BEGIN:VCALENDAR METHOD:PUBLISH VERSION:2.0 CALSCALE:GREGORIAN PRODID:-//NONSGML Sandhills Development\, LLC//NONSGML Sugar Calendar Fe eds v3.4.0//EN X-WR-CALNAME:The Suitcase Junket X-WR-CALDESC:Portland Downtown X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/New_York BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 DTSTART:20220507T080000 TZNAME:EDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 DTSTART:20220507T080000 TZNAME:EDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:The Suitcase Junket DESCRIPTION:ADVANCE PURCHASE: $16\nDAY-OF: $20\n10% MEMBER DISCOUNT\n\nM att Lorenz’s vision\, manifest in The Suitcase Junket\, developed in t he tension between the grand and the solitary. Grand in its imagery\, so und\, and staging. Solitary in its thrift and self-reliance. What instru ments he requires\, Lorenz builds from scratch and salvage. What parts f ive players would perform\, he performs alone. The spectacle of his one- man set bears constant comparison to legends of showmanship\, brilliance \, madness\, and invention.\n\nWhile audiences are captivated by his sol itary form and the show itself\, Lorenz\, who homesteads with rescue dog s and chickens in rural Western Massachusetts\, is most serious about th e songs. He has been building a catalog\, writing a world into existence . Solitary on stage and on the road\, his mind is crowded with character s\, narratives\, voices\, imagery\, sounds as wide and varied as mountai n throat singers and roadhouse juke boxes\, plus newsreels of the planet ’s destruction and salvage. With this 2020 release\, The End is New\, Lorenz’s grand vision for the song overrides the how of it.\n\n“The things I value are under attack\,” Lorenz writes. “And writing songs and making art are the methods I have for responding. I have tried to u se my observations and reflections of the world bent through my fun-hous e-mirror mind to show what I see\; a planet stressed. … We can do bett er.”\n\nThe End is New was produced by trusted friend\, producer Steve Berlin of Los Lobos\, who produced The Suitcase Junket’s acclaimed 20 18 release\, Mean Dog Trampoline.\n\n“Most of the time making records for a living is both fun and edifying\,” says Berlin “But every once and a while I get rewarded with a simply superlative experience\, and m aking The End Is New was certainly one of those.” He adds\, “We had a blast building these ideas into songs\, and Matt’s endless inventive ness made each workday a genuine pleasure. His talent is a unique gift. \n\n“I told Steve I wanted to make a doom-folk record\,” says Lore nz. “That’s what I’d started calling my music when people asked. H e was game. Neither of us knew quite what that meant at the time\, but I think we found out with The End is New. There’s a heavy mix of hope a nd desperation in the sound and lyrically I was trying to be a mirror to society using truth\, myth\, confessions and stories.”\n\nIn the stra ngest of ironies\, the production of this album\, an artist moving from solitude to collaboration\, went forward in a time when Lorenz\, Berlin\ , all their studio musicians\, and the entire world were in isolation fo r the lockdown of pandemic.\n\n“We had done some tracking in February and felt that we had a good start\,” says Lorenz\, “but things had g otten a bit strange. Steve Berlin\, producer extraordinaire\, was stuck at home on the West Coast under a newly imposed lockdown and here in Mas sachusetts the virus was starting to heat up. The bicoastal\, remotely p roduced recording process was bizarre and frustrating but fruitful. We p lugged along\, track by track\, occasionally commenting on how crazy eve rything was feeling. Justin\, the sound engineer and co-owner of Sonelab \, and I had spent time together in the same studio so we figured if one of us had The Virus we probably both did so why not finish the record a s safely as we could? So we watched as the world drastically changed aro und our little musical haven\, unsure of what lay ahead. We polished off the record bit by bit in the following months\, recording overdubs from home with no more studio time to be had. J Mascis made a ripping appear ance on ‘Light a Candle’ and Steve Berlin slipped off his producer s hoes and laid down some horn parts. I’m so very excited to share these new songs. I think the writing on this album is some of the best I’ve ever done and the production has them sounding huge and cinematic.”\n \nThe End is New is an artist expanding his possibilities\, collaboratin g\, matching his lyrical power over eleven tracks with the epic sounds a nd narratives of his imagination. “Black Holes and Overdoses” riffs off the unrelenting news cycle\, the numbness that wants for oblivion. And Then There Was Fire” finds Lorenz reflecting on current events\, inspired by the destructive wildfire in Australia\, which seems like th ree years ago at this point\, but took place right at the end of last ye ar and beginning of this year. “Light a Candle” is the simmering doo m of lost love. “Can’t Look Away” protests the overuse of a planet . “Jesus! King of the Dinosaurs” is a romp poking fun at extremists and biblical timelines.\n\nGrowing up in Cavendish\, Vermont\, Matt Lore nz began playing piano at age five\, and later took up violin\, saxophon e\, and guitar. During his years at Hampshire College in Amherst\, Massa chusetts\, he studied music and adaptive instrument design\, a pursuit t hat included building a prototype for a drummer who couldn’t use their legs\, where they’d be able to play the bass drum and hi-hat through a system of pulleys. After college\, he headed to Europe on a $150 plane ticket\, ran out of money in Barcelona\, and spent a year playing music in the streets. “That’s where I learned how to sing loud\, which go t me figuring out what my voice could do\,” Lorenz notes. Once he’d returned to Amherst\, he formed the band Rusty Belle with his sister Kat e and\, several years later\, started The Suitcase Junket with the aid o f a guitar he’d found in a dumpster. ‘The Suitcase Junket’ is a no d to Lorenz’s longtime love of collecting old suitcases\, including an antique that he’s refurbished into a bass drum\, and to a secondary d efinition of junket\, i.e. “a pleasure excursion.”\n\nThe End is New is Lorenz’s sixth full-length album as The Suitcase Junket\, his firs t for Renew Records/BMG. The sound has become more refined and deeper wi th each release. Lorenz tours extensively and plans to be back on the ro ad for a waylaid release tour for The End is New in 2021. Lorenz is also a visual artist. In the early years he designed all The Suitcase Junket album art and merchandise and made the music videos generated with his songs. He continues to create the visuals for merchandise\, and to produ ce some of his videos\, now with collaborators. He gets very excited abo ut coffee\, gardening\, bees\, dogs\, birds\, mushrooms\, tinctures\, ma king his own wine and maple sugaring season. URL;VALUE=URI:https://portlandmaine.com/events/the-suitcase-junket/ UID:urn:uuid:ace79068-94a2-4884-b0e2-5660397c1bac STATUS:CONFIRMED ORGANIZER: DTSTAMP:20260704T232617Z DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20221105T200000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20221105T220000 LOCATION:181 State St.\, Portland\, Maine 04101\, US END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR