May 15, 2008

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DIZZEE RASCAL Just three years ago it seemed certain that Dizzee Rascal was the MC who would finally sell American listeners on the UK subgenre called grime. He had a lot of hype to live up to, but in performance he lived up to it—he’s got the charisma, skills, and style to connect. Still, it hasn’t happened yet—last year the U.S. distributor for his third album, Maths + English, opted to release it as a digital download only, and it made virtually no impact. Def Jux decided to rescue the record, and it’s now available on CD. It’s not rock solid—Dizzee’s unconvincing when he goes for authoritative or tough, and “Hard Back (Industry)” comes off pretty clueless for a music-biz tutorial. When UGK drop some rhymes excoriating pretenders on “Where’s da G’s” it almost sounds as if they’re talking at Diz himself. But when, as on “Paranoia” or “Excuse Me Please,” he strikes an uncertain, jumpy tone that complements his manic, high-pitched, heavily accented flow, he remains very, very effective. The lineup, top to bottom: El-P with DJ Mr. Dibbs & the Mighty Quinn, Dizzee Rascal with DJ Aaron LaCrate, Busdriver. 9 PM, Abbey Pub, 3420 W. Grace, 773-478-4408 or 866-468-3401, $20, 18+. —Peter Margasak
Dizzee Rascal's MySpace page

HELIO SEQUENCE In simple terms what this longtime Portland duo does is a sort of shoegazer/folk/electronic mush, but that hardly captures the intensity of their sound—the combo of Benjamin Weikel’s restless clattering on drums and Brandon Summers’s lovely melodic washes on guitar is equal parts dreamy and frenetic. Summers lost his voice and questioned his path while touring behind 2004’s Love and Distance, and on the new Keep Your Eyes Ahead (Sub Pop) he sounds like he’s scrabbling at the door of Bob Dylan’s country church or Van Morrison’s ashram in search of some guidance. He claims to have found his salvation in hard work and discipline, and while painterly music like this is supposed to sound effortless, even the moments of bald corniness here sound earned. Bronze and Yourself and the Air open.  9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600 or 866-468-3401, $10. —Monica Kendrick
The Helio Sequence's MySpace page

MICHNA Adrian Michna’s been making records for years, but he’s still best known as Egg Foo Young, a DJ’s DJ and reviewer for the Web site of Turntable Lab—a record store so beloved by the spinnerati that its staffers have become underground celebrities. (TTL’s currently stocking Michna’s new cassette-only mix, Super Crispy Mega Ultra Fly.) His upcoming Magic Monday, on Ghostly International, could improve his name recognition considerably, though. The lead single, “Triple Chrome Dipped”—available on the free online comp Ghostly Swim—applies the label’s trademark frosty electro sheen to a surprisingly hedonistic booty-clapping beat straight out of a Miami strip club. Osborne headlines; Kill Memory Crash opens with a DJ set.  9 PM, Sonotheque, 1444 W. Chicago, 312-226-7600. —Miles Raymer
Free download page for Ghostly Swim, featuring Michna's "Triple Chrome Dipped"

Blind Melon, Van Ghost, Weber Band Metro, 9 PM

Mary Onettes, Netherfriends Beat Kitchen, 9:30 PM

Charlie Pate & Dixie’s Finest Joe’s, 9 PM

Laura Veirs, Liam Finn Schubas, 7 and 10 PM

Von Bondies, Die! Die! Die! Subterranean, 7 PM

J-Roddy Walston & the Business, Brice Woodall, and others play an AEMMP showcase (see Sharp Darts, page 39) Reggie’s Music Joint, 7 PM

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CPC GANGBANGS Lest you think the Montreal music scene is made up exclusively of artistes with their pinkies in the air, this gang of noisy punks—vets of 90s trash bands like Les Sexareenos and the Spaceshits plus one of the metalheads from FUBAR: The Movie—is here to wee on your fromage. Last year’s full-length debut, Mutilation Nation (Swami), is chest-beating garage rawk lent extra fearsomeness by dead-serious acid-rock and metal chops that say “not only do we have the desire to destroy you, we have the technology.” The range of tripped-out grime integrated into the Gangbangs’ sound suggests they’re record-collecting geeks at heart, but the fierceness of their playing makes you wonder if all that dope-guns-and-fucking-in-the-streets posturing might not actually be posturing after all. CoCoComa and Mother of Tears open. 10:30 PM, Beat Kitchen, 2100 W. Belmont, 773-281-4444 or 866-468-3401, $10, 18+. —Monica Kendrick
CPC Gangbangs' MySpace page

DANILO PEREZ TRIO The brilliant Panamanian pianist Danilo Perez hasn’t been too active in the studio lately—it’s been five years since his last album, not counting a live session recorded at the Jazz Showcase—but he keeps busy. His 15-minute Panama Suite was commissioned for Chicago’s Jazz Without Borders series two years ago, and he performed it here with the 911 Mambo Orchestra. A recording of the piece was recently released through ArtistShare to celebrate the Panama Jazz Festival, an event Perez runs that combines some knockout concerts with a focus on year-round education, providing lessons, scholarships, and role models for Panama­nians with limited resources. Perez also continues to play with the Wayne Shorter Quartet and in his own trio, with bassist Ben Street and drummer Adam Cruz. He’ll be back at Symphony Center next month with the Shorter group; tonight the trio will appear following a set by Puerto Rican reedist David Sanchez.  8 PM, Orchestra Hall, Symphony Center, 220 S. Michigan, 312-294-3000 or 800-223-7114, $19-$69. —Peter Margasak
A January NPR broadcast featuring a performance of Danilo Perez's Panama Suite

Dickey Betts & Great Southern Beverly Arts Center, 8 PM, sold out

Enter the Haggis Martyrs’, 9 PM

Head of Femur, Heavenly States Schubas, 10 PM

Killer Whales, Prairie Spies Empty Bottle, 10 PM

Bob Moses Trio with Doug Rosenberg Velvet Lounge, 9:30 PM

David “Fathead” Newman plays as part of the Manifest Urban Arts Festival (see Theater) Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies, 4:30 PM

OK Go plays as part of the Manifest Urban Arts Festival (see Theater) Grant Park, 8 PM (reservations required)

Alice Peacock Old Town School of Folk Music, 8 PM

Pnuma Trio, Eliot Lipp Lakeshore Theater, 9 PM

Rosewood Thieves, Cairo Gang Hideout, 10 PM

Sones de Mexico Steppenwolf Theatre, 7:30 PM

Sponge, One Night Love Child Double Door, 9 PM

Subnoize Souljaz Subterranean, 10 PM

Thrice, Circa Survive, Pelican Metro, 6 PM

KT Tunstall, Paddy Casey The Vic, 7:30 PM, sold out

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THE CURE If you’re over the age of 16 you probably have an opinion on the Cure, and there’s pretty much nothing I or anyone else could say to change it—you either bought the eyeliner or you didn’t. I fell into the this-band-means-everything-to-me camp, which is why I refuse to find anything ridiculous about a 49-year-old man wearing makeup and playing adolescently self-centered hits for an arena full of teenagers and old people trying to get back in touch with their inner teenagers. And if you find something ridiculous about it, well, you just don’t get it. You don’t get us and you don’t get our creative haircuts and you don’t get the Cure. Jock. 65daysofstatic opens.  7 PM, Allstate Arena, 6920 Mannheim, Rosemont, 847-635-6601 or 312-559-1212, $50-$65. —Miles Raymer
The Cure's site, with a clip from the band's new single

JEROME NOETINGER, JEAN-LUC GUIONNET, AND WILL GUTHRIE In improvised music, where ad hoc combos outnumber established bands, adapting your approach to varying contexts is the name of the game. I’ve never heard these three musicians together—they’ve only played as a trio once before, in Grenoble—but the way they’ve changed their stripes in other settings gives me some idea what to expect. On En Concert a la Salle des Fetes (Editions Mego), a 2006 album by his group Quintet Avant, scrappy French tape manipulator Jerome Noetinger toys with the flow of time, warping and reversing samples from his sound library to create a tactile, high-decibel collage, but on Sion (WMO, 2005), a quartet recording with saxophonist and fellow Frenchman Jean-Luc Guionnet, he dials it down with restrained and abstract sound streams that complement the reedist’s piercing faux-electronic cries. Guionnet also plays organ, where he favors a dark, harrowing style, but lately he’s been focusing on the saxophone, drawing out blistering John Zorn-style shrieks into epic tightrope-walking improvisations. On Map (Potlatch), a duo with Toshimaru Nakamura on no-input mixing board, it only sometimes sounds like he’s playing sax—elsewhere he shares his partner’s usual turf, blowing long pure notes like sine-wave tones amid Nakamura’s electronic flickers and static. Australian percussionist Will Guthrie, who now lives in France, makes his Chicago debut with this gig, and given the mixture of brittle clatter and thick acoustic and electronic resonances on his solo album Body and Limbs Still Look to Light (Cathnor), he should fit right in.  9 PM, Lampo, 216 W. Chicago, second floor, 312-282-7676, $12. —Peter Margasak
The page for En Concert a la Salle de Fetes (featuring Jerome Noetinger) at the Thrill Jockey site
A track from Jean-Luc Guionnet's Map at the Dusted Magazine site

Bottle Rockets, Otis Gibbs Beat Kitchen, 9:30 PM

Brighton, MA Schubas, 9 PM

Chicago Opera Theater performs A Flowering Tree Harris Theater for Music and Dance, 7:30 PM

Jon Langford & the Pine Valley Cosmonauts Abbey Pub, 9 PM

Lovell Sisters, Cu Roi American Legion Hall, 8 PM

Bob Moses Trio with Doug Rosenberg Velvet Lounge, 9:30 PM

65daysofstatic Subterranean, 9:30 PM

Subtle, Pit Er Pat, Locks Empty Bottle, 10 PM

Talibam!, Bird Names, Animal Law, Dead Luke, Smith Westerns, Wolfden Eckhart Quad, University of Chicago, noon

Thrice, Circa Survive, Pelican Metro, 6 PM

Paul van Dyk Vision, 10 PM

Ventures Beverly Arts Center, 8 PM

Cris Williamson, Mekole Wells, Coyote Grace, and others play the Alt Q festival Old Town School of Folk Music, 7 PM

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JOE LALLY Fugazi’s been on hiatus since 2002, but that hasn’t slowed down bassist Joe Lally. His second solo record, last fall’s Nothing Is Underrated (Dischord), is a mixed bag—not surprising, since every song uses a different lineup. (His old bandmates Ian MacKaye and Guy Picciotto play guitar on one track apiece, and both helped produce the album.) His voice doesn’t have much depth or authority, and he relies heavily on double-tracking to beef it up, but the bass grooves that made him Fugazi’s unsung hero—driving, repetitive, and drawing equally upon dub and blues (think “Waiting Room” or “Joe #1”)—are in evidence here too, anchoring standouts like “Tonight at Ten” and “Skin and Bone.” Lally will be backed by guitarist Jonathan Morris and drummer Ricardo Lagomasino; Michael Columbia and MRDR open.  9 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport, 773-525-2508, $8, 18+. —Areif Sless-Kitain
Joe Lally's MySpace page

