Rock Picks: Leonard Cohen, Wavves, Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, Britney Spears
Also, The Henry Clay People, Vetiver, Mad Professor and others
Also playing Saturday:
DEVLIN & DARKO, VHS OR BETA at the Shrine Auditorium; MIKE VIOLA, TOM BROSSEAU at the Little Room at Largo; KCRW DJ SPIN at the Park Plaza Hotel; BLIND PILOT, LOCH LOMOND at Spaceland; DARK STAR ORCHESTRA at El Rey Theatre; THE DISCO BISCUITS at House of Blues; TRAVIS, THE REPUBLIC TIGERS at the Henry Fonda Theater; FIONN O’LOCHLAINN at the Troubadour; AN CAFE at Avalon.
SUNDAY, APRIL 12
VETIVER AT EAGLE ROCK CENTER FOR THE ARTS
Vetiver’s fourth album is called Tight Knit (Sub Pop), and is the SF band’s first collection of new stuff in three years. Visionary Andy Cabic and crew bring a laid-back soft-rock sound soaked in some strangely wise shades of classic folk and ’60s rock, softly dappled with the orange glow of the ’60s West Coast and, mostly, a whole lotta Poco/Burrito Bros.–style country & roll. Each tune is something of a minor variation on another, and far from being a deficiency, this gives the album a wholeness that’s revealed to be sagely drawn streaks of hazy psychedelia and some of your more captivatingly harmonized pop. A lot of these intricate shades are provided by label mate Eric Johnson of the Fruit Bats, who contributes substantial portions of the album’s glorious melodies. Vetiver are capable of some very fine rocking straight-up, too, but Cabic’s heart isn’t in blowing us away; he’d rather daydream down by the river, watching the fish go by. File under Deceptively Pleasant, give it a quick half-dozen plays. Then you’ll swear it’s in your DNA. (John Payne)
Also playing Sunday:
HEADLIGHTS, THE LOVE LANGUAGE at Spaceland; LE ROUX, EL TEN ELEVEN, XANIMO at the Roxy; K-PAZ Y DAREYES DE LA SIERRA at the Conga Room.
MONDAY, APRIL 13
THE HENRY CLAY PEOPLE AT SPACELAND
It’s hard to be a guitar-rock band in 2009, what with so much history, so many and ventured and abandoned cul de sacs. You’ve got your verses, and your choruses, and your guitar, bass, drum and singing, your dramatic solos and sing-along refrains. How can anyone add to the conversation anything else that hasn’t already been uttered over and over and over and over and over again? “This ain’t a scene, it’s just a generation caught in between,” sings Joey Siara, the Henry Clay People’s singer and guitarist, and somehow, with verses, choruses, sing-along refrains and tangled guitar solos, he and fellow guitarist/harmonizer/brother Andy Siara create a big, catchy, smart rock sound. It draws on the biggies of ’90s post-punk, most notably Pavement, Uncle Tupelo, the Replacements, but never mimics. The band is one of the great L.A. hopes of 2009, and just signed an ace management deal on the strength of its blistering live shows and Autumn Tone Records debut, For Cheap or for Free. This is week No. 2 two of the band’s Monday-night residency, and also features the Broken West, the World Record and Writer. By week four, you probably won’t be able to squeeze into Spaceland, so best catch the Clay People now. (Randall Roberts)
Also playing Monday:
DUSTY RHODES & THE RIVER BAND, WAKE UP LUCID, WENDY DARLING at the Silverlake Lounge; FOOL’S GOLD, GLASSER, EDWARD SHARPE & THE MAGNETIC ZEROS, SWEATERS at the Echo; ELIZA MOORE at Home; FRIENDLY FIRES at the Troubadour.
TUESDAY, APRIL 14
MAD PROFESSOR AT HOUSE OF BLUES
The dub imperative requires deep technical facility and a one-step-ahead, almost editorial mind characterized by heaping helpings of intuitive, impulsive spontaneity and an ear for the bizarre. Mad Professor, the insanely prolific Guyana-born, U.K.-bred acrobat of the mixing board, is loaded with that stuff, and he’s parlayed a natural-fact gift for reductive exploitation into a calling that’s reached far beyond reggae’s familiar boundaries. His ear for splendidly spindled and mutilated aural contours has enhanced efforts by an army of disparate pop adventurers — Perry Farrell, Sade, the Orb and, most notably, Massive Attack — but he has also delved into resolutely old-school reggae via collaborations with Lee “Scratch” Perry, the mighty U Roy and the Professor’s own Black Liberation Dub albums. Joined here by Warchurch, the DJ Greyboy–mentored “turntable band” (that is, four DJs with bass, guitar and keys), the Mad one shall doubtless instill a sweet, shadowy, hard-socking mass hysteria, the succulent fruit of his altogether extraordinary rhythm-wrangling career. (Jonny Whiteside)
Also playing Tuesday:
BECKY STARK & FRIENDS at the Little Room at Largo; KIMYA DAWSON, ANDY MILONAKIS at the Troubadour; CRAIG DAVID, THE JANKS at the Mint; TOADIES at El Rey Theatre; COLLIE BUDDZ, PEP LOVE, DJ PEE WEE & THE PYRX BAND at the Roxy; PULSE OUT, ATOMS, FORMER GHOSTS at the Silverlake Lounge; THE POLYAMOROUS AFFAIR at the Echo; ANDY CLOCKWISE, TYLER STEELE, BROKEN METERS, JACK ADAMS at Spaceland.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15
WAVVES, FOL CHEN AT THE ECHO
Twenty-two-year-old Nathan Williams’ generation may be the last to have grown up shopping and working in record stores now that they’re an endangered species (Williams worked at the Music Trader in San Diego), but it’s this sad-but-true consequence that makes Williams’ (a.k.a. Wavves) two new albums exceptional nuggets of power pop. Like the Ramones, who were more a Ronettes cover band than a punk outfit, Williams is really doing Lesley Gore, with a heap of Bad Brains and sprinkles of Sonic Youth thrown in. He conjures soaring power chords, fuzzy riffs, hissing production value and Frank Black/Kim Deal verbal back and forth with himself to create an encyclopedic mess of joyous, unpretentious pop references. Fol Chen, on the other hand, keep a masterful control over their addictive rhythms, which have proven to be hugely accessible — they’ve recently graced Morning Becomes Eclectic and All Things Considered. Fol Chen’s black, grease-painted Hamburglar eye makeup went over smashingly well at SXSW, where their fluttering, detailed soundscapes and boisterous energy proved to be a crowd-pleaser. (Wendy Gilmartin)
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