Way back in 2008 (!!!), I went and sat in the Old Bend home of Wayne Newcome and talked to him about his band Problem Stick, which at the time was just evolving from a practice-space embryo to an actual public-facing concern that played gigs and stuff.

I knew then that Problem Stick would be worth following for as long as Newcome would keep it around. Here are four of his quotes from that article that will tell you why:

“Problem Stick’s all about wrong notes sometimes, but it’s on purpose.”

“We can do (stuff that sounds like) elephant bleats for 45 minutes, but it’s good to break it up … with something pretty, or as pretty as we can get.”

“Give yourself some parameters and then just screw it all up.”

“In real life, things don’t go the way you want them to. Things get messy. I like my music to be messy.”

Fifteen years later, Problem Stick is still around, and still playing music that sounds, as I wrote back then, like Tom Waits (or Cookie Monster) singing psych-rock cult hero Roky Erickson’s songs under a weighted blanket of distortion. Or, as I didn’t write back then, like The Beatles, the Velvet Underground, George Jones and the Ramones all tossed into a big ol’ blender, drenched in noise, crude humor and low-budget horror movies on VHS tape, and set to PUREE for eternity.

They rule, and they’re playing Friday night at M&J Tavern. Miss them at your own peril.

Problem Stick and Hopeless Jack: 9 p.m. Friday, free, M&J Tavern, 102 NW Greenwood Ave., Bend, 541-389-1410.