LE MYSTERE DES VOIX BULGARES I’m glad that this ensemble doesn’t travel under its official title, the Bulgarian State Radio and Television Female Vocal Choir, but it certainly didn’t need a French name to make it seem romantic—its haunting and unmistakable sound is enough to break your heart all by itself. Poised between West and East and subject to cultural winds blowing from both sides, Bulgaria has evolved a musical tradition that reflects Greek, Turkish, Slavic, and modern European influences, and you can hear them all in the repertoire of Le Mystere des Voix Bulgares—as well as whispers of pop, jazz, and contemporary classical. (The women usually perform two sets, one in colorful traditional costumes and the other in dark, simple dresses.) In December 2006 the group sold out two concerts at Saint John of Rila; tickets to this single show at the considerably grander Saint Clement are bound to go fast. The acoustics of a good-size church will certainly enhance the otherworldly glamour of the singers’ startling, piercing harmonies, but all they really need to make an impression is an audience with ears.  4 PM, Saint Clement Church, 642 W. Deming, $40, $35 in advance, 866-811-4111. —Monica Kendrick
The music page at the Web site of Le Mysteres des Voix Bulgares

CHARLES WILSON Soul-blues singer Charles Wilson owes much of the success of his latest CD, The After Party (CDS Records), to onetime Cameo writer and Ca$hflow singer Simuel “Simeo” Overall, who produced and wrote most of the material. Wilson’s tenor blends youthful optimism with adult sensuality and grit, and Simeo exploits that man-boy dichotomy well. “Candlelight,” propelled by subtly textured percussion, has a sexy, meditative quality that invokes Marvin Gaye, and Wilson rides the complex melody with grace. On “Follow That Thing” he readily adapts his blues-honed vocal chops to the rhythm track’s heavy hip-hop and neosoul elements. Throughout the record Simeo’s mix-and-match approach lends well-worn ideas new flavors: synth-heavy aural landscapes are infused with street-corner doo-wop harmonies, for instance, and fatback guitar chords and deep-funk bass lines get a glistening metallic veneer, so that even the most innocuous party anthems have an edge to them. MC Mr. Good Tyme hosts tonight’s show, which features, from top to bottom, David Dee, Lee “Shot” Williams, Andre “Little Tyrone” Shontel, and the Misfit Band.  6 PM, Mr. G’s Supper Club, 1547 W. 87th, 773-445-2020, $30. —David Whiteis
Promo video for Charles Wilson's "The After Party"

Air Traffic, Empires Reggie’s Rock Club, 8 PM

Chicago Jazz Orchestra with Eric Alexander Thorne Auditorium, Northwestern University School of Law, 3 PM

Moscow Virtuosi Symphony Center, 7:30 PM

Onesidezero Logan Square Auditorium, 6 PM

Kenny Rogers Rialto Square Theatre, 6 PM

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KTL, NEMETH Stephen O’Malley, best known as half of Sunn 0))), and Peter Rehberg, who performs as Pita, both couch explorations of subtle acoustic phenomena in punishing crushes of noise, uncovering rich, ever-shifting harmonic hues in avalanches of sound. As the powerhouse duo KTL, though, they only sometimes take that full-bore approach—and when they do, Rehberg’s electronics often play second fiddle to the post-doom metal, post-Sonic Youth roar of O’Malley’s overdriven guitar. Personally I prefer the more spacious passages, where their concern with texture and detail is easier to appreciate. On “Sunday,” from last year’s single-sided 12-inch 3 (Or), they create an atmosphere of paranoia and lurking terror, as O’Malley’s sparse guitar, alternately brittle and smoldering, crawls through the gullies of amplifier feedback that crisscross Rehberg’s slate gray electronic landscape. And “Estranged,” the opener from KTL’s self-titled 2006 debut (on Editions Mego), scatters reverb-heavy twangs across a vast organlike drone—it’s like the soundtrack for a Sergio Leone western shot on the moon. The duo’s less subtle music may well be more appealing in concert—I’m sure I haven’t experienced it at anything like its intended volume. —Peter Margasak
The artist page for KTL at the Thrill Jockey site (click on album titles for music)

