Events Search – Recommended
Casket Lottery, Maps for Travelers, Sweet Cobra, Jar'd Loose
Sat., Jan. 26, 9 p.m.Rock, Pop, Etc
If you’re a forlorn thirtysomething susceptible to nostalgia and still partial to early-aughts emocore—the kind that’s heavy on thick, twangy bass and doleful, out-of-key vocals with syllables drawn out like thiiiiiiiiisss!—the past five years have been pretty kind. Midwestern staples such as Small Brown Bike, Braid, and the Get Up Kids have re-formed and released new material, and just last year Kansas City’s Casket Lottery (who broke up in 2006) did the same, reintroducing their relatively proggy brand of emo with last fall’s Real Fear (No Sleep)—piano and second guitar now included. Having evolved into their present shape from that of a metalcore pillar a la Coalesce (who also exist again), Casket Lottery have a knack for playing potent, intricate guitar licks and getting as tough as the raspy vocal harmonies of Nathan Ellis and Stacy Hilt allow. Their 2000 release Moving Mountains stands toe-to-toe with anything from that era, and despite 2013’s expanded lineup and the visible gray hair on the heads of the band’s front men, the mature and thoughtful Real Fear can match the spirit of the best material in Casket Lottery’s catalog—aches and pains and all. —Kevin Warwick Maps for Travelers, Sweet Cobra, and Jar’d Loose open.
$10
773-269-2900Chicago Afrobeat Project, Nick & the Ovorols
Sat., Jan. 26, 9:30 p.m.International
Chicago Afrobeat Project—arguably the midwest’s best practitioners of the funky style pioneered more than four decades ago by Nigerian national hero Fela Kuti—adapt Afrobeat to a wide range of music on their new album, Nyash Up! (CAbP Music), including songs by local free-jazz combo the Vandermark 5, Brazilian pop thrush Ceu, and Led Zeppelin. In nearly every case the material has been so heavily remade that the only trace of the original is the occasional lyric or indelible lick—the bass line in Fugazi’s “Waiting Room,” for instance, or the vocals of guest singer Ugochi on Marvin Gaye’s “Inner City Blues.” CABP definitely have Fela’s sound down pat—they even fuse his “Just Like That” with Radiohead’s “I Might Be Wrong” on the opening track—but their take on it sometimes feels self-conscious and bland. And it doesn’t help that local rapper S. Squair Blaq adds some verses to the Gaye cover that back down from Fela’s radical politics to rather timidly demand an end to the war on the middle class—it sounds depressingly like an uninspired Obama stump speech. —Peter Margasak Nick & the Ovorols open.
$10
Action Bronson, Calez, Alex Wiley, Impala Sound Champions
Sun., Jan. 27, 6 p.m.Hip-Hop
Queens rapper and former chef Action Bronson spent most of last year supporting Blue Chips, a Reebok-sponsored mixtape cut with Brooklyn producer Party Supplies. It was one of the most celebrated rap releases of 2012—the Reader’s Miles Raymer praised its boldly sloppy subversion of NYC hip-hop—and a wave of year-end best-of roundups that mentioned it began right around the same time Bronson released the Alchemist-produced mixtape Rare Chandeliers (Vice/Warner). Though Rare Chandeliers doesn’t have the rule-breaking, free-for-all aesthetic that helped make Blue Chips a hit, Bronson preserves the playful energy he demonstrated on the earlier recording, delivering lines about his lothario-foodie lifestyle with a just-blazed attitude that smooths out his rough, sometimes piercingly nasal voice. Alchemist’s beats recall 70s exploitation-film soundtracks, their dramatic horn melodies, burning guitar solos, and buoyant bass lines bolstering Bronson’s outsize rebel-without-a-cause character—together they’re as much fun as a midnight screening of a grindhouse flick with a half dozen rowdy friends. —Leor Galil Calez, Alex Wiley, and Impala Sound Champions open.
$22, $20 in advance, $40 VIP tickets
Ital, Chrissy Murderbot, Hieroglyphic Being
Sun., Jan. 27, 9 p.m.Rock, Pop, Etc
According to a Village Voice profile by Michaelangelo Matos, San Francisco postrocker turned Brooklyn dance-music producer Daniel Martin-McCormick considers Malcolm X his primary fashion inspiration and says that he tries “to exclusively wear Bob Marley shirts”—in other words, he’s either a completely radical guy or the worst kind of obnoxious smirking ironist. But I don’t care which—Dream On, the 2012 album he released under the pseudonym Ital on incredible British label Planet Mu, is so good that I’d forgive behavior more egregious than fake Marley fandom. Martin-McCormick also plays in noisy experimental group Mi Ami, where his work has grown increasingly electronics-based, but nothing he’s done there has suggested that he was developing into what Dream On has revealed him to be: a full-blown techno producer with one foot in the form’s Detroit roots and one in its wiggy, art-damaged fringe. The album is full of odd sounds and challenging ideas, but more crucially it’s also the sort of thing that can get a crowd moving. —Miles Raymer Chrissy Murderbot and Hieroglyphic Being open.
$8
Lucinda Williams, Doug Pettibone, Kenneth Brian
Sun., Jan. 27, 8 p.m. and Mon., Jan. 28, 8 p.m.Folk & Country
Ellie Goulding
Tue., Jan. 29, 7 p.m.Rock, Pop, Etc
British singer-songwriter Ellie Goulding first released the song “Lights” near the end of 2009, but it wasn’t till last year that it found its proper audience—and in the process exploded unexpectedly into a global hit that reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100. “Lights” is a big, generous anthem with a tasteful but ecstatic techno bump and a massively epic chorus that almost demands to be screamed along to on a dance floor by drunk girls. But Goulding isn’t afraid to challenge her listeners. Last year’s Halcyon—which she released while its predecessor, Lights, was still charting—has some genuinely aggressive sounds and a nice spooky vibe that recalls Kate Bush and Tori Amos in equal measure, but it doesn’t sacrifice the mega hooks that rope in casual fans. She’s toured with Katy Perry and with Grimes, proving that she works just as well with a pop idol as she does with a more experimental musician. And the way her own musical ambition has paid off has probably helped close the gap between the two. —Miles Raymer St. Lucia opens.
Jose James
Wed., Jan. 30, 9 p.m.Jazz
R&B singer Jose James isn’t a known quantity in the jazz world, though tastemakers such as British DJ Gilles Peterson have done their best to make him one. James has made it clear to anyone listening that he doesn’t consider himself a jazz artist, even though early in his career he worked with the likes of Chico Hamilton and Junior Mance and in 2010 he recorded an intimate album of jazz standards with pianist Jef Neve called For All We Know (Impulse). With his rich, malleable, expressive voice, though, he’s an artisan compared to current R&B practitioners such as Frank Ocean or Miguel—and that’s apparently enough to persuade some people that he must be singing jazz. To my ears it’s obvious that James’s focus is on modern R&B, with a heavy dose of D’Angelo. He does little to disrupt that comparison on his newest and best record, No Beginning No End (Blue Note), which succeeds in large part because he’s no longer searching for his sound. It features bassist Pino Palladino (who also coproduced), a key player on D’Angelo’s Voodoo, and its terse, velvety horn charts and stuttery hip-hip grooves also recall that paradigm-shifting album. The influence of hip-hop-producer J Dilla is audible too, heightened by the presence on several tracks of keyboardist Robert Glasper, whose current project is steeped in Dilla’s sound—tightly coiled rhythms, compressed frequency range, gut-thumping bass. Unlike D’Angelo, whose singing is fiercely focused but reserved, James uses the full range of his powerful voice; it can be silky, gentle, and imploring, but every so often he really pours it on, a move that’s all the more powerful because he uses it so sparingly. An undercurrent of the blues in his style connects him to jazz (he admits that jazz is a part—but just a part—of his sound), and his writing covers more turf than D’Angelo’s does—the lovely “Come to My Door” could be a coffeehouse staple rather than a slow jam. He’s supported by a lean band featuring bassist Solomon Dorsey, keyboardist Kris Bowers, trumpeter Takuya Kuroda, and drummer Nate Smith (a Dave Holland sideman). —Peter Margasak
$18, $15 in advance
Soundgarden
Jan. 29-30, 8 p.m.Rock, Pop, Etc
Very few reuniting bands get the kind of high-profile opportunity to show off what they can still do that Seattle grunge legends Soundgarden did—their first new single in 16 years, “Live to Rise,” played during the end credits of The Avengers. Their first new album in just as long, King Animal (Loma Vista), makes the most of that exposure: though there’s no way it could sound as fresh and wild as the band did in 1989, it’s a great gift to their fans, as well as to anyone who needs a little schooling in just how incredibly influential they were in their prime. It’s 52 minutes that never let up, with a refreshing variety in theme and tempo, and Chris Cornell’s snarly rock-god pipes are as strong as ever; founding guitarist Kim Thayil is here too, as are drummer Matt Cameron (who joined in 1986) and bassist Ben Shepherd (aboard in 1990). The band’s songwriting star might never have burned as bright as Nirvana’s did, but there’s something to be said for a band that’s built to last—and Soundgarden sounds surprisingly indestructible. —Monica Kendrick
