Rock Picks: Sunset Rubdown, Alela Diane, Pelican, Rose Melberg

Le Loup, Nurses at the Echo
This is what acid rock means in the late ’00s — an orgiastic decadence in sound, zillions of notes shimmering around all at once, instruments covering the stage, tribal beats and rhythms, and a cultish, “family” vibe à la Animal Collective, High Places, Holy Fuck, the Octopus Project (and, locally, Foot Village). D.C.’s seven-piece Le Loup offer their translation on the experimental and noisy world of down-at-the-compound rock here tonight, and they have much to contribute: three-part harmonies and a keenly developed understanding of finger work (on banjos and mandolins), not to mention fully fleshed-out songs with beginnings, middles and clarifying ends that take the audience on a roller-coaster ride of emotion and sonic bliss. Informed by the long, reclusive time spent crafting their second album, titled — wait for it — Family (Hardly Art), Le Loup are experts at their brand of banging, honking, plucking cacophony. Nurses, on the other hand, play it subtle. This scruffy three-piece’s ghostly, atonal melodies and slight harmonies spill out from their fair share of ramshackle instruments and stage gadgetry too, but Nurses would rather have the audience mull over three or four abstract sounds hanging in the air, as opposed to Le Loup’s aural onslaught. (Wendy Gilmartin)

The Woolly Bandits. See Thursday.

From the vortex: Alela Diane

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Also playing Wednesday:

THE SWELL SEASON at Amoeba Music; RHYMEFEST at El Rey Theatre; REGINA SPEKTOR, JUPITER ONE at the Greek; SOULICO at Spaceland; JOSHUA RADIN, THE WATSON TWINS, EMILY WELLS at the Henry Fonda Theater; ALICE COOPER at the Nokia Theatre; JASON DIAZ, TONY LUCCA, BOBBY LONG at the Hotel Cafe; INNER CIRCLE, TRIBAL SEEDS, HOOLIGANZ, THE HOLD UP at the Roxy; THE BINGES, BADLUCK BANDITS, DASH RIP ROCK at the Viper Room.

Alela Diane, Marissa Nadler at the Echo
“Our lives are buried in snow,” Alela Diane cries on “White Diamonds,” from her second album, To Be Still (Rough Trade). Her rustic folk tunes are often as magical as the natural wonders she evokes, with her lilting vocals and stark acoustic guitar threaded with mystically exotic strains of violin. She hails from the small town of Nevada City, California, which must be located in some kind of enchanted musical vortex, since it’s home to more weirdly wonderful psych-folkies (including Diane’s pal Mariee Sioux) per capita than anywhere else in America. Brooklyn singer Marissa Nadler’s new CD, Little Hells (Kemado Records), is also rooted in folk, but such songs as “Rosary” and “Diamond Heart” are wrapped up in a shoegazer haze of spacy echoes and gossamer sound effects that make her chillingly beautiful vocals feel otherworldly and positively dreamy. (Falling James)

The Woolly Bandits at the Roxy
It’s tough to be in a garage-rock band these days. The concept of dorky bowl haircuts paired with intentionally crappy-sounding guitars is getting kind of ancient. Most “modern” garage-rock combos are so crippled by nostalgia and the inherent artifice in their wimpy attempts to mimic the Sonics that they come across as laughably outdated rather than genuinely rocking. What it really comes down to is songwriting, and local band the Woolly Bandits do a credible job of evoking ’60s big-beat energy by juicing it up with good ol’ punk-rock guitars and tempos on lively tracks like “Just Jealous” and “Gonna Make It Right,” from their new CD, Woman of Mass Destruction (Citation Records). Lyrically, the Bandits are a mess, with nothing new to say with such ungrammatical titles as “Your So Cute” [sic] and the semi-punky “I’m a Bug” (which is fairly pedestrian compared to the Urinals art-punk classic of the same name). But musically they’re similar to Arizona’s wonderful Love Me Nots, with singer Christa Collins alternately purring and spitting out her retro garage melodies (including a winsome ska-pop remake of the Specials’ “Gangster”) over groovy Farfisa and Hammond B3 organs. Guitarist-songwriter Rik Collins, who used to play with Sky Saxon & the Seeds and in Miss Derringer singer Liz McGrath’s old punk band Tongue, keeps things from getting too mired in the past with his distorted punk riffs. (Falling James)

Also playing Thursday:

THE ANTLERS at the Bootleg Theatre; THE NIGHT MARCHERS, NIGHT HORSE at Eagle Rock Center for the Arts; FLYLEAF, PAPER TONGUES at El Rey Theatre; BUILT TO SPILL at the Echoplex; THE TRAGICALLY HIP at Club Nokia; SLIPKNOT at Hollywood Palladium; VOODOO GLOW SKULLS, CELLPHISH, ASSORTED JELLYBEANS, OTHERS, at Alex’s Bar; LENKA, JOEY RYAN & KATIE COSTELLO at the Hotel Cafe.