Center into a third space for Avengers fandoms to assemble. The four-day con boasts panels and meet-and-greets with stars including Star Wars' Hayden Christensen, Twin Peaks icon Kyle MacLachlan, and Vampire Diaries heartthrob Ian Somerhalder, but experiences like the talent show, Pride Lounge, and tattoo pavilion really make this a community gathering to connect with fellow pop culture enthusiasts. (Seattle Convention Center, 10 am–5 pm, all ages) JANEY WONG

Community Organizer Jaelynn Scott Is Running to Represent the 37th Legislative District

Micah Yip — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 12:00:00 -0800

The Lavender Rights Project's Jaelynn Scott has never held public office. If elected, she would be the first openly trans person in the Washington State Legislature. She is running on crisis care; her focus is on housing instability, homelessness, healthcare access, ICE abductions, and trans rights. by Micah Yip

After nearly seven years as executive director of the Black trans feminist organization Lavender Rights Project, Jaelynn Scott is running for 37th District, Position 2, to represent the Central District, Columbia City, Beacon Hill, Rainier Valley, Rainier Beach and Renton.

There’s no incumbent, or so it seems, and Scott may just benefit from a game of musical seats. When Sen. Rebecca Saldaña announced her run for King County Council, 37th District Rep. Chipalo Street told the Washington State Standard that he’d run for the Senate seat she’s leaving behind, which would leave his seat open.

Scott has never held public office. If elected, she would be the first openly trans person in the Washington State Legislature. She is running on crisis care; her focus is on housing instability, homelessness, healthcare access, ICE abductions, and trans rights. She’s invested in helping the state’s vulnerable, like trans people and immigrants, with holistic solutions.

Local progressives believe she can get the job done. Sen. Saldaña, Seattle City Attorney Erika Evans, and City Councilmembers Alexis Mercedes Rinck and Dionne Foster have endorsed Scott. She’s full of ideas, but what about follow-through?

“There’s a lot on the line,” Scott says. “Everything in this race is holding the hopes and wishes and dreams of a lot of people who are struggling and suffering…Everything I do in the legislature will be absolutely critical because of the crisis that we’re facing as a country.”

Housing

The Lavender Rights Project operates permanent supportive housing in partnership with Chief Seattle Club, so Scott’s’s a big fan. The future of these programs has already been tenuous this year, because the feds have repeatedly threatened to pull huge chunks of its funding, but she believes partnerships and a hypothetical heap of public money from progressive taxation our state doesn’t yet have could scale up this model, which provides mental health, addiction and disability support for the recently homeless.

“My approach would be, throw everything at it,” Scott says. “Let’s get our taxation where it needs to be and then face the challenges so we can get revenue as quick as possible.”

Surveillance

Scott couldn’t say if surveillance tools like CCTV and automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) make the community safe, but she thinks they’re risky for the immigrants and transgender people being targeted by the federal government.

If she had her way, she’d turn them off. But in the interest of harm reduction, she supports a bill to limit data retention to 21 days, State Senate Bill 6002. Even so, a seven-day cap would be much better, she says, which is the limit ACLU-WA recommends.

“Until we know that it’s secure, let’s just pause [surveillance across the state] to keep the sanctuary that we want this place to be,” Scott says. “That is our goal and that means protecting us from federal intrusion.”

ICE

Scott wants ICE out, but she’s not sure how to do that.

“I want to spend these next months sitting in front of, not lobbyists, not legislators, not candidates who have great ideas—I want to actually sit in front of communities who are on the ground protecting folks and find out what are the policy recommendations that they have,” Scott says. (She followed up after the interview to say the legislature should revisit anti-ICE bills that failed last session, like House Bill 2641, which would’ve barred Washington law enforcement from hiring anyone who became an ICE officer after January 20, 2025.)

Trans Rights

Scott’s focus wasn’t on new legislation to protect trans rights, but on strengthening the social safety net. Trans people are disproportionately poor, and are often discriminated against at work.

Protecting them means expanding access to housing and health care, and finding state resources to bypass the federal government as it tries to restrict Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming care and abortion. (Sounds good, but that last one is a tall order.)

“There’s a lot of fear and anxiety about rights being pulled back, but especially when I talk to communities of color, trans communities of color, immigrant communities, it always goes back to those three priorities,” Scott says.

She really wants universal healthcare (who doesn’t?), and supports Whole Washington’s Washington Health Trust, a proposal to create a publicly funded, statewide universal healthcare system. But she didn’t know how to make it a reality.

Once in a Dead Moon

Audrey Vann — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Toody Cole on Harmonies, Hardship, and Why She’s Back Onstage

by Audrey Vann

I once found myself sitting at a bar beside Toody Cole and told her that she was my all-time favorite bassist, to which she blushed and said, “Thank you, I’m trying really hard, and I practice a lot.” A telling response from a humble punk veteran who is far too cool to play it cool. Over the past five decades, Toody and her dearly departed husband, Fred, have kept Portland's music scene alive with their bands—Dead Moon, the Rats, Pierced Arrows, and several others—self-recording and self-releasing music in their self-built Clackamas County home. While it’s easy to take one look at Dead Moon’s drippy font and iconic skull logo and assume that their music is raucous, dark, and speedy, you might be surprised to find the tenderness that runs beneath, exemplified on vulnerable, slow-paced tracks like “Where Did I Go Wrong” and “It’s O.K..” At the center of Toody and Fred’s projects has always been love: love for the community, love of music, and love for one another. Even in one of their most pissed-off songs, 1994’s “Poor Born,” Fred sings lovingly, “I’ve got a woman who still makes me crazy with the shake of her nightgown.” I caught up with Toody Cole over the phone ahead of her show at the Tractor Tavern with bandmates Kelly Halliburton and Christopher March (of Jenny Don’t and the Spurs).

I emailed you for this interview through the contact on the Dead Moon website. Do you run the site, merch, and press inquiries on your own?
Yeah, baby, I’m still DIY all the way! It has pretty much always been my gig. And, shit, I turned 77 in December. I'm retired now, and while it's great to kick back, I'm still used to being busy. So, it’s just something to do, and it doesn't take up that much of my time. It's cool because I can do whatever I want or not do anything at all, depending on how I feel.

I was listening to an interview you gave in 2019, and you said, “I’ve always had it in my head ‘70 years old, and I’m done.'” I assume you changed your mind?
I'm as vain as anybody. I just thought that I would look too old, and I didn’t want to get on stage. But at some point, I got past that and just went, “What the hell!” and got back on stage. The more I look at old pictures, the more I go, “Fuck, I look great!” But the coolest thing is that it still feels just the same to get up on stage. It's not easy to do anymore—it takes a lot of work and prep time to make it happen.

What got you back into playing shows?
When I lost Andrew [Loomis, Dead Moon's drummer, who passed away in 2016] and Fred, followed by the pandemic, wildfire evacuations, and a huge ice storm, I looked up at the sky and thought, God, what next? It was like a domino effect. But, in 2023, Eric Isaacson (who runs Mississippi Records and reissues the Dead Moon LPs) had a 20th-anniversary party for the shop and asked if I would perform. I had the idea to do a retrospective of songs written by Fred from all the bands we had been in together. I figured it would just be a one-off. But I guess the set came off really, really well. I'm not used to this whole social media thing—I don't check it out, I don't do it, I don't post it, you know, whatever. But that's like all anybody does right now. So, as soon as videos from the show got posted, I got a flood of messages saying, “Oh my god, you're back playing again?” and offering gigs.

After that, I did a few local shows and got together with Kelly Halliburton and Christopher March from Jenny Don’t and the Spurs. It just fell together. At this point, Jenny takes care of all the bookings and detailed work for the band. I just resigned myself to booking a bunch of shows this year. This might be the last time I want to do it, I don't know.

How does it feel to play Dead Moon songs with different musicians, without Andrew and Fred?
Well, I'm not a songwriter—Fred wrote all the songs. I wish I had that talent. I really respect it. To me, his lyrics are amazing and timeless. People still love to hear his stuff, so I'm just doing the best that I can. It's not as good as the two of us together, that's for sure! One of my good friends said, “Man, know what I really miss? You and Fred’s harmonies together.” That's what I miss, too. It's just something that can't be duplicated, and thank God for that. It was the special ingredient.

What advice would you give to couples who want to create art together?
There are a lot of people who can and a lot of people who can't. I think one of the reasons that it worked so well for us was the fact that I wasn't a songwriter—there was no competition on that particular artistic level. Fred was pretty much the only reason I ended up playing music. He talked me into it, showed me how to play bass, and it just kind of grew from there. I got bit by the bug. I ended up loving being on stage. For me, it was more about performing in front of people and feeling that vibe, rather than getting satisfaction from writing a great song. We were both really good at different things.

We were an incredibly great partnership. I did all the paperwork and 90-percent of the business for the band: taking care of booking, hotels, flights, tour managing, and dealing with the money. Because of that, Fred got royalties from his songs. He never would have gone through that on his own. Some people are just too artistic to worry about money. So, anyway, we had everything handled between the two of us. That's why that worked. It was a really unique situation.

What was your first time on stage like?
My first show was with the Rats in 1977 or ’78, just doing punk-rock stuff. Fred had just started playing electric guitar on stage—before that, he was on lead vocals with the Weeds and the Lollipop Shoppe. I had only been playing bass for a couple of weeks, and our drummer was this kid who had never played drums before. [laughs] One night, while we were rehearsing together and having a drink, Fred said, “Oh, by the way, I got us a gig—we're playing a house party on Friday.” I was like, “What!? I can't do that, no way!” And he goes, “No, it'll be fine. Get a couple of beers in you, and you'll be great.” That was my first gig. It was in somebody's little teeny bar or front room or whatever, in front of about five-10 people.

Were there any musicians whom you were looking up to or emulating at the time?
Oh yeah. Greg Sage, man, the Wipers! A lot of my bass-playing style was influenced greatly by Dave Koupal, the bass player of the Wipers.

Between the Rats and Dead Moon, you released a solo single of Brenda Lee’s “Coming on Strong” and “Rather Be Your Lover,” written by Fred. How did that single come about?
Well, that happened because Fred was playing with his country group, the Western Front, at that time. We had broken up the Rats, and I got to a point where my kids weren't quite grown yet. My younger son was around 12/13, and he guilt-tripped me about going out of town and not being around. So I told Fred, “I'm done.” He ended up kind of messing around with country music and got the Western Front together. I would sing with those guys off and on. And that's how the Toody single happened. I love singing country, but it's not as exciting to play on stage, which is one of the reasons we left it behind and started Dead Moon.

I know that Fred was heavily inspired by seeing the Ramones to start the Rats. Was there a similar event that inspired the start of Dead Moon?
Fred wanted to go back to his roots and play rock and roll again. You know, real rock and roll, like the stuff he was doing with the Weeds and the Lollipop Shoppe. We got started by playing covers and a few of his older songs. Fred quickly got inspired and wrote so much incredible material in the first three years. From there, we got picked up locally, just from the reputation of our previous bands. The Wipers had started touring in Europe, and Hans Kesteloo (who ended up signing us to his label Music Maniac Records in Germany) hounded Greg Sage, saying, “You're living in Portland, right? Do you know Fred Cole?” So that's how that connection happened. It's just so weird. Everything seemed fated. It just fell into place.

I love that Dead Moon has some really pissed-off songs followed by some really sweet, tender songs, like the first album, when “Out on a Wire” goes into Elvis’ “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” Was that intentional?
Fred was always looking for material for me to sing before he started writing songs with me in mind to do the lead vocals. “Can’t Help Falling in Love” just kind of happened. At some point, we started playing it live, and I don't know, maybe we used it because we needed filler on the album. For whatever reason, my version of that song just caught on. Everybody loves hearing it.

Mixing the hard and the hopeful, the light and the dark, and that girly vocal thing, added a whole new dimension to Dead Moon. It’s what Fred used to call a roller coaster—he'd make setlists based on it—He liked to hit the audience hard at the beginning and the end. In the middle, we would build it up, and then bring it back down into a ballad or something slow, or start all over again. He totally learned it from watching punk-rock bands. You know, when everything's BAM! BAM! BAM! in your face, the effect wears off. Fred was an amazingly multifaceted individual, and he felt everything—you can tell just by the way he carried off his vocals. Every feeling was equally important to him.

See Toody Cole with Semisoft and DJ Kurt Bloch at the Tractor Tavern on Mar 6 at 8:30 pm.

Slog AM: We’re at War With Iran, It’s Expanding Through the Region, and There's No End in Sight

Hannah Murphy Winter — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:55:00 -0800

The Stranger's Morning News Roundup. by Hannah Murphy Winter

Operation Epic Fury: We’re in our third day of war with Iran. On Saturday morning, in three strikes over the course of about a minute, the US and Israeli militaries killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the nation’s supreme leader of almost 37 years, and more than 40 senior leaders in his government. Another missile strike hit an Iranian girls’ elementary school, killing 160 people. Trump has called for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard to lay down arms and “receive full immunity or face certain death.”

This could become a sprawling regional war in the Middle East. In retaliation, Iran has already fired a barrage of missiles and drones at Israel, and launched missile attacks on US military bases in Qatar, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain. Hezbollah then launched missiles at Israel in retaliation for the death of the Ayatollah, and as of this morning, Israel has also bombed the suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, where there’s a Hezbollah stronghold.

