By Todd Lavoie

Bowler hats, banjos, backwoods hollers, and burlesque hawkers - sounds like old-timey goodness to me. San Diego's mountain music-loving vaudeville-revivalists the Silent Comedy will be dishing out sepia-toned balladry and carny-shouted hootenannies to the Café du Nord crowd Friday, Nov. 21.

It should be one hell of a rompin'-stompin', suspender-slappin' shindig. Whether or not the band will share their homebrewed bathtub-gin onstage remains to be seen, but they're certain to be generous with everything else you might need for a round or two of Prohibition-era revelry. OK, the bathtub-gin thing is pure speculation on my part; what else could possibly be fueling their deliciously unbridled rip-ups?

The quintet, formed in 2005 by brothers J. John and J. Benjamin from the remnants of their San Diego post-punk band Dehra Dun, is rooted in acoustic-based roots music - banjo, mandolin, and violin figure prominently - but indie rock has clearly played a significant role in shaping how they approach country and folk idioms.

Continue reading "Sounding out on the Silent Comedy's backwoods indie rock" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:36 AM | Comments (0)

By Louis Peitzman

Don't let the name fool you: MC Frontalot is serious about rapping. He just does it a bit differently than most other hip-hop artists.

Frontalot (real name: Damian Hess) has been called "the godfather of nerdcore" for his role in establishing a genre where it's cool to be uncool. He raps about everything from Internet porn to Magic: the Gathering - exposing nerds to hip-hop culture, and vice versa. Along with his band, he's the subject of the documentary Nerdcore Rising, currently screening in select theaters. In a phone interview, I chatted with Hess about the film and the direction nerdcore is taking. He performs at the Uptown Night Club tonight.

SFBG: My first question is about the name - is it ironic, or do you feel as though you actually front?

Damian Hess: I mean, I picked it out originally because I thought there'd be no other rapper who would want to steal that from me. Because rappers generally eschew fronting and, you know, try to convince everyone that they're not fronting at all.

Continue reading "'Nerdcore Rising': MC Frontalot spills the geek" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 11:00 AM | Comments (0)

This in from Jello Biafra's people:

"Cobb's Comedy Club will host a taping of VBS.tv's Soft Focus with Ian Svenonius. Svenonius will interview Jello Biafra as well as Alan and Richard Bishop of the Sun City Girls in front of a live audience. The taping is free and open to the public. You must RSVP with your name and e-mail address at www.viceland.com/softfocussf."

SOFT FOCUS
With host Ian Svenonius featuring interviews with Richard and Alan Bishop and Jello Biafra
Wed/19, 6:30 p.m.
Cobb's Comedy Club
915 Columbus, SF
Space is limited; RSVP at www.viceland.com/softfocussf

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:17 AM | Comments (0)

By Brandon Bussolini

It would be hard to take someone seriously if they told you they were addicted to music. The notion of addiction might have more purchase for books or movies, but listening to music compulsively seems like a given for this generation. Music "helps" - in the broadest sense of that word: it can be restorative or push you into productive discomfort, and can help articulate feelings that might not get very far on language alone.

It’s easy to listen to Love Is All’s new album, A Hundred Things Keep Me up at Night (What’s Your Rupture), like water, two times a day easy, on the bus trying to calm down. With each listen, the disc becomes less like a collection of songs and more like a collection of vignettes, ones that seem to capture something important about what it feels like to be in the midst of your second adolescence.

Vocalist Josephine Olausson knows how to throw a good tantrum, but even amid the more blown-out sentiments of “Give It Back,” her delivery is so much more than merely spiteful as she delivers the lines: “All the love I gave you, give it back / Every time I praised you, I’m keeping track / Every minute on the phone / It was only cos I felt so alone.”

Continue reading "Another punk: Love Is All has a lot of feelings" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 07:58 AM | Comments (0)

Neon beat: Mi Ami live. Photo courtesy of the band's MySpace page.

This in from Quarterstick Records:

"Quarterstick Records, Touch and Go's partner label for the last 17-plus years, is pleased to welcome San Francisco drum punk trio Mi Ami to the fold. Featuring two key members of Dischord's hyper-percussive Black Eyes (Daniel Martin-McCormick on vocals and guitar and Jacob Long on bass) as well as Damon Palermo on drums, Mi Ami builds on the promise of Black Eyes' spastic energy and renowned live performances, but steers it into a more focused, volatile, and personal direction.

"Mi Ami's first single on Quarterstick, "Echononecho," will be released as a 12-inch and digitally Jan. 27, 2009, with the follow-up full-length, Watersports, out Feb. 17, 2009. The band fully takes flight and thrives in the live setting, with shows turning into all-out pulsating rhythmic throwdowns, so save up some energy and be sure to catch them on their extensive tours throughout 2009."

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 12:30 PM | Comments (0)

Old-school ballin': the Breeders' "Cannonball."

Ah, Kim Deal - how down-to-earth cool can you be? Here's more from the Breeders leader and Pixies bassist - we talked on Obama... I mean, election day. For the first part of this interview, see this week's Sonic Reducer.