Like Brian Eno’s Music for Films, the soundtrack pieces on Stefan NEMETH’s solo debut, Film (Thrill Jockey), work quite well separated from the movies they were originally recorded to support. (And in this case, the movies are real.) On “Luukkaankangas” colorful sequences of timbrally varied bass tones and electronic textures play across a cool, throbbing beat, and “Transitions” uses shrieking synths and a gently echoing kick drum to bracket a metronomic clatter reminiscent of This Heat. The whole record is tightly paced and marvelously detailed, but I’m betting that Nemeth will top Eno by making this stuff work onstage too. The Viennese electronicist and guitarist is also a member of the trio Radian, whose music has always felt more immediate and thrilling live than on disc—and though Film is more linear and open-ended than any Radian album, it uses the same vocabulary of elusive guitar harmonics, stark melodies, and unstoppable grooves. Austrian guitarist Martin Siewert and local percussionist Steven Hess will accompany Nemeth. —Bill Meyer
The page for Nemeth's Film at the Thrill Jockey site

KTL headlines, Nemeth plays second, and Helen Money opens.  9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600 or 866-468-3401, $14.

Arch Enemy, Dark Tranquility House of Blues, 6 PM

Asylum Street Spankers Abbey Pub, 8 PM

Baby Alright featuring Bobby Albright & the Boogie Band Sonotheque, 10 PM

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BELLRAYS Much of the history of indie rock reads like a determined movement away from rock ’n’ roll’s R & B roots, but LA’s Bellrays stubbornly keep bringing it all back home. Operating in a microcosm largely undisturbed by the tides of trend, they’ve spent their career recapitulating the early evolutions of the music they love: having already done Motown, garage, and black-power soul, on their eighth album, Hard Sweet and Sticky (Anodyne), they’ve arrived at 70s festival rock, exploring all its incarnations, from mellow to merciless. Though it’s in small clubs that the band earned its formidable reputation as a sweaty good time, front woman Lisa Kekaula’s voice is so huge it’s almost hard to imagine it cooped up indoors—the unapologetic bigness of blues-rock anthems like “Infection” seems to beg for thousands of shirtless fans shaking it in the sunshine. The Architects and Obah & the Cosmos open.  9 PM, Double Door, 1572 N. Milwaukee, 773-489-3160 or 312-559-1212, $12. —Monica Kendrick
The Bellrays' MySpace page

CLUSTER A dozen years ago Hans-Joachim Roedelius characterized Cluster, the duo he’s fitfully maintained with fellow multi-instrumentalist Dieter Moebius since 1971, as “two old chaps who communicate better through sounds than words.” That communication has taken many forms: sprawling protoindustrial soundscapes on Cluster 71, concise, pastoral keyboard melodies on Sowiesoso (1976), frosty electronic atmospherics on One Hour (1994). Roedelius and Moebius have occasionally opened up their long conversation to heavy friends like Brian Eno and Neu! cofounder Michael Rother (who joined them to form the trio Harmonia), and almost everything they’ve said has influenced generations of musicians—Boards of Canada’s blend of nostalgic tunes and mellow beats, to pick just one example, sounds an awful lot like late-70s Cluster filtered through downtempo hip-hop. The new live disc Berlin 2007 (Important) is the first Cluster album in a decade, and its patient, gradual segues from sampled church bells to monster-movie creepiness to wistful piano prove that these old chaps still haven’t run out of things to say to each other. This is only the second time they’ve ever played Chicago, so don’t wait to catch them on their next tour. Chandeliers (who are celebrating the stateside release of The Thrush) and Disappears open.  9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600 or 866-468-3401, $18, $15 in advance. —Bill Meyer
A fan-run MySpace page for Cluster
Hans-Joachim Roedelius's MySpace page
Dieter Moebius's Web site