Friendly Fire: In all of this chaos, three US fighter jets were accidentally shot out of the sky over Kuwait. All six crew members safely ejected from the planes.

In Trump’s video address to the public, he announced the Ayatollah’s death, saying that he had the blood of thousands of Americans on his hands. “We will continue until all of our objectives are achieved,” he said, but never clarified what those objectives were. Simply: “We have very strong objectives.” He also said that three American service members died in the attacks. “Sadly, there will likely be more before it ends,” he said. “That’s the way it is.” Secretary of War Pete Hegseth acknowledged a fourth American death this morning. “America will avenge their deaths,” Trump said in the video.

Hegseth did articulate the broad strokes of the war’s objectives this morning: “Destroy Iranian offensive missiles, destroy Iranian missile production, destroy their navy and other security infrastructure, and they will never have nuclear weapons. We’re hitting them surgically, overwhelmingly, and unapologetically,” he said in a press conference. He told reporters that it wouldn’t happen “overnight,” but didn’t say how long he expected the operation to last. And in an interview with CNN, Trump said that the “big wave” is yet to come.

“They Started It”: Both Trump and Hegseth have tried to present this as unavoidable, despite reports that there was no risk of a preemptive strike from Iran. In his video message, Trump said that the US-Israeli operation is a "righteous mission,” and the “duty and burden of a free people.” He said that Iran had been “waging war against civilization itself.” In a Pentagon press conference, Hegseth said, “We didn’t start this war, but under President Trump, we are finishing it.”

Meanwhile: Congress is starting the debate of whether or not Trump has the power to launch this war about three days too late. The power to declare war does technically lie exclusively with Congress, but they’re not likely to scrounge up the two-thirds vote they’d need to overcome a presidential veto.

Stateside, a gunman in Austin, Texas, walked into a bar early on Sunday morning with a pistol and a rifle, wearing clothes with an Iranian flag design and the words “Property of Allah.” He killed two people and wounded 14. Police killed the shooter on the scene, and the FBI is investigating the shooting as a possible act of terrorism.

In Seattle, hundreds of anti-war protesters showed up at Pike Place Market on Sunday, while a caravan of about 300 cars on I-5 demonstrated in support of the attacks.

Weather: Amid all of this insanity, the universe is giving us a little taste of spring today. Highs around 58, clear skies. Get into the sunshine, if only for your mental health.

If You’re Not One for the Sun: Perhaps a total lunar eclipse instead? Early Tuesday morning, between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m., the moon will fully fall behind Earth’s shadow, turning it blood red. It won’t happen again until New Year’s Eve 2028.

Something a Little Lighter: According to Playboy, experts in the field, the Winter Olympics were especially horny this year. “Set against the operatic mountains of Italy, homeland of Romeo and Juliet and centuries of Catholic repression, the steam emitted from the 2026 Winter Olympics came early,” they wrote. There was “penisgate.” USA Hockey Captain Hilary Knight got engaged at the games. Plus, every viewer was looking for a hint of Heated Rivalry this year. “The Olympic Village distributed 10,000 condoms to athletes, a well-known protective measure as our foremost athletes collaborate with their international counterparts. Within three days, they were gone—a record-breaking feat. With nearly 3,000 athletes in attendance, that’s roughly three protected encounters per competitor.”

Speaking of Olympians: The Seattle Torrent played their first game since the Olympics on Friday at Climate Pledge. The arena sold out for the first time for a PWHL game, but two of their Olympic stars—Hilary Knight and Hannah Bilka—were both out with injuries from the games. Knight, the team’s captain and Olympic record holder, will be out for at least three weeks. The team still held their own for most of the game, but lost in the third period when the Toronto Sceptres shot two goals into an empty net from the other side of the ice. It wouldn’t be Seattle sports without a little heartbreak.

If you, like me, are still riding the high of Team USA’s impeccable women’s hockey vibes, may I recommend Saturday’s SNL monologue with Heated Rivalry’s Connor Storrie, and members of both the men’s and women’s hockey teams? Torrent Captain Hilary Knight takes a stab at Trump, saying they included the boys “to be fair,” and Storrie tells the men’s hockey players (who insist they haven’t watched the Gay Hockey Show) that Ilya only gets his teeth knocked out “metaphorically.”

View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Saturday Night Live (@nbcsnl)

Amazon Who? The tech giant isn’t Seattle’s Number One Employer anymore. They reached their peak in 2020, with 60,000 employees, but after a few rounds of huge layoffs, they now employ fewer than 50,000 Seattleites.

Big Win for the Little Guys: In a push from a group of 13 progressives, the Washington State House Finance Committee stripped a tax break that would have benefited big businesses from the latest version of the Millionaires Tax. It could claw back $550 million—more than the governor’s proposed cuts to education and child care. Don’t you care about the kids, Bob?

A Song for Your Monday: A little Discovery Zone while you try to shake all this off and start the day.

March Things to Do: This & That

Nathalie Graham — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:09:00 -0800

The best culture and community events happening this month. by Nathalie Graham

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

Emerald City Comic Con

Mar 5–8

Nerds run the city the first week of March. They, bedecked in cosplay, are the mayor now. Their first conquest: the Convention Center. Emerald City Comic Con is the place to be if you like sci-fi, fantasy, or popular Renaissance faire acts like Jacques ze Whipper. If you head to ECCC this year, you could be in the same room as Kyle MacLachlan (Twin Peaks, Fallout) or the one woman who was in Heated Rivalry. You’ll also get to see Hayden Christensen from everyone’s least favorite Star Wars movies and renowned authors like Matt Dinniman, who wrote the electric Dungeon Crawler Carl, or Chuck Tingle, who writes “tinglers” like Pounded in the Butt by My Own Butt. Something for everybody! Don’t forget to wear deodorant! (Seattle Convention Center, all ages) NATHALIE GRAHAM

The Seattle Color Festival

Mar 28

Celebrate Holi, the Hindu Festival of Colors, almost a month late but near the Space Needle. Entry is free, registration is mandatory, colors are not free, and you can’t bring your own colors. This palette is regulated. We’re celebrating the eternal love of Radha and Krishna, the end of winter, and the arrival of spring, not your favorite shade. I would not recommend the festival to crowd-a-phobes. Last year’s Holi celebration drew 10,000 people. (Mural Amphitheatre Seattle Center, 11 am, all ages, free) VIVIAN McCALL

Daffodil Day

Mar 20

The clocks are forward. The birds are chirping. The rabbits are going to start fucking any second. The daffodils have burst forth from the earth, buttery and hopeful. Spring has sprung. The only way to celebrate is to venture down to Pike Place Market on March 20. The roof of the market turns yellow, lined with the happy flowers. Underneath the blooms tossing their heads in a spritely dance (Wordsworth, anyone?), you’ll be able to participate in the market’s annual Daffodil Day. Between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., the market just gives away bundles of flowers. You’ll need to be quick, though—the free daffodils go quickly. If worse comes to worst, you may need to prepare for daffodil battle. Stems can poke an eye out. (Pike Place Market, 11 am–2 pm, free) NATHALIE GRAHAM

More

Riding Together: 135 Years of Cycling in Seattle Through Apr 26, Museum of History & Industry

Stitch and Bitch Mar 4 (every first Wednesday), Push/Pull, 6 pm, free

Northwest Record Show Mar 8, Seattle Center Armory, 10 am–5 pm, all ages

Free Play Open House Vinyl Night Mar 10, Northwest Pinball Collective, 8 pm, all ages

Pi Day Dash Mar 14, Green Lake Community Center, 8 am, all ages

Cultivating Your Best Crop of Tomatoes Mar 14, NE Seattle Tool Library, 1 pm

Irish Festival Mar 14–15, Seattle Center Armory, all ages, free

The Gothic Market Mar 14–15, Seattle Center Exhibition Hall, noon, all ages

Block Printing Workshop Mar 27 (every last Friday), Push/Pull, noon

Sneaker Con Seattle Mar 28, Seattle Convention Center, noon, all ages

Spelling Bee 2026 Mar 29, Town Hall, 1 pm, all ages, free

March Things to Do: Food

Grace Madigan — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:09:00 -0800

The best food & drink events happening this month. by Grace Madigan

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

Lunar New Year Celebration 2026

MAR 7

The Chinatown–International District Business Improvement Area’s annual Lunar New Year party returns this year, and so does its signature food walk. While the list of which restaurants will be participating wasn’t out before our publication date, you can count on neighborhood staples like Dim Sum King and Kau Kau BBQ to be included. The best part of the food walk? Too many choices. Last year, there were more than 40 businesses. Each one will offer $6 specials ranging from snacks like wings to drinks like boba. One time, I went with a friend and created a whole spreadsheet so we could maximize our time, stomachs, and money spent. Once you’re stuffed from all the food, you can head over to Hing Hay Park, where there will be a main stage with dragon and lion dance performances. And, hey, if you’ve got some of that lucky money to spend after feasting your way through the neighborhood, there will also be arts and crafts vendors. (Hing Hay Park, 11 am–5 pm, all ages, free) GRACE MADIGAN

Hannyatou x Sake Noire x No Call No Show

MAR 9

Everything that the No Call No Show pop-up—themed craft cocktails and snacks concocted by a group of fine-dining creative weirdos—does is fucking elite, and this one’ll be no exception. Chef Mutsuko Soma, who owns award-winning Kamonegi, is hosting this month’s NCNS next door at Hannyatou, her foggy-windowed tavern straight out of a Miyazaki film. Your bartenders tonight are Murray Stenson’s prodigal protégé and NCNS impresario Matt Pachmayr (Le Coin, Streamline Tavern) and the mononymous Quan from the exquisite Sake Noire popup. (And soon-to-be Hillman City bar!) Fresh off a trip to Mexico, Quan and Soma came home inspired by “street tacos, endless hot sauces, ceviches, and late-night micheladas.” So they’re doing a Hannyatou x Three Amigos! shtick this month! Featured bites include Japanese curry nachos and wagyu taco rice—that’s Okinawan-style ground beef on rice with crushed Doritos—while the drink list includes a horchata-clarified milk punch with sōchū and chocolate, a jalapeño–yuzu gin martini, and a pickled strawberry old-fashioned made with yellow Chartreuse and tropical-fruity Nuestra Soledad Ejutla mezcal. To quote the film: I like these guys. They are funny guys. (Hannyatou, 21+) MEG VAN HUYGEN

FareStart Guest Chef Night with Matt Lewis and Dre Neeley

MAR 19

FareStart Seattle provides culinary on-the-job training to individuals facing barriers to employment and a unique dining experience all in one. Twice a month on Guest Chef Night, the FareStart students prepare a three-course meal served by volunteers, and March 19 will feature a dinner made in collaboration with local chefs Matt Lewis and Dre Neeley. Chef Matt Lewis is best known for his food truck, Where Ya At Matt, slinging Southern soul food reflective of his roots in New Orleans. Chef Dre Neeley of Vashon Island’s much-celebrated Gravy is likewise recognized for his Southern-inspired American fare and use of locally sourced, seasonal ingredients. Students in the program receive 12 weeks of culinary training, including food safety, recipe planning, and food prep, and Guest Chef Night will be a celebration of their work and a further opportunity to learn from established local chefs who have been through every stage of the industry. All proceeds from Guest Chef Night directly support the FareStart job training programs. (FareStart Restaurant, 5–9 pm) DYLAN BUECHE

Author Talk: Ham El-Waylly

MAR 31

Sohla and Ham El-Waylly are one of the most charming, talented, down-to-earth chef couples around, and I regularly tune in for their dispatches from the kitchen on YouTube. Their laid-back approach has a way of making cooking seem fun and effortless, which is why I’m so excited for Ham’s debut cookbook, Hello, Home Cooking: Do-Able Dishes for Every Day. The book encourages home cooks to experiment and promises nostalgic, out-of-the-box comfort dishes with international flavors and a “can’t-quite-put-my-finger-on-it heart-warming quality,” such as Bolivian cheesy rice, onion-smothered pot roast, and a version of Cinnamon Toast Crunch made out of pita. Ham will drop by Book Larder to discuss the book with Ahmed Suliman, the James Beard–nominated chef of Cafe Suliman. (Book Larder, 6:30 pm) JULIANNE BELL

More

Tacoma Beer Week Through Mar 8, various locations across Tacoma

Crumb Bakery Tour Through Mar 30, various locations

Soup Club Mar 7 (every first Sunday), Book Larder, 11 am

2nd Annual Seattle Sister Cities’ Soup Sampling Mar 8, National Nordic Museum, 2 pm, all ages

