Shows to see: Dragged Into Sunlight, Swimsuit Addition, Radiohead, and more

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Thursday, June 7, 2012

Do This / Music Shows to see: Dragged Into Sunlight, Swimsuit Addition, Radiohead, and more

Posted By Miles Raymer on 06.07.12 at 09:33 AM

Daniel Boczarski
Swimsuit Addition

According to iTunes I added New York rapper Le1f's Dark York mix tape to my library more than a month ago, but I only listened to it for the first time today. Now I really wish I hadn't let it get temporarily lost in the never-ending flood of music coursing through my downloads folder, because I really like it and wish I'd heard it in time to write about Le1f for Soundboard. With any luck he'll come back soon so I can remedy this, but in the meantime allow me to let you, our cherished online readers, know that Dark York is one of the most psychedelic rap records of the whole psychedelic rap revolution happening right now, with production by heavyweights like Nguzunguzu and Matt Shadetek and raps by Le1f that make you wonder if he somehow scored a sensory-deprivation tank and replaced the salt water with promethazine. He opens for dance-pop trio Lemonade at the Empty Bottle on Friday.

After the jump, four more concert picks from the days to come.

Fri 6/8: Swimsuit Addition at Township
It's hard to want to call local punk quartet Swimsuit Addition anything but "bubblegum," since their songs are so catchy, but this would be like some apocryphal-Halloween-scare-story bubblegum that's full of broken glass and will totally fuck your shit up if you're not careful.

Sat 6/9: Dragged Into Sunlight at Ultra Lounge
Reader music editor Philip Montoro is intrigued by this "noisome Liverpool four-piece" and its members' brutally self-negating image, but says the real treat is music that "combines doom, death, black, and sludge metal into an incomprehensible Lovecraftian horror that changes shape every time you take your eyes off it—its suffocating, protean bulk extrudes wobbly gray long tones that yawn and ooze, riffs that slash and swoop and claw, and sputtering bursts of frenzied scrabbling and thumping." I'm sold.

Sun 6/10: Radiohead at First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre
Peter Margasak says Radiohead's King of Limbs failed to impress him initially, but "now that the record has been out 16 months, I've learned to appreciate its charms." Those charms include "ever morphing tones, melody fragments, and humid polyrhythms." If seeing a little floppy-haired British man do a funny dance is on your to-do list for 2012, this is a must-see.

Sun 6/10: Dr. John at Ravinia Festival
Margasak was similarly disappointed at first in swamp guru Dr. John's latest, Locked Down, but after readjusting some expectations he says it's "his best, most energized album in decades." Dr. John opens for indie-folk troubadour and fellow beard wearer Iron & Wine.

Tags: Soundboard, Swimsuit Addition, Lemonade, Le1f, Radiohead, Dragged Into Sunlight, Dr. John, Iron & Wine, Image