MATANA ROBERTS In the late 90s, when I first saw her play, alto saxophonist Matana Roberts stood out for her keen sense of space and the melodic tenderness of her probing improvisations—qualities then uncommon on the local scene. Still, when she left Chicago in 2000 her playing could be tentative in patches, and she’d yet to escape the shadows of her heroes. She’s matured greatly since then, but her Chicago ties remain strong: every album she’s recorded under her own name since she left (as well as two with the trio Sticks & Stones) incorporates help from back home, including her latest and best, The Chicago Project (Central Control), with bassist Josh Abrams, drummer Frank Rosaly, and guitarist Jeff Parker. Though she’s pursued some austere solo work and heady conceptual projects, as befits a member of the Chicago-based AACM, this album justifies its title in part with its exploration of the gritty blues feeling that marks so much of the great black music made here. But Roberts’s embrace of familiar modes doesn’t hamper her creativity with harmony and melody. The transparent influences of her earlier work are gone—though the three improvised duets with Fred Anderson make the two sound like siblings—and in their place is a newfound confidence. She’s delivering big time on the promise she showed a decade ago. Today Roberts is joined by Jim Baker and Marcus Evans; see also Wednesday. On Fri 5/23 she plays solo and then joins John Herndon in a trio led by Jaimie Branch at Heaven Gallery; on Sat 5/24 she plays with Mike Reed in a trio led by Tomeka Reid at the Velvet Lounge.  12:15 PM, Randolph Cafe, Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington, 312-744-6630. F A —Peter Margasak
Matana Roberts's Web site

Pete Best Heartland Cafe, 8 PM

Bobaflex, Bangkok Five Pearl Room, 6 PM

Chicago Opera Theater performs A Flowering Tree Harris Theater for Music and Dance, 7:30 PM

Dandi Wind, Brilliant Pebbles Funky Buddha Lounge, 10 PM

Mike Ness, Jesse Dayton Park West, 8 PM

Old Time Relijun, B1g T1me, Mayor Daley, Spires That in the Sunset Rise Abbey Pub, 9 PM

Seether, Flyleaf, Red Riviera Theatre, 6 PM

White Rabbits Schubas, 9 PM

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OLD HAUNTS This Olympia three-piece might be best known as the latest vehicle for its latest drummer—Tobi Vail of Bikini Kill—but front man Craig Extine is the star of the new Poisonous Times (Kill Rock Stars). His rambunctious, swarming guitar riffs overflow the 4/4 measures, their driving punk attack tinged with rockabilly twang, and he takes the band’s verse-chorus-verse garage anthems to the next level by punctuating them with bluegrassy hammer-ons and beautiful arpeggios. With his smarmy drawl he could pass for an irritable Tom Verlaine: when he repeatedly slurs “V-O-L-A-T-I-L-E” over the chorus of the album’s opening track, he makes the band sound like they showed up drunk to a punk-rock pep rally. Red Eyed Legends and Stanley Ross open; this is a release party for a split seven-inch by REL and the Old Haunts on the local Nodak label, co-run by Nick Meiers of Stanley Ross.  9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600 or 866-468-3401, $8. —Areif Sless-Kitain
The Old Haunts' MySpace page
The MySpace page for Nodak Records

MATANA ROBERTS See Tuesday. Roberts performs the first chapter of her autobiographical “Coin Coin” project, backed by Jason Adasiewicz, Anton Hatwich, Tomeka Reid, and Jaimie Branch.  7 PM, Claudia Cassidy Theater, Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington, 312-744-6630. F A

Eddie C. Campbell Old Town School of Folk Music, 8:30 PM

Cool Kids, All Natural Abbey Pub, 9 PM

Beto Cuevas, Cucu Diamantes House of Blues, 9 PM

Eric Hutchinson, Marie Digby Double Door, 8 PM

Mago de Oz Aragon Ballroom, 8 PM

Mike Ness, Jesse Dayton Park West, 8 PM

Nightmare of You Subterranean, 6:30 PM

Pela, Minipop Schubas, 9 PM

Dave Specter Buddy Guy’s Legends, 9:30 PM

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