the BEAT of the week: "Portlandia" streaming on IFC

The secret's coming out: Portlandia is how I spent my (non-)winter vacation. With a whopping total of six episodes, I whizzed through the first season (currently streaming on instant Netflix) in a simple matter of hours, and came out at the end pretty humored. It helped that I visited Portland earlier this year and was actually aware of some of its idiosyncrasies -- biking, hippies and major unemployment rate among them -- plus the season had a number of great guest stars like Jason Sudeikis and Aimee Mann, but I think keeping an open mind about its strange humor will get you some laughs. Fred Armisen isn't even one of my favorite people (is he really still playing Obama?), but Carrie Brownstein really steals the show. Riot grrls are funny, who knew?

But you decide for yourself. IFC is streaming a full episode of season two on its website right now, and already it boasts Jeff Goldblum and Eddie Vedder as guest stars. So take a trip to the lovely land of Portlandia, where the '90s never died. Season two officially premieres on Jan. 6th.

Cacao!

-- Chau Tu

ps. And if you love it just enough, Carrie and Fred are doing a Portlandia tour and hitting the Echoplex on Jan. 17th. It's sold out, but you can probably scout for tickets outside or on Craigslist.