Underground Bee

The Little Ones’ album Morning Tide has been one of my listening addictions lately, so it was cool to see the band finally, Tuesday (Oct. 21) at Schubas. The pretty power-pop songs sounded tight and lively, and lead singer Edward Reyes delivered the catchy vocal melodies with clarity and feeling. I also enjoyed the opening set by Other Lives, a band from Oklahoma, which had cello and violin along with the standard rock instruments for a slightly orchestral folk-pop sort of sound.

Photos of the Little Ones and Other Lives.

Without the least hint of fanfare, Randy Newman casually strolled out onto the stage of Waukegan’s Genesee Theatre Friday night (Oct. 12), waved to the crowd and sat down at a grand piano. The concert felt just as informal as that entrance, as if Newman was an uncle wandering over to a piano in the corner of your living room and playing some old favorite songs and telling jokes and stories.

Newman is as much of a humorist and raconteur as he is a composer, and he was in top form Friday. After opening with “It’s Money That I Love,” he remarked: “There were some people who wanted to call it the national anthem – but I thought that wouldn’t be right.”

Newman played every song from his excellent new album, “Harps and Angels,” deftly substituting piano solos for everything that the orchestra and backing musicians do in the studio. Whether he was playing a New Orleans boogie-woogie or more symphonic chords, it sounded lively and lyrical – even when Newman made self-deprecating comments like, “Boy, that is some pretty senile fingering. I don’t know where I was going.” And as ever, Newman sang with a great sense of character and timing, even if it’s not the prettiest voice you’ll ever hear.

The concert featured plenty of classic songs from throughout Newman’s career as well, so many of them written from the peculiar points of view of fictional characters. As Newman explained at one point, “Most of my songs are not autobiographical, or I’d be in an institution.” When the audience applauded “Short People,” his hit song that seemed to promote hatred of diminutive folks, Newman joked, “I’m glad you feel that way.”

The performance demonstrated how well constructed Newman’s songs are – both as pieces of music and short stories that sometimes resemble comedy routines. The jokes don’t get old because they’re filled with insights about human nature and politics.
An old song like Newman’s 1972 “Political Science” didn’t sound the least bit dated. If anything, recent world events have once again made it relevant for Newman to sing sarcastically, “Let’s drop the big one and see what happens.” And Hurricane Katrina added a new poignancy to Newman’s song about a previous disaster, “Louisiana 1927.”

Seeming more like a wisecracking guide than a didactic professor, Newman took his audience on a tour through centuries of history – singing about slave ships in “Sail Away,” imperialism in “The Great Nations of Europe,” Marxism in “The World Isn’t Fair,” and the Bush administration in “A Few Words in Defense of My Country.” In between, Newman sang about romance with humor and tenderness. And you could hear a pin drop when he played one of his darkest songs, “In Germany Before the War,” the haunting story of a man murdering a young girl. That was just a gray-haired man with an ungainly voice playing a piano by himself up on the Genesee stage Friday night, but it felt like a cast of thousands.

SET LIST:
It’s Money That I Love
My Life is Good
Same Girl
Short People
Birmingham
Korean Parents
The World Isn’t Fair
I Miss You
Laugh and Be Happy
Marie
You Can Leave Your Hat On
A Few Words in Defense of My Country
Potholes
Losing You
I’m Dead (But I Don’t Know It)
Political Science
(INTERMISSION)
Last Night I Had a Dream
Baltimore
Mr. President (Have Pity on the Working Man)
In Germany Before the War
The Great Nations of Europe
Harps and Angels
Dixie Flyer
Real Emotional Girl
You’ve Got a Friend In Me
A Piece of the Pie
Easy Street
Louisiana, 1927
Rednecks
Sail Away
Only a Girl
I Love L.A.
I Think It’s Going to Rain Today

ENCORE:
Lonely at the Top
Feels Like Home

THE LITTLE ONES, “Morning Tide” (Chop Shop Records) – Ah, this one hits the sweet spot. Such shiny, tuneful music. What is it? Power pop? Not exactly, but the Little Ones definitely belong in that camp of bands who seem to be striving to concoct the perfect melodic pop tune — pop in the old sense, not the contemporary top 40 sense. This record goes down easy, with a sound that reminds me of the Weakerthans and Youth Group, but it never sounds too slick or calculated. On a couple of occasions this week, as I finished listening to “Morning Tide,” I decided to listen to the whole album over again, enjoying just as much as I had the first time.
www.wearethelittleones.com
www.myspace.com/wearethelittleones

KATJONBAND, “KatJonBand” (Carrot Top) – Jon Langford of the Mekons is almost insanely prolific. Langford’s various bands and recordings can blur together, but this one stands out as one of his most exciting projects in years. Langford has teamed up with Kat Ex, drummer for the veteran Dutch punk band the Ex, as a duo on this album. Kat’s lively, idiosyncratic drumming seems to push Langford in new directions … or revive some of the punk spirit he displayed on early Mekons records. The combination of Langford’s vocals with a female singer is bound to bring up memories of his many past duets with Sally Timms, but Kat has a tone all her own. Her cool North European accent sounds great next to Langford’s Welsh everyman vocals. A couple of the tracks are traditional folk songs, though you might not know it from the rocking versions here. The riffs and rhythms are jagged and ragged, but not abrasive. The songs have strange edges, but like the best of the old art-punk songs of the late ’70s and early ’80s, they feel direct, simple and unexpected.
See my photos of KatJonBand at the Hideout Block Party.
www.myspace.com/katjonband
www.carrottoprecords.com/artists/katjonband

SAM PHILLIPS, “Don’t Do Anything” (Nonesuch) – I wrote about this wonderful record in my Southtown Star review of the recent Phillips concert at the Old Town School of Folk Music. It’s holding up as my favorite records this year, and it has one of those perfect transitions between songs. The way the quiet “Another Song” ends, followed by the muted opening riff of the title track, is etched into my brain… Listening to the first song without the second just wouldn’t seem right. Like some of the other songs here, “Don’t Do Anything” is also a marvelous example of love song lyrics. You would think just about every idea the human race has had about love would have been expressed in a song by now, but a songwriter like Sam Phillips somehow managed to say new things — or to say old things in new ways. I love the sentiments of this song’s contrariness: “I love you when you don’t do anything/When you’re useless I love you more…”
See my photos from the recent Sam Phillips concert.
www.samphillipsmusic.com
www.myspace.com/officialsamphillipsmusic

FRIDA HYVÖNEN, “Silence Is Wild” (Secretly Canadian) – This album doesn’t come out until Nov. 4, but I’m already hooked on it. And like the aforementioned Sam Phillips, this Swedish singer-songwriter has a talent for expressing her feelings and stories in a way that somehow seems both original and familiar. Here’s another example of a song lyric that expresses an idea about love that struck straight at my own heart, making me wonder if I’ve ever heard a song saying something similar. In “My Cousin,” Hyvönen sings: “I’m not the marrying kind, and neither are you/but still I am absurd enough/To ask you: If we were the marrying kind/Would it be my hand you’d ask for?/Would you be the dad/of the children I most likely won’t have?/Is that how much you like me/Or is it not even close?/I know my question doesn’t make sense at all/Since we live outside the realms of yes and no… But right now somehow/I need I need to know.” It’s just one of several beautiful moments on this record when the music and the words resonate on a deep, personal level every time I listen. Hyvönen expands her sound from her strong 2006 debut, “Until Death Comes,” with lush strings and backup vocals, and even a bit of Theremin and some Girl Group shimmer.
Read my 2007 interview with Frida Hyvönen for Punk Planet.
See my photos of Friday Hyvönen from SXSW 2007.
www.fridahyvonen.com
www.myspace.com/fridahyvonen

I recently had the great honor of interviewing one of our time’s best songwriters, Randy Newman. My Q&A is up at the Pioneer Press Web site.

Just why was Sunset Rubdown playing two shows tonight at the Empty Bottle in Chicago? The band had no new album to promote, but leader Spencer Krug mentioned during the early show that Sunset Rubdown is recording a new record starting tomorrow here in Chicago. The group put on a spirited performance, showing that they’re more than just a side project to Krug’s other band, Wolf Parade. It seems like just about every Canadian indie-rock musician is in at least two bands, and this family of bands includes a few top-notch acts, including Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown and the Handsome Furs. The opening act was Vacations, a “super group” of sorts featuring members from several other Chicago rock bands. Seems like Chicago is getting into that Canadian spirit.

Photos of Sunset Rubdown and Vacations.

Performing Monday night (Sept. 29) at Chicago’s Riviera Theatre, Nick Cave repeatedly leaned into the crowd, pointing his finger and intoning his lyrics like some mad preacher. Cave, an Australian-born singer-songwriter with some 20 albums, is not the only rock musician who borrows stage moves from old-style evangelists — the sort who shouted the word of God in revival tents and inspired their followers to speak in tongues. Cave is a scary sort of preacher, and he prowled the stage with barely concealed sexual energy, his white shirt completely drenched with sweat.

It was a remarkably fiery performance by Cave, who came to Chicago with his stellar backup band, the Bad Seeds, to promote his latest record, “Dig!!! Lazarus, Dig!!!” Although Cave has been making music for almost three decades, he shows no signs of flagging energy or creativity. In fact, he’s on a hot streak right now, with several top-notch albums in a row.
In addition to his music, Cave has written novels and screenplays, proving his literary talent. And many of his songs are practically bursting with witty, dense and profane words, which Cave tosses out with wild abandon. Before launching into one of the best songs on his new album, “We Call Upon the Author,” Cave gave a classy nod to Chicago literature, dedicated the song to legendary local author Nelson Algren.

With two drummers, guitar, bass, keyboards and few other assorted instruments, the Bad Seeds deftly covered the gamut of Cave’s musical styles Monday, from brooding Gothic rock and hard-charging punk to piano ballads and gospel. Cave played songs from throughout his career, including fan favorites from his early days such as “Red Right Hand” and “Deanna” and more recent tunes like “Get Ready for Love.”

Cave’s outing last year with a side project called Grinderman seems to have inspired him to play guitar more often, and he picked up the instrument several times Monday night, casually cranking out some loud chords. Cave also went back to the piano for one song, “God Is in the House,” bringing the raucous concert down to a hush as he whispered the line “If we could all hold hands and shout … hallelujah!”

Cave closed his encore with “Stagger Lee,” his updated version of the old blues song about a killer. Leaning over the crowd one more time, Cave began to clap his hands slowly to the beat, with a swaggering swing in his arms. By now, his shirt was practically translucent with perspiration. The crowd clapped along with Cave, and then he leapt back onto the stage and let loose a blood-curdling scream.

Leaving the stage, Cave let the audience know how long they’ll have to wait to see him again in Chicago. “See you in a couple of years,” he said. Cave’s acolytes will have trouble waiting that long. An enthusiastic female bartender at the Riviera, who’d experienced a Nick Cave concert for the first time on the previous night, proclaimed, “I’ve discovered God, and he wears a mustache!”

My review is also up at the Southtown Star’s Web site.

Photos of Nick Cave.

Just in case anyone was unaware of My Bloody Valentine’s reputation for playing very loud concerts, security guards were handing out free earplugs Saturday night (Sept. 27) outside Chicago’s Aragon Ballroom. Most of the concertgoers probably knew what to expect, even though few of them had ever seen My Bloody Valentine. The Irish rock band has been practically silent for 17 years, without any tours or albums. But the record that My Bloody Valentine released in 1991, “Loveless,” has become enshrined as an indie-rock classic, perhaps the defining album of the dense noisy style of guitar music known as “shoegaze.”

Saturday night’s sold-out and yes, very loud, concert was marvelous for many of the same reasons that the album “Loveless” is such a wonder. Whether they’re playing in the studio or in concert, My Bloody Valentine sounds like an orchestra of electric guitars. Riffs and chords are channeled through effects pedals until they sound like church organs or bagpipes – or 100 guitars instead of just two. This wall of noise isn’t just noise, however. It often has a regal, soaring quality, and many of the songs have the pretty pop melodies — if you listen closely enough through all that feedback.

The big question a lot of fans were probably wondering before Saturday’s show was: Can My Bloody Valentine do it live? The answering is yes, but with an asterisk. As the band played lively but faithful versions of the songs from “Loveless,” it was difficult to tell exactly where all those sounds were coming from. It seemed as if the group was using at least some backing tracks or samples. That’s nothing unusual at concerts these days, and it did not detract much from the listening experience, but it did make you wonder how much of the show was authentically live.

However they made all that noise, it sounded glorious. Guitarist Kevin Shields, the band’s leader, switched off on lead vocals with guitarist Bilinda Butcher, their voices floating somewhere near the top of those churning chords – as if vocals were just another instrument in the mix. Bassist Debbie Googe and drummer Colm O’Ciosoig kept the swirling music anchored to a solid rhythmic foundation throughout the 90-minute set.

“Shoegaze” music got its name from the musicians’ habit of staring down at their shoes as they were playing. The members of My Bloody Valentine didn’t literally look down at their feet all that much Saturday night, but they did have a tendency to stand in place. The only thing they said to the audience all night was “thank you.”

The band closed with the title song from a 1988 EP, “You Made Me Realize,” and when the song came to an instrumental break, it froze in place. My Bloody Valentine locked in on a single chord, playing it over and over – stretching it out for 25 minutes. Fans standing near the stage could feel the floor of the Aragon shaking. It was the sort of droning rock music that sends some listeners running out of the room and puts other people to sleep. But it also can have a transcendent quality if you let the oscillating waves wash over you.

It seemed like that chord might never end, but then it suddenly shifted back to the chorus of the song. A minute later, My Bloody Valentine’s musicians put down their guitars and left. There was no encore, and fans may have wondered if they’ll get a chance to see My Bloody Valentine any time in the next 17 years.

My review is also at the Southtown Star newspaper’s Web site.

Photos of My Bloody Valentine.

The Hideout Block Party is Chicago’s quirkiest music festival. Where else could you see zombies dancing to country singer Robbie Fulks and rapper Rhymefest collaborating on a cover of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”? Or audience members holding the drummer for Israeli rock band Monotonix above their heads, along with his drums? How about 40-some guitarists playing a loud E chord for half an hour in a parking lot? Several musicians sitting on top of a (fake) elephant? Nora O’Connor serenading a papier-mâché rat? Those are just a few of the playful and sometimes downright weird antics that set the Hideout Block Party apart from Lollapalooza, the Pitchfork Music Festival and all the various street festivals held in Chicago every summer.

The festival got off to a bright and early start on Saturday with PLASTIC CRIMEWAVE’S VISION CELESTIAL GUITARKESTRA, which I just described above. Wall of noise. Crescendo. Music eventually stops. That’s pretty much what you need to know. Then came a set of kids music (enjoyed by adults, too) from the WEE HAIRY BEASTIES, climaxing with Jon Langford riding the big gray elephant some Hideout employees created for the occasion. Sally Timms dryly remarked: “A first for Chicago – a hippopotamus riding an elephant.” Langford was back onstage a few minutes later for his latest project, KATJONBAND, a duo with Kat Ex of The Ex. It’s a great combination, bringing out the harder-edged punk side of Langford’s guitar playing and merging it with Kat’s eccentric rhythms. Next up was GIANT SAND, which put on a pretty decent set, ranging from old-fashioned piano lounge music to roots rock. Still, I think I like Howe Gelb better when he has a choir of female voices behind, as he did on his last solo record. PHOTOS OF GUITARKESTRA, WEE HAIRY BEASTIES, KATJONBAND and GIANT SAND.

At a few points, this year’s Hideout Block Party and the Chicago World Music Festival overlapped, including a set by the Hungarian rock band LITTLE COW. My first introduction to Little Cow was hearing Tony Sarabia play their music when I was the guest on his “Radio M” show on WBEZ. I enjoyed Saturday’s performance by the band, especially when they leaned heavily on the accordion on gave the music more of a folk sound. That’s when I felt like dancing. PHOTOS OF LITTLE COW.

DAN LE SAC VS. SCROOBIUS PIP is a UK hip-hop act I was completely unfamiliar with. I enjoyed their set (although a friend described it as “sheer torture”) because of their sense of humor. Dan Le Sac ranted between tracks about the “null point two” review the duo’s album received on Pitchfork, and his complaints were pretty amusing. Music-wise… well, if I say much about it, I’ll just be displaying my ignorance of Brit hip-hop, but it’s interesting to hear the patterns of an English accent against those beats. PHOTOS OF DAN LE SAC VS. SCROOBIUS PIP.

PLASTIC PEOPLE OF THE UNIVERSE are legendary, but they’re also very little heard in this country. Several weeks ago, I tried to track down some of the band’s early recordings, but all I managed to find were more recent live versions of the songs they wrote back when they were an underground band behind the Iron Curtain in Czechoslovakia. It was inspiring to see these oldsters and a few younger Plastic People playing here in Chicago. With some dissonant sax and violin solos and lots of electric guitar pyrotechnics, the music sounded fairly thick and powerful. The sax player, Vratislav Brabenec, had to sit down after a while. It looked like the sun was getting to be too much for him. After the show over at the merch table, I bought one of the CDs that the band had brought from the Czech Republic (Magor’s Shem, 40th Anniversary Tour PPU 1968-2008 Special Edition), and I also tried a little harder in my Internet search for the record regarded as their classic, Egon Bondy’s Happy Hearts Club Banned.. It’s available for download at http://mygeneration60s.blogspot.com/2008/01/plastic-people-of-universe-egon-bondys.html… and while I would urge you to buy a legitimate copy, if you can’t find one, at least you can hear it here first. My first impression is that it’s a lot starker and stranger than the live show I saw Saturday. PHOTOS OF PLASTIC PEOPLE OF THE UNIVERSE.

As far as all-out energy and general insanity, the set by MONOTONIX had to be the high point of the Hideout Block Party. I’d heard and read about these guys from Tel Aviv, so I was prepared to get pushed around and sprayed with random fluids. This trio plays out in the audience, and the set started with the drums in flames. Then the band moved the drum kit around, pushing it all over the place as the guitarist and singer crowd-surfed and, well, it’s hard to say exactly what they were doing, but it felt like they were playing inside and on top of the crowd the whole time, and somehow managing to keep the music going. The singer dumped a garbage can (with garbage in it) on the drummer’s head. The crowd lifted the drummer and his drums aloft, and he kept playing. It’s hard to believe no one gets hurt at Monotonix shows, but I found this experience to be a lot more fun and lot less violent than some of the mosh pits I’ve been stuck inside. It was more like a party than a riot. And what about the music? Well, I can’t say I really paid much attention to it while I was in the midst of all this insanity, but some loud guitar riffs and primitive (what else?) drumming cut through everything. PHOTOS OF MONOTONIX.

BLACK MOUNTAIN channels a lot of 1970s hard rock and art rock into its own sort of stoner rock… Not exactly like My Morning Jacket, but with some of the same spirit. Not exactly like all those countless bands inspired by the repetitive grooves of the Velvet Underground, but a similar vibe. Add some psychedelic touches, a little glam rock, some cool female vocals along with slacker guy singing… The band’s just great, and this was a rare opportunity to see them in actual light. PHOTOS OF BLACK MOUNTAIN.

Another piece of the World Music Fest was next, as Malian guitarist VIEUX FARKA TOURÉ took the stage. It was a nice set of his hypnotic guitar lines, although I think it would have been a better fit earlier in the day. After seeing Black Mountain, I was in the mood for the headliner… PHOTOS OF VIEUX FARKA TOURÉ.

NEKO CASE is always a pleasure to see and hear, and at this point, I believe I’ve seen about a dozen concerts by her. As always, she belted out those beautiful notes, leaning back her head from the microphone and closing her eyes as if she were in rapture. She played a few songs from her next album, which is apparently still a work in progress. “I’m totally jinxing myself because it’s not done yet,” she remarked. One of the new songs was a cover of Harry Nilsson’s “Don’t Forget Me.” The other new compositions seemed to be in a similar vein to the music on her last couple of albums, though it’s hard to predict how they’ll sound on CD. By necessity, Case tends to simplify her songs a bit in concert, leaving out some of the flourishes that really made Fox Confessor Brings the Flood such a great album, one of my very favorites of the last decade. While we didn’t get the violin and dulcimer solos in concert, we did get Case’s superb signing, plus top-notch backup vocals by Case pals Kelly Hogan and Nora O’Connor and a fine performance by her backup band, especially Jon Rauhouse, whose pedal steel guitar often sounds to me like a bird singing a duet with Case. PHOTOS OF NEKO CASE.

The second day of the party got off to a low-key start with the lovely, loungey sounds of the JON RAUHOUSE SEXTET. Although I’ve seen previous shows were Neko Case, Kelly Hogan and Sally Timms took turns singing with Rauhouse’s band, this time Rachel Flotard of Visqueen handled all the vocals, doing a nice job with some old standards. “Stay behind the barricade unless you want to get some jazz on you,” she joked. Continuing in an old-timey vein, DEVIL IN A WOODPILE played some of its backwoods blues music next. The real treat was when 93-year-old bluesman HONEYBOY EDWARDS sat in with the trio for several songs. Edwards has a strong voice for a guy in his 90s, singing a ways back from the mike, and his guitar soloing was classic Delta blues. PHOTOS OF THE JON RAUHOUSE SEXTET, DEVIL IN A WOODPILE and HONEYBOY EDWARDS.

THE UGLYSUIT, a band from Oklahoma City, shook their long hair like My Morning Jacket used to do in their old hirsute days. In fact, when the Uglysuit was in the midst of an instrumental jam, the group not only looked like MMJ but sounded a fair amount like the band, too. When there was singing, it was another story. I predict the Uglysuit could end up with a following, since their songs are fairly melodic, and since I heard a number of people in the crowd saying how much they liked what they were hearing. It wasn’t really to my liking, though. The songs and vocals just seemed bland and generic. But, hey, what do I know? PHOTOS OF THE UGLYSUIT.

I’ve been enjoying the CD Fair Ain’t Fair by TIM FITE since it came out earlier this year on Anti- records. Fite’s not an easy guy to categorize. What he does is often nerdy white-guy hip-hop, but sometimes his songs sound more like some old-fashioned singer… A little bit of cabaret, a little bit of early ’70s singer-songwriter, a little bit of folk… What the heck is this stuff, anyway? Despite the fact that Fite’s concert performance basically consists of him singing over recorded tracks, it came off really well Sunday because of his clowning and humor. This was almost a comedy act, and I found it to be a great deal of fun. I heard very mixed reactions from other people in the crowd. Some people got it, some didn’t. PHOTOS OF TIM FITE.

MUCCA PAZZA is like a marching band from some kid’s outlandish dream. The group strutted its stuff with exuberance and a bit of performance art Sunday. The musicians and cheerleaders arrived in the parking lot in small squads, and then they seemed to be communicating each other across the audience, like animals signaling with mating calls. The musicians would drop to the ground as if they’d fallen asleep then rise back up like marionettes. The play-acting continued as the whole bunch finally got onto the stage, with lots of wild gymnastics moves as the horns blasted away. It was around this time that Hideout co-owner Tim Tuten made the announcement: “All zombies must meet at 5:45.” (More on that later…)PHOTOS OF MUCCA PAZZA.

DARK MEAT was almost as large of a group as Mucca Pazza, with a slew of horn players, cheerleaders and dancing girls in addition to the core rock band. I didn’t know Dark Meat’s music before seeing this show, but I enjoyed it thoroughly. It seemed to combine the psychedelic side of the Elephant 6 bands with the big, anarchic spirit of the Polyphonic Spree. Or maybe that’s just how it seemed because the band was spraying colored confetti at us. PHOTOS OF DARK MEAT.

ROBBIE FULKS was next on the schedule, but this was not just any Robbie Fulks show. It was a Michael Jackson tribute from beginning to end. Fulks has been playing Jackson songs at his concerts for years, especially “Billie Jean,” which is sort of an unusual fetish for an alt-country singer, but what the heck – he has fun with it, and does darn good versions of those Jackson hits. He even recorded an entire album of Jackson covers, but then shelved it because Jackson was on trial at the time. Now, in honor of Jackson’s 50th birthday, Fulks put on a peculiar performance starting with some early Jackson Five music. This is when we got the rare chance to see Nora O’Connor singing to a rat. It climaxed with a re-enactment of the “Thriller” video, with a bunch of Hideout employees and volunteers disguised as zombies. While that bizarre spectacle was under way, the next act on the lineup, rapper RHYMEFEST began his set. Now who would have thought that a Robbie Fulks concert would morph into a Rhymefest show? PHOTOS OF THE MICHAEL JACKSON TRIBUTE with ROBBIE FULKS, NORA O’CONNOR, ASSORTED ZOMBIES and RHYMEFEST.

THE NEW PORNOGRAPHERS were the biggest act of the day, and they did what they always do so well, bouncing through their power-pop tunes with precision and powerful vocals. I always like it best when Neko Case is with the band, although the other girl singer, keyboardist Kathryn Calder, is great in her own right, so having both of them sing together with A.C. Newman is a real treat. After running through some of the best songs, the New Pornos closed with a spot-on cover of the Electric Light Orchestra’s “Don’t Bring Me On.” PHOTOS OF THE NEW PORNOGRAPHERS.

Although the New Pornographers were the ostensible headliner, they were not the final act of the day. The New York techno band RATATAT followed… and I have to say I do not get the appeal of this group. Electronic music has to hit me in just the right way. Otherwise, I just find it dull and uninteresting, which is how Ratatat struck me. However, I could see that a lot of people were digging it, so maybe there’s something more to it than I’ve been able to figure out. After Ratatat, HERCULES AND LOVE AFFAIR played a DJ set, which was even less interesting as far as I was concerned. But hey, it came at the end of a terrific weekend that was packed with a ton of great music, so I won’t complain. PHOTOS OF RATATAT and HERCULES AND LOVE AFFAIR.

The Dandy Warhols were the main act last night (Sept. 12) at Chicago’s Vic Theatre, but the main attraction for me was opening act Darker My Love. I did like some of the early records by the Dandy Warhols, but I haven’t kept up with what they’ve done the last several years, and their newest record, Earth to Dandy Warhols, hasn’t impressed me too much so far. I could see at last night’s packed show that the band certainly has some fervent fans. I liked what I heard at times, including some of those old songs and a cover of the Rolling Stones’ “The Last Time.” The newer songs were bland or occasionally even annoying, as far as I was concerned.

Darker My Love was another story. Their new album, 2, is a really top-notch set of catchy, fuzzy tunes. This band’s not too far from the realms of drony garage rock and psychedelic bands like the Black Angels, all of it springing out of old Velvet Underground records, of course. They played an excellent set last night, with lots of sweet tunefulness in the vocals and some crunchy bite in the guitar chords. The first band of the night, the Upsidedown, also played a pretty decent set of music in a similar vein.

Photos of Darker My Love and the Dandy Warhols.

The Wire magazine’s Adventures in Modern Music festival, held each year at Chicago’s Empty Bottle, is always a good opportunity to experience some of the most adventurous music out there. The festival started Wednesday and continues through Sunday; I caught most of the first two nights. The headliner on Wednesday (Sept. 10), Kenji Haino, cancelled his appearance, which was probably a great disappointment to those fans looking forward to one of his rare appearances. I’m not familiar with his music, but the advance blurbs I read were enough to interest me. As it worked out, it was a pretty good evening of music.

The highlight for me was Paul Metzger, who plays a banjo with (I think) 24 strings – 12 main strings and a bunch of resonating drone strings. Metzger really attacks his instrument, plucking, strumming and bowing as he drags every imaginable note and noise out of that banjo, and his performance was pretty amazing to behold. It was followed by the band These Are Powers, who played some fairly intense rock with a slight electronica flavor, and the percussion-heavy rock of Tussle.

Photos from Wire Festival Day 1.

On the second night of the festival (Sept. 11), I did not make it all the way to the end of the night, missing the headlining set by Black Moth Super Rainbow. All I can say is it was very late and I was tired. But I was very glad to see a galvanizing performance by Evangelista, the latest band led by Carla Bozulich. It was a stronger set than the one I saw this spring at SXSW, though perhaps not all that radically different. Bozulich has a singular strange presence, walking around in an almost skipping gait at times, even when she’s intoning ominous sounds with her voice. She occasionally comes out to the edge of the stage with an aggressive posture, and she seemed to be directing some ire toward the people talking over at the bar. (Or maybe I was just reading that into her expression, since I was feeling ire toward them.) Bozulich looks like she could erupt into a violent act at any moment, but then she goes over to exchange words with one of her musicians and she flashes an easygoing smile. The violinist in her band, Agathe Max, played the first set of the night, doing a lot of tape looping with her violin – essentially the same thing that Andrew Bird does, but to much different ends, more avant-garde orchestral. The other band on Thursday was Colourmusic, who played some fairly catchy-sounding indie pop… I enjoyed their set, though I did wonder if it was a good fit for the experimental theme of the Wire festival.

Photos from Wire Festival Day 2.

During her concert Saturday at the Old Town School of Folk Music, Sam Phillips remarked that it had been an evening filled with “chick singers” (including opening act Samantha Crain). So she gave the audience a suggestion. “After this I would recommend seeing some manly men sing something, just to balance out the evening.”

As it happened, as soon as Phillips had finished playing, I did dash to another concert, but it was not one that featured manly men singing. It was time for yet another chick singer, but one quite different from Phillips. The Scottish rock band Sons and Daughters was playing at the Double Door. I arrived just as they were playing their first songs of the night, and singer Adele Bethel was already singing up storm onstage. She’s quite the lively frontwoman, and last night she was decked out with glittering coverings on her wrists and a short “dress” made out of a Leonard Cohen T-shirt.

Bassist Ailidh Lennon was not there (on a leave of absence, perhaps?), but that didn’t prevent the rest of the band from putting on a dynamite show that brought back memories of the two great sets I saw them do this spring at SXSW. The songs from their album The Gift as well as the songs like “Dance Me In” from their earlier record, The Repulsion Box, sounded so tense and alive.

Photos of Sons and Daughters.

Sam Phillips is, quite simply, one of the best singer-songwriters of the past 15 years. She’s had several great albums in a row, including the new one on Nonesuch, Don’t Do Anything, which is the first one she’s produced herself since divorcing her longtime producer T-Bone Burnett. She’s continuing to explore unusual sonic settings for her songs, clearly carrying on what she learned from working with Burnett.

She played two concerts this weekend at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago, and I saw the first of these shows, on Saturday (Sept. 6), which also happened to be the first show of her tour. She apologized a couple of times for any first-night jitters or mistakes, saying, “So you’re going to get a little extra for your money – a few odd notes.” No need to apologize. No need at all. Phillips put on a superb performance, with a terrific trio of backing musicians (Jay Bellerose on drums, Eric Gorfain on guitar, violin and banjo, and Ted Reichman on guitar, piano and accordion). I did not hear the least bit of shakiness in this confident, beautiful performance.

Phillips often turned her eyes upward as she sang, sometimes darting her glance back and forth, and a smirk occasionally played across her lips. She seemed at peace with herself, and maybe a little amused. Commenting on a woman in the front who’d brought a big bag of jelly beans to the concert, Phillips said, “You just can’t face me without that sugar – I know the feeling.”

In the oddest bit of stage banter, Phillips introduced her new song “Shake It Down” with a surreal little story. “Recently, I met an angel and he said, ‘You want to wrestle?’ I said, ‘OK.'” Continuing, Phillips explained how she’d asked the angel for a song. “He said, ‘You chick singers are all alike.’ I said, ‘Hand it over.’ And this is what he gave me.”

When Phillips’ band played noisier passages of cabaret music with clattering drums, it reminded me of Tom Waits. And when the violins played, I heard touches of Andrew Bird. Her voice reminds me of no one else.

For more on the Sam Phillips concert, see my review for the Southtown Star newspaper. The show also featured a nice opening set by another female singer named Sam, Samantha Crain, who won a pretty long round of applause from an audience largely unfamiliar with her music.

Photos of Sam Phillips.

The free show by Andrew Bird Wednesday night (Sept. 3) at the Pritzker Pavilion was one of those moments for a local musician that feel truly triumphant. A guy you’ve seen playing in front of small crowds is now playing in front of thousands. I felt a similar sensation during earlier Andrew Bird concerts, as his venues have grown gradually bigger, from Metro to the Riviera, and now Millennium Park. Reportedly, some 13,000 people were present for his show on Wednesday.

And when Bird thanked everyone for turning out, he seemed almost taken aback or overcome with pride at playing on such a beautiful stage in front of such a huge gathering. He said he’d felt nervous about the concert as he introduced one of his songs. “Every time I would think about it, I would get this shudder of terror and sort of cast it off my head to the left,” he said. Of course, this was his way of introducing his song, “A Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left.” Somehow, it did not seem like he was completely joking, however.

Bird played a few songs solo, using his trademark looping-pedal techniques, but he had a backing band of three for most of the show (drummer Martin Dosh, guitarist Jeremy Ylvisaker and bassist Mike Lewis). Bird had some problems with his violin, remarking that it had “exploded” backstage before the concert and was having trouble staying in tune because of the weather, and then, halfway through the show, the high E strung broke. Bird soldiered on, playing the violin with just three strings for the rest of the show. It still sounded remarkably beautiful, despite that woeful hanging string.

Although Bird’s music seems precisely composed and arranged when you hear it on CD, he allows a lot of room for variation during his concerts, and Wednesday was no exception, as he stretched out some sections of his songs. The set list included a lovely cover of the Handsome Family’s “Giant of Illinois” and a few songs from Bird’s forthcoming CD, which he said will be out in January. I can’t wait.

Photos of Andrew Bird.

The free concert also featured a lively opening set of African-style dance music by the Occidental Brothers Dance Band International… and a delightfully cool breeze in the Pavilion. It was a cloudy evening, but the threatening rain clouds never delivered the fear deluge.

Following the Andrew Bird concert, I hopped on the Green Line and went over to that new club on the West Side, the Bottom Lounge, for a show by experimental rockers Xiu Xiu. I showed up in time for a scathing set of noisy feedback and male-nipple-twisting by the second band of the night, Prurient. And then Xiu Xiu’s singer Jamie Stewart laid bare his emotions with his warbling voice over a mix of harmonium, autoharp, melodica and guitar… Xiu Xiu is a peculiar band with music that’s hard to pin down. It’s only occasionally what I would call catchy, but the feelings always come through the weirdness crystal-clear.

Photos of Xiu Xiu.

On Sunday night (Aug. 31), I caught a nice show by Squeeze with an opening set by Aimee Mann at the Ravinia Festival in Highland Park. Both acts were especially gracious as they spoke with the audience, really seeming genuine as they expressed their appreciation for the applause.

My review for Pioneer Press is posted here. And here’s my interview with Glenn Tilbrook of Squeeze.

I did not take photos, but here’s a cool montage of five Aimee Mann photos from the concert by my friend Kirstie Cat.

I’ve joked in the past that it seems like a lot of male singers want to sound like girls. Well, in any case, a lot of men sing falsetto, stretching their voices up as high as they can, hitting notes the sort of notes most women can hit a lot easier. But it’s rare when men singing in a high range actually sound like women. It’s not just the pitch that you hit – there’s some other quality that makes it sound feminine or masculine. Joel Thibodeau of the band Death Vessel is one of those guys who does sound like a girl – which is not a bad thing, but just a little strange when you first experience it. I saw Death Vessel last Saturday (Aug. 30) at Schubas, touring to support the band’s new record on Sub Pop, Nothing is Precious Enough for Us. The music is a pleasant sort of folk rock, reminding me a bit of Sufjan Stevens (the banjo-plucking side of Sufjan Stevens rather than the Philip Glass orchestral side). The group’s bassist, Micah Blue Smaldone, was also the opening act, playing a solo set of even folkier music, fingerplucking his 12-string guitar and singing in a high, quavering voice – which somehow did not sound feminine.

Photos of Death Vessel.

Beyond all the nightclubs and concert halls in Chicago, a lot of interesting live music is happening in odd little corners, including art galleries. In a gig that received virtually no advance notice, the trio of David Daniell, Douglas McCombs and Frank Rosaly played last night (Aug. 22) at Heaven Gallery in Wicker Park. Things were extremely casual as the three sat down around midnight in front of 20 or so audience members and played a short set (or rather, one long “song”).

McCombs is the best known of these three, thanks to his years of work with Eleventh Dream Day, Tortoise and Brokeback. He’s been recording experimental instrumental guitar music lately with Daniell, an artist I became familiar with last year when he performed at the Empty Bottle’s festival of drone music. Daniell is also in the band San Agustin, and since he moved from New York to Chicago, he’s become of those loyal concertgoers you always see at places like the Empty Bottle. (I interviewed Daniell for a story in Signal to Noise magazine.) Daniell tells me that he and McCombs have about seven hours of music on tape now, including work with various drummers. They’re in the process of sifting through that music and editing it into an album.

Last night, their drummer was Rosaly, who used kitchen pots, a bow and various pieces of metal junk to make a cool kind of clatter, while Daniell and McCombs made shimmering chords with piercing melodic notes occasionally emerging out of the wash. Guitarist Matt Schneider played an opening set that was quieter but with a similarly contemplative vibe.

Photos of the David Daniell / Douglas McCombs / Frank Rosaly trio.

I have Bill Murray to thank for my love of Ethiopian music. Despite being a fan of music from other parts of Africa, I had never heard Ethiopian music until it was prominently featured in the soundtrack of the Jim Jarmusch film starring Murray, Broken Flowers. I loved what I heard and tracked down a few of the CDs in the wonderful Ethiopiques series of albums. I still have a lot to discover, but Ethiopia strikes me as a country that’s especially rich in music, a sort of crossroads where Arabic and Middle Eastern modal influences converge with other African music as well as European jazz, rock and classical music.

I mention all of this as a way of introducing the extraordinary Ethiopian saxophonist Getatchew Mekurya (or perhaps that should be spelled Mekuria… the sources out there are about evenly split on the spelling, but the Ethiopqiues collection of his old recordings spells it with a “y,” so that’s what I’m going with). Getting a chance to see Mekurya in concert would be amazing enough, but he was in Chicago this week as part of an unusual collaboration with the Dutch punk-rock band The Ex. In 2006, the two made an album together, Mon Abessa, which is now getting distribution in the U.S. through Chicago’s Touch & Go Records. I played a track from it recently when I was a guest on “Radio M.”

The Ex & Mekurya played Sunday night at Logan Square Auditorium then put on a free show around noon Monday at the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park, part of a series of “Audible Architecture” concerts organized by the city with help from Pitchfork Media and various nightclubs, such as the Empty Bottle. I haven’t been able to attend any of these shows until now (even having the flexible life of a freelance writer doesn’t mean I don’t have to work), but I’m so glad I was able to make it to this one. It was a perfect day, and the music was perfect, too. With the Chicago skyline there at my side and a terrific band right in front of me in the middle of the day on a Monday, I found myself thinking: Why isn’t life always like this?

The Ex have been around forever (well, since 1979 or so), and they tend to play edgy art punk, so they seem like an unlikely backup band for Mekurya. But those snake-charming sax melodies sounded all the more powerful combined with the rugged grooves and shrapnel-spewing guitar solos of The Ex. These Dutch punks showed that they know how to swing. Mekurya was a marvel, too, taking one solo without the band and one song backed just by the Ex’s drummer, Kat Ex. She also contributed some mellifluous vocals to two of the songs. (Kat has an album coming out Sept. 23 with Jon Langford under the name KatJon Band, and they’re playing at this year’s Hideout Block Party.)

A male Ethiopian dancer came out onto the stage at various points, wearing three different costumes and breaking out into some gymnastic moves that were simply incredible to behold. At one point, an elderly gentleman in the crowd (an Ethiopian immigrant, perhaps?) walked with a cane up to the area in front of the stage and danced a little bit, too. Near the end, the guest dancer whipped out a big ceremonial knife and engaged in a mock fight with the lead singer of the Ex, G.W. Sok. Now there’s something you don’t see at a concert every day.

Photos of The Ex & Getatchew Mekurya.

No, this post has nothing to do with Edgar Allan Poe. The Raven was the unusual name for a new street fest in Chicago, so named because it was in Ravenswood. Sort of. Truth be told, it was on Clark Street at Leland, which is right on the border between Ravenswood and the neighborhood where I live, Uptown. I didn’t even realize this festival was happening so close to my home until I looked up the location in the Reader on Saturday afternoon. The close proximity erased any doubts I’d had about checking it out.

Whoever booked the music for The Raven has good taste. The crowds were a little on the sparse side, especially on Sunday, but there was plenty of good music to hear. On Saturday (Aug. 16), I showed up in time to see the cumbersomely named SOMEONE STILL LOVES YOU BORIS YELTSIN. I need to get the new record by this tuneful indie-rock band out of Missouri. The older songs that I recognized, like “Oregon Girl,” as well as the newer, less familiar ones sounded peppy and melodic.

Next up was the Chicago band CHIN UP CHIN UP. I had trouble warming up to this band’s vocal style, but the arrangements were fairly interesting.

Back on the other end of the fest, WHITE RABBITS played a nice set of piano-and-guitar pop with doubled-up percussion. I still haven’t really gotten that excited about White Rabbits’ album, but this live set confirmed my fond memories of their show last year at Lollapalooza.

The final band of the night was TAPES ‘N TAPES. I only stayed for a few songs, since I was getting ready to head down to the Empty Bottle for ONEIDA. I haven’t kept up on Tapes ‘N Tapes since the band got that initial burst of buzz. They sounded pretty dense and noisy from what I heard Saturday.

Photos from The Raven, Day One: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, Chin Up Chin Up, White Rabbits, Tapes ‘N Tapes.

I returned to The Raven on Sunday (Aug. 17) in time for a cool set by BOUND STEMS. I’ve had mixed feelings about this Chicago group in the past. One set wowed me with its energy, another left me feeling a little undernourished as far as the songs themselves. This time, I felt myself getting more into the spirit, especially during the last part of the show. According to the band’s introductions, the songs were about historical topics including the French Revolution. That’s interesting, but what was more impressive were the catchy choruses and the group’s lively, friendly attitude onstage.

DIRTY ON PURPOSE is another band I’d seen before, and I have to admit I could barely remember anything about that earlier gig. But I was duly impressed with their set at the Raven. The songs were fairly catchy with strong rhythms, and the last tune built to an energetic groove with guitars pressed up against the amps.

And then it was time for the final band of the whole fest, THE M’s. I don’t have much new to say about THE M’s, since I just saw them recently, but this was another good set by a good local band, which soldiered through a brief absence by the bass player due to a broken string. By the end, I think the M’s may have won some new fans.

Photos from The Raven, Day Two, with Bound Stems, Dirty on Purpose and The M’s.

Oneida has been one of my favorite bands in recent years, a group that seems to be capable of doing so much… And yet, Oneida remains fairly obscure. I used to wonder why the group wasn’t getting more attention, but I can see why. Oneida’s experimental impulses take the band down some strange musical paths that may turn off some listeners. This is a band that loves stretching musical idioms to the breaking point – and sometimes beyond. A musical motif that might take up a few seconds in a normal song goes on for minutes in an Oneida song. “Song”? When the band played Saturday night (Aug. 16) at the Empty Bottle, the musicians jokingly referred to the fact that they were playing “things” rather than “songs.” Oneida is one of those musical acts that can move you into a sort of transcendental state through its use of long repetitions and intense rhythms. That sort of experimentation may drive some people crazy, but Oneida has some pretty strong melodies at the core of its songs… once the guys finally get around to singing (which didn’t happen all that often during the Saturday show).

Oneida’s latest record, Preeteen Weaponry, comes with a sticker proclaiming rather pompously (or more likely, sarcastically): “The first piece of Oneida’s much-anticipated “Thank You Parents” triptych of releases, which will lay bare the band’s colossal vision of a new age in music.” Wow. I don’t know that this record really shows a colossal vision of a new age in music, but it does sound pretty colossal. It’s just three tracks, and they run into one another, creating the feeling that it’s all one song. The first track is the build-up, the middle one has the singing (just a little bit), and the third is the cool electronic fadeout.

Saturday, Oneida opened its show by playing Preteen Weaponry in its entirety. It was a strong start to a strong set, which came to an end with the great song “Up With People” and a new one called “The River” (I think). As always, drummer Kid Millions was amazing, driving every song forward at high speed with his insane rhythms. The rest of the band was tight, but not tight with the precision of math rock. It was more like you were hearing five guys playing sixteenth notes, falling in and out of sync, and whenever they fell into sync, the music became more intense. The first time I saw Oneida, they played as a trio. Then they were four. Now they are five, but the core trio still seems to be the weirdly named Kid Millions, Hanoi Jane (now calling himself Baby Hanoi Jane on the band’s myspace page) and Fat Bobby (now calling himself Bobby Matador).

The only problem with seeing Oneida in concert is that you don’t get to see the full breadth of what the band can do. I enjoyed the vocal harmonies on Oneida’s Happy New Year album, which sounded almost like medieval folk music at times, but the group is too intent on its hectic rhythms to spend much time harmonizing in concert.

Photos of Oneida.

Check out Oneida’s Web sites: www.myspace.com/oneidarocks and www.enemyhogs.com

The opening acts included Arriver, whom I’ve seen a couple of times before. As far as heavy-metal bands go, they’re fairly fun to watch, with some tight, fast riffs. The show also featured Dirty Faces, a band I was not familiar that shares a record label with Oneida, Brah. At times, Dirty Faces was pretty shambolic, sounding like the music was going to fall apart at any minute, but then it came together into a sort of sludgy garage punk, sounding at times like the Stooges or Velvet Underground.

I’ll keep this one brief… I don’t really know the music of the Duke Spirit too well, but I listened to both of their albums a couple of times to prepare for their appearance Thursday (Aug. 14) at the Empty Bottle. My early impression: This is some nice power pop, or shiny guitar-driven indie-rock. Something like that. Good melodic hooks. The band put on a good show, too, especially singer Liela Moss, who strutted around in tight black pants… Now, why couldn’t the dear old Empty Bottle turn up the lights a little bit so we photographers could get a few nice shots of Liela? Oh, well, I did the best I could.

Photos of the Duke Spirit.

DAY THREE, Aug. 3: I didn’t plan things this way deliberately, but my schedule today at Lollapalooza is dominated by various kinds of electronic and hip-hop (or hip-hop-influenced music). First off, there’s Chicago R&B/hip-hop singer Kid Sister, who puts on an entertaining set around noon on the AT&T stage. She seems surprised to be featured in such a big venue. “Main stage – what the hell?” she says… as always, flashing a huge smile. Kid Sister has one of those infectiously joyful looks, and I can picture her becoming a big star. PICTURES OF KID SISTER.

Next, I catch a little bit of What Made Milwaukee Famous. Despite the name, they’re from Austin. (Are any recent bands actually from the places they mention in their band names?) Dumb name, if you ask me. The music sounds OK, but I impatiently move on… to see the Whigs.

Now, this band is old news as far as I’m concerned. I’ve seen them twice this year already. But what the heck… why not see them again? They always hammer out their tunes with a lot of intensity, and the songs are smarter than you might think on first listen. This trio from Athens, Ga., is definitely worth watching. PICTURES OF THE WHIGS.

I haven’t heard the new record by Brazilian Girls yet (it just came out today), but their first two albums are a nice brand of electronic pop music: a little bit dance, a little cabaret, some tropicalia… Classy stuff and sexy, too. The sexy part’s especially obvious when you see lead singer Sabina Sciubba in concert. Not only is she a knockout, she’s also a fashion adventurer, always appearing in a new outfit unlike anything else you’ve ever seen. And she knows how to flirt and toy with her audience like few other singers these days. She’s been one of my favorite photographic subjects over the past three years, but somewhat elusive. She used to wear blindfolds or masks, almost always keeping her eyes hidden. The first couple of times I photographed her, all I had was a point-and-shoot camera, so my pictures were not quite as high-res as I wished. Here’s a retrospective of previous Brazilian Girls shows I photographed (click on the images to go the galleries of more photos). At SXSW 2005, she was wearing a sort of workout get-up with asymmetrical puffy appendages. Later that year at Metro, she wore a flesh-colored body suit with black bars across her eyes, chest and crotch like a censored character from a porn film… and halfway through the show, she tore off the breast bar to reveal a knife in her chest. In 2006 at Metro, she covered her body with colored balloons.

This time around, she is in a puffy white outfit, showing lots of leg and twirling a parasol (for the first song). And, hey, no blindfold. She lets us see what her eyes look like! She even says good-bye to us photographers as we depart the photo pit at the end of the third song. Aw, how sweet.

Oh, yeah… the music? It’s a nice set of the Brazilian Girls’ sparkling pop, with lyrics in several languages… culminating in a classic track with a naughty chorus. Introducing it, Sciubba explains, “There is the international language of music, and then there is the international language of: ‘Pussy, pussy, pussy, marijuana!’” PICTURES OF BRAZILIAN GIRLS.

Black Kids became a buzz band last winter on the basis of nothing more than some myspace tracks. The buzz is still going, and the band puts on a pretty impressive show at Lolla. Yes, a couple of them are in fact black “kids,” though the others have fairly pasty complexions. Politically incorrect? Ironic? Whatever. The band’s music sounds at times like disco pop (a little too much), but there’s also some punk attitude and actual electric guitar. And lots of youthful gusto. PICTURES OF BLACK KIDS.

