Music Picks: Amanda Jo Williams, Usher, Masaki Batoh, Procol Harum

Kind of the ideal venue for a group of '60s Brit poppers who parlayed one-hit-wonder status into a credible career as lite symphonic rockers in the '70s. Best use of "A Whiter Shade of Pale" (and possibly of any pop song in any movie) ever: as a sound track to Nick Nolte's lust for Rosanna Arquette in the Scorsese segment of New York Stories. Check it out. (Gustavo Turner)

Also playing Sunday: BEST COAST at the Troubadour; BUTCHY FUEGO, SEX WORKER, PSYCHIC REALITY, DIVA DOMPE at The Smell; FISTFUL OF MERCY, ALAIN JOHANNES at Hollywood Forever; MARGOT AND THE NUCLEAR SO & SO'S at the Echoplex.

The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger. See Wednesday

Masaki Batoh: See Sunday

Location Info

Map

Dinner House M

1263 W. Temple St.
Los Angeles, CA 90026

Category: Restaurant > Bakery

Region: Echo Park

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The Airliner

2419 N. Broadway
Los Angeles, CA 90031

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: Downtown

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The Troubadour

9081 Santa Monica Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: West Hollywood

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Roxy Theatre

9009 Sunset Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: West Hollywood

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House of Blues Sunset Strip

8430 Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90069

Category: Bars/Clubs

Region: Out of Town

Photos

The Orpheum Theatre

842 S. Broadway
Los Angeles, CA 90014

Category: Music Venues

Region: Downtown

Photos

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• Amanda Jo Williams
• Mikael Wood
• Chris Martins
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MONDAY/NOVEMBER/15

BLACK APPLES, LA FONT AT THE ECHO

There was a time when the up-and-coming Black Apples weren't Los Angeles residents — dark days spent in Colorado, when their expertly delivered garage rock and proto-psych fell upon ears that were definitely deaf and probably a bit icy. Though their chosen medium's innovators hailed from cold climes — Black Apples pay a lot of loving homage to London's Pretty Things — Stateside psychedelia has always sounded best sunbaked, and these guys have flourished since hitting the (best) coast. Last year's eponymous EP is chock-full of splashy cymbals, shouty vocals, upbeat rhythms and grimy, sometimes surf-tinged guitar. For this second night of the band's Echo residency, Black Apples will be paired with LA Font, who occasionally dabble in the traditionally trippy but tend to veer closer to the distorted shambolic jangle of Pavement than the reverb-drenched excursions of 13th Floor Elevators. They've got a new album out, American Leagues, which focuses on the struggles of blue-collar city life. (Chris Martins)

Also playing Monday: EL TEN ELEVEN at Origami Vinyl.

TUESDAY/NOVEMBER/16

GWAR, THE CASUALTIES, INFERNAEON AT HOUSE OF BLUES

With House of Blues' Sunset Strip location poised to close within the next year or so, it's a bit of a shame that this isn't the farewell gig. Were the inimitable GWAR allowed to officially see the venue off, there's a good chance front-demon Oderus Urungus would've taken the opportunity to demolish a wall or two with his massive, slime-spewing phallus. Of course, he and the other intergalactic monster barbarians that populate the band will do just about everything but. Their recent appearance at the Bonnaroo festival left the grounds' central fountain dyed blood-red, and their stage show is a legendary mix of punishing thrash metal, sci-fi video presentations and gore-soaked costumery and effects. The experience is loud and messy and completely offensive (at recent shows, they've portrayed Michael Jackson having a three-way with a space infant and Urungus himself), but you truly haven't lived until you've survived a GWAR concert. Wear white. (Chris Martins)

BLONDE REDHEAD, PANTHA DU PRINCE AT THE MUSIC BOX

You've seen their photograph: two handsome identical twin brothers, Amedeo and Simone Pace from Italy, framing a beautiful young woman from Kyoto, Kazu Makino. That's Amedeo on guitar or bass and vocals; Simone is the drummer, a very hard-rocking and idiosyncratic one (he plays keyboards, too); Makino plays slanted, wrenchingly dramatized guitar shards and sings in a breathy, not-so-guileless sigh — or screeeeeeeeeams. But their sound keeps evolving, growing sleek, even, a cinematic-romantic impulse that wrenches a formerly lonely and alienating sound into genuinely touching realms, opening up like some kind of dark flower overflowing with a strangely sweet nectar — a dam has burst, exploding with new tone colors, new unidentifiable emotions. Their new album, Penny Sparkle (4AD), is, if possible, even more heartbreaking than their 2004 masterpiece, Misery Is a Butterfly. With techno-shoegaze psychedelia, courtesy German electronic musician-producer Pantha Du Prince. (John Payne)

LEGENDARY PINK DOTS AT THE ECHOPLEX

When Dave Henderson wrote about Legendary Pink Dots in his seminal 1983 article "Wild Planet" for British rock weekly Sounds, he called them a "unique London-based outfit who mix experimental music with a touch of psychedelia — and almost everything else you can imagine — to produce an ultimately unique sound." Since then they've decamped to Holland, but, aside from constant changes in personnel, that is essentially what they've always been: singular. One of the standouts from the early days of cassette culture, the band — founding member and left-field singer-songwriter Edward Ka-Spel, along with co-founder and synth/electronics player Phil "The Silverman" Knight, guitarist Erik Drost and sound sculptor Raymond Steeg — has distilled Ka-Spel's obsessions with towers, dolls, premonitions and the number 834 into something deeply personal, weird and shot through with loss, longing and fleeting discomfiture. Bonus Southland factoid: The Pink Dots also have a recurring fascination with our beaches: Their 1988 LP, Any Day Now, features one of their finest songs, "Laguna Beach," and tomorrow they're playing in Hermosa Beach! (David Cotner)

GREG DULLI, CARINA ROUNDAT THE TROUBADOUR

Former Afghan Whigs leader Greg Dulli has been preoccupied in recent years with his current band, the Twilight Singers, as well as the Gutter Twins, an ongoing project with Screaming Trees singer Mark Lanegan. Although he got his start in the late '80s, he's only just now getting around to touring under his own name, with this series of solo shows, which will draw upon material from all of his various groups. Regardless of the setting, Dulli's moody songs are fueled by an introspective passion that's contrasted by the euphoric power of soaring alterna-rock guitars and the saving grace of lyrical wit and intelligence. British singer Carina Round also has had a diverse career in the past decade, moving from the delicate folk-pop tunes of her early days to heavier and artier experimentation on more recent albums, like Slow Motion Addict. She's always changing and in constant, not-so-slow motion, having stretched out even further with new collaborations with Tool's Maynard James Keenan and Smashing Pumpkins' Billy Corgan. (Falling James)