| | Issue #21.22 :: 05/28/2008 - 06/03/2008 | Local Emcee Preach at NBT
Plus: Dignan, Los Perdidos, The Working Title
| BY FREE TIMES WRITERS
| Wednesday
Dignan — Though the quintet hails from McAllen, Texas (a town some 5 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border), Dignan looks to our neighbors to the north for aural inspiration, fleshing out its emotive indie pop with the flowery arrangements of Broken Social Scene and the group-think dynamics of Arcade Fire. But there’s still plenty of prime, made-in-the-U.S.A. touchstones here; the epic slow-build of “Officer” (from The Guest) recalls fellow Lone Star Staters Explosions in the Sky, and tunes such as “Curtains” and “They’re Outnumbered” bring to mind a less-fractured Colour Revolt. Perhaps soon the City of Palms will be known for more than being the home of the Xbox repair center. All Get Out headlines; Your Sparkle Heart opens. P. Wall
New Brookland Tavern: 6:30 p.m., $10 ($8 advance); 791-4413, newbrooklandtavern.com.
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Thursday
Rose Fraser — Southern Pines, N.C., might be best known for its golf courses, but the indie-folk pop of this resident’s debut, Life Is Beautiful, is more than a few strokes above par. Fraser’s voice is sultry and self-assured, swooning through the epic-sounding “Blue Dress” and emoting like a jazz singer on the more sparsely orchestrated title track. Despite her youth and lack of experience, she sounds like an amalgam of the last 30 years of female singer-songwriters, from Laura Nyro to Cat Power or K. D. Lang to Feist. K. Oliver
Café Strudel: 8 p.m., free; 794-6634, cafestrudel.com.
Preach — In his book, All About the Beat: Why Hip-Hop Can’t Save Black America, John McWhorter challenges the notion that the conscious rap of acts like The Roots can ever effect serious change within the black community. “Their views do not move us forward,” McWhorter writes. “The Roots are fine artists. But as to what kind of politics their art suggests, I’m afraid no poor black person would benefit from it.” To be fair, the hip-hop of acts like Public Enemy, N.W.A. and Boogie Down Productions is significant for the same reason Bob Dylan’s folk records are significant: It brought many controversial issues and points of view to the public discourse. Local emcee Preach is cut from that same fabric. The responsibility to (re)act, thereafter, is on the listener. K. Foster
New Brookland Tavern: 7:30 p.m., $5 ($7 under 21); 791-4413, newbrooklandtavern.com.
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| The Working Title |
The Working Title — My favorite thing about The Working Title has always been its name. I don’t mean that as a slight; our brothers from down Charleston way create some pretty terrific pop-rock that sounds as if Switchfoot had The Edge come produce its next album. According to the band’s MySpace site, it’s “a name for something that’s always changing.” And changing and adapting is something these guys excel at: From the band’s debut EP Everyone Here Is Wrong to 2006’s Atlantic Records-released full-length About-Face, The Working Title’s been constantly improving. T. Baker
Five Points Pub: 8 p.m., $7 ($5 advance); 253-7888, myspace.com/5pointspub.
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Friday
Los Perdidos — I don’t get as excited about most local bands as I do Los Perdidos — probably because they’re the only surf-rock band in town, but mostly because they’re so damn amazing at it. The instrumental trio is so tight it reminds why you ever liked rock ‘n’ roll in the first place. Is it time for The Whig’s Christmas in July festivities yet? And is it too much to ask for Los Perdidos to play? Their surf-rock “Good King Wenceslas” is one of my favorite Christmas songs ever. T. Baker
The Whig: 11 p.m., free; 931-8852, thewhig.org.
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| Daniel Machado |
Daniel Machado — To say Daniel Machado’s Themes in American Friction — a sprawling, 16-song, autobiographical rock opera — is ambitious is probably a bit of an understatement. Indeed, Themes, as Machado says, attempts to “make sense of how growing up in my generation could have been so uneventful and terrifying at the same time.” So, sure, the answers within might be personal, but the music is purely populist — Themes is chock-full of power-pop gems (“Growing Up Octagonal,” “The Kings of Misery,” “How I Lost Maria”) and one picture-perfect slow-burning album closer (“Jessie the Usher”) sure to please fans of Ben Folds, Ben Kweller, Ben Lee and other power-poppers not named Ben (i.e. Rooney, Weezer). P. Wall
New Brookland Tavern: 6:30 p.m., $8; 791-4413, newbrooklandtavern.com.