Next, I see just a little bit of the set by Eli “Paperboy” Reed & the True Loves. Another dumb name… Hmmm, this guy’s horn-heavy soul music sounds all right, but not so great that I’m going to miss the show by Saul Williams about to begin on the other side of Buckingham Fountain.

Williams’ musician come onto stage dressed like vampires and spacemen, and then Williams storms out with war paint around his eyes and feathers sticking up from his head. The music in the photo pit is so loud that I can feel the vibrations in my body. I move over a bit to avoid, well, whatever health problems massive vibrations might induce. Williams sounds as fierce as he looks, spitting out words in a manner that’s sort of like hip-hop but with an entirely different spirit and style to it. It’s rap-rock, I guess, but it also sounds different from most of the stuff I’ve heard with that label. At one point, Williams remarks: “We on this stage know race is a social construct. And we can see beyond it.” PICTURES OF SAUL WILLIAMS.

The next set feels like a Lollapalooza flashback. Gnarls Barkley was one of the big names at the fest in 2006, when “Crazy” was the hot song of the summer. The duo and their crack backing band are back again, sounding as good as ever. This time, Danger Mouse takes his rightful place at the front of the stage, next to singer Cee-Lo, instead of trying to hide in the back as he did last time. Another strange spectacle that reminds me of Radiohead the other night: As a grinning Cee-Lo sings lyrics about madness and suicide, the crowd waves and sings like it’s a beach party. PICTURES OF GNARLS BARKLEY.

Over on the other end of the park, The National play one of Lolla 2008’s best sets. This band has perfected a style of stripped-down, tense arrangements for its songwriting. There’s a simmering intensity, which finally explodes in the last song. PICTURES OF THE NATIONAL.

The headliners tonight are Nine Inch Nails and Kanye West. To be honest, neither is one of my personal favorites, but I’m curious about both. I watch the first half-hour of NIN, impressed by the band’s muscular attack. Trent Reznor has one of those punk-rock-bodybuilder statures as he leans into his microphone stand.

I head over to the south end of the park, fully expecting to be annoyed by the Kanye West show. I found his performance at Lollapalooza in 2006 irritating. Kanye’s rants about sound problems and whatever else was bothering him derailed all of that concert’s momentum. But lo and behold, as I approach the crowd surrounding Kanye’s stage this time, I sense that things are different this time. Hutchinson Field is not as full as it was for Radiohead or Rage Against the Machine, but tens of thousands of fans are waving their hands and singing along to Kanye’s hip-hop hits. There’s a feeling of good spirits and joy in the air. This time, Kanye shows a much more assured sense of how to be a showman, keeping the music rolling. The arrangements soar with orchestral flourishes, and the crowd seems to love it.

Yes, Kanye voices some of his typical complaints… moaning about how people say he’s cocky. Maybe if he talked less about being criticized, he wouldn’t be criticized so much. This guy’s narcissism just circles back in on itself again and again. But somehow, he manages to seem a little less cocky to me this time… or maybe I’m just more forgiving. In any case, I find myself enjoying his show a lot more than I’d expected. There’s something to be said for being surrounded by enthusiastic fans. PICTURES OF KANYE WEST.

DAY TWO, Aug. 2: I start out the day by catching a little bit of Margot and the Nuclear So-and-So’s. The group’s songs still seem a little generic to me, though the big instrumental ensemble sounds good playing them. I head down the field for the British duo Ting Tings (guy on drums and vocals, girl on guitar, keyboard and vocals), who are doing a kind of dance rock. Seemed like part electronic, part guitar rock. I’m not sold yet on the songs, but the performance is fun. PHOTOS OF THE TING TINGS.

I’ve been a Dr. Dog fan since seeing them open for M. Ward a few years back at Schubas, and I’ve seen them several times since. I’m still letting their new album sink in, but I always find a lot to admire in the subtleties of their compositions (even if the recordings aren’t always that subtle). They’ve got a classic sense of harmony and melody that brings the late 1960s Beatles and Beach Boys to mind, with some early ‘70s Faces hints, too. They’re a rambunctious bunch on stage, with lots of cartwheeling moves. When I saw them at SXSW in March, they seemed a bit under the weather or something, though they still played fine. Their Lolla set is better, really bringing out the both the energy and the smarts behind their songs. PHOTOS OF DR. DOG.

I read a rave review of Foals not long ago in the New York Times, so I suppose they’re one of the latest bands from the UK to get some buzz. I head over to the Lolla stage where they’re playing. I’m pretty impressed by what I hear. Not that I’m hearing anything I haven’t heard before. This is yet another group taking inspiration out of the herky-jerky post-punk of groups like XTC and Gang of Four. They have a good pop sensibility, too, and I even hear a little bit of early U2 in their tunes. I like it enough to stick around for nearly the entire set, an experience which is something of a luxury in the hectic pace of Lolla. PHOTOS OF FOALS.

After traversing the length of Grant Park six times on Friday, I somehow manage to schedule my Saturday so that I only go the distance once. After Foals, all of the bands I really want to hear are playing on the two stages at Butler Field on the north end of the park, so that’s where I spent most of the afternoon and evening. The first of these is Devotchka. I haven’t seen this group for a long time, not since they were an opening act at the Abbey Pub. They’ve grown in popularity quite a bit since then, and they also seemed more sophisticated and more fun than I recall. I love their colorful sonic palette, with accordion, violin and sousaphone combining in multicultural music. I feel a strong similarity to the music of Calexico. PHOTOS OF DEVOTCHKA.

Some of the recent bands playing instrumental rock music sound like they’re playing songs that still need lyrics. That thought never crosses my mind, however, as I listen to the Lolla set by Texas group Explosions in the Sky. The compositions have that cinematic quality, and the band lives up to its name with some thrashing guitar solos. PHOTOS OF EXPLOSIONS IN THE SKY.

Okkervil River is next, and as always, lead singer Will Sheff gives an impassioned performance of his highly literate songs. The lineup of the band is a little different than the last time I saw Okkervil, but they still sound strong. It looks like Sheff is pouring out every once of his soul. PHOTOS OF OKKERVIL RIVER.

Broken Social Scene makes some good records and also puts on lively shows, with a sort of jamboree feeling, thanks to the big number of people onstage. I feel my enthusiasm lagging a bit during their Lolla set, however. Maybe I’m just getting tired. The music isn’t bad at all, but I feel like lying down for a while… Although he’s Canadian, ostensible BSS leader Kevin Drew offers the crowd some advice on how to vote in November. He’s for Obama, of course. (Are there any indie-rock musicians backing McCain?) “You’re not just voting for your country,” Drew says. “You’re voting for everybody.”
PHOTOS OF BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE.

And now, finally, some real soul music. The Dap-Kings take the stage, and after warming up with some intro music, here comes Sharon Jones – former prison guard, longtime soul singer, human dynamo. She’s really something else. The band is super tight, with a powerful horn section, and Jones’ voice sounds just as strong as those trumpets and saxes. She talks about how much shorter she is than Tina Turner but vows, “I’m going to shake it like Tina Turner.” And she does. She gets the crowd into a dancing mood, too. A definite Lolla highlight. PHOTOS OF SHARON JONES & THE DAP-KINGS.

Next, I face the choice between two headliners: Wilco or Rage Against the Machine. I’ve seen Wilco so many times that I should probably try out something different, but I was never a Rage fan, so I go with the safe choice. As the Wilco concert gets under way, I start hearing via text messages about the madhouse at the other end of the park. From a reporter’s standpoint, I regret missing all the action down there, but as a concertgoer looking to enjoy myself, I’m relieved that I missed out on the moshing. I also stick around at the Wilco show after hearing the rampant rumors that Barack Obama might make an appearance. He turns out to be a no-show, of course. (To read more about what went on during the Rage Against the Machine show, check out the Chicago Sun-Times blog.)

The members of Wilco are all decked out in colorful Nudie suits in the tradition of country-music stars, with some pyschedelic patterns. Jeff Tweedy jokes that the band spent months sewing in preparation for its Lolla gig. Wilco plays one new song, with Tweedy saying, “This one’s what we call a WIP – a work in progress.” The song sounds similar to the music on Wilco’s 2007 album “Sky Blue Sky,” with a mellow opening that builds to a more raucous guitar-solo climax.
The show feels a little low-key at first, but it picks up steam at the end. Three horn players, known as the Total Pros, join Wilco for several songs late in the set, adding some R&B oomph. Wilco reinvents a few of its old tracks, injecting more of a soul feeling into songs from “Summerteeth” and “Being There.” The epic “Spiders (Kidsmoke)” sounds less techno and more organic than the studio version, as the band stomps through those loud electric chords with a cathartic sense of abandon. PHOTOS OF WILCO.

At the end of the night, thousands of people stream out of Grant Park Saturday night onto the streets of downtown Chicago. Several times, the rock fans walking down the middle of Michigan Avenue break out into spontaneous applause, whooping and clapping. Nothing in particular seems to provoke these outbursts. It seems like these concertgoers just have to express their enthusiasm one more time after a long day of music. Or maybe what they’re saying: “Hey, it’s almost like we own these streets!”

With 120 bands, this year’s Lollapalooza had plenty to choose from. Some of my favorite bands played, as well as some bands that I either hate or feel completely indifferent about. A lot of bands I barely even know, which in some cases seemed to be just as well. Walking around the park in between sets, I heard a lot of music coming from the various stages and most of these passing impressions could be summed up: Well, that sounds sort of generic. Not fair, I know. Spend more time listening to a band up-close and you might learn to love it. But first impressions do count.

Enough griping. While I didn’t necessarily discover that many new artists, I witnessed some terrific performances by old favorites. And I avoided getting my arms and/or photographic equipment smashed to pieces by staying away from the Rage Against the Machine mosh pit.

DAY ONE, Aug. 1: I catch a couple of songs by Swedish singer Sofia Talvik. Quiet folkie stuff. It doesn’t grab me right away, but I’m not writing her off. I’m just in a hurry… heading north for the Black Lips. PHOTOS OF SOFIA TALVIK.

The last time I saw the Black Lips, one of the guys in the band threw up in the middle of a guitar solo. There was no vomiting this time. The group ripped through some very fine-sounding garage rock. The B. Lips know the power of a good “Whoa-oh!” chorus. Their guitars sound best when they seem to be slightly out of tune. Makes it more garage-y. The only flaw comes when the band indulges in some drawn-out psychedelic noise. A little bit of that goes a long way, especially in the context of what should be three-minute Nuggets. PHOTOS OF THE BLACK LIPS.

I like the music of Rogue Wave, but I haven’t been paying especially close attention to the band lately. They still remind me of the Shins, though their melodies aren’t quite as inventive. They put on a pretty good set today, a little more lively than the Rogue Wave show I saw a few years back at Schubas. PHOTOS OF ROGUE WAVE.

I wasn’t sure whether to buy into the hype surrounding Yeasayer, having heard both rave and mediocre reviews of their shows through word of mouth. Their album is pretty interesting, and the music sounds even stronger in today’s live set, with twitchy dancing, shimmering layers of sound, and quirky beats. Still, I wonder if I should have missed the Go! Team set for this. PHOTOS OF YEASAYER.

Another choice I have trouble making: The Kills or Duffy? If I were simply deciding based on what I personally want to hear, the Kills would win hands-down, but I did see (and photograph) an excellent show by them recently at Metro. And I’m curious about Duffy, so I make the long trek north again. Her show turns out to be a disappointment for me. She’s got some good pipes, which she shows with a couple of a cappella bits. And her band isn’t bad, but somehow these pseudo-soul songs are falling flat for me. It doesn’t help that I’m picturing Sharon Jones (who will take the same stage tomorrow) kicking Duffy’s ass into the photo pit. OK, I’m just being mean now. Duffy has some potential, but I didn’t hear her achieving it just yet. And I say this as someone who admits to being an Amy Winehouse fan. PHOTOS OF DUFFY.

I love Eastern European and Gypsy music, with their unusual keys and rhythms, so it seems natural that I would enjoy the Gypsy punk-rock of Gogol Bordello. I’ve sort of neglected this band until now. The studio recordings I’ve heard were maybe a little too relentless in their intensity for me to sit back and take it in. What I needed to experience was a live performance. I’m lucky to catch one this afternoon. This is hands-down the most energetic concert of the whole festival. Singer-guitarist Eugene Hütz rampages across the stage like a crazy man. I’m still not sure what I think of the songs but I have a hell of a time watching Hütz and his band partying onstage. PHOTOS OF GOGOL BORDELLO.

