Now I’m Fine @ On the Boards
Those who watched Ahamefule Oluo’s Now I’m Fine two years ago left the experience with the impression that something very unusual had just happened in Seattle. The show is not easy to describe because it fuses three elements that are rarely, if ever, fused: big band jazz, stand-up comedy, and storytelling. The music, composed by Oluo, is catchy, bold, and gorgeous, the comedy is sharp and political and never falls flat, and the storytelling provides the autobiographical soul of the show. Oluo, who is also the trumpeter for the band, Industrial Revelation, that won this year’s Genius Award in music, assembled an A-list of local musicians (okanomodé Soulchilde, Evan Flory-Barnes, D’Vonne Lewis) for this mission into his life, his family, and his society.
CHARLES MUDEDE
White Lung and Co. @ Chop Suey
Mish Way is a genuine rock star. The White Lung frontwoman commands the mosh pit her band summons with a powerful urgency, like a punk-rock Buffy slaying demons of bullshit and patriarchy with her Hayley Williams meets Kat Bjelland howl, and also in her prolific music-writing career. On their most recent (and totally excellent) Domino release, Deep Fantasy, her band plays menacing, impressively tight and controlled punk songs with a grunge-y rage that feels like a stake through the heart, in a good way. This is what happens when DIY hardcore bands grow out of the basement and get polished: They totally shine. If there’s any band that could stop an impending bro apocalypse, it’s White Lung. ROBIN EDWARDS
Claude VonStroke @ Q
The puckish producer/DJ who started San Francisco’s notorious Dirtybird Records back in 2005 is back to wreak havoc on dance-floor decorum. Claude VonStroke (aka suburban Detroit native Barclay Crenshaw) has clawed his way to near the top of the house-music heap with a winning catalog that combines the loopy with the sinister. Though his music’s far from dipping into lowest-common-denominator territory, VonStroke plays plenty of big rooms and festivals, exposing a lot of normals to some weird and funky dance music. Plus, he’s worked with James Brown/Funkadelic bassist Bootsy Collins (on “The Greasy Beat”), which most in his field have not. DAVE SEGAL
Black Cobra and Co. @ Highline
With 13 solid years of cranking out maximum-quality metal, San Francisco–based riff machines Black Cobra show no signs of toning, turning, or slowing down. But, really, how could they? The two forces that came together to form this drum-and-guitar duo surely have a reputation to uphold, as both have backgrounds in well-known, unrelenting underground kings—Acid King and Cavity, respectively. Black Cobra’s music is stripped-down, raw, and heavy as fuck. Don’t slack on openers Brain Scraper, either. These dudes bring a breakneck thrash approach to blackened death metal that is a refreshing take on a well-seasoned sound. KEVIN DIERS
Matt Hern @ New Foundation
It’s a lecture entitled “Sports, Creativity, and the Radical Imagination.” The thesis can be found here: “Often derided as a subaltern opiate, sports need to be understood as containing huge social and cultural power, and possibilities that are condescended to at our peril.” So don’t ignore sports.
Here be treasure of the Thursday variety.