Thursday 7/10
An Evening with Sub Pop Records Founders Bruce Pavitt and Jonathan Poneman
(EMP) See preview
Club Pop: Felix Cartal, Giraud, DJs Recess and Reflex
(Chop Suey) See Bug in the Bassbin
Friday 7/11
Trevor Loveys, Recess, DJ Same DNA, Claude Balzac
(Chop Suey) See Bug in the Bassbin
Obits, The Lights, Android Hero
(Funhouse) I didn't necessarily dislike Rocket from the Crypt, but I've always felt Jon Ries's guitar dexterity isn't fully utilized unless it's by a rock outfit that also involves Rick Froberg. On a few cuts from the new Night Marchers' (Reis's new gang, which consists mostly of other ex–Hot Snakes players—excepting Froberg) recent album, You See in Magic, you can hear them try to re-create the magic exhibited in past Ries/Froberg collaborations like Hot Snakes and Drive Like Jehu. These moments come close, but they just don't have the same abandon. Obits, Froberg's new cohorts, reign from NYC instead of San Diego—and while it's hard to judge from the few rough numbers on their MySpace account, I'm betting it's going to be as full-throttle as Froberg's work always has been, just different. GRANT BRISSEY
Retribution Gospel Choir, David Karsten Daniels, Red Jacket Mine
(High Dive) With a name like Retribution Gospel Choir and featuring members of Low, you might reasonably expect this band to be even more haunted church-choir somber than Alan Sparhawk's main gig. But you'd be wrong. Instead, Retribution Gospel Choir finds Sparhawk and company churning out bright, fuzzy power pop; loose, country-tinged indie rock; and odd lo-fi dub jams (as well as the occasionally dour number). Sparhawk's voice remains as clear and airy as ever; it's a treat to hear it buoyed by upbeat fuzz rather than roaming through Low's spare sonic landscapes. Seattle-based Fat Cat recording artist David Karsten Daniels sings intimately small, folky acoustic songs, occasionally dressed up with piano or drums or backing vocals, which bear some sonic hints of his previous homes of Texas and North Carolina. ERIC GRANDY
Les Thugs
(Neumo's) Any clueless kids who end up at Neumo's tonight probably won't realize that the band they're watching hasn't been active for over a decade. Les Thugs' last record, Nineteen Something, was released in 1998 on Sub Pop, but their sound has proven to be a timeless combination of brash punk and transcendent rock that still has a niche in today's trends. Coming all the way from France, they're making the most of their stay in the Northwest by playing two shows (they're also appearing at Sub Pop's anniversary party in Redmond on Sunday) but your best bet is to see the four Frenchmen in the more-intimate club setting, with the energy of the city all around you. MEGAN SELING
Sub Pop 20th Anniversary Comedy Show: Patton Oswalt, David Cross, Eugene Mirman, Todd Barry, Kristen Schaal
(Paramount) Thank you, Sub Pop, for getting into the comedy record biz. For one, you sparked the standup transition from comedy clubs (usually with unnecessary "z"s in their names) to rock venues. And your high-profile album releases also fueled the current wave of popular standup, which some people call "alternative" or "indie." I prefer "actually funny." But there's a catch to Sub Pop's impact—joke requests. When Sub Pop gathers its best tonight—David Cross, Patton Oswalt, Eugene Mirman, Todd Barry, and newest Daily Show correspondent Kristen Schaal—fans are going to yell joke lines out as requests, and it's going to suck. "Freedom bowl, Patton!" "Funny MySpace ads, Eugene!" Demanding a joke is like trying to tickle yourself—it winds up making nobody laugh. So shut up. Otherwise, Kristen will never hear my shout of "avocado vagina." SAM MACHKOVECH
Saturday 7/12
Freeway, D.Black, Cancer Rising, Jay Barz
(Chop Suey) See My Philosophy
Sub Pop 20th Anniversary Festival: Eric's Trip, Seaweed, the Helio Sequence, Pissed Jeans, Fleet Foxes, the Fluid, Low, Mudhoney, the Vaselines, Iron and Wine, Flight of the Conchords
(Marymoor Park) See previews page 33 and 34; Stranger Suggests, page 21.