Decorative Pie Class with Natalie Popkave Mar 14, Pastry Project, 3 pm

My Dinner with SAM: Preeti Agarwal Mar 12, Seattle Asian Art Museum, 6:30 pm

Taste Washington Mar 21–22, various locations

Author Talk: Ella Quittner Mar 12, Book Larder, 6:30 pm

Author Talk: Sana Javeri Kadri and Asha Loupy Mar 17, Book Larder, 6:30 pm

Celebrate Women’s Month with Freeland Spirits Mar 17, Barrel Thief, 6 pm, 21+

March Things to Do: Film

Julianne Bell — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:09:00 -0800

The best film events and screenings happening in March. by Julianne Bell

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

Safe

MAR 1–15

Todd Haynes’s Safe is a horror movie cloaked in pastel colors, plastic tarps, and unsettling silence. Julianne Moore, the master of tension and nuance, plays Los Angeles housewife Carol White, who comes down with a debilitating illness that doctors cannot diagnose. After becoming self-convinced that the illness is caused by extreme environmental allergies, White flees to a retreat in New Mexico led by a New Age guru. Perhaps the most fascinating element of this film is the numerous ways it can be interpreted: a critique of suffocating suburban life, an allegory for the queer experience, a metaphor for the AIDS crisis, or a commentary on self-help culture—the more time that passes since its release, the richer the text gets. Don’t miss the chance to see it on the big screen this month to celebrate its 30th anniversary. (Northwest Film Forum, times vary) AUDREY VANN

Pillion

MAR 20–29

A24’s kinky gay “dom-com” Pillion, adapted from the 2020 novel Box Hill by Adam Mars-Jones, is one of my most highly anticipated films of 2026. English filmmaker Harry Lighton’s feature directorial debut follows the meek, guileless Colin (Harry Melling), whose life is turned upside down when he hooks up with gorgeous biker Ray (certified sexy freak Alexander Skarsgård) in an alley. Soon, Colin is initiated into the intriguing world of gay biker culture and BDSM and finds an unexpected sense of purpose and agency in his role as submissive. It’s a hot, funny, and surprisingly sweet meditation on sex and power—Secretary for the leather boys. Read our full review here. (Northwest Film Forum, times vary) JULIANNE BELL

Scorsese: The Age of Innocence

APR 1

Martin Scorsese has made countless iconic films about the Big Apple in different time periods, from Wall Street in the late ’80s (The Wolf of Wall Street) and decaying post-Vietnam New York City (Taxi Driver), to the city’s swanky jazz clubs of the 1940s (New York, New York). So naturally, he was the man for the job when it came to adapting fellow New Yorker Edith Wharton’s 1920 novel The Age of Innocence. Set in Gilded Age Manhattan, the story follows a messy love triangle between a young lawyer, his fiancée, and his fiancée’s newly separated cousin. This movie has everything: Winona Ryder, staggering period accuracy, decadent feasts, sweeping cinematography, and plenty of yearning glances. This is part of SIFF’s Martin Scorsese: Maestro of Cinema series, showing a different film by the director every Wednesday evening through the end of April. (SIFF Cinema Uptown, 7:30 pm) AUDREY VANN

More

The Hawks and the Sparrows Mar 2–5, the Beacon, times vary

Scorsese - Taxi Driver: 50th Anniversary Mar 4, SIFF Cinema Uptown, 7:30 pm

The Bride! Opens Mar 5, wide release

Truth to Fiction: The Librarians Mar 5, NW Film Forum, 7 pm

The Room Mar 5, Central Cinema, 5 pm

A Poet Opens Mar 6, SIFF Film Center

Days and Nights in the Forest Opens Mar 6, SIFF Cinema Uptown

Dial M for Murder Mar 6–11, Central Cinema

The Big Lebowski Mar 6–11, Central Cinema

HUMP! Film Fest Through Mar 7, On the Boards

Collide-O-Scope Mar 9, Clock-Out Lounge, 7 pm

Scorsese: Raging Bull Mar 11, SIFF Cinema Uptown, 7:30 pm

Retro Night: Mean Girls Mar 11, Majestic Bay

Numbskull Revolution Mar 11–12, Northwest Film Forum

The Ugly Stepsister Mar 11–12, SIFF Film Center, 7:15 pm

Werckmeister Harmonies Opens Mar 13, SIFF Film Center

Learning to Be Naked Screening with live burlesque from Mx. Pucks A’Plenty Mar 14, Central Cinema, 4 pm

Emerald City Irish Film Festival Mar 14–15, Pacific Science Center PACCAR IMAX theater

The 13th Annual On Cinema Oscar Special Mar 15, the Beacon

Raised by TV Oscars Viewing Party Mar 15, Clock-Out Lounge, all ages, free

Scorsese: The King of Comedy Mar 18, SIFF Cinema Uptown, 7:30 pm

Project Hail Mary Mar 19, wide release

Tow Opens Mar 20, SIFF Cinema Uptown

He Never Dies: The Films of Kalil Haddad Mar 20–29, NW Film Forum

The Cutoff Presented by Aravaipa Running Mar 21, SIFF Cinema Uptown, 1 pm

Scorsese: Goodfellas (4K Restoration) Mar 25, SIFF Cinema Uptown, 7:30 pm

National Film Festival for Talented Youth (NFFTY 2026) Mar 26–29, SIFF venues, times vary

Stand by Me: The Film and Its Stars 40 Years Later with Wil Wheaton, Jerry O’Connell, and Corey Feldman Mar 28, Paramount Theatre, 7:30 pm, all ages

March Things to Do: Performance

Nathalie Graham — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:09:00 -0800

The best theater, dance, and comedy events happening this month. by Nathalie Graham

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

Mary Jane

MAR 19–APR 19

Mary Jane is by no means a new play. Amy Herzog wrote and premiered it at the Yale Repertory Theatre in 2017; that same year, Carrie Coon (who you at least know from the most recent season of White Lotus or The Gilded Age or Fargo) won an Obie for playing the title character at the New York Theatre Workshop; then in 2024, Rachel McAdams made her Broadway debut as that same lead. And based on the critical reaction to every staging so far, I’m certain of one thing: This compact, 95-minute play is guaranteed to break your heart. Herzog’s story is semi-autobiographical, about the impossible reality of parenting a chronically ill 2-year-old who wasn’t expected to live past his first week. But don’t mistake it for a tragic Lifetime movie. Instead, it captures what it is to be suspended, frozen in a state of crisis, but the play still promises humor, clarity, and humanity. Whether you’ve seen it staged already or not, catch it this time. (Bagley Wright Theater, times vary) HANNAH MURPHY WINTER

Amy O’Neal: Again, There Is No Other (The Remix)

MAR 26–28

Amy O’Neal is back home again. After spending two decades dancing and curating in Seattle, she took a few years off in LA, but she’s settled back into the Pacific Northwest, and at On the Boards. When O’Neal was a finalist for a Stranger Genius Award back in 2013, Jen Graves and Brendan Kiley wrote that “delicate, wide-eyed girls with mouths that never open are about the only thing you will never find in Amy O’Neal’s dances.” And it’s a solid bet that you won’t find them in her newest play, either. She describes her return to On the Boards as a “ritual of femme power and connection” that “interrogates fear for the Feminine in patriarchal culture.” The piece combines the energy of nightclub and theater through five femme dancers, and includes original music from WD4D, Shabazz Palaces, Natasha Kmeto, and Moderat. (On the Boards, 8 pm) HANNAH MURPHY WINTER

Heather Kravas: RoCoCoCoCo

MAR 26–28 AND APR 2–4

Longtime Seattle choreographer and dancer Heather Kravas has put together a contemporary dance series in late March through early April. RoCoCoCoCo has four movements—all take place in the black box theater at 12th Avenue Arts, all feature a different combination of dancers, and all will be accompanied by two pianists playing on two upright pianos that are bound together. You can see these dances—which are described like a DIY folk dance—unspool over four evenings, or if you haven’t rotted the fuck out of your attention span, you can opt for the marathon version and watch 4.5 hours of dance in one evening and see everything all at once. Whatever you choose, RoCoCoCo will be an experience you shouldn’t miss. (12th Avenue Arts, times vary) NATHALIE GRAHAM

More

A Midsummer Night’s Dream Through Mar 8, Union Arts Center, times vary

The Bonnies Mar 4–7, 12th Avenue Arts, 7:30 pm

I Will Miss You When You’re Gone Mar 5–21, Theatre off Jackson, times vary

Spike Einbinder & Honey Pluton Mar 10, Clock-Out Lounge, 8:30 pm, 21+

Benny Feldman Mar 11, Fremont Abbey, 8 pm

Joketellers Union with Emmett Montgomery and Brett Hamil Mar 11, Clock-Out Lounge, 8:30 pm, 21+

Morgan Jay Mar 13, Paramount Theatre, 7 pm, all ages

Tina Friml Mar 13–14, Laughs Comedy Club, times vary, 21+

Pacific Northwest Ballet Presents: Firebird Mar 13–22, McCaw Hall, times vary

Ain’t Misbehavin’ Mar 18–Apr 25, Taproot Theatre, times vary

Samantha Bee Mar 19, Neptune Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

Moisture Festival 2026 Mar 19–Apr 12, Broadway Performance Hall, times vary

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater Mar 20–22, Paramount Theatre, times vary, all ages

Hurricane Diane Mar 20–Apr 12, Seattle Public Theater, times vary

Wife of Headless Man Investigates Her Own Disappearance Mar 27–Apr 11, Annex Theatre, times vary

Grand Kyiv Ballet: Swan Lake Mar 29, Moore Theatre, 4 pm, all ages

Brandon Wardell Apr 3, Crocodile, 7 pm, 21+

Early Warnings

Walden Apr 9–May 3, ArtsWest, times vary

The Stranger’s Undisputable Champions of Comedy Apr 4, Washington Hall, 7:30 pm, 21+

Appropriate Apr 9–May 10, Bagley Wright Theater, times vary

Pacific Northwest Ballet Presents: Giselle Apr 10–19, McCaw Hall, times vary, all ages

Jet City Improv at ArtsWest: An Improvised Musical Apr 19, ArtsWest, 7:30 pm

Margaret Cho Apr 19, Moore Theatre, 7 pm, all ages

Jonathan Van Ness Apr 24, Moore Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

Seattle Opera: Carmen May 2–17, McCaw Hall, times vary (See preview, pg. 43)

Jesus Christ Superstar May 2–17, 5th Avenue Theatre, times vary

Feat: Velocity Bash 2026 May 6, Washington Hall, 6 pm

Fauxnique: How Do I Look? May 7–9, On the Boards, 8 pm

Barefoot in the Park May 13–June 20, Taproot Theatre, times vary

Pacific Northwest Ballet Presents: All Lang May 29–June 7, McCaw Hall, times vary

NW New Works 2026 June 4–6, On the Boards, 7 pm

Disappearance at the Rocky Mountain Leatherdyke Snowpicnic June 5–20, Annex Theatre, times vary

The Play That Goes Wrong June 11–28, Bagley Wright Theater, times vary

March Things to Do: Literature

Julianne Bell — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:08:00 -0800

The best talks and readings happening in March. by Julianne Bell

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

Richard Hell

MAR 9

In his 2005 novel Godlike, punk pioneer Richard Hell reimagines the tumultuous relationship between 19th-century French poets Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine in 1970s New York. Hell’s adaptation follows esteemed poet Paul Vaughn, a married 27-year-old New Yorker, and a newly transplanted teenage poet, R.T. Wode, as they embark on a messy affair full of acid trips, crashed parties, and unrequited love. The book is getting a snazzy rerelease from NYRB (the Criterion Collection of the book world), and Hell will be there in the flesh to discuss the book and maybe even sign a few (if we’re lucky). (Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free) AUDREY VANN

Scott Broker with Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

MAR 13

Scott Broker’s first novel, The Disappointment, starts where so many stories do: a man trying to sneak his mother’s ashes into his suitcase without his husband noticing. The book is described as a surrealist vacation through this couple’s desperate, disconnected trip to the Oregon Coast. And no one could be better to interview him than Seattle’s own Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore (who recently released Terry Dactyl, if you somehow haven’t gotten your hands on it yet). The conversation promises to be brilliant, funny, and very, very queer. (Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free) HANNAH MURPHY WINTER

Stephen Graham Jones

MAR 30

With books like The Only Good Indians, My Heart Is a Chainsaw, and I Was a Teenage Slasher, Stephen Graham Jones has established himself as one of the most thrilling and urgent voices in horror right now. His latest release is the critically acclaimed historical horror novel The Buffalo Hunter Hunter, which tells the story of a Blackfeet Indian vampire named Good Stab who haunts the fields of the Blackfeet reservation, searching for vengeance. Jones will discuss his chilling oeuvre with local horror expert Sadie Hartmann, aka “Mother Horror,” co-owner of the horror fiction subscription company Night Worms and a Bram Stoker Award–nominated editor. (Town Hall Seattle, 7:30 pm) JULIANNE BELL

More

James McBride Mar 3, Town Hall Seattle, 7:30 pm

Norma Wong Mar 4, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

The Moth StorySLAM Mar 5, Fremont Abbey, 8 pm

Olivia Waite: Nobody’s Baby Mar 10, Charlie’s Queer Books, 7 pm

Lit Lounge: A Prose & Poetry Salon with Jodi-Ann Burey, Minda Honey, Deesha Philyaw, Mitchell S. Jackson, and DJ Twilight Mar 13, Royal Room, 8 pm

Kate Schatz with Molly Wizenberg Mar 16, Third Place Books Ravenna, 7 pm, free

Darcy Michael with Jeremy Baer Mar 18, Third Place Books Lake Forest Park, 7 pm

Lauren Westerfield with Erin Langner and Katie Lee Ellison Mar 19, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