Back north past Buckingham Fountain… I’m really putting in some miles today. Cat Power is up next. She plays a set pretty similar to the last two Cat Power concerts I’ve seen (at Pitchfork 2007 and later at the Vic). She mostly sings cover tunes, including a lot of the tracks on her newest album, Jukebox. With that crack band playing behind her, Cat (aka Chan Marshall) seems to feel more freedom to roam the stage as a lead singer. And man, does she put herself into her vocals. Just look at some of the expressions in my photos. She looks like she’s growling or screaming, but she’s actually singing with lots of nuance and flair. She embellishes melodies and plays around with the timing and tempo of the songs she is covering, improvising like a talented jazz vocalist. Today’s set includes a cover of Credence Clearwater Revival’s “Fortunate Son” (a popular song to cover during the era of Bush and the Iraq war), transforming into a bluesy ballad that sounded all her own. Only flaw in the set: Some sound problems. Marshall has allowed herself to get flustered by that sort of thing in the past, but she gamely makes do, despite the occasional annoyance of loud feedback. PHOTOS OF CAT POWER.

Are the Raconteurs becoming Jack White’s regular band? As much as I like them, I hope not. They don’t pack quite as much oomph as the White Stripes. Still, they’re a hell of a live act. I like the first Raconteurs album quite a bit. Yeah, it was derivative stuff, nicking lots of touches from classic rock, but I don’t mind derivative music if it’s fun and catchy and reasonably smart. The second Raconteurs album has its moments, but it hasn’t grabbed me in the same way. Songs from both records sounded great, however, as the Raconteurs played them at Lolla. The riffs and bluesy guitar licks came at us non-stop. PHOTOS OF THE RACONTEURS.

The Brazilian band CSS has been getting a lot of buzz, especially for their live act. I don’t know the music at all, but I make it over to their stage and catch a couple of songs. I like what I hear – and what I see. These ladies know how to get your attention with their costumes. And they know how to get a crowd moving. PHOTOS OF CSS.

A few minutes before Radiohead begins its headlining set, I found out that I’m not getting access to the photo pit. The band’s publicists are restricting access, and I do not make the list. All I can is: Ugh. I’d feared something like this would happen, but it sure would have been nice to find out earlier. I make my way through the crowded field (talk about “Packt Like Sardines in a Crushd Tin Box”) and get close enough to take some telephoto shots through the crowd… and to enjoy a top-notch show by one of my all-time favorite bands.

One thing that made this show special was the history behind it. This was in Hutchinson Field, on the south end of Grant Park, the same field where the band played a magnificent show in 2001. That concert was the first time in years that the city of Chicago had allowed a rock concert in Grant Park other than free events like Taste of Chicago shows and the Blues Festival, and it laid the groundwork for Lollapalooza a few years later. Now, Radiohead was back on the same field, with a sold-out crowd of 75,000.

Although Radiohead has a huge following, the group sometimes seems like an unlikely candidate for mass appeal, with all of its tricky time signatures, peculiar sonic mixtures and dark lyrics. It’s a strange spectacle to see this music performed live in front of a big crowd of enthusiastic fans.

Girls in bikinis dance as Yorke sings about the next world war. People whistle and clap whenever Yorke holds a long, high falsetto note. A collective “Ahhh!” goes up each time fans recognize the opening chords of a song. The audience seems to enjoyed Radiohead’s slower and moodier songs as much as the rockers, softly swaying along to the band’s introspective music.

The set spans virtually Radiohead’s entire career, and the songs from last year’s In Rainbows fit right in alongside classics from OK Computer and The Bends. The big sound system brings out a startling clarity in the individual parts played by each member of Radiohead. This is not a band that improvises much, but it somehow manages to make its songs sound fresh and alive, as if everyone in Radiohead is finding a new way of playing these tunes right there on the spot.

Near the end of the show, when the crowd falls quiet between a couple of songs, Yorke jokingly checks to make sure the audience was still there. “I’ve got a bit of jet lag,” he says. “This could entirely be a dream.” It did indeed seem a bit like a dream… PHOTOS OF RADIOHEAD.

My first big batch of Lollapalooza photos is coming later today. In the meantime, my review of Day 3 is on the Southtown-Star web site as well as the Pioneer Press Entertaining Ideas blog. My Day 2 review is here.

A sample of a few photos from all three days is up at flickr.

Stay tuned…

I’ll have tons of Lolla 2008 photos later… probably on Monday. In the meantime, my review of Lollapalooza Day 1 is up at the Southtown Star web site and the Pioneer Press Entertaining Ideas blog.

My Day 2 review is up at Pioneer Press.

And my first batch of a few photos is on flickr here.

Much, much more to come…

I had a fun time on Friday night as the guest on Radio M, a show that Tony Sarabia hosts on WBEZ, Chicago Public Radio. After picking out some of my favorite indie-rock by artists in foreign countries, I brought a backpack full of CDs to the WBEZ studios on Navy Pier. It was a very informal setting, with Tony asking me what I wanted to play as we went along. Tony picked out a number of songs, and I ended up playing 11 tracks. You can stream the show at http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Program_RM.aspx for the time being.

Here’s what I played.

LOS SHAKERS – “Break It All” from Nuggets II: Original Artyfacts From the British Empire and Beyond. I started off with this as a historical example of how rock music has crossed boundaries for decades. This is on the wonderful Nuggets II box set from Rhino, the sequel to the American garage-band collection Nuggets. The second box is overseas bands, mostly ones from the U.K. and British commonwealths, but also a sampling from places like… Uruguay? That’s where Los Shakers hailed from, but clearly, they’d heard the Beatles.

BAM BAM – “Hi-Q” from Bam Bam EP. A wonderful new record with punk energy, catchy melody and some delightfully daft a cappella vocals at the end by a group from Monterrey, Mexico. I heard this mp3 when I went to SXSW this year, but somehow I missed seeing the group. Last week, I discovered that their entire self-titled EP is available for free download at the Nene Records Web site. Get it. It’s great stuff.

LONEY, DEAR – “Sinister in a State of Hope” from Loney, Noir. A favorite track out of many fine songs by singer-songwriter Emil Svanängen of Jonkoping, Sweden, who calls himself Loney, Dear for some reason. If you know the Loney, Noir record already, make sure to check out the Sub Pop reissue of his older record Sologne, which is excellent, too. Some of his songs are posted here.

BANG GANG – “Find What You Get (Live in Rejkyavik)” from Find What You Get EP. I don’t have a handle yet on what this Icelandic band is all about. They put on a riveting if strange and dissapointingly brief set at SXSW 2007. Their records have a lot more female lead vocals and electronic pop than the live show I saw. The bio of frontman Bardi Johannsson on the myspace page is ridiculously over-the-top. The myspace stream of the new album sounds promising. But I still like this song better than everything else they’ve done, and this live version may be even better.

GETATCHEW MEKURYA & THE EX – “Musicawi Silt” from Mon Anbessa. Classic Ethiopian sax player teams up with classic Dutch punk-rock band… not a combination I would have expected, but it works. The album is out now from Chicago’s Touch & Go. Mekurya & the Ex play Aug. 17 at Logan Square Auditorium and then do a free noontime show Aug. 18 at Millennium Park.

MALAJUBE – “Pâte Filo” from Trompe L’Oeil. Montreal has a vibrant rock scene, but few of the bands (at least the ones who are known here) sing in French. Malajube is a wonderful exception. I’m eagerly awaiting their next record.

ANNA JÄRVINEN – “Svensktalande Bättre Folk” from Thank You for the Music, a Licking Fingers compilation. A native of Helsinki who moved to Sweden, Järvinen used to be in the Granada. I don’t know much about her, but I downloaded this compilation to get some of the other artists on it, including Frida Hyvönen, who has a wonderful new song here. The Järvinen track is a great little pop tune with a light, bouncy quality. And lyrics in Swedish. The rest of the compilation is pretty strong, too. You can download it here for $11.35.

EFTERKLANG – “Frida Found A Friend” from Parades. A stirring song with beautiful harmonies and brass by this post-rock band out of Copenhagen, Denmark, who recently played at the Empty Bottle.

MONARETA – “Matanza Funk” from Electronoche. Electronic/hip-hop music by a duo from Bogotá, Colombia, who have apparently relocated to Brooklyn. I like the humor of the spoken-word bits (the ones in English I understand) and the terrific beat. Their album is on emusic.

BORIS WITH MICHIO KURIHARA – “Rainbow” from Rainbow. Out of all the Boris songs, I picked this one because it was so quiet … and thus, less likely to cause ear bleeding in all of the NPR listeners out there. Despite its chill quality, it has a searing guitar solo that comes in like a buzz saw. It sounds like you’re right there next to the amp as they’re playing.

SEABEAR –”I Sing, I Swim” from The Ghost That Carried Us Away. I just discovered this Icelandic group last week as I was hunting around for music to play on the show. I just did a google search for Icelandic mp3s, and this came up. The band has a free EP on its Web site, which is charmingly titled Seabearia, but you should get the album this delightful pop tune comes from, The Ghost That Carried Us Away. It’s available on emusic, which also has a single of Seabear covering “Teenage Kicks.”

Here are the songs Tony chose to play on the show:
CARSICK CARS – “He Sheng (Rock and Roll Heroes)” from Carsick Cars
LOS VIDRIOS QUEBRADOS – “La Primavera de Miss L.O.B.” from Love Peace and Poetry: Chilean Psychedelic Music
MIDIVAL PUNDITZ – “Hold On” from Midival Times
BLK JKS – “Lakeside” 10″ Single
LITTLE COW – “Mintha” from I’m In Love With Every Woman
YOAV – “Club Thing” from Charmed & Strange

I’ve missed some excellent-sounding street fests in Chicago this summer. Many of these festivals feature pretty impressive musical lineups, and they’re a cheap and fun alternative to more expensive events like Lollapalooza. I finally made it out to one yesterday, checking out several bands at the Wicker Park Festival. I showed up in time to hear the last few songs by the 1900s (but not in time to get any photos of ’em – sorry). They were really rocking at the end. Then came some indie pop by Bishop Allen, orchestral rock by Ra Ra Riot, post-rock or whatever you want to call it by Joan of Arc, and the intricate guitar riffs of Polvo.

See my photos from Wicker Park Fest.

A few of my Pitchfork Music Festival 2008 highlights:

King Khan and the Shrines played a lively, jumping set of soulful garage rock – think Nuggets tunes performed by James Brown. The big band includes a hard-swinging horn section, and there’s even a cheerleader. Khan wore a glittering net over his hair and a shiny cape, living up to his “King” title. This guy has great charisma, and the music sounded top-notch.

The thing that struck me about the Dodos’ album Visiter is a sort of quirky XTC pop sensibility. So I was a bit surprised when the band took the stage and sounded more rootsy and acoustic than I expected. Singer/guitarist Meric Long got so involved with his playing that he fell out of his chair at one point, continuing to play on his back. The two percussionists raised a ruckus, one of them pounding on an actual trash can. I liked the Dodos’ live show better than the record. Maybe I need to listen to that more.

As I’ve said before, M. Ward is one of my favorite singers, songwriters and guitarists, so it’s probably needless to say that his Pitchfork set was a personal highlight for me. He opened with a couple of acoustic songs before his band took the stage. Ward sang with a sly smile and looked completely at ease playing the guitar. The set included several of my favorite songs, among them “Lullaby & Exile,” “Right in the Head,” “Vincent O’Brien” and “Big Boat.”

Spoon nailed the tight rhythms that made me like this band in the first place, sounding better than I’ve ever heard them live.

The last time I saw Times New Viking (an opening-act slot at Metro), it sounded just like noise. When they played Sunday at Pitchfork and I walked across Union Park late in their set, their voices rang out with unusual clarity and the songs sounded downright catchy.

It was a completely different kind of harmony, but Fleet Foxes sounded beautiful when they went a cappella.

In addition to King Khan, several performers showed off manic stage antics, including the members of !!!, Tim Harrington of Les Savy Fav (who got into a garbage can where I was standing in the crowd), and of course, Craig Finn of the Hold Steady. All of these guys whipped their fans into arm-waving frenzies.

Jarvis Cocker somehow managed to be gawky, geeky, suave and elegant all at the same time. How is that possible?

Titus Andronicus and Jay Reatard raised unholy rackets. They gave incredibly energetic performances that make me want to check out their records.

Vampire Weekend… I still don’t get the hype.