Trombone Cake, Valis, In the Empty City
(Jules Maes) I don't mean to frighten you, but voodoo is alive and well and thriving in Seattle—and it goes by the name of Trombone Cake. How else can you explain the urban-bayou-folk-rock-boogie-woogie madness cooked up by these crazy cats? Led by the twisted genius of singer/guitarist Eric Richards and anchored by the legendary percussive skills of one Mike Stone, these under-the-radar scene veterans have been slowly and steadily concocting an insanely rocking, funky, lethal brew's worth of influences and inspirations. Part head-ripping musical moonshine and part mind-tripping auditory absinthe, it'll fuck you up and have you coming back for more every time. Beware. BARBARA MITCHELL
Sub Pop 20th Anniversary: The Gutter Twins, Brothers of the Sonic Cloth
(Showbox at the Market) As part of Sub Pop's weekend-long anniversary celebration, tonight's show stars two new acts featuring label veterans. The Gutter Twins are Mark Lanegan (who released his first solo record on Sub Pop in 1990) and Greg Dulli of the Afghan Wigs (who also put out a couple of records on the Pop before going to major Elektra). Sub Pop signed the duo in 2007, and earlier this year they released the moody, critically acclaimed Saturnalia. Opening for them is the heavy-yet-ethereal Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, the new band featuring Tad Doyle of TAD. They don't wear flannel or cart around chainsaws, but their new sound is every bit as capable of giving you tinnitus as was TAD back in the 1990s. MEGAN SELING
Sunday 7/13
Sub Pop 20th Anniversary Festival: The Ruby Suns, Grand Archives, Kinski, Foals, Les Thugs, No Age, Red Red Meat, Comets on Fire, Beachwood Sparks, Green River, Wolf Parade
(Marymoor Park) See Preview; Band of the Week
My Education, Joy Wants Eternity
(Funhouse) See the Album Review
King Khan and the Shrines, Jacuzzi Boys
(Tractor) Like Vice label mates Dark Meat, King Khan and the Shrines travel with a massive nine-piece big band–style crew. Unlike the Meats, King Khan is a hyper hoodoo voodoo James Brown-esque soul music freak-out. Jared Swilley of the Black Lips describes the band as "one of the best shows I have ever witnessed... Horns were blaring that could have taken down the walls of Jericho, the drums pounding a rhythm deep into my heart, guitars, bass and organ wailing and King Khan at the epicenter of it all commanding the stage like a soul-soaked shaman." I expect to dance. KELLY O
Monday 7/14
Earl Scruggs, Sparrow Quartet
(Benaroya Hall) There is nothing surprising about hearing a string player in Benaroya Hall. But Sparrow Quartet's Ben Sollee is definitely at the end of the venue's comfort zone—and not in a novelty hair, playing-the-classics-too-fast kind of way. Given his primary instrument (cello) and pop songwriting smarts, the temptation is to tag Sollee the modern answer to innovative New York producer and composer Arthur Russell. But that misses the mark. On his debut full-length, Learning to Bend, this Louisville, Kentucky, nature boy displays a more robust singing style than the late Russell, and integrates myriad timbres—including banjo, saxophone, and harp—to vibrant effect, striking a curious balance between folk, Tin Pan Alley, and the imaginary America peddled by Aaron Copland. Besides, any ninny can play acoustic guitar. KURT B. REIGHLEY
Tuesday 7/15
(Easy Street Records, Queen Anne) By all accounts, Natalie Portman's Shaved Head are a band I should like. I like electro. I enjoy pop. I get jokes. And yet... the electro is just too preset, the pop is too Disney, the jokes are, well, not so funny. And here's the rub, it seems, when it comes to Seattle and electro-pop: Too few bands are willing to just do it sincerely à la, say, LCD Soundsystem or Hot Chip (U.S.E, weirdly, might be the exception, as genuine as they are goofy). It's an understandable stance in such a traditional, rockist town—to make a joke out of your synth pop before anyone else can—but it means such acts will only ever be a gag. And if you're going to be just a gag, you better at least be funny. ERIC GRANDY
Jimmy Eat World, Dear and the Headlights
(Showbox Sodo) Lately, I've been revisiting the records of my youth—those soundtracks to unrequited crushes and frustrating "no one understands me!" fights with my parents—and Jimmy Eat World's Clarity is one of the great ones. The band were on the verge of adulthood, and their songs were glittery guitar-fueled mixes of optimism, confusion, hope, and despair. The band hit the mark again with Bleed American (oversensitively retitled Jimmy Eat World post-9/11). The band polished their pop sound, and while it proved more radio friendly, with the posi-adolescent anthem "The Middle," it still dripped with sincerity. Since then, though, the band have gone downhill. Futures was a failed experiment in electronic flourishes, and on Chase This Light, frontman Jim Adkins seemed too much like an old guy trying to be a teenager again. And their last Seattle performance was bor-ing. MEGAN SELING
Wednesday 7/16
Flosstradamus
(Chop Suey) See the Album Review
Flobots, Doomtree, P.O.S.
(El Corazón) Who in the love of the LFO are these Flobots clowns? That "Handlebars" songs is hot, steamy, wet trash—and I never even heard their stupid-ass name till their video was in heavy rotation and KNDD was banging them like Yellowcard. Yet I'm going to go to their show because P.O.S., the most interesting act on Rhymesayers Entertainment, is a fucking lightning bolt onstage. A punk-rock singer turned shitstarting MC, Pissed Off Stef's half-Eminem/half–Against Me! swag can turn timid rap shows to hardcore pits in a blink. His Doomtree family follows suit—their dark, rock-damaged aesthetic akin to the Northwest's Oldominion clique. LARRY MIZELL JR.
The Jesus and Mary Chain
(Showbox Sodo) There doesn't really seem to be a point to a reunion of the Jesus and Mary Chain, the landmark Scottish band who invented the Velvet-Underground-in-a-pop-nuclear-blast philosophy and gave us songs like "Head On," "Darklands," and "Far Gone and Out." The rest of the world's been filling the void, sounding like them, from Black Rebel Motorcycle Club to the Raveonettes, or igniting a resurgence, like with the climactic use of "Just Like Honey" in Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation. But maybe that's the point. The Jesus and Mary Chain did one sound, one monumental sound, their whole lives, but did it so well that they might as well come back and show everyone how it's done. DEAN FAWKES
Lyfe Jennings, Ray Lavender
(Showbox at the Market) I like Lyfe Jennings. I appreciate that he changed his name from "Chester" to "Lyfe," 'cause Chester is not the move. I appreciate that after he got locked up years back, he focused his energy on music, and emerged as R&B's premier socially conscious talent. Instead of sing-rapping about cheap sex and parties and bullshit like most of these clowns, he explores, say, the complex feelings involved in dating someone with kids. He pulls a Johnny Cash and does a live show at a prison—except unlike Cash, he really served time there. But most of all, I guess I like Lyfe Jennings because my girl likes him—she's got good taste. LARRY MIZELL JR.
