Bands. Art. Comedy. Community. These are just a few of the things you can expect from the upcoming City Arts Festival, taking place at various venues throughout the city from Thursday, October 20th through Saturday, October 22nd. They've done a damn fine job of showcasing a ton of local artists as well as featuring some national acts, both sure to pack their respective houses -- and thus, it's through a sea of tears that we give you some of our picks for what you should do to make the best of those seventy-two hours.

City Arts isn't bringing us to tears, of course, unless you count tears of JOY at reading the full lineup! But we are a little sad to report that part of our imaginary team will be in New York for CMJ this year {for those of you keeping score at home, yep: it's the same week / weekend}.

THURSDAY

The Don't-Miss: The Long Winters / Campfire OK / Cobirds Unite / Cataldo
Where: Showbox at the Market
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The Long Fucking Winters. At the Showbox. Seriously!! The rumors are true -- we're presenting this show, it's going to kick ass, the night will be full of surprises, and the lineup is killer. Cataldo will be warming up the night, fresh off the release of their latest album Prison Boxing, Cobirds Unite will send the masses swooning, Campfire OK will undoubtedly win the house over... and all of this before John Roderick and Company take the stage. Any night when he and Rachel Flotard are in the same house, whether they perform together or not, is sure to go down as one for the books.

The Runner-Upper: Seateeth
Where: Theatre Off Jackson
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Thao with the Get Down Stay Down return to Chop Suey on Thursday, October 22nd, and we can send a lucky reader of TIG to the show for free.

Also on the line up with Thao et. al. are labelmates Portland Cello Project, a horde of classicaly trained cellists affectionately nicknamed PCP by their fans. Thao Nguygen guests on PCP's first release on Kill Rock Stars label; you can download a free MP3 of the Thao/PCP collaboration "Tallymarks" here.

To enter the drawing, all you need to do is send an e-mail to tig@threeimaginarygirls.com by 9am on Monday, October 19th with "ThaoGetDown" in the subject line (please no spaces). That, and be 21 or older. We'll select the winner shortly thereafter and will notify the lucky him or her then.

 

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Another day, another free ticket giveaway...

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at Chop Suey

The small, intricate details in Thao's music lifted the set into something that the people outside would rave about later as they sucked their cigarettes down.

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