JON HOPKINS'S ELEGANTLY GRITTY TECHNO, TEEBS'S BLISSFUL BEATSCAPES
Out of all the brazenly talented artists on Flying Lotus's Brainfeeder label, Teebs (aka Mtendere Mandowa) might be the one who infuses the most beauty into his music. Known for its acute, mutational shifts of instrumental-hiphop paradigms, Brainfeeder has issued three full-lengths by Teebs: Ardour, Collections, and the new Estara. The latter release retains Teebs's trademark oneiric, aquatic production style but toughens up the beats in places, although tempos continue to move at a languorous pace. (Teebs may be an ex-skateboarder, but he's a deeply mellow and sensitive dude in the studio.) No exaggeration, he may be the closest thing America has to a Boards of Canada. London's Jon Hopkins may be Coldplay's favorite electronic musician, but I assure you he's worth your time. He has a huge canon of finely wrought ambient, down-tempo, and techno compositions, and in 2010 helped Brian Eno make one of his best late-era albums with Small Craft on a Milk Sea. A masterly arranger whose scope is cinematic, Hopkins creates elegant yet gritty tracks that sound at home in both the orchestra hall and the dance club. With Nordic Soul. Crocodile, 9 pm, $17 adv, 21+.
THE FOURTH INSTALLMENT OF ELEVATOR GOES DEEP AND SPAZZY
Recording for well-regarded labels like NNA Tapes, Digitalis, and Aguirre, Paris-born Je Suis le Petit Chevalier (aka Felicia Atkinson) peddles electro-dream-pop and psychedelic-drone compositions that tickle your subconscious with wanly beautiful melodies and faint vocals that out-whisper Vashti Bunyan. By contrast, R.M. Francis generates rivulets of ruptured, highly warped and pulverized tones that sound like a 21st-century Xenakis on meth. His set at Debacle Fest was a feast for lovers of spazzed-out, extreme frequencies. The last time I saw Olympia-based guitarist/electronics artist Total Life live, opening for Fuck Buttons at the Crocodile, he put the "iteration" in obliteration; it was a total Zen-noise wipeout, like minimalist composer Éliane Radigue's infinitesimal whorling drones blown up with a nuclear missile. Machine House Brewery, 9 pm, $10, all ages.
PORTLAND DJ LINCOLNUP FLEXES VERSATILE SKILLS
Former Seattle/current Portland resident Lincolnup is one of those DJs who excel at several styles while possessing vast knowledge of both old and new releases. A serious student of electronic music who for the last four years has run PDX's most forward-thinking club night, Bubblin, with Ben Fuller, Lincolnup (Lincoln Heath) can throw down sets encompassing house, techno, garage, and many branches of bass music with enviable technical dexterity. By the way, the man is also an outstanding massage therapist. I'm pretty sure this skill somehow ends up helping him behind the decks. He intimately knows the body's musculature and how best to make limbs move with optimal flexibility—especially on the dance floor. With Ctrl_Alt_Dlt, Roddimus, Eva, and Nick Black. Kremwerk, 9 pm, $5 before midnight/$10 after, 21+. 