Bob Crawford with John Roderick Mar 19, Third Place Books Lake Forest Park, 7 pm

The Moth StorySLAM Mar 20, St. Mark’s Cathedral, 8 pm

Tayari Jones with Ijeoma Oluo Mar 23, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

Ibram X. Kendi Mar 23, Town Hall Seattle, 7:30 pm

Sasha taqwšblu LaPointe with Katie Campbell Mar 23, Seattle Public Library Central Branch,
6:30 pm, free

Jane Hirshfield Mar 24, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

Sydney Langford: Someone to Daydream About Mar 28, Charlie’s Queer Books, 6:30 pm

Rebecca Brown with Christopher Frizzelle Mar 28, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

Ashley McGirt with Marcus Harrison Green Apr 1, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

Lindy West Apr 3, Town Hall Seattle, 7:30 pm

March Things to Do: Visual Art

Amanda Manitach — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:08:00 -0800

The best art shows and events happening in March. by Amanda Manitach

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

‘Everything, Everywhere, All at Once’

MAR 5–APR 25

This spring marks the 60th anniversary of Foster/White, one of Pioneer Square’s longest-standing fine art galleries. To mark the occasion, they’re bringing out a little bit of everything: works by some 55 represented artists, installed salon-style throughout the space. Alongside work by local legends such as Alden Mason and artists associated with the Northwest School, Foster/White’s roster spans a wide range of contemporary practices—from George Rodriguez’s ponderous ornamental ceramics and Ilana Zweschi’s algorithmic dances on canvas, to Eric Louie’s sheening metallic landscapes, and Casey McGlynn’s rough-hewn, punk poems gushing color. Word has it there will be cake on First Thursday. (Foster/White) AMANDA MANITACH

‘Beyond Mysticism: The Modern Northwest’

MAR 5–AUG 2

Featuring over 150 works, the SAM’s newest exhibit chronicles a rapidly changing 20th-century Seattle as told by artists who questioned the environmental and social impacts of industrialization through the visual language of social realism, surrealism, and abstract expressionism. Among these artists were the Northwest School’s Mark Tobey, Kenneth Callahan, Guy Anderson, and Morris Graves. I am most excited to see works from the unsung painter and Seattle-via-New York City transplant Yvonne Twining Humber, known for incorporating touches of Impressionism into her vibrant cityscapes. (Seattle Art Museum) AUDREY VANN

‘Let There Be Light’

OPENS MAR 13

The appetite for figurative work has grown ravenous over the past decade, eclipsing nearly all else (I jest—but bring back the conceptual weirdos and prankster-philosophers, please). That said, Let There Be Light is poised to be a blockbuster exhibition of figuration, curated by local artist-célèbre Anthony White. White’s own practice—steeped in fetishized beauty and objects of desire—draws from art-historical figurative traditions, often staging languorous odalisques refracted through a male-on-male gaze. Featuring work by 20 artists from Toronto, New York, Los Angeles, London, Paris, Philadelphia, Portland, and Seattle, this exhibition pushes figuration into the murkier terrain of the abject—a place where beauty melds with grotesquerie and the absurd. (Cannonball Arts) AMANDA MANITACH

Eric-Paul Riege: ‘ojo|-|ól’

MAR 14–OCT 25

The soft sculptures of Eric-Paul Riege aren’t quiet objects—their presence inscribed in space is monolithic and monumental, and when brought to life through movement, they become instruments of sound. Riege, who is Diné, has built a practice of collaging and reworking elements drawn from Navajo weaving and jewelry-making traditions, ultimately constructing large-scale, hanging installations that sway, ripple, and jingle when touched. For this exhibit—his largest solo show to date—Riege researched collections of Navajo artifacts held by Brown University’s Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology and the University of Washington’s Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture. What emerged is an immersive environment that envelops the viewer while quietly unsettling institutional narratives of Indigenous culture. (Henry Art Gallery) AMANDA MANITACH

Unpoetry

MAR 19

Unpoetry, organized by Eric M. Acosta, is not your everyday open mic night; defying tidy description, it descends from a lineage of happenings and communal experiments where performance, poetry, and visual art collide. This year marks Unpoetry’s fourth anniversary and its third season collaborating with the Frye Art Museum, activating the galleries through ekphrastic intervention. This evening’s performances draw inspiration from works on view by Priscilla Dobler Dzul and Camille Trautman, and while the particulars are still gestating (there are rumors of a wall of CRT televisions, live video augmentation, and immersive soundscape performance), the lineup features multidisciplinary artist Arabella, composer Eddie Mospan, poet Caleb Thomson, and interdisciplinary collective Til the Teeth. The after-party is down the street at the Hideout. Where else in this city will you find ekphrastic-themed drinks and NA uncocktails? (Frye Art Museum) AMANDA MANITACH

More

New Nordic: Cuisine, Aesthetics, and Place Through Mar 8, National Nordic Museum

Susan Meiselas: Crossings Through Mar 22, Photographic Center Northwest, free

Tininha Silva: It’s Not What I See, It’s How I Sea Through Mar 25, J. Rinehart Gallery

Gala Bent: A Woman Awash Through Mar 25, J. Rinehart Gallery

Future Forward: crisscross Through Mar 29, Mini Mart City Park

The One-Two Punch: 100 Years of Robert Colescott Through Mar 29, Tacoma Art Museum

Indira Allegra: The Book of Zero Through Apr 4, Jacob Lawrence Gallery, free

Boren Banner Series: Camille Trautman Through Apr 12, Frye Art Museum, free

Priscilla Dobler Dzul: Water Carries the Stories of Our Stars Through Apr 19, Frye Art Museum, free

Project NW: Ralph Pugay Through May 17, Tacoma Art Museum

Haunted Through June 7, Tacoma Art Museum

Jonathan Lasker: Drawings and Studies Through Sept 27, Frye Art Museum, free

A Room for Animal Intelligence Through Jan 2027, Seattle Art Museum

Ten Thousand Things Through Spring 2027, Wing Luke Museum

Ivy Jacobsen: Into the Wild Mar 5–28, Patricia Rovzar Gallery

Fred Holcomb: Fast Forest Mar 5–28, Harris/Harvey Gallery

Service/Symbiosis Mar 5–Apr 18, Actualize AiR and SOIL

Aimee Lee: Tethered Opens Mar 6, Bainbridge Island Museum of Art

Crafting Futures: Emerging Artists Invitational Opens Mar 6, Bainbridge Island Museum of Art

George & David Lewis: Deeply Rooted Opens Mar 6, Bainbridge Island Museum of Art

Interwoven Narratives Opens Mar 9, M. Rosetta Hunter Art Gallery, free

Tethered: An Artist Talk with Aimee Lee Mar 14, Bainbridge Island Museum of Art, 3 pm

Any Body: An Exploration of the Body in Abstract and Figurative Art Mar 19–May 2, Magnuson Park Gallery

Water Ways: Healing the Circle of Water and Life Opens Mar 26, Schack Art Center, free

Bootsy Holler with KEXP DJ Troy Nelson Mar 30, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free

Kiliii Yüyan: Guardians of Life: Indigenous Science, Indigenous Wisdom and Restoring the Planet Apr 1, Town Hall Seattle, 7:30 pm

Ongoing

Pioneer Square Artwalk Every first Thursday

Capitol Hill Art Walk Every second Thursday

Georgetown Art Attack! Every second Saturday

Chris Kallmyer: Song Cycle Ongoing, Seattle Art Museum

Gossip: Between Us Ongoing, Tacoma Art Museum

Legacy: Highlights from the Permanent Collection Ongoing, Tacoma Art Museum

Qiu Zhijie: Map of the History of Science and Technology Ongoing, Olympic Sculpture Park, free

Ash-Glazed Ceramics from Korea and Japan Ongoing, Seattle Art Museum

March Things to Do: Music

Julianne Bell — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 09:08:00 -0800

The best concerts and dance nights happening in March. by Julianne Bell

Want more? Here's everything we recommend this month: Music, Visual Art, Literature, Performance, Film, Food, and This & That.

Toody Cole, Semisoft, DJ Kurt Bloch

MAR 6

I once found myself sitting at a bar beside PNW legend Toody Cole and told her that she was my all-time favorite bassist, to which she blushed and said, “Thank you, I’m trying really hard, and I practice a lot.” A telling response from a humble punk veteran who is far too cool to play it cool. Over the past five decades, Toody and her dearly departed husband, Fred, have kept Portland’s music scene alive with their bands—Dead Moon, the Weeds, the Rats, Pierced Arrows, and several others—self-recording and self-releasing music in their self-built Clackamas County home. Can we get this woman a key to the city of Portland already!? Toody will be joined by her band, Kelly Halliburton and Christopher March (of Jenny Don’t and the Spurs), for a retrospective of material from her aforementioned projects. Fingers crossed that she plays one of her solo deep cuts, “Coming On Strong” or “Rather Be Your Lover.” Tacoma-based psych rock trio Semisoft and DJ Kurt Bloch (the Fastbacks, Young Fresh Fellows, Filthy Friends) will open. (Tractor Tavern, 8:30 pm, 21+) AUDREY VANN

Truly, King Youngblood

MAR 6

With their classic 1995 debut album, Fast Stories... from Kid Coma, Seattle’s Truly peaked just as gr*nge was heading to the morgue. Guitarist/vocalist Robert Roth, ex-Soundgarden bassist Hiro Yamamoto, and former Screaming Trees drummer Mark Pickerel had released two Sub Pop EPs that foreshadowed the brilliance to come. On Fast Stories..., a concept album about a comatose youth “reliving a past summer of grandeur,” the songs have the eerie glow of a codeine dream. Similar to fellow Seattleites Love Battery, Truly possess a keen grasp of triumphant psych-rock guitar tones and vocal extenuation. A blurred majesty prevails here and on 1997’s Feeling You Up, and Roth’s unhinged snarl and tuneful moan are Cobain’s equal. At their best, Truly’s songs display a cinematic sweep that’s absolutely transcendent while simultaneously seeming nonchalant. It’s a feat that few can pull off. Welcome this return by our (relatively) unsung local heroes. (Baba Yaga, 8 pm, 21+) DAVE SEGAL

Steve Hauschildt, Kara-Lis Coverdale

MAR 6

The Reflections series has become a nexus of challenging, chill music and retina-rippling light shows in nontraditional venues. The latest match-up features ex-Emeralds synth sorcerer Steve Hauschildt and Canadian composer Kara-Lis Coverdale. The former is a studious builder of majestic arpeggios and icily pretty melodies. His huge catalog abounds with twinkling tunes that will surely sound stunning bouncing off stained glass. The latter is a PhD-level sound scientist who excels in melodically complex, long-form excursions and concise, timbrally exciting abstractions. Last year, Coverdale peaked with Changes in Air, a sonorous drone-athon par excellence. Before she entered the heady world of electronic music, Coverdale began working at age 13 as an organist and music director at many Canadian churches, where she also put in time as a choir conductor. A cavernous Capitol Hill church should be an ideal setting for her. (Seattle First Baptist, 7 pm, all ages) DAVE SEGAL

Whitney, Prewn

MAR 7

When former Smith Westerns guitarist Max Kakacek and departed Unknown Mortal Orchestra touring drummer Julien Ehrlich formed Whitney and released their acclaimed 2016 debut, Light upon the Lake, they revealed a rare, enviable dynamic that was both raw and comforting. Ehrlich’s Sunday-morning armchair poetry felt like effortless reflections; his falsetto should have been required to register as an electric blanket. Kakacek’s alternating pedal steel and bendy ’70s guitar licks melted into the warm lo-fi recording like a grilled cheese on a motel room radiator. Plus, Ehrlich sang from behind the kit, which was cool. Though the Chicago duo has made the occasionally questionable choice to veer into overly produced cutesy funk (2022’s Spark), they were able to reclaim much of their country soul and tavern piano charm with last fall’s Small Talk. The band doesn’t hit as many high notes as it once did (so to speak), but they still have enough lightning in the bottle to warm a stage for an evening. (Showbox, 8:30 pm, all ages) TODD HAMM

Blackwater Holylight, SOM, MUÑECA

MAR 10

Portland-born all-female metal band Blackwater Holylight contrast their shimmering harmonies with sludgy, psychedelic instrumentals, creating a product that is haunting, beautiful, cathartic, and scary all at once. Their new album, Not Here Not Gone, features some of their most approachable songs yet. Take “Heavy, Why?” for example, which is reminiscent of 2010s rock bands like the Dum Dum Girls and Broken Water. I don’t listen to very much metal, but I find myself revisiting this band every time I’m in a dark, hostile mood (which these days is often). Consider this evening of metal your gateway into the genre, with opening sets from the shoegaze-inspired SOM and sludge metal punk trio MUÑECA. (Neumos, 7 pm, 21+) AUDREY VANN

