Music Picks: Ida & Michael Hurley, Rasputina, Hercules & the Love Affair

MONDAY/AUGUST/16

Carnival of cellos: Rasputina

Rodrigo y Gabriela (Spanish for "Rodrigo and Gabriela")

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El Rey Theatre

5515 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90036

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: Mid-Wilshire/ Hancock Park

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The Orpheum Theatre

842 S. Broadway
Los Angeles, CA 90014

Category: Music Venues

Region: Downtown

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More About

• Pasadena
• John Payne
• Levitt Pavilion
• Hip-Hop and Rap
• Metal and Hardcore

ALICE RUSSELL, THE RUBY FRIEDMAN ORCHESTRA AT THE BOOTLEG THEATER

Thrills and chills: Alice Russell, the great retro-soul singer from Brighton, England, pays a visit to purvey her superfunky gospel-revival kinda thing. She is a singer's singer, you might say, with control down to the last little quaver, never overdone or slipping into saccharine, with a beautiful, rich, husky tone and style that's hers and hers alone, and which she's contributed to collabs with the heady likes of Roy Ayers, the Roots, Lonnie Liston Smith, De La Soul and the Quantic Soul Orchestra. Now just check her version of "Lights Went Out," recorded for a Giles Peterson BBC session on YouTube, and seek out her Pot of Gold album (Six Degrees) immediately. Also L.A.'s own dynamic diva Ruby Friedman and her band. (John Payne)

NNEKA AT THE TROUBADOUR

With Lauryn Hill increasingly being mentioned in the past tense, there's certainly a yawning niche for young Nneka. Like Hill, this German-Nigerian soulstress likes to rap (and, in concert, ramble), but seems to connect with so many more folks when she sings. Her desperately tremulous verse performances on single "Heartbeat" and soccer World Cup tribute "Viva Africa" forgive those songs' rather dumbed-down choruses. Having grown up in the oil-rich yet mysteriously dirt-poor Niger Delta, Nneka has plenty to say about capitalism and corruption, but her politics — macro and micro — is delivered in a Trojan horse timbre more soothing than scolding. Her debut U.S. full-length, this year's Concrete Jungle, is effectively a "best of" her two international albums to date and offers a welcome crash course in Nneka's potentially world-beating celebration of hip-hop, Afro-pop, reggae and forward-facing soul. (Paul Rogers)

Also playing Monday: PAT HULL, TIN CAN NOTES, BOYZ SKULE at Echo Curio; FOL CHEN, CROCODILES, LIGHT POLLUTION at the Echo; ABE VIGODA, MASTERS & JOHNSON, NAOMI PUNK, DUNES at the Smell; WHITE ARROWS at Spaceland; UNKLE MONKEY at the Waterfront.

TUESDAY/AUGUST/17

EARTHLESS, DEAD MEADOW AT FORD AMPHITHEATRE

Hip-hop and punk rock have long been the expected sound track to the ollies, nose-grinds and various aerials committed to tape by skateboarding's elite guard, so when shoe company Emerica decides to debut its brand-new feature-length skate film, Stay Gold, out under the stars with live accompaniment by a couple of stoner-metal bands, well, consider the trucks mold broken. Dead Meadow got its start in D.C. influenced by Jimi Hendrix and J.R.R. Tolkien, then smartly moved to the land where kush is king. The trio's droney psychedelic compositions fold Eastern modal music into a sludgy purple batter of big riffs and spacey vocals, and their records veer toward the conceptual, with the latest, Three Kings, actually acting as the score for a band-produced feature-length film. San Diego's Earthless doesn't have any prior experience with syncing audio to visuals that we know of, but this instrumental outfit has long been crafting epic-length heavy rock with an unusually cinematic flair. (Chris Martins)

BRANDON FLOWERS AT THE TROUBADOUR

As the Killers' three studio albums have demonstrated, Brandon Flowers is not a man who likes to limit himself: From the lean new-wave revivalism of Hot Fuss to the Springsteen-scaled Americana of Sam's Town to the astral disco-rock of Day & Age, Flowers' Las Vegas–based foursome have already covered more stylistic turf than most bands do over their entire careers. So it doesn't come as much of a surprise to hear that for his upcoming solo debut, Flamingo (due September 14), Flowers recruited not one, not two, but three of music's highest-profile producers — Stuart Price, Daniel Lanois and Brendan O'Brien — to help him capture his vision. Lead single "Crossfire" suggests that vision is less synthed-up than it was on Day & Age, but with Flowers you never know. Get a sneak peek at this ground-softening small-room gig tonight. (Mikael Wood)

IDA & MICHAEL HURLEY AT LARGO

An evening of top-shelf eccentric folk featuring New York weirdies Ida and the revered elder of left-field tunesmithery, living legend (and heartwarming album-cover illustrator) Michael Hurley. Get some humble wisdom from a guy who's seen it all and lived to sing it, the still-thriving link between Leadbelly and Devendra Banhart. (Gustavo Turner)

Also playing Tuesday: DARKER MY LOVE, WOUNDED LION at the Bootleg Theater; DUNES, NAOMI PUNK, MASTERS & JOHNSON at Echo Curio; COTTON JONES, THE PARSON RED HEADS at the Echo; LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC with PIETARI INKINEN, LEON FLEISHER at the Hollywood Bowl; OTEP, THE BIRTHDAY MASSACRE, BENEATH THE SKY, THE AGONIST at Key Club; ADAM H. STEPHENS (of Two Gallants), PAPA, THE HOLLOYS at Spaceland; THE RICHARD GLASER JAZZ BAND at the Waterfront.

WEDNESDAY/AUGUST/18

CHILDISH GAMBINO AT THE BOOTLEG THEATER

Despite his mixtape series' titular claim that he is Just a Rapper, Childish Gambino is much more than that. Look no further than a key lyric from the 26-year-old's braggadocious track "Let Me Dope You," which reads as follows: "When I wrote for 30 Rock/I was only 25." No, that's not a veiled crack reference. In fact, Gambino is best known as actor/comedian Donald Glover, who currently plays Troy Barnes on the scrappy NBC sitcom Community. But his rap persona, he frequently insists, is no act, even if his style seems cribbed from a certain contemporary referenced directly on "I Be on That" in this line: "Weezy F. is in jail/I keep his seat warm, nigga." So he bites Lil Wayne. The thing is, Gambino does it very, very well, and even if all his emceeing simply amounted to copycatting, he'd do a clever job of it, weaving wry humor into every couplet, which justifies the hype. (Chris Martins)