Entering Manhattan for the first time is a strange experience. Is it going for posh or trashy? The gigantic chandelier says the former; the ram with gold rifles for horns screams the latter. A glance at the menu does little to alleviate the strangeness: New American, sure, but with winks toward Louisiana and Hawaii as well. Of this, you can be sure: their Monday happy hour lasts all day, the fried green tomatoes are delectable, and their daytime bartender Funk, in keeping with the tone, is one of the stranger ones out there. KYLE FLECK
Orden Mundial, White Wards, The Coltranes, and Wet Brain @ Black Lodge
Indulge in the opposite of holiday cheer tonight with Spanish hardcore punk nihilists Orden Mundial, who punish (in a good way) with their frenzied antiestablishment destruction. Their songs are in Castilian Spanish, but their whirlwind of fury also transcends language barriers, so be prepared for some brutal guitar annihilation. Also don’t miss Olympia’s Iron lung Records–backed punks White Wards, who make fantastically ugly hardcore with pummeling guitars and harsh technical dissonance. I’m super impressed with their latest full-length, Cigarette Burns, which blazes seamlessly from each one-minute blast to the next and sounds more varied and art-driven than most hardcore. Touring noisy hardcore freaks the Coltranes also bring more mean riffs (and, um, geriatric alien sex art) to this aggressively awesome night. BRITTNIE FULLER
The Roots and Lionbabe @ Showbox at the Market
Going from raw, hyperintelligent underground heavy-hitters to beloved house band for the white-bread-iest of America’s talk shows was an arduous and hard-fought journey for the Roots, but on record they’ve lost none of their righteous fire. Latest album …And Then You Shoot Your Cousin co-opts hiphop’s recent fixation on concept albums, with an eviscerating set of stories deconstructing violence, the media, and the landscape of rap music in 2014. As usual, Black Thought’s desolate, gritty tales are anchored by the greatest “live rap” band ever, led by Questlove’s fluid and funky work behind the drum kit and a who’s who of big-name collaborators. Don’t let their kazoo-assisted viral videos with Carly Rae fool you: These dudes don’t play around. KYLE FLECK
If you want organ-centric jazz for free (no free jazz, though), you can’t do much better than Seattle’s McTuff Trio. Led by Hammond organ maestro Joe Doria, McTuff also contain one of the region’s most dexterous guitarists, Andy Coe, drummer Tarik Abouzied, and, sometimes, wild-card saxophonist Skerik. Along with Afrocop but in a bit more of straight-ahead manner than that younger group, McTuff Trio write alluringly malleable tunes, redolent of soul, ablaze with technical virtuosity, and often funky. And they do a radical reinvention of the Beatles’ “She’s So Heavy” that deserves a Nobel or something. They play Seamonster for free every Tuesday, so it’s easy to take them for granted, but these guys would be a bargain at $20 a gig. DAVE SEGAL
Pettirosso’s Monday bake sales include all kinds of sweet and savory goodies from pastry chef Danell George, plus Lighthouse coffee.