Animal Collective… Nice trance vibe, though I wish it had taken off into higher realms.

Boris was loud and powerful, making a magnificent sort of noise. The only problem was the short length of the set, which ended after 30 minutes when the band apparently experienced some sort of technical problem. Drummer Atsuo explained, “Not much energy power” as the band departed. The crowd chanted “Boris! Boris!” to no avail.

See my last post for links to photos.

All of my photos from the Pitchfork Music Festival are up now. My review will appear in the fall issue of Signal to Noise magazine, but in the meantime, I will post a blog entry with some highlights and random thoughts soon.

Here are the photos:
GENERAL PHOTO INDEX

MISSION OF BURMA, SEBADOH and PUBLIC ENEMY

BOBAN & MARKO MARKOVIC ORKESTER, TITUS ANDRONICUS, JAY REATARD, A HAWK AND A HACKSAW, CARIBOU, ICY DEMONS, FLEET FOXES and DIZZEE RASCAL

THE RUBY SUNS, ELF POWER, !!!, THE HOLD STEADY, JARVIS COCKER and ANIMAL COLLECTIVE

TIMES NEW VIKING, MAHJONGG, DIRTY PROJECTORS, APPLES IN STEREO and KING KHAN & THE SHRINES

BORIS

LES SAVY FAV and THE DODOS

M. WARD, SPIRITUALIZED, DINOSAUR JR. and SPOON

Or if you prefer FLICKR

My photos from the first night of the Pitchfork Music Festival are up now, with shots of Mission of Burma, Sebadoh and Public Enemy. Commentary coming later… Click here to see the gallery of photos.

Friday night (July 11) was my first visit to the new Bottom Lounge. It was too bad when the old Bottom Lounge near Belmont closed (I saw a few bands there, including the Hold Steady, the Like Young and the Redwalls), so I was glad to hear that the venue was coming back – albeit in a completely different location. It’s out on the near West Side, near the corner of Lake Street and Ogden Avenue. That’s not far from Union Park, which hosts the Pitchfork Music Festival this coming weekend, and it seems like that area is gaining in hipness lately.

The new venue is … well, new. It just seems too clean and antiseptic right now for a rock club, but maybe that’s just because it hasn’t had time to get a little dirty. Neatly arranging the posters for upcoming concerts on a bulletin board in the hallway rather than plastering them on the walls does seem a little too anal-retentive, though. The main music room is a nice big space with decent sound and sight lines. The lighting seemed pretty good at first (from my point of view as a photographer), but then it seemed to get dimmer as the night went on.

I saw a couple of shows by the Chamber Strings back before the band went on a sort of hiatus. They sounded as good as ever Friday night, with nice poppy tunes. I recognized some of the songs, though I can’t say I know their repertoire inside and out. I’d like to hear them do more new songs. The band’s capable of good things.

Photos of the Chamber Strings.

For those of us unfamiliar with the music of the Sudan, last night’s Sudanese Music and Dance Festival 2008 at Chicago’s Pritzker Pavilion was about as good of an introduction as you could ever hope to get. Several of the war-torn African nation’s most famous singers performed two songs each, backed by a big but nimble band, the Nile Music Orchestra of Sudan. The conductor (and first singer of the evening) was Yousif Elmosley, who was introduced as “the Quincy Jones of Sudan.” Other performers included Mohamed Adaroab, Omar Banaga Amir, Ali Alsigade, Dynamq, Omar Ihsas and the Albalabil Sisters. Only two of the three sisters performed; if I understood what was being said, the other did not make it because of visa problems. I wonder if that why some of the other singers originally billed as part of the festival were absent, too? No matter – it was a marvelous evening, despite intermittent downpours of rain.

Most of the music was Arabic in flavor, with Middle Eastern tonalities as well as some melodic flourishes that wouldn’t sound out of place in a Bollywood film. Dynamq was the most Western-sounding of the singers, with more of a reggae/hip-hop feel. The musicians and organizers expressed the hope that their country might be made whole again, and that music can bring together people from every part of Sudan. In introductory remarks, the towering former basketball star Manute Bol said he wanted to send his homeland a message: “How good it is to be free.” And at the end, producer Matwakil Mahmoud looked across the assembled performers and said: “Just look at us. We are the Sudan … Musicians insisting we will live together.”

See my photos from the Sudanese Music and Dance Festival 2008.

I saw Stevie Wonder from a great distance for about 25 minutes on Saturday (June 28), but, hey, at least I can say I’ve seen him. I hadn’t even planned on attending his free show at the Taste of Chicago in Grant Park, but I was downtown to see a different concert (Orchestra Baobob at the Pritzker Pavilion), and I was there early, so I wondered over to see Wonder for a bit. Easier said than done. The park was as crowded as I’ve ever seen it, with cops blocking off most of the entrances. The police weren’t allowing any more people to enter the main section of the park because it was already filled to capacity. So I found myself standing on a sidewalk way, way, way, way back in the park. Still, it was really fun to see so many people getting into the music, including kids as well as some gray-haired folks who obviously have been Stevie Wonder fans for a long time. This is the middle of what turned out to be a three-hour concert – amazingly long for a free summer-festival show. Most artists seem to do the short version of their regular concert when they’re playing a gig like this. As Wonder ran through one hit after another, people shouted out words of encouragement, talking to Wonder like he was an old friend. People danced and shook their heads in wonder.

…And then I was off to the Pritzker Pavilion. I believe I had seen Orchestra Baobob three times at the old HotHouse, and it was great to see them again, this time on the pavilion’s beautiful outdoor stage. Those intricate, interwoven guitar, drum, sax and vocal melodies sound like a aural tapestry on record. In concert, all those subtleties are still there, but the rhythms are more obvious – rhythms that make you want to dance. As I’ve seen happen with some other world-music shows at Millennium Park, the security guards struggled in vain to keep dancers from filling the space in front of the stage, trying to get them to leave room in the aisles for people to walk through. Near the end of the concert, the singers gestured for the audience to stand up and get moving, proclaiming, “Music is for dance!” At that point, the security guards gave up and the dance party really got under way.

See photos of Orchestra Baobob.

As if that weren’t enough music for the night, I stopped at Schubas on the way home to see Hayden, a.k.a. Hayden Desser, who recently released the excellent album In Field & Town. I’m a latecomer to the music of Hayden, who’s been recording for years, and now I definitely want to track down his earlier records. I wasn’t sure what sort of crowd he would draw, since he doesn’t seem to have a lot of hype, but the room was quite full with enthusiastic fans. Hayden has a sweet, mellow voice, and his folk-rock sounded great in live performance. I showed up in time to hear the last few songs by opening act Haley Bonar, who sounded stronger this time with a band than she did at a recent solo set.

See photos of Hayden.

Tom Waits is on tour, but he ain’t coming to Chicago (at least for the time being) so it was time for me to take another Waits road trip, this time to the Fox Theatre in St. Louis. What a show it was last night (June 26) – maybe the best of the five Waits concerts I’ve seen, with the possible exception of the first Chicago Theatre show he did back on the Mule Variations tour. On his 2006 tour, Waits focused more on his bluesy side. For this new tour, dubbed “Glitter and Doom,” the sound is more diverse, more subterranean, more colorful, with more horns and keyboards, classical guitar flourishes and klezmer-style wind solos.

Waits danced like a marionette last night, allowing some invisible strings to jerk his body to the rhythms of the band. This guy has always been a great actor (whether he’s acting on the screen or through his music), and last night he seemed almost like a silent film star. Those were some Chaplin moves he was trying out.

One of the things that made the concert exceptional were the moments when Waits stretched out the end of tunes, lifting his voice into that hoarse but heartbreaking falsetto of his. Of course, not everyone appreciates the way Waits sings, but it is truly something to behold, and last night he brought together an outlandish sense of showmanship with a tangible feeling of human frailty. Yeah, that is one oddball character up there on that stage putting on a spectacle for us, but listen to that voice and see the way he strains to hit the notes – and then just does. I felt like Waits was letting his mask slip just a little bit – especially when he sat down at the piano and did one of my all-time favorites, “Johnsburg, Illinois.” First, he ran through the whole song (it’s a short one) as an instrumental, then he sang it, seeming to have a little landing his voice on the right pitches. It was an imperfect performance, but imperfect in just the right way, if that makes any sense.

The Fox is an amazingly beautiful venue, some madman’s idea of Ali Baba’s palace, with ornate quasi-Arabic decor – a perfect setting for a Waits concert. And the warbly gramophone recordings of Caruso that played over the speakers as the audience filled in set the mood. (Waits said something about having a dream about Caruso.) One flaw in the show was the acoustics. Those vocals needed to be just a bit louder in the mix. It wasn’t bad enough to rate as a problem, but when Waits faced the usual barrage of audience shouts, it became a struggle to make out what he was saying. His banter last night included a humorous list of ridiculous laws that are supposedly on the books in Oklahoma, where he’d just played a concert. He added that it’s against the law to open a soda bottle in St. Louis unless you’re in the presence of an engineer. Or something like that.

Waits played an outstanding selection of songs last night. I never thought I’d hear him do his twisted version of the Disney classic “Heigh Ho (The Dwarfs Marching Song).” Another out-of-left-field choice that I enjoyed was “On the Other Side of the World,” a lovely ballad from his overlooked soundtrack to the Jim Jarmusch film Night on Earth. And I finally got the chance to hear him do at least one song from Alice,, which is one of my favorite Waits records. (Does he have something against it? He rarely seems to do that material.) After playing three songs on piano in the middle of the show (standard practice for Waits), he moved over to some sort of harmonium and played the Alice song “Lost in the Harbour,” the band joining him midway through the tune.

And there was lots from Rain Dogs, another favorite album, including a piano version of “Hang Down Your Head,” which is normally a guitar song. Waits acted like a conductor (a slightly drunken conductor, perhaps) during “Cemetery Polka” and “Singapore,” and the band responded nimbly to every one of his cues. For the final song of the night, Waits played the sentimental “Innocent When You Dream,” and with his encouragement, the audience sang along to the last chorus, like a choir at some mad church.

SET LIST:
Lucinda
Way Down in the Hole
Falling Down
Black Market Baby
All the World Is Green
Heigh Ho (The Dwarfs Marching Song)
Get Behind the Mule
The Day After Tomorrow
Cemetery Polka
Hang Down Your Head (piano)
Lucky Day (piano)
Johnsburg, Illinois (piano)
Lost in the Harbour
Make It Rain
Lie to Me
On the Other Side of the World
Singapore
Dirt in the Ground
What’s He Building?
16 Shells From a Thirty-Ought Six
Rain Dogs
ENCORE
Goin’ Out West
Anywhere I Lay My Head
Innocent When You Dream (piano)

I was sad to miss the Sadies when they were in Chicago recently for a couple of shows… and then relieved to see them added to the schedule at Schubas. Their last record, New Seasons, was my favorite of 2007, and I’ve been eager to see them do some of those new songs in concert ever since hearing it. I think that the show on Friday (June 20) was about the 12th or 13th time I’ve seen the Sadies, if you count the various shows where they’ve backed up other musicians. As is so often the case, the always-generous Sadies turned over the mike Friday night to some of the guest singers they’ve worked with over the years. I’d never seen them with Andre Williams, so it was a treat to catch them doing a few songs with this old-school soul singer. The appearances by Jon Langford and Sally Timms were no surprise, of course.

Despite all those guest singers, it was the Sadies’ night, and they played a nice long set crammed with lots of terrific tunes that just got better as the night went on. Dallas Good’s laconic vocals were great (and his song introductions were as droll as ever), and his brother Travis made caveman faces all night long as he sang and whipped out some of the most amazing fretwork you’ll ever see or hear. The rhythm section was in fine form, too, with Sean Dean attacking the strings of his upright bass and Mike Belitsky pounding away with ferocity on the drums. For the last two songs of the encore, the Sadies played a rampaging version of the Love classic “A House is Not a Hotel” followed by “Leaving Here,” an old Eddie Holland song previously covered by Motorhead.

The opening act, Joe Pug, was a pretty decent folk-rock singer. I liked his very Dylanesque solo acoustic songs, which had some good imagery in the lyrics.

See photos of the Sadies.

