Friday 24
Saturday 25
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CURT KIRKWOOD The Meat Puppets staked out their turf a quarter century ago, playing meditative sunbaked underground rock for punks who wanted to like Neil Young & Crazy Horse but hadn’t completely gotten over their hatred of hippiedom. Snow (Little Dog), Curt Kirkwood’s first solo album, sounds like the band’s messier, slicker 90s period never happened–his languorous sense of pacing meshes with a real delicacy in the songwriting and playing on guitar and pedal steel. On its more shining moments you might mistake the album for the work of a young man who hasn’t gotten cynical about music yet, but it’s actually something better than that: the work of a mature man who’s outgrown his jadedness. Casey Meehan opens. 10 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport, 773-525-2508, $8 in advance, $10 at the door. –Monica Kendrick
WOLF EYES, KEVIN DRUMM They used to be almost funny years ago, in a making-things-up-as-they-went sort of way, but WOLF EYES keep getting darker as they age. And I don’t mean gothier or more macabre–I mean actually seriously fucking scary, like they’re on a greased-rails descent into a bloody, hallucinogenic Hermann Nitschian theater of ritual sacrifice. As usual they’ve been putting out superlimited releases at a ridiculous rate on labels they run themselves–including a square seven-inch on AA Records with the grooves cut by hand on their own vinyl lathe–but the most recent disc you’ve got a prayer of finding anywhere is still 2004’s Burned Mind (on Sub Pop, oddly enough), which sounds like something you buried in your backyard that’s been resurrected with black magic. The album’s full of throat-shredding vocals, thudding beats that are half evil throb and half drum track, and desperate, piercing electronic screeches, like the sound of a huge rusty gate swinging open–and what’s outside is a vast stretch of dark rumbling clouds vomiting rivers of lava. Their pestilent-earth noise is beyond abrasive–it’s physically sickening. Even better than a match put out in your eye. –Liz Armstrong
MAVERICK ENSEMBLE One of the most accomplished classical outfits in the city, the Maverick Ensemble is dedicated to promoting contemporary work from around the globe; at this show it’ll pay tribute to Chilean poet Gabriela Mistral, who won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1945, by performing pieces written by a who’s who of Chicago-based Latin American composers. Among those represented are jazz guitarist Fareed Haque, who’s of Chilean and Pakistani descent, Uruguayan Elbio Barilari, whose work is steeped in tango, Argentinean reedist and improviser Guillermo Gregorio, and acclaimed Brazilian classical guitarist Sergio Assad. Actresses Rosario Vargas and Marcela Munoz will also read from Mistral’s work. 3 PM, Preston Bradley Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington, 312-744-6630. Free. All ages. –Peter Margasak
Tuesday 28
KISS ME DEADLY Misty Medley (Alien8) is the first full-length from Montreal quatuor Kiss Me Deadly, which according to its label began as an “emo/math rock” group. Somewhere along the line they were bitten by the BPMs and decided you can’t really cut loose when you’ve got both arithmetic problems and sexual-identity problems to work out. So now they’ve arrived at a fairly enticing (and much more straightforward) electro-rock sound–the album recalls the moment when New Order realized it had changed from a rock band with electronic equipment to an electronic band with human equipment. The band alternates male and female lead vocals; when Emily Elizabeth sings she often punctuates whatever needs punctuating with an amusical screech, which gets annoying quick, but elsewhere (as on “Dance 1”) her breathy, overheated drawl conjures up a Missing Persons vibe. (And when the dude sings? Duller than a food court in Hamilton, Ontario.) Regardless of whether they’re leaning on the electro or the wood and wire, almost all their songs (particularly “Dance 2” and “Pop”) have a wicked momentum, which whisks you through the unsavory parts like a bodyguard. Film School headlines and Lying in States opens. 9 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport, 773-525-2508, $10. –J. Niimi
