Music Picks: Ornette Coleman, Gary Numan, Natacha Atlas

Also playing Monday: APPLES IN STEREO, FOL CHEN at the Echoplex; LAURA VEIRS, LESLIE & THE BADGERS at the Troubadour; DIRT DRESS at Spaceland.

Cult secret weapon: Kristian Hoffman

Location Info

Map

El Rey Theatre

5515 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90036

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: Mid-Wilshire/ Hancock Park

Photos

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The Troubadour

9081 Santa Monica Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: West Hollywood

Photos

The Avalon

1735 Vine St.
Los Angeles, CA 90028

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: Hollywood

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Shrine Auditorium & Expo Center

649 W. Jefferson Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90007

Category: Community Venues

Region: Out of Town

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Hollywood Palladium

6215 W. Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90028

Category: Music Venues

Region: Out of Town

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House of Blues Sunset Strip

8430 Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90069

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: Out of Town

Photos

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TUESDAY/NOVEMBER/2

WAYNE HORVITZ/GRAVITAS QUARTET AT REDCAT

Composer-pianist–electronic musician Wayne Horvitz purveys a progressive, modernist aesthetic that smears and then erases genre lines in accessible ways. His range is broad and deep, from the steaming fusion-funk of his Zony Mash combo to the avant-jazz-rock of Pigpen, or his earlier work in the New York downtown scene alongside John Zorn, Fred Frith, Bill Frisell and Bobby Previte, and collaborations with his acclaimed composer wife, Robin Holcombe. Among his more recent critically praised projects is his improvised-composition chamber ensemble Gravitas Quartet, which unites the new music, jazz and contemporary-classical worlds in extraordinarily evocative atmospheres probing the inner/outer reaches of sound, structure, time and counter-time. On acoustic piano Horvitz is a master of painterly dynamics and head-turning harmonies, rather rare traits shared by his highly accomplished quartet partners: cellist Peggy Lee, bassoonist Sara Schoenbeck and trumpeter Ron Miles. (John Payne)

KRISTIAN HOFFMAN AT M BAR

The multitalented Hoffman has been everyone's secret weapon since the No Wave era, where he led the Mumps, added verve to Lydia Lunch and served under troubled sax maniac James Chance/James White. He also composed songs for iconic oddity Klaus Nomi, was a collaborator of cult performers like Ann Magnuson and Russell Mael of Sparks and, more recently, was partly responsible for the overt cabaret-ing of Great Gay Hope Rufus Wainwright. From Nomi to Pee-wee Herman and El Vez, if it's a skewed take on pop and it's happened in the last 30 years, chances are the cosmopolitan and bicoastal Hoffman had a hand in it. Now it's his turn to shine, with a long-in-the-works album called (what else) Fop. If you're into cult legends, go see their cult legend. (Gustavo Turner)

Also playing Tuesday: THE NEGRO PROBLEM at the Echoplex (see Music feature); WHITE DENIM at Spaceland; CATTLE DECAPITATION at the Whisky a Go Go; TWO DOOR CINEMA, GENERATIONALS at the Music Box; INGRID MICHELSON, THE GUGGENHEIM GROTTO at the Troubadour.

WEDNESDAY/NOVEMBER/3

GARY NUMAN AT EL REY THEATRE

After a few beers, Gary Numan's 1980 performance of "Down in the Park" in the film Urgh! A Music War is achingly funny, his onstage "module" lurching around the Tron-ish set like a drunken bumper car while his voice conjures KITT on karaoke night. But ol' Gazza never cracks a smile, and that remains a great allure of his lonesome android persona: However kitschy the concepts, he holds his nerve and delivers with a steely, revenge-of-the-nerds pride. Though he was a '70s synth pioneer, these wacky waveform generators were still not sufficiently futuristic for Numan, so he mutated their signals further with guitar effects pedals. This technique and a voice with all the human warmth of an ATM machine formed the signature of his 1979 international breakthrough album, The Pleasure Principle (and its ubiquitous hit "Cars"), which Numan will be performing in its entirety at El Rey. Also Thurs. (Paul Rogers)

SNOOP DOGG, MIKE EPPS AT THE GIBSON AMPHITHEATRE

It doesn't take an old-school partisan to conclude that Snoop Dogg has had his studio efforts on cruise control for a minute now: Excepting the wonderful "Gangsta Luv," which owes the majority of its wonderfulness to the Dream and Tricky Stewart (who wrote and produced it), last year's humdrum Malice N Wonderland sounded like it was cobbled together during time-outs at his sons' football games. Yet as fans who caught this summer's Rock the Bells festival know, Snoop is on something of a hot streak at the moment when it comes to his live performances. This joint show with comedian Mike Epps should showcase his ability to entertain a crowd even if his recent songs don't. Snoop recently told Vibe that Imagine That! (as he and Epps are billing the concert) is right for "your girl, your kids, your mama, grandma, everybody." Family night, y'all! (Mikael Wood)

ORNETTE COLEMAN AT UCLA ROYCE HALL

Free jazz is what you might call it, or you could make reference to his own "harmolodic" as a way of describing what the giant, Ornette Coleman, hath wrought on the world of music and the shape of sounds to come. It's a big story; he'd tell you that himself, but you might have to pay him a million bucks. In short, since the late 1950s, when he sort of crept up on the New York jazz scene with his legendary engagement at the Five Spot, he's been offering a new kind of jazz, which didn't play by the old bebop rules, didn't swing like it was supposed to, didn't do much except challenge with every note the way everyone heard and conceived of tone and rhythm in harmony/disharmony. It was like listening to a magic carpet, somehow. He made a lot of enemies, eventually gained a cult, then practically a religion. Ornette Coleman was and is a revolutionary, he changed everything, and you've got to hear his utterly idiosyncratic genius son Denardo Coleman on drums: He's doing the same thing for the tubs, and it is insane. They've got Tony Falanga on bass and other special guests helping out tonight, too. Do not miss this — you'll regret it if you do. (John Payne)