MV & EE are one of those bands that deserves a lot more attention. Their 2007 record Gettin’ Gone had the sort of crunchy electric folk-rock that should win over fans of Crazy Horse and all the Crazy Horse imitators out there. It’s ragged, honest music. But the two times I’ve seen MV & EE play concerts in Chicago, they were sparsely attended shows. After playing a duo show some months back at the Hideout, they came back to town Thursday (June 19) for a show with their backing band, the Golden Road, at the Empty Bottle. Man, that room was like a ghost town, but the music was good. It was an improvement over the Hideout show, with the additional musicians filling out the sound where it needed some filling. The band’s live show is an unusual mix of that Crazy Horse-style rock I mentioned earlier with more experimental drone music. I liked the rock better than the droning, but it was a fine show overall – if only more people had been there to hear it. The first band of the night, Tacoma Narrows, sounded pretty generic; the second, Sonoi, played an intriguing sort of atmospheric folk-rock, reminding me of Califone.

See photos of MV & EE with the Golden Road.

Sometimes you’ve got to live with a record for a little while to decide how good it is. Seeing a band live after hearing the record for a while is another way of telling whether the music has staying power. I like the recent record by These New Puritans, Beat Pyramid, but it didn’t really hit me how much the songs had stamped themselves into my nerves until I saw the band doing them live last night (June 14) at Subterranean. It’s not necessarily all that original – they’re yet another band taking a lot of cues from the Fall and Mark E. Smith – but what the heck, I do enjoy it tremendously. This is my kind of dance music. The only disappointments were the fact that These New Puritans played in darkness (making my photographic efforts especially challenging) and that the set was so short. Oh, well, with music like this, a punk-rock sense of brevity may be a strong suit. Singer-guitarist Jack Barnett delivered his rants about numerology and paper with a perfect sense of crazed intensity, and the percussive electronic punk sounds behind him keep the pulse quick and frantic. We also got a nice opening set by The Eternals, doing their funky Afro indie-rock thing, whatever you want to call it, and a not-so-distinguished set by Project Ultra.

Photos of These New Puritans.
Photos of The Eternals.

You can always count on Centro-matic to put on a good show, and Saturday night (June 7) at Schubas was no exception. The Denton, Texas, band is putting out a new CD titled Dual Hawks – or rather, a double-CD with one disc by Centro-matic and one disc by the other band led by Centro main guy Will Johnson, South San Gabriel. Centro-matic is Johnson’s more straightforward rock group, while South San Gabriel is his outlet for moodier, mellower and more experimental music. At times, it sounds like Centro-matic stretched out, with more emphasis on the spaces between the notes. I love the South San Gabriel recordings, but I’ve yet to see a live show by that configuration. That wasn’t what we got Saturday anyway – it was all Centro, with a strong set of new and old tunes. Johnson did lots of his patented leg kicks and pumped his hands on his chest for the heart-beating encore.

See my photos of Centro-matic.

This was the first night of a two-night stand for the double bill of Centro-matic and The M’s. Centro was the headliner on Saturday, and the M’s got top billing Sunday. Luckily for me, as a fan of both groups, I felt like I got a full set out of The M’s on Saturday. Even though they played first, they got to play a longer set than usual. The group’s sound isn’t quite as dense and thick as it was on earlier records, but the songs on the new album Real Close Ones have a similar way of burrowing into your brain after repeated listens.

See my photos of The M’s.

Friday night (June 6) I split my concert-going between two clubs. First, I was at the Beat Kitchen to see Weinland, a group from Portland, Ore., that released a really nice record earlier this year titled La Lamentor. I’ve been listening to it quite a bit over the past few months, and it’s held up very well on all those repeat spins. Weinland isn’t getting much attention, however, and the show had little to no hype here in Chicago. The room was not nearly as full (or as quiet) as it should have been for this show. When the first band of the night (Gentleman’s Auction House) began, the seven musicians on the stage outnumbered the five people standing out on the floor. By the time Weinland took the stage, maybe 30 people were in attendance. The band played with toy tigers, plastic owls and a hatchet on the stage. I’m not sure why. Weinland is clearly guided by its singer-songwriter-guitarist John Adam Weinland Shearer, who sings in a high mournful voice, but it’s also a strong band, with interesting and atmospheric arrangements for Shearer’s folk-rock songs, which remind me of the bands Dolorean and Great Lake Swimmers. It’s pretty mellow stuff, but Weinland did occasionally turn up the noise. Twas a nice show and I look forward to seeing Weinland again. Check out the band’s web site: www.weinlandmusic.com and myspace page: www.myspace.com/johnweinland

See my photos of Weinland.

I would have stuck around the Beat Kitchen to see the headliners, Sleep Out (that Trib story on their songs inspired by Graceland Cemetery was intriguing), but I also wanted to see a couple of bands playing down the street at Schubas. I showed up just as Speck Mountain was starting. I don’t know their music, but I enjoyed the soulfulness of what I heard. The headliners were Cryptacize, whom I’d seen not that long ago at the Hideout. Wacky deconstructed folk music, sort of like avant-garde campfire songs. Guaranteed to drive some listeners crazy, but I like it.

See my photos of Speck Mountain.
See my photos of Cryptacize.

An incredible change has taken place in the musical world over the last decade, with most of us barely noticing what was happening. Music has become much more of an international and global phenomenon than it ever was before. In the realms of that stuff we call indie rock, for lack of a better term, it now seems like an almost humdrum occurrence when two bands from Denmark come to a place like the Empty Bottle in Chicago for a concert. Sure, there have always been musicians in every part of the world, and back in the 1970s European groups like Can and Kraftwerk received some attention in the English-speaking parts of the planet. But those were rare exceptions to the U.S. and U.K. dominance of pop and rock music. These days, bands from Sweden, Italy, Indonesia, you name it, are recording music that ends up on iPods all over the U.S. and it doesn’t seem strange at all to see them touring here. What a fertile time for music…

Anyway, what prompts these thoughts was yet another show by foreign bands bringing their lovely music to the shores of Lake Michigan here in the middle of the Midwest. Efterklang, a group from Copenhagen, put out a cool record last year, Parades, with music that’s both atmospheric and complex. They were in town Monday (June 2) for a show at the Empty Bottle, and the big ensemble (eight of them, if I remember right) sounded great, with some interesting vocal harmonies, which were occasionally echoed in the horn arrangements. It was a lively set, and the crowd was enthusiastic. (And hey, it was free, too – I love these free concerts on Mondays at the Bottle.)

I showed up just in time to catch the last couple of “songs” (sonic experiments might be a more apt description) by the first act of the night, Chicago’s Nick Butcher. Interesting. And then another group from Denmark, Slaraffenland, played. I wasn’t familiar with their music, but it had a bracing quality similar to Efterklang. It seemed like many people in the crowd were there to see Slaraffenland as much as they were there to see Efterklang.

See my photos of Efterklang and Slaraffenland.

Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band’s recent record, 13 Blues for Thirteen Moons, is one of the year’s best. It’s just four songs, all of them epic, all of them pulsing with the mesmerizing power of a pagan ritual. As a result of listening repeatedly to 13 Blues, I began to wonder, “Why the heck haven’t I been listening to Silver Mt. Zion before now?” I’m a latecomer to the whole oeuvre of Godspeed You Black Emperor and related Montreal bands like Silver Mt. Zion, but I’m backtracking now to discover all of this great music belatedly.

Saturday (May 31) at Logan Square Auditorium, Silver Mt. Zion showed what orchestral rock can be. As much as I love bands that use strings to play pretty pop music, it’s nice that someone else is using violins and cellos to play a different kind of music – more like a dramatic symphony than a light piece of chamber music. At a few moment, the violins were amplified to sound like guitars, but for the most part, they sounded not all that different from the strings you’d hear at Orchestra Hall, with a particularly deep sound thanks to the presence of a bowed double bass. Singer-guitarist Efrim Menuck is clearly the guiding genius of Silver Mt. Zion, but it did feel like an orchestra (if not exactly a tra-la-la band) with a big sound. The main set closed with the first track from 13 Blues, “1,000,000 Died to Make This Sound,” which opens with the string players singing the title line in a chant, then builds to epic heights, with Menuck passionately singing counterpoint lyrics on top of the chant. For its encore, Silver Mt. Zion played an as-yet-unreleased song titled “There Is a Light,” which was one of the night’s highlights.

As magnificent as the musical performance was, the concert was marred by some profoundly irritating drunks, morons and attention-hungry brats in the audience. (Of course, the vast majority of people in the room were a well-behaved bunch eager to see and hear the band.) There was loud yelling between songs – some of it heckling (sort of), some of it positive, all of it annoying. The contrast between the music and all this intoxicated idiocy was jarring, and it seemed to annoy and confuse Menuck and the other musicians. What a way to welcome some Canadians to Chicago. I was downright embarrassed. Fortunately, the members of Silver Mt. Zion didn’t let it bother them enough to affect their performance.

The first band of the night was Dead Science. I was not impressed; I think the singer’s voice just grated on me. Next up was an improvisational set by Josh Abrams, Jeff Parker and Avreeayal Ra. It was just one long song, with repetitive melodies on Parker’s guitar and Abrams’ instruments (a ghimbri and some sort of gourd harp) cycling around and around and gradually shifting. It was a marvelous piece of musical experimentation, and a great fit with the coming set by Silver Mt. Zion.

See my photos of Silver Mt. Zion and the opening acts.

I’m not sure that Los Campesinos truly deserves the exclamation point that it puts at the end of its name. How many bands would? Sure, I suppose that exclamation point is ironic, but in one way it does seem like a fitting punctuation mark for Los Campesinsos: The alternating male-female vocals sometimes sound like a shouting match. Not necessarily in a bad way. Listening to Los Campesinos on record it occurred to me that they often turn the old Pixies formula (soft verses, loud choruses) on its head, playing loud verses with big guitar chords and shrill cries with soft, tinkly choruses. At least, I think that’s what they’re doing, though it isn’t always easy to tell what’s a chorus and what’s a verse. Los Campesinos (who, despite their Latino-sounding moniker, are from Cardiff, Wales) is punk one second, twee the next.

I do like their album, Hold on Now, Youngster…, but Los Campesinos strikes me as one of those small-doses bands – bands best enjoyed a few songs at a time. A whole record of this stuff can wear you down. The band’s thin repertoire (one album, plus an EP, plus a Pavement cover) seemed about the perfect length for a live show, however. Playing Monday (May 26) at the Empty Bottle, Los Campesinos put on a fun and rousing show. There was a lot of wild dancing on the floor in front of the stage. The Welsh kids on the stage weren’t quite as wild, but they did seem to be having fun, too. See my photos of Los Campesinos.

The opening act, Jeffrey Lewis, is truly an odd duck. I saw him doing a solo opening set at the recent Super Furry Animals show, and now he was back with a three-piece band, the Jitters playing behind him. I’d say he’s considerably better with the band. The little bits of instrumental jamming offer some much-needed relief between Lewis’ torrents of words. He’s definitely a love him or hate him kind of guy. I’m starting to love his music after seeing two shows, though I know other people who are hating it. That nonstop spiel about seeing Will Oldham on a subway is an amazing piece of work, and Lewis’ “movies” (narrative songs that he illustrates by flipping the pages of his hand-drawn picture books) are charming… charming in a very odd way. See my photos of Jeffrey Lewis and the Jitters.

Laura Veirs, who’s one of my favorites among today’s female singer-songwriters, was in Chicago Thursday night (May 15) for two shows at Schubas. I’ve seen her play once with a band backing her up, but I think I prefer her solo shows, when she uses looping pedals to build layers of guitar and vocal harmony. She doesn’t do it with as much finesse as the incomparable Andrew Bird, but there’s a similar vibe in what she’s doing. She even apologized at one point for not being able to whistle as well as Bird. Veirs sounded terrific, and a bonus was getting her tour-only CD Two Beers Veirs, a short collection of five covers. She said these are simply songs that she loves, mostly traditional folk or country tunes that have influenced her. She played a lovely rendition of one of them, Elizabeth Cotten’s “Freight Train,” during the show. The CD also includes Mississippi John Hurt’s “Spike Drivers Blues,” Irving and Webster’s “Wildwood Flower,” Clarence Ashley’s “The Coo Coo Bird” and Mike Dumovich’s “Wasps of Rain.” Pick it up if you can. I asked Veirs when she’ll have a new album and she just said she’s working on it. Photos of Laura Veirs.

The opening act, Liam Finn, attracted a decent-sized crowd of his own (including some folks standing near me who had Down Under accents). Like Veirs, he also uses looping pedals, but to much more percussive effect. I’ve seen him play a few times now, but I still don’t really know his songs. They all sounded pretty strong, and the energy he displayed as he pounded away on the drums was infectious. Photos of Liam Finn.