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Friday
Mind vs. Target! — Despite the similar guitar-bass-drum setup, Shane Perlowin’s Mind vs. Target! project charts a much different course than his Ahleuchatistas dayjob. Gone are the stop-start pseudo-prog histrionics, eschewed in favor of equally nimble and much more tuneful excursions into post-bop guitar jazz. Perlowin’s lithe, virtuosic runs mesh seamlessly with Joseph Burkett’s counter-melodic walking basslines, all while drummer Michael Libramento keeps the beat with fluid stick-and-brush work and outstanding accents. The trio is compact but powerful, displaying an intuitive and almost psychic rapport that makes its improvisational moments as faultless as its rehearsed parts. Dig the hard-driving, shoulda-been-a-spy-movie-theme “Bizarre Ritual” and the tranquil, Karate-esque “Oakland Park East.” P. Wall
Hunter-Gatherer: 11 p.m., $3; 748-0540.
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Same As It Ever Was — The Talking Heads were products of New York City’s post-punk scene, born from the seminal club CBGB. Early on, these art-school punks were defined by the screwy, nervous energy of singer David Byrne, but 17 years, 11 albums and a very sour split later, the band had amassed a kaleidoscopic catalog that blended new wave, pop, polyrhythmic worldbeat and funk. The conventional wisdom is The Talking Heads will never, ever reunite, so this tribute band is the closest you’re bound to get to seeing those titans of the ‘80s live and in person. And if it doesn’t do the trick, go buy Stop Making Sense on DVD. K. Foster
Five Points Pub: 8 p.m., $5; 253-7888, myspace.com/5pointspub.
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| Villanova |
Villanova — How exactly do we know that Villanova — and really, we shouldn’t have to tell you exactly who that band is, should we? — is starting to make a name for itself? Google, of course: The funk-rock quartet’s web site pops up on the first results page of a Google search, topping the Philadelphia university’s law school and ice hockey team. Hey, speaking of the City of Brotherly Love, Philly funkers The Urban Sophisticates join Villanova for tonight’s installment of Rock 93.5’s Friday Night Live series, as do This Machine is Me and Headfirst for Halos. P. Wall
Headliners: 6 p.m., $7 ($5 advance); 796-2333, headlinerscolumbia.com.
Saturday
The Drownout — Atlanta’s The Drownout plays an interesting take on the new New Wave resurgence hiding at the bottom of music’s collective cereal box lately. Vocalist-slash-guitarist Jason Jones has an eerie quality to his vocals and melodies not unlike those of Interpol’s Paul Banks. And hey, when you list influences as disparate as The Police, The Cars, Brian Jonestown Massacre and Nirvana and you actually manage to make that make sense, more power to you, sirs and madam. The Reverie, Cats and Cobras and Magnetic Flowers open. T. Baker
Art Bar: 9 p.m., $3; 929-0198, artbarsc.com.
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Lauren Lucas — When her 2005 debut for a major Nashville label never made it out of the starting gate due to the usual music label shake-ups and a first single that peaked at No. 52, it might have actually been the best thing to happen to Columbia native Lauren Lucas’ career. Last year, she self-released an EP that took out the Shania Twain-esque tendencies of some of her earlier work and replaced them with country soul, as on “Riverstone,” which wouldn’t sound out of place on an Alison Moorer or Shelby Lynne album. This show will be a solo acoustic set. K. Oliver
West Columbia Riverwalk Amphitheatre: 6 p.m., free; 794-6504.
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| Sound the Alarm |
Sound the Alarm — There’s no telling what producer Howard Benson (My Chemical Romance, Hoobastank, Trust Company) heard in Sound the Alarm when he took the band under his wing. He flew the baby-faced quintet from northeast Pennsylvania to Los Angeles, where it spent eight months writing and recording its debut for Geffen, Stay Inside. The food-court frolics contained within are safe, radio-ready and tailor-made for adolescent girls clamoring for the perfect ringtone. In other words, perhaps it was the sound of easy money that ensnared Benson. Hey, in these troubled times, it’s hard to fault a man for playing it safe. K. Foster
New Brookland Tavern: 5 p.m., $8 ($7 advance); 791-4413, newbrooklandtavern.com.
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