Indigo De Souza, Mothé

MAR 10

Indigo De Souza’s music has always dealt with different kinds of death; her layered vocals revel in the ownership of personal missteps that echo as communal failings and social death. Last summer’s Precipice is no different in tone, from the consistently awesome skeletons-with-boobs album artwork to the edge-of-existence conceit. A main marker of evolution has been the embrace of electronic pop production over the crunchy Lucy Dacus–esque guitar ballads of albums past, which she has confirmed to be a purposeful choice, even excitedly. To this, I cannot give a more heartfelt endorsement, to the contrary of Pitchfork’s Robins-Somerville review. Even the album’s most Taylor Swift–ian of tracks are dark as fuck, and I can’t imagine a better, more worthy philosophical mindfuck to jam the pop algorithms. (Showbox, 8 pm, all ages) TODD HAMM

Cochemea, Jungle Fire

MAR 11

The Daptone label’s most out-there act, saxophonist/flautist/bass clarinetist Cochemea creates humid, psychedelic roots music that vibrates in its own lane. Before the Yaqui/Yoeme artist went solo, he played sax for Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings and worked with Quincy Jones, Amy Winehouse, Archie Shepp, and others. However, Cochemea’s own recordings skew more toward Budos Band and Antibalas, of whose touring bands he was a member. On his 2010 debut LP, The Electric Sound of Johnny Arrow, Cochemea fused spiritual jazz, funk, and boogaloo into gripping sonic panoramas. His next three albums broadened the palette to include cumbia, Moroccan gnawa, blues, and his ancestral Indigenous music. Tangy percussive timbres—Asian Indian and Latin American drums figure heavily—combined with Cochemea’s electrified sax and chants from his tribe result in songs that sound at once ancient and otherworldly. This show promises, if only briefly, a primal trip out of our national political nightmare. (Sunset Tavern, 8 pm, 21+) DAVE SEGAL

Mt Fog, iroiro, DJ Martin Douglas

MAR 12

If a Washington rainforest started a band, it would sound something like Mt Fog—Carolyn B.’s playful whispers are like a sprite luring you into a mossy forest. The percussion, like raindrops plopping into a mushroom. And the electronics, like a ray of light shimmering through the trees. The Seattle-based trio whimsically marries the vocal stylings of Kate Bush, Björk, and Siouxsie Sioux with sparse electronics, evocative of CAN and Mort Garson. They will celebrate the release of their new album, Every Stone Is Green, which they describe as a “Gothic tale (in the Brontë sisters’ sense) about finding happiness, which is human-ness.” They will be joined by the psychedelic instrumental band iroiro and music journalist/DJ Martin Douglas. (Tractor Tavern, 8 pm, 21+) AUDREY VANN

Peaches, Pixel Grip

MAR 14

It’s 2026, and we need Peaches’s sexually transgressive electroclash hip-hop more than ever. Luckily, the noted feminist musician, director, and performance artist is back with her first album in over 10 years, No Lube So Rude. “When the world is friction, lube isn’t a luxury. It’s a necessity,” Peaches writes. “It’s how you turn that friction into pleasure, into power, into pride.” The icon’s seventh album does just as it’s advertised by acting as a relieving salve for these dark times, slickening the constant thrust of dystopian news with empowering, funny, and celebratory tracks for the dance floor like “Fuck How You Wanna Fuck” and “Not in Your Mouth None of Your Business.” She will support the album alongside electropop trio Pixel Grip. (Showbox, 8:30 pm, 21+) AUDREY VANN

Conan Gray, Esha Tewari

MAR 16

If you can’t get enough of Chappell Roan and Olivia Rodrigo, I hope you’re also listening to Conan Gray—he shares their songwriter and producer, the pop Midas hitmaker Dan Nigro (previously the lead vocalist in the indie rock band As Tall as Lions). Gray’s latest album, Wishbone, traces the rise and disastrous fall of a star-crossed gay teen romance with irresistible ‘90s panache, channeling Beck on the biting “Romeo” and the Cranberries on the tender “Care.” The standout “Vodka Cranberry” is a devastating torch song that showcases Gray’s soaring vocals and simply begs to be belted while drunk at karaoke. Gray has been donning chic pajamas and sailor-inspired outfits for the tour, so wear a comfy sleepwear set or dress to the nautical nines! (Climate Pledge Arena, 8 pm, all ages) JULIANNE BELL

Donny Benét

MAR 19

Since spurting onto the scene in 2011 with Don’t Hold Back, a quirky nine tracks of tinny drum-machine lounge and 16-bit love songs, Australian multi-instrumentalist Ben Waples has developed his Donny Benét character into something of cult star on the Italo disco-referential/fetishized ’80s synth funk circuit. Benét has certainly captured the hearts of many with a presentation that is gleefully tongue-in-cheek, but there is no punch line per se. Suffice to say, the shtick is thicc, but as a classically trained jazz musician, Benét knows how to work it. Last month saw the release of Il Basso, the chronological follow-up to 2024’s Infinite Desires, though he has clarified it is a spiritual descendant of his 2022 single, “Le Piano” with a bass (as in his four-string) emphasis. Though his music is typically adorned with his sultry tenor crooning or softcore raps about consensual loving, Basso is entirely instrumental, but it still has all the pulsing, boxy four-on-the-floor to get you going. (Crocodile, 8 pm, 21+) TODD HAMM

THC.XLR, Erin Jorgensen

MAR 26

An instrumental improv trio whose name hints at their music’s effects, THC.XLR filter elements of drone, krautrock, jazz, and dub into hazed and glazed sonic vistas. Their drummer, Madi Levine, has created some of Seattle’s deepest techno of the last decade under the name IVVY, but this new project is a much looser and more exploratory experience. The lineup’s rounded out by Erik Sanchez (Richie Dagger’s Crime) on synth/sampler and Rob Hanlon (Sketch Artist) on sax, piano, and electronics. Their live sets are continuous, spontaneous streams of creativity that demand and reward long attention spans. On their newest track, “beside you,” THC.XLR detour into watery, Talk Talk–style songcraft. Very cool. Erin Jorgensen is that rarest of beings on the local scene: a singer/composer who plays five-octave marimbas. With soft, caressing vocals à la Young Marble Giants/Weekend singer Alison Statton’s, Jorgensen creates intimate art pop that perfumes the air with enchanting melodies and the marimba’s wondrous timbres. Hear “Man of Steel” from 2018’s Little Hex for proof. (Black Lodge, 7 pm, all ages) DAVE SEGAL

Champagne Bubblebath, Midpak, DJ Moohah

MAR 26

The newish Champagne Bubblebath feature the cream of Seattle’s robust funk scene: four members of Afrobeat-inflected funkateers Polyrhythmics, plus Hendrixian guitar virtuoso Jimmy James of True Loves and Parlor Greens. Bandleader Grant Schroff is the Ziggy Modeliste of the Pacific Northwest—a drummer whose impeccable feel and powerful, precise funkiness have moved more asses over the last decade than Sound Transit. This show celebrates the release of Champagne Bubblebath’s debut album, Mixtape: Volume One. The band says it was “[o]riginally conceived as a throwback beat-tape of minimalist garage-funk grooves,” and the 10 songs here reflect deep immersion in history’s most effective, subtlest groove science and the world-class chops to infuse soul into every bar. The band’s slinky, head-nodding instrumentals are ripe for another generation of hip-hop producers to sample. Clearly, these old-school funk disciples still have many vital sonic lessons to impart. (Hidden Hall, 8 pm, 21+) DAVE SEGAL

Grrrl Gang

MAR 28

Indie-pop group Grrrl Gang’s members—vocalist/guitarist Angeeta Sentana, bassist/vocalist Akbar Rumandung, and guitarist/vocalist Edo Alventa—met at college in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, in 2016 and decided to form a band. Their blend of pop hooks and irrepressible punk spirit garnered international attention and praise from the likes of legendary critic Robert Christgau. In 2023, they released their debut studio album, Spunky!, which fully embraces their riot-grrrl influences and which NME called “an instant ticket to the sort of basement show where sweat rolls down the walls.” If you’re into bands like Potty Mouth and the Linda Lindas, you won’t want to pass up the chance to catch their gritty, infectious energy at the Clock-Out. (Clock-Out Lounge, 9 pm, 21+) JULIANNE BELL

Eliza McLamb, Lily Seabird

MAR 31

I was introduced to North Carolina–born singer-songwriter Eliza McLamb via her podcast Binchtopia, but quickly became enamored of her incisive writing on her newsletter Words from Eliza and her introspective, clever indie pop. (McLamb recently stepped away from Binchtopia to pursue music full-time.) Last October, she released her sophomore album, Good Story, which explores her urges to self-narrativize and the stories she tells herself and others. “An effective narrative, I came to realize, is a reserve with limited returns,” she writes on Substack. “But I still love to work the magic—I love knowing that a bad time can be a good story, that experience without meaning is only missing a few narrative beats. I love the limits of the story, agency that was once out of reach returning through the act of creation and recreation.” (Neumos, 7 pm, all ages) JULIANNE BELL

Tara Clerkin Trio

MAR 31

Paragons of musical understatement and elusiveness, England’s Tara Clerkin Trio weave magical spells with piano, clarinet, drums, synth, and looped samples. Lovely, dreamy melodies tumble out with a nonchalant artfulness while Clerkin sings in a feathery deadpan. Touchstones include the ECM label’s chamber jazz, Virginia Astley’s delicate, poignant songcraft, Pram’s oneiric, accidental dub, and the wee-hours-in-the-cathredal atmospheres of Talk Talk circa Laughing Stock. However, deviations do occur, such as on their 2021 In Spring EP: the hauntological trip-hop of “Night Steps” lollops between Portishead and Seefeel, which is... holy shit! The ridiculously charming “Marble Walls” would be a chart-topper in Utopia. I had the good fortune to catch Tara Clerkin Trio in Detroit in 2025, and it mesmerized me like no other performance from that terrible year. They truly got the special sauce, so clear your schedule and get your head right for this show. (Sunset Tavern, 8 pm, 21+) DAVE SEGAL

More

Gogol Bordello Mar 4, Showbox, 8 pm, 21+

Tortoise, Spacemoth Mar 5, Neptune, 8 pm, all ages

KenTheMan Mar 5, Neumos, 7 pm, all ages

St. Vincent Mar 5, Town Hall Seattle, 8 pm, all ages

Marble, Love So Deep, Plash Mar 6, Sunset Tavern, 8:30 pm, 21+

Listening Session: Fleetwood Mac, Rumours Mar 6, Shibuya Hi-Fi, 6 pm

Where’s Beth, Bryan John Appleby, Don Piano Mar 6, Add-a-Ball, 9 pm, 21+

The Briefs, the Drowns, the Coolers Mar 7, Clock-Out Lounge, 9 pm, 21+

Sam Greenfield Mar 7, Baba Yaga, 8 pm, all ages

Brittany Davis, Ellie Grace Mar 7, Royal Room, 7:30 pm, all ages until 10 pm

Matt Pryor, Small Uncle, Carl Christensen Mar 7, Sunset Tavern, 8:30 pm, 21+

Sunny War, the Local Strangers Mar 8, Sunset Tavern, 8 pm, 21+

The Wayne Horvitz Ensemble Mar 9, the Royal Room, 7:30 and 8:30 pm, all ages until 10 pm

Dining Dead, Glass Egg, Reverse Death Mar 11, Tractor Tavern, 7:30 pm, 21+

Listening Session: Tracy Chapman, Tracy Chapman Mar 12, Shibuya Hi-Fi, 5 pm

Yung Kai Mar 12, Neumos, 7 pm, all ages

Diminished Men, Corespondents, Von Wildenhaus Mar 12, Add-a-Ball, 8 pm, 21+

Oldies Dance Party with DJs Shannon Shaw, Swain, and Ganj Mar 13, Clock-Out Lounge, 9 pm, 21+

Bill Frisell’s 75th Celebration featuring Luke Bergman and Tim Angulo Mar 13, Moore Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

Shrek Rave Mar 14, Crocodile, 10 pm, 21+

The Hoot Hoots, Rat Queen Mar 14, Add-a-Ball, 9 pm, 21+

Redveil, Chenayder Mar 14, Neumos, 8 pm, all ages

Bog Ore, Kinski, Toxic Thrust Mar 14, Clock-Out Lounge, 9 pm, 21+

Aimee Mann, Jonathan Coulton Mar 15, Neptune Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

Ruthie Foster Quartet Mar 17–18, Jazz Alley, 7:30 pm, all ages

Anthers, My Pet Fossil, Slugfeast, Miscomings Mar 19, Add-a-Ball, 8 pm, 21+

Band of Horses Mar 19, Vera Project, 7 pm, all ages

Dirty Three Mar 21, Neumos, 7 pm, 21+

Tune-Yards, Kassa Overall Mar 22, Neumos, 7 pm, 21+

Drug Church, White Reaper, Spy, Death Lens Mar 23, Neumos, 6 pm, all ages

Liz Cooper Mar 25, Sunset Tavern, 8 pm, 21+

Mclusky, Ekko Astral Mar 26, Crocodile, 8 pm, 21+

Marissa Nadler Mar 26, Tractor Tavern, 8 pm, 21+

Listening Session: Frank Ocean, Channel Orange Mar 27, Shibuya Hi-Fi, 7:30 pm

Skullcrusher Mar 30, Barboza, 7 pm, 21+

L.A. Witch, DAIISTAR, Buckets Apr 1, Neumos, 6:30 pm, 21+

Spoon Benders, Semisoft Apr 1, Baba Yaga, 8 pm, 21+

Hockey Teeth, Poached, Zailee Haze Apr 2, Hidden Hall, 7:30 pm, 21+

Prism Bitch, Byland, Melanie Radford Apr 2, Sunset Tavern, 8 pm, 21+

FKA twigs, Brutalismus 3000 Apr 2, WAMU Theater, 8 pm, all ages

Jeff Tweedy, Macie Stewart Apr 2, Moore Theatre, 7:30 pm, all ages

Sex Mex, Sux, Taste Testors Apr 3, Clock-Out Lounge, 9 pm, 21+

Witch Ripper, Dust Moth, Izthmi Apr 3, Sunset Tavern, 8:30 pm, 21+

Tomo Nakayama, Maita, Plash Apr 3, Tractor Tavern, 8 pm, 21+

Father John Misty Apr 3–4, Paramount Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

