Strongboi

strongboi plays Wonder Ballroom on Friday, November 13, as part of their headline tour. It's a project that started in Berlin from the collaboration between Ziv Yamin and Alice Phoebe Lou, born out of a passion project between close friends working mainly with Casio keyboards and toys. What began as two people playing around with cheap gear has since grown into a full band that still emulates those lo-fi beginnings.

That lo-fi root is a good way to get a handle on what they do, because the live shows pull in two directions at once. They describe their sets as ranging from disco dance tunes to jazzy ballads, so the night can shift from something you dance to something you sit with. It's that same contrast that defines the project: the Casio-keyboard playfulness of the early days sitting right next to the full-band sound they've built around it.

They've been around for a few years now, too. After releasing three singles in 2020, the duo returned with a self-titled debut album, strongboi, which they recorded at their own studio, La Pot. That album is the core of what they're touring, and it's where you'll hear the project fully realized as a band rather than just a studio experiment. If you're coming in cold, that's the record to start with.

Tickets start at $27.50, and the show is Friday, November 13, at Wonder Ballroom here in Portland.