It was about a year after Paranoid Social Club’s first album — Axis II, winner of BMP 4’s Best Album — came out. The buzz of "Wasted" was still in the air, PSC’s live shows were growing legendary, and they were readily acquiring an outsized reputation fitting for Portland’s biggest rock band. Then they basically disappeared. I heard rumors PSC were working on a new double album, material so diametrically opposed that they were going to separate themselves into two completely different works — one aggressive and exciting, one self-scrutinizing and mellow. I thought they’d probably gone collectively crazy.

So did their manager, Scott Ordway, whom I remember talking with in the Portland Public Market over sushi as he confirmed their double-disc plans with a bit of a sigh. Managers think about things like price point, duplication fees, marketing a sound, singles — a double album seemingly by two different bands gave him a bit of a stomach ache, I could tell.

But this project was more for PSC’s mental health, I suspect, than it was for your musical enjoyment. It was the winter of 2003/2004, when you didn’t hear from them much. Mostly, they went from their jobs (third shift) to their practice space to their beds (often in their practice space). No one really knew what they were doing. So I called and left some messages. Finally, frontman Dave Gutter called me back.

"Sorry, man," he said, "but I don’t usually get up until about 5, and I didn’t think you’d be at work." It was about 3 in the afternoon. I could tell he’d gotten up early just to call me. He said they had some stuff to play for me, and he wanted me to come by the practice space.

On a rainy Wednesday afternoon, Gutter met me at their space, surrounded by about 5000 cigarette butts, and sat down in front of their Pro-Tools rig. Off the computer and a boombox, he proceeded to play me parts of every song that would wind up on Axis III & I, a release I think I knew even then would eventually gain a cult status similar to that enjoyed by the early Sublime disc, Robbin’ the Hood. Because this August PSC are going to release a new boiled-down, single-album version of the double disc for ON Entertainment, they’re going to get all famous and shit (just got added to K-ROCK, actually), and that brand-new release will be their "debut album" — leaving just a select few of us with their epic three-part psychological journey into rock and roll as it goes quickly out of print.

On that rainy Wednesday, though, it was like Gutter was showing me pictures of his children, their report cards and soccer trophies. Forgoing the standard studio route, PSC had recorded just about everything right here in their space, despite the fact — or maybe because of the fact — that Gutter and bassist Jon Roods had at one time recorded in the fanciest studios around with the likes of David Leonard and David Bowie. Pro-Tools can make anyone sound professional, sure, but it takes time, lots and lots of time, and I could tell Gutter had lived and breathed this shit. With every track, he rocked back and forth in his chair, singing the vocals aloud in lock-step, all the while lighting a new cigarette off the embers of the last.

For Portland’s most charismatic frontman, Dave Gutter sure can act like a member of a Paranoid Social Club sometimes. Getting that first listen in their practice space, I felt like he needed a hug more than anything else. I tried to write one for him when I reviewed the CDs a few months later.

"Two Girls" ended up being the big single, winner as this year’s best song, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg. Far from the rock that dominates radio today, where you’re lucky to get two full verses or lyrics that seem to mean anything, Gutter borrows from his hip-hop interests to provide songs of real depth, character, and meaning, sometimes five and six verses deep. "Righteous" is a full-fledged exegesis on God’s place in the modern world. "Baglady" might be the most real and true song about homelessness in the rock catalog. "Amateur Porn" is downright chilling. But none of it is preachy or didactic or anything but honest, and all of it is backed by the hands-down, universally accepted best rhythm section in town in bassist Roods and drummer Marc Boisvert (Boisvert, I hear, rents a second practice space just for himself).

Likely, we’ll hold on to these discs like family heirlooms, coveting the soft-core porn of the liner notes like china and silver. One song at a time, you might think the ’60s vamp of Axis III was Smashmouth-esque, or that they’d raided the lost Elliot Smith tapes for Axis I, but taken as a package the discs speak to a pathos belied by PSC’s antic-filled public persona (raiding ’CYY’s studios, dressing up like cops for shows, spilling numerous drinks on me as they came up to accept their Bimpies).

They are, and can be, radio rock. But they can and will be so much more. Even the fortune-cookie prophecy Dave Gutter took from his wallet as he accepted his Best Male Vocalist Award says so.

Best Act runners up: Headstart!, As Fast As

Best Male Vocalist runners up: Chris Moulton (In the Arms of Providence), Graham Isaacson

Best Radio Rock Act runners up: Headstart!, Animal Suit Driveby

Best Song runners up: Animal Suit Driveby, "Sugar Pills"; As Fast As, "This Is Real"

Best Album runners up: As Fast As, Open Letter to the Damned; Sontiago, Abuse My Adoration