Early Warnings

Raye Apr 3, WAMU Theater, 8 pm, all ages

Cass McCombs, Hand Habits Apr 4, Tractor Tavern, 8:30 pm, 21+

Ratboys, villagerrr Apr 7, Neumos, 7 pm, 21+

Fishbone Apr 11, Crocodile, 6 pm, 21+

Weedeater, Conan, Telekinetic Apr 12, Crocodile, 7 pm, 21+

Ari Lennox Apr 12, WAMU Theater, 8 pm, all ages

PinkPantheress Apr 14, WAMU Theater, 8 pm, all ages

Throwing Muses Apr 15, Crocodile, 8 pm, 21+

Midpak, BendreTheGiant, Super Mother Apr 17, Add-a-Ball, 9 pm, 21+

Waxahatchee, MJ Lenderman May 3, Paramount Theatre, 7:30 pm, all ages

Northwest Terror Fest VIII May 7–9, Neumos, 21+

Florence + the Machine May 12, Climate Pledge Arena, 7:30 pm, all ages

The Last Dinner Party May 22–23, Showbox SoDo, 8 pm, all ages

Capitol Hill Block Party Aug 7–9, Capitol Hill

Iron & Wine Oct 13, 5th Avenue Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

The Best Things To Do in Seattle This Month: March 2026

EverOut Staff — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Emerald City Comic Con, Taste Washington, and More

by EverOut Staff

Just when it seemed like winter would never end, March is swooping in with cherry blossoms and Daylight Saving Time. Whether you want to make up for all the time you've spent huddled under a blanket by spending time outdoors or you want to celebrate the holidays this month brings (including Women's History Month, St. Patrick's Day, and Holi), your options are plentiful. Below, we've compiled the biggest comedy shows, concerts, food events, and other great things to do, from Emerald City Comic Con to Taste Washington and from Miguel's CAOS Tour to Speaking of Seattle: Immigrant Rights Are Human Rights.

COMEDY

Morgan Jay: Goofy Guy Tour
Unless you’ve been living under a rock (or are just in saner corners of the algorithm), you’ve surely come across at least one “WHAT'S YOUR NAME BRO???” video. With autotune crowdwork now Morgan Jay’s claim to fame, it's easy to forget that deep down, he’s just a goofy guy. And his new tour is a chance to catch the LA-based performer truly in his prime. If you're only familiar with his short-form comedy, you’re in for a treat with this Friday the 13th headlining set. Be ready for wild setups, off-the-cuff musical bits, and beautifully timed pauses from the once familiar face on Wild ’N Out, Comedy Central, and NBC. TL;DR? Jay has tapped into an awkwardness that few comedians (or humans) could turn into an art form, and it should absolutely be experienced. LANGSTON THOMAS
Paramount Theatre, Downtown (Fri Mar 13)

Immaculate Collection with Esther Rose

Audrey Vann — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 10:17:00 -0800

Ahead of her upcoming PNW tour dates, I caught up with Esther Rose to hear all about her collection of vintage leather clothing. If you missed out on tickets to her sold-out show at the Sunset Tavern on March 3, fear not! You can still catch Esther Rose in Bellingham at the Shakedown the day after. by Audrey Vann

I first discovered Esther Rose in 2017 when she released her debut, This Time Last Night, an intimate country/folk album that feels like she’s playing for you around a campfire. Now on her fifth studio album, Want, the New Orleans native defies the expectations of what an Esther Rose album can be with bold indie rock arrangements and fuzzed-out guitars. As it’s depicted on the album’s cover, with a Rose in a gauzy white cotton dress beside a Rose in a black pleather catsuit, the album balances hard and soft, juxtaposing songs like the Liz Phair–esque track “Ketamine” with the stripped-down piano ballad “Color Wheel.” The album also includes “Scars,” a duet with Seattle-based troubadour Dean Johnson (no surprise, it’s absolutely beautiful). Ahead of her upcoming PNW tour dates, I caught up with Rose to hear all about her collection of "vintage leather clothin in all shapes."

If you missed out on tickets to her sold-out show at the Sunset Tavern on March 3, fear not! You can still catch Esther Rose in Bellingham at the Shakedown the day after.

Akasha Rabut

What was the first item you acquired in this collection?
When I was 28, I was gifted a hand-me-down cowboy jacket by a record label executive. It was mint 1950s red suede with fringe and patches. I thought it was kinda hideous, but it fit, so the first time I wore it was as a joke. But something sacred happened that night... an energetic switch turned ON. I became a believer in the power of vintage leather. I'm less interested in new leather, even if it's ethically and sustainably sourced, because I like the randomness of finding a one-of-a-kind item. It has to choose you.

Chris Acker

What is your favorite thing in your collection?
My high-waist motorcycle pants are perfect for tour. They always look stage-ready, and I never wash them—slightly gross yet very convenient.

Shelby Duncan

Tell me about an item you'd like to add to your collection or a new collection you'd like to start.
I would welcome a leather skirt or dress.

Pop Loser: This Week in Music News

Audrey Vann — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 17:35:00 -0800

This week's music news. by Audrey Vann

The 2026 Capitol Hill Block Party lineup is here. This year’s lineup dives back into the pop sphere with gems like MUNA, Magdalena Bay, Wet Leg, and Parcels, plus DJ sets from Trixie Mattel and Tinashe. The festival will once again be 21+ in an effort, according to Daydream State, to “[optimize] the footprint across the Pike/Pine corridor to deliver an elevated fan experience while supporting neighborhood flow and local businesses,” aka hopefully avoid Chappell Roan–sized crowds. (I was there, and I was afraid for my life—can someone please make commemorative shirts that say “I Survived Chappell Roan at CHBP 2024?”)

The ZooTunes lineup has also dropped, and it’s really good this year. Highlights include Pavement, the Breeders (with Team Dresch!), and Belle and Sebastian, celebrating the 30th anniversary of If You’re Feeling Sinister with Quasi. See the full lineup over on the ZooTunes website.

Pioneering French electronic musician Éliane Radigue has died at 94. Known for reinventing the synthesizer through “meditative and feedback-drenched sonic explorations” (the Guardian), Radigue released over two dozen albums in her lifetime that pushed the boundaries of what music can be. The best way I could describe her sound is like holding your ear up to a seashell (which there happens to be a beautiful image of her doing). Her 1986 ambient composition, Jetsun Mila, remains one of my favorite things to listen to while I write.

RIP Willie Colón and Lil Poppa. On Saturday, family confirmed that pioneering salsa trombonist Willie Colón died at the age of 75. Along with his 40-plus-album discography, he was also known for musical partnerships with artists ranging from Celia Cruz to David Byrne. Jacksonville rapper Lil Poppa died by suicide on Thursday at 25. The young artist began making music at 7 years old, writing religious raps for his church before pivoting to secular music, which led to his breakthrough single “Purple Hearts” at just 18.

LEAVE LIZA ALONE! While promoting her new memoir, Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!, legend, icon, and my president Liza Minnelli has claimed that the Academy “inexplicably ordered” her to sit in a wheelchair at her 2022 Oscars appearance with Lady Gaga. She told Variety, “I was told it was because of my age, and for safety reasons, because I might slip out of the director’s chair, which was bullshit. I will not be treated this way, I said. I was heartbroken. I was much lower down than I would have been in the director’s chair. Now I couldn’t easily read the teleprompter above me.”

Bad Bunny represents the USA better than the president, survey finds. A recent poll, conducted by Yahoo! and YouGov after the Super Bowl, found that more Americans feel better represented by the Puerto Rican star than the president. What is surprising is that slightly more participants identified themselves as Republicans than Democrats.

Did you watch Alysa Liu’s free skate!? I have watched it at least 15 times with tears streaming down my face. The 20-year-old team USA figure skater won a gold medal with her joyful performance to Donna Summer’s “MacArthur Park.”

Erasing Gates

Marcus Harrison Green — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 15:30:00 -0800

In light of the Epstein files, should Bill Gates' name be on a building at University of Washington? by Marcus Harrison Green

There's a specific kind of lie that powerful men tell when the walls start closing in: the minimizing lie, the "it wasn't what it looked like" lie, the "I was barely there" lie. Bill Gates tried that last one earlier this month, insisting his relationship with convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was limited to dinners.

"It's factually true that I was only at dinners," Gates said. He claimed he "never met any women." The Epstein Files just proved otherwise—young women were present, and there are photos. According to some, no amount of philanthropic goodwill should erase that.

But in Seattle, philanthropic goodwill has erased a lot. A name on a building is a command: suspend memory, smooth the sharp edges, turn biography into infrastructure, and controversy into cornerstone. It dares you to forget that the name above the door still belongs to someone who breathes, errs, and benefits from the power that placed it there.

For years at the University of Washington, the Gates name has been exactly that: civic wallpaper. It crowns the Bill and Melinda Gates Center for Computer Science and Engineering in large letters, like a title for the simple story this city tells itself. Local boy becomes tech titan, tech titan becomes global humanitarian, city becomes beneficiary. Clean. Uncomplicated. Unquestioned. In the wake of the Epstein files, one 22-year-old journalism student couldn't let that story go unchallenged.

Last week, UW student Jaya Parsons published an op-ed in The Daily, the university's student newspaper, calling for Gates' name to be removed from campus buildings. The headline was unambiguous—Bill Gates is in the Epstein files. UW should take his name off its buildings in response—and the message pointed.

Gates' repeated appearances in the files, coupled with his admitted meetings with Epstein after Epstein's 2008 conviction for soliciting a minor, were "more than enough to make anyone uncomfortable to see Gates' name on their way to class." Parsons walked by the Bill and Melinda Gates Center everyday.

The column landed like a match in dry grass because it named something that has been hovering at the edge of Seattle's civic life for years: the quiet bargain institutions make when a benefactor becomes too big to criticize.

"I definitely did not expect as many people to see it as people did," Parsons told me over Zoom.

Classmates and professors thanked her for saying what they had been thinking, a surprise.

"I hadn’t really heard people talk about it," she said. "So I wanted to at least let people know that this is something that could be happening and maybe we should pay attention to it."

UW did not respond to her two requests for comment.

She wasn't expecting demolition orders, just acknowledgement. "I mostly just wanted to hear why these buildings are named after him, and what we think about seeing his name every day."

The university didn’t respond to The Stranger either.

Silence, in moments like this, becomes its own posture.

Gates has not been accused of criminal conduct by any of Epstein's victims. But his explanations have shifted, narrowed, and widened again under pressure. Gates has buckled, if only a little. This week, in a town hall with Gates Foundation staff, he called his relationship with Epstein a "huge mistake," and apologized to employees for bringing foundation executives into contact with Epstein. But still he insisted "I did nothing illicit. I saw nothing illicit."

The problem is not that Gates has been charged with a crime. It’s that new disclosures are overtaking his lies: meetings around the globe, flights on Epstein's plane, the presence of young women at gatherings, and evolving acknowledgments about the scope of their contact. What was once framed as peripheral now appears more sustained, like a relationship between two fabulously wealthy men. What was described as trivial now reads as misjudged at best.

"If these buildings around campus were called the 'Jeffrey Epstein Library,'" Parsons wrote in The Daily, "they'd have hopefully been changed long ago."

But we treat proximity to harm differently when the proximity comes with billions attached. Money is like duct tape over the mouth.

As of 2017, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation had awarded UW more than 250 grants totaling nearly $1.25 billion. This philanthropy has been woven so deeply into the institution's financial and research infrastructure that the prospect of removing Gates' name is not simply a reputational concern. It is a reckoning with dependency.

It is easier to leave the letters in place when Trump is a threat to higher education funding and the university has already faced layoffs tied to budget shortfalls. Staying in the good graces of a “good billionaire” is security.

Tim Schwab, author of The Bill Gates Problem: Reckoning with the Myth of the Good Billionaire, has long argued that Gates’ philanthropy has discouraged scrutiny.

If this were only a matter of reputation, it would be confined to op-eds and campus debates. But the Gates Foundation is not merely a personal vehicle for his generosity; it is an $86 billion institution operating under a tax-advantaged status that effectively subsidizes its power with public dollars. That scale alone raises regulatory questions, precisely because philanthropy, as currently structured, enjoys massive public subsidy with comparatively minimal democratic oversight. But they’re not actually above scrutiny, legal or otherwise.

