JOEL PORTER, TIM CARPENTER, THE REMNANTS WINDOW at Kelly’s Olympian – Portland, OR

Porter’s songs delve into the complexities of family, solitude, and the quiet tension of being both connected and isolated. On St. Anthony (from Mountain Twin), we eavesdrop on his apprehension to “writing songs that make my father cry.” In Amaranthine (from Hiraeth), we witness his plea to “tempt a friendly death, among my reminisced,” a poetic meditation on loss and connection. By the time we reach “on your nape, I trace your spots and markers” in Little Tooth (from A Costly Collection), the listener is swept into Porter’s intimate world, where love, vulnerability, and change coalesce.

Porter and Hillman form a sonic guyline— a creative thread that runs through a genre often muddled by fleeting trends and hollow experimentation. Their music acts as an invitation to a lush world that is equal parts storytelling and confession and a prompt to explore and understand the universal joys and struggles of the human journey a little better.