Jackboot Juggernaut

Thursday 3
The So So Glos’ SoCal stay is over. The band of brothers has been touring on the back of their Low Back Change Shift EP, a 13-minute, 5-song sock in the face for not noticing them in ’08 when their jackboot juggernaut Terrorism/Tourism couldn’t get a leg up among so much Brooklyn dross. How’d the machine miss these guys? Too many Clash/Costello references for the heap of hype tuned to fuzzy doo-wop, that’s how. The righteous ending is that the record won Best Punk Album at the ’09 Independent Music Awards, while rock scribe Robert Christgau declared the DIY quartet punk’s last gasp. They are rock crystal, kids, and they will play a farewell show at Eleven with Flowerthief and Midwinters. See you there.... House of Blues hosts Grace Potter & the Nocturnals. Ms. Potter and her band of Vermont hippies displayed chock-a-block chops on last year’s well-received s/t studio effort, a collection that tends to blues-rock in a marinade of Memphis groove. Taste their “Medicine”: gracepotter.com/music/.... In the northland, Wall of Voodoo dude Stan Ridgway brings that Spaghetti Western baritone to Belly Up behind last year’s critically acclaimed comebacker Neon Mirage, “Ridgway’s most mature record to date.” (Dude’s 56...) He’ll prolly still dial up “Mexican Radio” and “Ring of Fire” for ya. Country skrunks the Farmers will set the Solana Beach stage.

Friday 4
Mighty minimalist Hermit Convention (a guy named Craig from Santa Cruz who plays a looped bass and sings some infinitely listenable lo-fi pop poetry with the cadence of Archer Prewitt and melodic sense of Robert Pollard) (how’s that for a digression, beyotch?) comes to Ché Café with Rachel Fannan of Sleepy Sun. She’s rad, too. With slo-fi locals Trashcan Fires and Jehovah’s Fitness setting it up, these’d be the sets to see Friday night. Y’know, if e-z listening’s your thing.... Like it loud, them noizy ’Sconnies Naked Aggression hit the Shakedown Bar with the female-fronted original four that stood up and stood out with a social agenda in Madison’s musically messy ’90s. (Killdozer, anyone?) For a taste of NA, Netflix The Decline of Western Civilization III, they’re one of punk auteur Penelope Spheeris’s four featured gutter-punk bands of the era. El Cojones Tim Raldo and his Filthy Fuks go first.... Uptown, you got indie-pop big band Martian Horses grazing at Soda Bar...and dark cabaret trio Tragic Tantrum’s throwing a CD release for Mirror, Mirror at Ruby Room.

Saturday 5
Denver duo Tennis will serve a set at Tin Can Ale House. Young marrieds Patrick Riley and Alaina Moore met in college and hatched a plan to sail the Eastern seaboard before settling into “a world shaped by spreadsheets.” After seven months on the sloop, the kids committed their adventure to the song cycle of Fat Possum debut Cape Dory, a throwback that nets agreeable girl-group pop from the ’60s through ’80s. It’s light and fluffy, like your mom’s Ambrosia. Lord Huron and Air Waves up first.... Brooklyn-based mix master Sammy Bananas peels one at El Dorado. Remixing for the influential Fool’s Gold label, Sammy’s style is chopping R&B hits into “quirky and infectious uptempo club tracks.” Go boogie wit’ Bananas.... O.C. punk perennials Guttermouth speed it up and spit it out at Casbah with Los Kung Foo Monkeys, Authentic Sellout, and free hotdogs!... And it appears to be night of the gerund bands at Soda Bar with Jail Weddings, Burning of Rome, and Taming the Fox. “Wedding” can too be a gerund.

Sunday 6
Tin Can Ale House pops the top off Under the Covers Volume 2: A Tribute to the Nerves (Paul Collins, Peter Case, and Jack Lee’s seminal ’70s nu-pop group that sprouted such notables as the Breakaways, the Plimsouls, and the Beat). With Audacity and Tijuana Panthers doing the honors, this should be a good’n.... Reverend Horton Heat preaches the gospel of greazy rock-n-roll up at Belly Up. The Texas-bred saint of psychobilly is out to tout last year’s Yep Roc release Laughin’ & Cryin’ with the Reverend Horton Heat.... Alt-country rocker Ryan Bingham drags his Dead Horses into House of Blues. Local faves Silent Comedy set the downtown stage.

Monday 7
Blake Schwarzenbach (Jawbreaker, Jets to Brazil) has got a fresh joint, forgetters (“No ‘the,’ no capital f”). The Brooklyn-based punk’d power trio includes drummer Kevin Mahon (Against Me!) and bassist Caroline Paquita (Bitchin’) and has one four-song EP out on their own Too Small to Fail Records label. I haven’t heard ’em, but the pedigree speaks VOLUMES. “Expect comedy, tragedy, tea, and sympathy” when they follow Street Eaters into Bar Pink.... Casbah’s Anti-Monday meet-up books Bay Area experimental metal merchants Scott “Wino” Weinrich (St. Vitus) and Scott Kelly (Neurosis).

Tuesday 8
Dizzy’s downtown welcomes Russian pianist Misha Piatigorsky’s Sketchy Black Dog, a collective dedicated to deconstructing and refashioning the classic rock of Zeppelin, Hendrix, and Bowie, among others. According to Eventful New York, “This piano trio with strings violates and whispers in the ears of its audience.” ’kay.... Boston native and soul-singing throwback Eli “Paperboy” Reed hits Casbah behind his Capitol Records debut Come and Get It, a collection the singer-songwriter says was “strongly influenced by Chicago soul artists like Tyrone Davis and Mel & Tim.” You’ve heard of them.... Else: Soda Bar’s got the Ls (Ladycop, Lights On, and Lanterns)...The El D’s got Mattson 2...and “Mardi Gras Indian funk cooperative” Voice of the Wetlands All Stars takes the stage at Anthology. Tab Benoit’s in there somewhere.

Wednesday 9
Baby Birds Don’t Drink Milk is a four-piece psych-folk band from Lawrence in Kansas. They have 7706 friends and a song called “Jeremy Irons Couple Skate” that kind of goes around and around — albeit prettily — on theirSpace page. Also, while you’re there, be sure to scroll down to the GIF of Darth Vader stealing a slice of pepperoni pizza from Han Solo. If you like Animal Collective but just wish they’d calm the hell down, go see these guys at Soda Bar. Paper Forest sets it up.... Rest of the hump-night highlights’d be acoustic-rapper Bushwalla bringing The Man Who Invented the Sky to Belly Up...super-smooth soul singer Gregory Porter playing Anthology behind his Grammy-nominated debut Water...Bar Pink booked L.A. alt-pop act Chasing Kings with like-minded locals Hotel St. George...and it’ll be country-gothic at Casbah with cult faves Murder by Death and Portland’s Builders and the Butchers, whose Dead Reckoning drops February 22.
— Barnaby Monk