So the question becomes: does anyone actually have the authority to hold it accountable? When I asked Washington Attorney General Nick Brown's office, Deputy Communications Director Mike Faulk responded bluntly:

“We don’t speculate about our decision-making regarding any potential investigatory matters… If the question is just whether we have the authority to investigate nonprofits and charities, the answer is yes, state law does give us that kind of authority.”

At UW, naming decisions sit with the Board of Regents, and policy allows for reconsideration in certain circumstances. Parsons doesn’t believe they’ll do anything.

But she rejects the idea that raising the question is trivial or performative. "I think there's nothing wrong with caring about something like this. That's not some waste of time."

For her, the point is not immediate victory; it is civic muscle. Universities are places where people are supposed to question power, not rehearse deference to it. Even if the name never comes down, she argues, asking why it’s there, and whether it still reflects the institution’s values, is exactly the kind of scrutiny higher education claims to teach.

Councilmember Kettle Insists Surveillance Tech Is Safe

Micah Yip — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 15:00:00 -0800

Let’s set the record straight on Mr. Kettle's claims. by Micah Yip

Councilmember Bob Kettle wanted to dispel “misconceptions” about Seattle’s surveillance program. Ahead of Tuesday’s Public Safety Committee meeting, which he chairs, Kettle issued a press release arguing that tools like CCTV cameras, automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) and the Real-Time Crime Center (RTCC) are an effective crime deterrent that doesn’t jeopardize vulnerable populations as severely as has been reported.

In his release, he argued that the “implementation of ALPR, CCTV and RTCC technology in Seattle is not a choice between public safety and personal privacy—it is a smart and responsive commitment to both.” His argument was a bizarre combination of misdirects (claiming we’re safe because we don’t use Flock-brand cameras for our license plate readers), irrelevant details (assuring Seattleites that cops aren’t watching all of the cameras at all times) and anecdotal evidence (arguing that CCTV cameras reduce crime, based on vibes).

This stunt comes amid public outcry against surveillance technology. Community members and advocacy groups worry that surveillance data can leave marginalized communities vulnerable to federal tracking. And their concerns aren’t theoretical—in Washington state and across the country, federal authorities have accessed local surveillance data, raising questions about how much protections local guardrails actually provide.

So let’s set the record straight on his four claims.

Deterring Violent Crime

When we talk about CCTV cameras, researchers most commonly cite a 40-year systematic review by CUNY that found no evidence that CCTV cameras reduce violent crime. But in his press release, Kettle wanted his constituents to focus on another line in the study, which said the results support the use of cameras to deter (non-violent) crime. “It can help address property crime and has always been intended to help with a variety of crimes beyond violent crime,” he wrote.”

However, at the Tuesday press conference, Kettle doubled down on the idea that the program could still deter violent crime. He gave an example of a recent shooting at Second Avenue and James Street. Using surveillance footage, police were able to quickly identify and apprehend a suspect, said Kettle.

You may notice that that’s an example of footage used in solving a crime, not deterring it.

But according to Kettle’s logic, being able to rapidly identify and arrest suspects prevents future crimes by removing repeat offenders from the streets. “If somebody is so blatant to shoot someone in the back of the head, they may have done some other crimes,” he said.

When asked again what evidence Kettle has that Seattle’s CCTV deters violent crime before it happens, Kettle acknowledged the city hasn’t yet completed its formal evaluation, which is currently in progress by the University of Pennsylvania. But he still doubled down on his argument that the cameras are a deterrent, because if bad actors know they’re being watched, their operations will be disrupted and delayed, allowing local authorities more time to investigate and apprehend. What evidence does Kettle have of that? “I believe it to be true based on anecdotal,” he said.

But It’s Not Flock!

He’s right. Seattle doesn’t contract with Flock, the notoriously fed-friendly tech vendor. But we do have our own automatic license plate readers (ALPRs), provided by a surveillance company called Axon. And according to Tee Sannon, ACLU of Washington’s technology policy program director, there are no laws in Washington state that govern ALPRs.

The State Senate is currently considering Senate Bill 6002, which would regulate how jurisdictions in Washington handle ALPR data. It would create a 21 day retention period, meaning after 21 days, the data would be deleted, unless it had been pulled within that time frame for an investigation. The 21-day-retention schedule isn’t much of a reform, as jurisdictions in Washington generally stick to a 30 day time limit. Seattle’s is much longer—the Seattle Police Department keeps ALPR data for 90 days. “Thirty days is a very long time to keep basically a database of almost entirely [data of] people that are not associated with wrongdoing,” Sannon says.

ACLU-WA (and Kettle) both support the bill.

Surveillance Data Isn’t Safe From the Feds

In his press release, Kettle specifically focused on the argument that surveillance data might be insecure because it’s stored out-of-state, and therefore outside of Washington’s protective laws. “DHS has no access to SPD data regarding civil matters (such as immigration) unless the federal government subpoenas footage from the vendor. SPD owns this data, regardless of where it is stored,” he wrote.

Requiring a subpoena doesn’t eliminate the potential for federal access—it formalizes it. He also pointed to the guardrail added by Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck, which triggers a 60-day shutdown of the CCTV program if the feds subpoena any data—which still allows data to get into their grubby hands before it’s paused.

“Is it perfect? Probably not,” Kettle said at his press conference. “I’m not making that claim that we’re 100 percent intact.”

Translation: Our surveillance data isn’t safe.

Seattle Police Officers aren’t constantly monitoring cameras at the RTCC.

His final note in his press release ensured Seattleites that there isn’t a desk monkey watching your every move through the city’s CCTV program. No one thinks they are. Thanks, Bob.

The Best Bang for Your Buck Events in Seattle This Weekend: Feb 27–Mar 1, 2026

EverOut Staff — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 10:54:00 -0800

Shunpike Storefronts & Artist Residencies, Travessias Brazilian Film Festival, and More Cheap & Easy Events Under $20

by EverOut Staff

The weekend starts now. There's no time to waste, so dive in with our cheap and easy guide, pointing you to events from the Shunpike Storefronts & Artist Residencies Grand Opening to the Official Seattle Sounders FC Watch Party with Sammy the Orca and from the Travessias Brazilian Film Festival to the 50th Annual Kalevala Lecture. For more, check out our top picks of the week.

FRIDAY PERFORMANCE

So You Do Drag?! Kremwerk's Premiere Drag/Burlesque Competition
Oh, you do drag? Don’t be shy! Prove it at Kremwerk’s So You Do Drag?! It’s a new one-off competition dedicated to spotlighting the next generation of Seattle drag and burlesque performers. And not just by putting them on stage, but by giving Seattle’s rising stars a chance to prove “WHO they are and WHY they deserve stardom” in front of established icons like Clara Voyance and Pupusa. For this inaugural event, contestants Kimme Kash, Lizzie McHigher, and Nadia Nuff will strut, lip sync, and seduce their way through performances designed to show audiences exactly what they’ve got tucked deep down inside. Don’t overthink showing up, it’s gonna be a great time. LANGSTON THOMAS
(Cherry Nightclub, Downtown, $15)

Slog AM: More Seattle Budget Woes, Drunk of the Week Is House Majority Leader, White House Staffer is Johnny MAGA

Nathalie Graham — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 09:18:00 -0800

by Nathalie Graham

Another Bad Budget: The forecast for the city of Seattle's budget is grim. The analysts have looked into their cursed crystal ball and given Seattle its fortune (or, lack thereof): We'll be dealing with a $140 million deficit this year. Damn, those soothsaying nerds! In response, Mayor Katie Wilson asked city departments to prepare for the worst and issue plans for shaving off between 5 and 10 percent of their budgets. That's not a guarantee anything will happen—Bruce Harrell did the same thing last year before he pulled enough money out of a hat (read: the JumpStart Seattle tax's coffers) to balance the budget.

All of this was expected. For the last couple of years, the city's budget has been similarly cratered. A pandemic and a fascist president will do that to a liberal city. And, Harrell didn't do anything to find new revenue, he just pickpocketed the JumpStart tax to solve the problem in front of him. It will be very interesting to see if Wilson, who helped create the JumpStart tax to primarily fund the creation of affordable housing, will do what every other mayor has done and raid JumpStart to keep the city afloat.

Speaking of Forecasts: It'll be borderline pleasant in Seattle today. There will be sun. It will still be chilly, though. Don't plan a beach day just yet.

Spritzgibbon: House Majority Leader Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon apparently tied one on before Wednesday evening’s House Appropriations Committee meeting where legislators were passing the supplemental operating budget. Fitzgibbon's speech was “slurred and halting” and an unnamed Republican said Fitzgibbon appeared to be sleeping during parts of the night-time meeting. Fitzgibbon has apologized for having a little tipple before his important job. "Being impaired in that situation was harmful to my work and to my co-workers," he said in an apology.

Gig Harbor Stabbing: On Tuesday, a 32-year-old man stabbed and killed his mother and three of her neighbors outside her suburban home near Gig Harbor. According to KING 5, he lived in his younger sister's garage and suffered from bipolar disorder. His sister said he stopped taking his medication three days before the attack. His mother filed a protection order against her son in 2020 that lasted through 2022. In 2025, she petitioned for another one, which a court granted, but failed to serve him with the order. Therefore, it was not enforceable. The police didn't respond quickly because the order wasn't in effect.

Hey, Cut That Out: Someone shot a harbor seal in the face in Quilcene Bay near Hood Canal. Apparently, this is the second harbor seal that's been shot in the face in a matter of months. The law enforcement arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is investigating. Yeah, I am also surprised to hear there's a cop division in NOAA.

Good News: Capitol Hill's Seven Hills Park has been freed from prison. The Bruce Harrell administration locked up the park—and three other small parks across the city—six months ago to stop homeless people from camping there.

A Touch of TB: Someone at Rainier Beach High School was diagnosed with tuberculosis. According to Public Health, around 130 people in connection with RBHS may have been exposed to the airborne disease and will need to be tested. While this is serious, TB takes "repeated and prolonged exposure" to really spread. Tuberculosis remains the leading infectious cause of death around the world. But in wealthy countries, the risk and prevalence is low. Except, TB has been making a resurgence in the US.

War: Pakistan and Afghanistan are at war. Pakistan has bombed Afghanistan’s capital Kabul, and both countries claim to have inflicted substantial losses on the other.

I Did Not Have Sex-Offender Relations With That Man: In a closed-door deposition with members of Congress in Chappaqua, New York, former President Bill Clinton is testifying in the House’s Epstein investigation. A former sitting president has never been compelled to testify to Congress before. Hillary Clinton sat with lawmakers for her deposition yesterday.

I’m Just Chillin’ in Chappaqua: Hillary spent more than six hours with the House Oversight Committee. In a short press conference afterward, she told reporters she wished the proceedings had been public and that her attorneys have asked for transcripts and video to be available as soon as possible.

But Where Will We Watch It? Probably not on any of Warner Bros. Discovery’s subsidiaries. Netflix walked away from a deal to buy the company after David Ellison’s Paramount launched a hostile takeover. The deal may, in the words of WBD’s CEO David Zaslav, create “tremendous value for shareholders,” but it’s also putting a tremendous media empire in Ellison’s flag-waving, Trump-loving hands. It’s an antitrust nightmare, Democrats say.

Big Brother Burger: Burger King is testing new Open AI-powered headsets to assist employees and track if they’re saying “please” and “thank you.” Data on restaurant operations is shared with “Patty,” an AI that will speak to employees through their headsets. Patty can tell them if a drink machine is low on Diet Coke, or when a customer reports a bathroom disaster. Employees can ask Patty for instructions or ask it to remove out-of-stock items from the store’s digital menus. It sounds like torture.

Trump Staffer Runs X Account Johnny MAGA: By day, Garrett Wade is a rapid response manager for the Trump administration. Also by day, he runs a massive X account devoted to kissing his bosses’ feet. Wade tweets as Johnny MAGA and helps run the White House account that boosts Johnny MAGAs tweets. And when he tweets as Johnny MAGA, he tweets things like how great the administration is. OR how it was obvious Trump didn’t watch the entire video showing the Obamas as apes. If Trump had, he would’ve posted the entire thing. “It was a masterpiece,” wrote Johnny MAGA.

Quit Your Job, Ice

Anonymous — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 17:10:00 -0800

Do you need to get something off your chest? by Anonymous

Dear ICE and CBP Agents,

Resign. Quit. Retire. Think about it. If you quit now, you can at least say you got out when the shit got crazy. If you continue to work for ICE or CBP, however, you will fuck yourself over in multiple ways.

You are probably not very bright, so I’ll try to make this simple: Nobody likes you.

Nobody.

At all.

Forever.

No real employers will want to hire you in the future if they see ICE or CBP on your resume. No one will be your friend. No one will fuck you. Your food will be spit on, or worse. If you have children, they will hate you. You will be subject to mockery, ridicule, and loathing forever. And you hopefully will get criminally prosecuted.

But if you resign now, there is a glimmer of hope. You can say that you got out when you realized that ICE and CBP are Nazis. You can say, “I’m one of the good ones who did what was right when my country depended on it.” Sure, it was significantly later than any rational, sane person would come to the same realization, but at least you got to the right place eventually.

If you resign, you will still be a douchebag, but you won’t be a fascist douchebag. And regular, non-fascist douchebags are incrementally better. They are far more likely to get a job and get paid. Or laid.

