Music and wine escape to the great outdoors.

Byline: BUZZWORTHY The Register-Guard

Ta-da! The Cuthbert is open for business, and Saturday's show will be a marathon of hip-hop, funk, folk, reggae and any which way that Michael Franti & Spearhead with his many friends can mix upgenres.

Memorial Day weekend is always a good time to head to our many gorgeous wineries. Check out their Web sites for events, but all of them tend to have something going on this weekend, at the very least tastings.

You also have the chance to taste two homegrown guitarists, over whom the veteran musicians in this town have been very protective and nurturing. David Jacobs-Strain and Brooks Robertson may be at different stages of their careers, but both have shown tremendous talent as finger-style guitarists.

Jacobs-Strain is further down the musical road. He's releasing his fourth CD tonight at Sam Bond's Garage. Robertson, who's still in high school, plays an outdoor, mostly instrumental concert Mondayat Silvan Ridge/Hinman Vineyards.

There are actually no movies opening today. We could guess it has something to do with not wanting to butt heads with the Indiana Jones franchise, but who needs movies with real-life dramas playing out daily?

The fight for the Democratic nomination? The sentencing of boy band mogul Lou Pearlman for cheating people out of their money? The R. Kelly trial? So much to gawk at, so little time.

Another thing to look at and listen to is electro-pop band the Slants, who are back at Luckey's for a late Saturday set after playing an early one at the Black Forest.

We're working on a video on this band, but this show snuck up on us somehow and we never finished editing it. Anyway, a band of Asian-Americans is pretty rare in this town, and they are a lot of fun live. A January article on the blog will have to tide you over until we can release that video.