A day-by-day guide to our Critic’s Choices and other previews
a 9 PM, the Note, 1565 N. Milwaukee, 773-489-0011 or 866-468-3401, $8 in advance, $10 on the day of the show. –J. Niimi
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cTHURSTON MOORE, JIM BAKER, ROLLO RADFORD, AND AVREEAYL RA On Saturday and Sunday the Hyde Park Art Center will host a symposium connected to its exhibit of ephemera from Sun Ra’s sojourn in Chicago, where panelists will consider the cultural import of his work, but the odd hybrid lineup of the quartet put together to kick off the weekend says as much as any lecturer could about his influence on the world of music. Bassist Rollo Radford and drummer Avreeayl Ra, veterans of Sun Ra’s Arkestra in one or more of its many incarnations, have worked in innumerable jazz ensembles both straight-ahead and avant-garde; keyboardist Jim Baker has played hundreds of free-improv gigs, as well as with acts as diverse as Freakwater, Nicholas Tremulis, and Ken Vandermark’s Territory Band; and of course guitarist Thurston Moore is in Sonic Youth. This concert will be totally improvised, so don’t expect to hear any tunes you recognize, not from Space Is the Place or Daydream Nation. But the rhythm section knows the Arkestra’s peculiarly clunky big-band swing and blistering free-jazz broadsides, Baker’s ARP synth echoes the grainy ray-gun tonalities of Ra’s more interstellar moments, and Moore’s harsh and hallucinatory feedback guitar, also heard in noise outfits like the Diskaholics, is sure to scatter sparks–the sounds of outer space are definitely within this group’s grasp. My Barbarian opens and the Intergalactic Myth-Science DJs spin throughout, including during a screening of rarely seen silent footage of the Arkestra shot in France in 1970. a 9 PM, Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia, 773-227-4433 or 866-468-3401, $20. –Bill Meyer
cROBERT POLLARD You might expect the title of Robert Pollard’s second post-GBV studio album, Normal Happiness (Merge), to be at least a little ironic. But he actually plays its 16 songs completely straight, sounding giddy as a teenager hopped up on Red Bull and hormones, spazzing out to the Raspberries in front of a mirror. There’s no middle-aged, been-around-the-block self-consciousness to the songs, even when he’s plumbing piano-driven country blues on “Serious Bird Woman (You Turn Me On)” or darkly pouting on “Give Up the Grape.” I’ve often wondered if he considers the depth of his songbook and gets overwhelmed when he puts a set list together, but now I wonder if he’s worried about what that task will be like in ten years. Judging by the freshness and energy of the record, it seems like retirement, or even winding down, is a long way off. Nassau opens. a 10 PM, Abbey Pub, 3420 W. Grace, 773-478-4408 or 866-468-3401, $20. –Monica Kendrick
a 7 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport, 773-525-2508,
On his most recent CD, last year’s No Earthly Man (Drag City), Glaswegian singer-guitarist ALASDAIR ROBERTS dug deep into traditional British folk, putting his own spin on eight darkly gorgeous murder ballads. He’s back to playing originals on his forthcoming The Amber Gatherers (out in January on Drag City), but the songs have the crystalline beauty of age-old music. On most of the songs he’s joined by a nimble electric trio that includes Teenage Fanclub bassist Gerard Love, but the band doesn’t diminish the lovely, delicate quality of Roberts’s delivery. Loads of contemporary hippies like to blather about their favorite private-press folk records from the early 70s, but Roberts is more than just talk–he demonstrates his knowledge of and connection to tradition and makes it his own. –Peter Margasak
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