But if you stay? After the shootings? The beatings? The tear gas? The intimidation of protesters and observers? The detainment of 5-year-olds? The Nazi coats?

If you stay, you’re a Dick with a capital D for the rest of your sorry, lonely, pathetic life. So grow a pair of balls and resign already. Get a real job. Ice Out.

Ticket Alert: ZooTunes, Queens Of The Stone Age, and More Seattle Events Going On Sale This Week

EverOut Staff — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 14:02:00 -0800

Plus, Ali Wong and More Event Updates for February 26

by EverOut Staff

Start making summer plans: The 2026 BECU ZooTunes concert series will bring acts including Courtney Barnett, Suki Waterhouse, and Pavement to Woodland Park Zoo’s meadow. Seattle-formed alt-rock band Queens Of The Stone Age return to their old stomping grounds on the Catacombs Tour. Plus, Emmy Award-winning actress and comedian Ali Wong brings her brash humor to McCaw Hall. Read on for details on those and other newly announced events, plus some news you can use.

ON SALE FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 27

MUSIC

A.J. Croce Presents Croce Plays Croce
Moore Theatre (Wed Sept 30)

BECU ZooTunes
Woodland Park Zoo (June 4–Aug 20)

Blitzen Trapper - Two Nights
Tractor Tavern (June 5–6)

Pillion, the Feel-Good Gay BDSM Christmas Movie for Spring

Julianne Bell — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 11:00:00 -0800

Defying popular, negative perceptions of BDSM—especially gay BDSM—Colin’s submissive role transforms him into a more assertive person, free to pursue his desires on his own non-negotiable terms and proudly advertise his “aptitude for devotion.” by Julianne Bell

In Harry Lighton’s debut feature based on Adam Mars-Jones' 2020 novel Box Hill, the life of a sheltered twenty something named Colin (Harry Melling, Harry Potter) is forever changed the moment biker Ray (Alexander Skarsgård, The Northman, Infinity Pool) unzips his leather pants in a dark alley on Christmas Day, freeing a massive, pierced, dangling cock.

The two quickly enter into an all-consuming, 24/7 dominant/submissive relationship. Colin follows Ray’s rules, becomes his devoted pet. But when the relationship begins to unravel, the power dynamics are not to blame. Like any other relationship, it’s bad communication. Apart from all the kinky sex, Pillion is almost family friendly and it is easily one of my favorite queer films of the last several years.

It’s interesting to see Melling, best-known for playing Harry Potter’s greedy, idiotic cousin Dudley Dursley, as the sensitive object of Skarsgård’s cold affection. Though the characters share a similar background (doting parents, an upbringing in the southeast London suburbs), Melling is no longer the butt of an eight-movie-long fat joke but a character with agency, allowed to explore his sexuality and to be considered desirable. Unlike Dudley, Melling tugs heartstrings as the naïve Colin, who you can’t help but want to hug. His face is an open book; his puppy eyes widen in simultaneous fear and delight.

With Melling’s Colin as a guileless vehicle, BDSM is shown as sweet rather than debased. The sex scenes aren’t soft-focused, porny fantasies, but genuine and even endearingly awkward, like when Colin and Ray grapple in spandex to Tiffany’s version of “I Think We’re Alone Now.” (The scene was the first that Melling and Skarsgård shot together, so the awkwardness might be authentic.) In Pillion, tenderness is found in birthday orgies and beautifully shot late-night, windblown motorcycle rides showing freedom can be found in submission.

BDSM in Hollywood is often played for laughs and scares, or portrayed as exotic and perverse, as in the case of Fifty Shades of Grey. Lighton cited Secretary and The Duke of Burgundy as films he had in mind while making Pillion, but went for a more relatable route. “I always wanted Pillion to have enough of a foot in realism, that you weren’t, as a viewer, able to distance yourself from the character in the way I think that I personally do in those films, by dint of the tone,” he told Letterboxd.

Pillion doesn’t exploit gayness either, or make sexuality the friction in these men’s lives. Colin’s parents are enthusiastically supportive of his queerness, but just want to see their son treated right outside the bedroom. In that way, they’re a stand-in for viewers who might not know boot-blacking from anal beads, but can read the conventional love story between the lines of this unconventional relationship.

I’d bet a reasonably open-minded family could watch it together. Alexander Skarsgård could do it: He watched it with his dad Stellan Skarsgård (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Dune) at Telluride Film Festival. As Stellan succinctly put it, “I have no problem seeing him do BDSM, that’s not a problem. If he acts badly, I have big problems.”

Slog AM: Speedboat Gunfight, Murder Charge in Capitol Hill Shooting, Gatesgate

Micah Yip — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 09:43:00 -0800

The Stranger's morning news roundup. by Micah Yip

US Speedboat Boat Shot By Cuba: A shootout between a Florida-registered speedboat and a Cuban border patrol vessel left six people dead and four injured. The Cuban government accused the heavily-armed “Cuban residents of the United States” in the speedboat of trying to infiltrate the island for “terrorist purposes.” They were carrying guns, Molotov cocktails, bulletproof vests, and camouflage, the Cuban government said.

Gatesgate: At an internal Gates Foundation town hall Tuesday, Bill Gates apologized to staff for endangering the foundation with his yearslong connection to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Gates acknowledged first meeting Epstein in 2011 to raise money for global health, three years after the financier was convicted for soliciting a minor for prostitution. Gates continued to see the financier until 2014. Gates also admitted to two affairs, which Epstein tried to use as leverage over him, he said. Gates never got his money for global health.

Will They, Won’t They: Normally, Super Bowl winners are invited to the White House. But Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald said the team hasn’t gotten an invite, though he expects one. The White House has indicated they will invite the Seahawks. But will the team accept? Macdonald wouldn’t commit, but a league source told the Seattle Times the team was initially inclined to accept. The Super Bowl was weeks ago.

Murder Charge in Capitol Hill Shooting: Daniel John Carlee, 41, was charged with murder for allegedly shooting 38-year-old Solomon Thompson in Friday night’s Capitol Hill shooting. King County prosecutors said Carlee instigated the fight. Before shooting Thompson, he told a witness, “I’m going to shoot him.”

Another Teen Shooting: Police arrested two teens with a handgun after a shooting in Mount Baker that put Franklin High School on lockdown. As a precaution, students at John Muir Elementary sheltered-in-place. Police are still looking for two more suspects.

Temu Sesame Street: A 27-year-old man in Ohio has been dubbed “Oscar the Grouch” after a sanitation worker found him hiding from police in a trash can. It was caught on tape. Now, I’m no fan of surveillance, but…this was entertaining.

Weather: Partly sunny with a high near 51 and a chance of on and off rain. Wind gusts will be as high as 25 miles per hour. Tonight will be mostly cloudy with a low around 42 and a 30 percent chance of rain.

What Are the House and Senate Doing with Our Money? The Seattle Times compiled key takeaways from the state Senate and House budget proposals, including how lawmakers are accounting for the not-yet-passed millionaires’ tax, how they’ll use Climate Commitment Act money, what’ll happen with House’s proposal to eliminate occupational, speech and physical therapy coverage and instead provide a limited, one-time rate boost for certain long-term care facilities, and more.

Jeff Galloway: Galloway, the 1972 U.S. Olympic runner who inspired amateurs and pros alike with his “run-walk-run” strategy, died yesterday from a hemorrhagic stroke. He was 80.

Nobody Likes Newsom: California Gov. Gavin Newsom is offending everybody. He’s on a book tour right now—another effort to cast off his reputation as a liberal elitist to position himself as the Democratic frontrunner in 2028. But he’s just pissing everyone off. Conservatives accused Newsom of suggesting that Black people weren’t smart while talking to the Black mayor of Atlanta, Andre Dickens. Liberals are mad about Newsom’s CNN interview, where he said Democrats should be “more culturally normal” and stop spending “a disproportionate amount of time on pronouns, identity.”

LA Superintendent Investigation: The FBI raided the home of Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho and the district’s headquarters. A source told the Associated Press that the warrants were served as part of an “ongoing investigation.” The district hasn’t provided further information, but said it is cooperating with the investigation.

Bummer: A state bill to lower the legal driving limit from 0.08 blood alcohol content to 0.05 blood alcohol content died in the House yesterday. The bill, sponsored by Sen. John Lovick, would’ve been a good idea, given that drunk driving kills people.

Slugs Not Slop

Chase Hutchinson — Wed, 25 Feb 2026 15:30:00 -0800

The Sea Slug Animation Festival is making clear what was true its first year: only art made by passionate craftspeople is allowed. AI hacks, please dispose of your slop in the nearest trash can. by Chase Hutchinson

The Sea Slug Animation Festival is making clear what was true its first year: only art made by passionate craftspeople is allowed. AI hacks, please dispose of your slop in the nearest trash can.

This line in the sand is a matter of self-preservation. AI is an “existential threat” to animators. Though there is much uncertainty about what its impact will be in the future, the Animation Guild — a union that represents more than 5,000 artists, writers, technicians and production workers—estimate that 29 percent of jobs will be “disrupted,” whether through layoffs, loss of work, or other impacts. DreamWorks founder Jeffrey Katzenberg pessimistically predicts up to 90 percent of animation jobs could be cut. While the festival won’t save the animation industry on its own, Sea Slug is doing its part to push back against this technological nightmare.

“Sea Slug remains a platform for artists who are creating art themselves to show their independent work,” co-founder Hannah Baek said, noting all the “awesome analog-made animation” screening during this weekend’s (Feb. 27 through Mar. 1) festival at the SIFF Cinema Uptown (511 Queen Anne Ave N).

Baek and co-founder Rhys Iliakis run the festival together. They started it last year with the guiding philosophy of spotlighting animation in all its forms and providing a space for local PNW animators to connect about their work.

They’ve curated the festival’s second run with equal care, showcasing a variety of shorts and features that consist of animation on celluloid, hand-drawn with pencil, copper relief carving, oil on glass, pinscreen, collage, and stop motion with paper/puppets/clay, as well as 2D and 3D digital animation. The festival has also gained additional support since last year in the form of a grant from 4Culture. On top of that, they’ve got a new fiscal sponsor in Shunpike. This has allowed them to reach non-profit status and accept donations—if anyone feels like supporting humans in their fight for art against slop. Thus, with all that and the programming to support another day, they’ve expanded the festival in year two.

The highlights this year range from a rare restoration screening to inventive shorts that all use a variety of techniques. Specifically, there is Son of the White Mare, a masterful 1981 Hungarian film about a divine white mare who gives birth to three heroes that must go on a quest to save the universe. There is also the outstanding Oscar-shortlisted short The Night Boots, which is made entirely via the meticulous process of pinscreen animation, an animation style that makes use of a screen filled with movable pins. Then, there is the mesmerizing Weeds, which is animated by painting on glass. To close it out, there is the spectacularly silly film No Room, a short set in a wacky world where cars have legs for wheels.

The closer is then a mystery film and—without giving anything away on what it is—it’s one that absolutely rips in a way AI could never. Just like the rest of the festival.

Sea Slug Animation Festival takes place Feb. 27-Mar. 1 at the SIFF Cinema Uptown. Tickets are available at https://seasluganimation.com/

Correction: The festival ends March 1, not March 3. We regret the error.

Anti-Drunk Driving Bill Crashes and Burns in the Legislature

Nathalie Graham — Wed, 25 Feb 2026 14:30:00 -0800

The bill to lower the legal blood alcohol content limit died in the House, even in spite of The Stranger's flawed-science experiment last summer. by Nathalie Graham

Congrats you lushes, winos, drunkards, sots, and tipplers. A bill to lower the legal driving limit from a 0.08 percent blood alcohol limit to a 0.05 blood alcohol limit (BAC) has failed for the fourth year in a row. Despite passing the Senate, it floundered in the House Committee on Community Safety.

It’s not such a wild idea, even if the only US state with a 0.05 percent BAC limit is buttoned-up, prudish Utah. From a global point of view, we’re way outside the norm—eighty four of the world’s countries have a 0.05 BAC limit or lower. The unholy union of Big Alcohol and Big Automobile in the US of A has kept reform efforts in check across the country, driving something we like to call vehicular manslaughter. In 2023, Washington saw 800 driving deaths—a 30-year high. Over half of those deaths were linked to impaired driving.

Sure, we at The Stranger are known to partake in potent potables. We can put ’em away just like the rest of you. Yet, after a bit of science last summer, we were radicalized. The bill’s prime sponsor, Sen. John Lovick, a former state trooper who’s been advocating for years to lower the BAC, is right.

In an experiment, we combined alcohol and Mario Kart to see how drinking impaired our driving without tearing up these streets. Most of us came away shocked at just how drunk we felt with a BAC at 0.05, let alone 0.08 percent. We were also shocked at how bad we were at Mario Kart. Except Vivian, who got drunker than anyone. Oh, how the mighty fall.

The experiment had flaws, like how it wasn't real science. Or how Charles Mudede, who does not have a license and has never driven, could not comprehend how to use a Nintendo 64 controller. His BAC also mysteriously dipped down toward the end of the test. Regardless, it was enough to assure us that a 0.05 percent BAC was plenty drunk.

There’s always next year, Sen. Lovick!