Paul Spring//Meernaa//Steven Van Betten//Rob Shelton

The Quilcene Lantern is proud to present Paul Spring, Meernaa, Steven Van Betten, and Rob Shelton! 

$12 advance//$20 at the door

6pm doors//7pm music

all ages, bar w/ ID

Paul Spring is a songwriter and guitarist based in New York City. He has released 7 albums in the last 5 years ranging from classical to electronic, before recently settling into guitar based folk. In 2021 he released J.S. Bach 12 String Transcriptions, supporting it with a 2 year long weekly residency in Manhattan’s Burp Castle. Between 2023’s Always Almost Home “meshing 90s pop and Bach” (MPR) and the “hidden pop gem” (Irish Times) of 2022ʼs Thunderhead, Spring experimented with minimal electronic production and folk. Aquarium Drunkard called his album, 2024’s River Flows Two Ways, “a singular fresh offering as well as a catalogue introduction of sorts.” It accompanied a canoe tour down the Hudson River. In 2024 and 2025 he recorded Kind of Heaven and Dumb and Free with drummer and co-producer Jon Nellen.  In the summer of 2025, Paul put out an album of original music entirely in Classical Latin entitled Vita Brevis. He has also appeared as a session guitarist and co-writer on Blackthought and El Michels Affair’s Glorious Game, and his guitar playing was sampled on releases by Kenny Beats, Vic Mensa, Sofia Valdez, and Kirby.

Meernaa is the moniker of LA-based musician Carly Bond, blending elements of R&B, jazz, psychedelic rock, folk, art rock, and pop to create a genre-defying sound. Her music delves into themes of emotional evolution, personal growth, and introspection. In June 2019, they released their debut album, Heart Hunger, drawing inspiration from Bond's personal experiences and family history. Their follow-up album, So Far So Good, was released on October 6, 2023, through Keeled Scales. Pitchfork describes So Far So Good as "a more soulful, introspective collection of folk songs whose fingerpicked guitar, gauzy synth lines, and swooping string arrangements diffuse like smoke."

Meernaa has actively toured, performing at various venues and festivals, and they've shared the stage with artists like Deep Sea Diver, Helado Negro, Nilüfer Yanya, Sam Evian, Miya Folick, and Luke Temple. Carly Bond also co-owns Altamira Sound, a recording studio in Alhambra, California, where she engineers and produces music.

Steven van Betten is a songwriter living in Los Angeles who’s taken aim on storytelling. From reflections of the American West to the depths and intimacies of human relationships, his lyrics reveal the magic hidden in mundane day-to-day life. Born and raised in Blue Diamond, Nevada—a tiny, rural, desert community—his music is inspired by time spent playing guitar in rocky canyons, taking breaks to climb the sandstone and search for swimming holes in the sweltering sun. Echoing across dim, lamplit living rooms, his solo shows are vulnerable, tender, and brutally honest. 

While it’s easy to connect some of what he does to a tradition of folk greats like Randy Newman or Towns van Zandt, there’s undoubtedly a modern boundary that Steven is pushing. Deeply experimental and informed by contemporaries like Luke Temple and Sufjan Stevens, there’s hardly a category he fits into neatly. You can’t predict whether a given song will make you chuckle or tear up, but he has a way of being reliably emotional and potent.

Rob Shelton