SFBG: Hi, Kim.

Kim Deal: Hi, Kim. Beautiful name.

SFBG: How's it going?

KD: Good, I'm in Dayton, Ohio. I went and voted today so I'm a little tired. I got up to pee at 7 in the morning and I thought, aaah, I should just go and vote now and I did.

Wholly unholy: the Breeders' "Saints."

Continue reading "The Breeders' Kim Deal on ATP, 'Milk,' pop, voting, and more" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 08:33 AM | Comments (0)

By Marke B.

It occurs to me -- your nightlife numbskull, your good-times guide -- that my Super Ego column this week and its bloggy follow-up, which focussed on some of my fave queer clubs, was a tad phallocentric. Dykes are HOTTT! Including the invisible ones. Here's an especially lovely lesbian hoedown coming up, with more dyke nightlife delights to come.

Diamond Daggers Disco Thanksgiving

The enormously talented and flexible all-queer-women burlesque troop Diamond Daggers blew naughty minds at the Castro Street Fair and have been perfoming monthly at Fat City lately. Who can deny their death-defying feats of daring dykeness? Not me. This time around, on Sat Nov. 22, they're presenting a "Disco Thanksgiving" for all you polyester turkeys stuffed with shards of mirror ball and platform giblets.

Oh yes, there's an especially all-star lineup for this one as well: dark god Vinsantos, "princess of pork" drag superstar Glamamore, fabulously nimble SF Boylesque troupe, local cabaret starlet and "Oakland's Chocolate Kisses of Burlesque" Alotta Boutte, drag king singer Leigh Crow aka Elvis Herselvis, and many, many more than listable in this infinite webspace. The disco part will be provided by girl-about-town DJ Campbell and the mysterious C’est Jille. C'est chic! Let's freak!

Diamond Daggers Disco Thanksgiving
Sat/22, doors 9pm, show 10:30pm
$12-$20 sliding scale
Fat City
314 11th St., SF.
www.myspace.com/DiamondDaggersBurlesque

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Posted by Marke B. at 02:29 PM | Comments (0)

All the rage, all onstage: Girl Talk at the Fillmore. All photos by Lisa Weiss.

By Michelle Broder Van Dyke

We met up with Girl Talk, ne Gregg Gillis, before his second sold-out performance at the Fillmore on Oct. 28. We’d later witness him rising into the audience as he abandoned his Saran-wrapped laptop, plunged off the stage, and crowd surfed above sweaty bouncy bodies. He was followed by an entourage of party-throwers dressed in shirts adorned with glow sticks. If you must speak only one truth about Girl Talk, you must say that he breaks the mold of arms-crossed hipster shows and gets people pumped and partying. He also recommends throwing parties with babies.

SFBG: What did you do differently in preparing the Night Ripper vs. Feed the Animals?

Girl Talk: I think on the new one I had a lot more music prepared beforehand, and I had played a lot more shows. After Night Ripper’s release, I started playing a ton of shows, and the way I try out material is in the live setting. If I don’t have shows for a month, I might relax and not work that hard. But over the two years between [the albums] I played close to 100 shows, which is kinda like constantly working on stuff. I think even approaching Feed the Animals I had a lot more ideas set, so I could pick and pull. So I didn’t have to use everything.

Continue reading "Partying with Girl Talk the second time around" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:54 AM | Comments (0)

Built like a brick house: Impossible Shapes' "Let the People Build What They Will."

O, SF - as if you could ever stop rolling out the intriguing jamz. Here are a few more musical offerings that didn't make it into print.

LOS CENZONTLES
"The Mockingbirds" do it up in the Bay again - with Los Lobos' David Hidalgo - after flying through for Hardly Strictly Bluegrass. Wed/12, 8 and 10 p.m., $20-$30. Yoshi's, 510 Embarcadero W., Oakl. (510) 238-9200.

Continue reading "Sonic Reducer Overage: Usher, Tune-yards, Impossible Shapes, Weasel Walter, Nodzzz, Sean Smith, and more" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 01:02 PM | Comments (0)

Dead Man
Euphoria
(Crusher)

By Will York

The second album by Swedish quartet Dead Man, **Euphoria,** is an unapologetic throwback to the turn of the 1970s - specifically, the transition from ‘60s folk- and psyche-rock to the more sinister hard-rock and proto-metal sounds that would follow. Most of the album is poised right on that brink, and its 11 songs bring to mind everything from early Pink Floyd and Donovan (in his more tolerable moments) to Peter Frampton-era Humble Pie to the softer side of Led Zep or Black Sabbath (think “Planet Caravan”). Impressively, they do so without making me feel like I need to check myself into rehab.

Yes, you can almost smell your burnout uncle’s musty LP collection while listening to this disc, but the songwriting and arrangements are really well done, and the headphone-ready production captures it all with a warmth that’s increasingly rare in this era of Pro Tools.

Continue reading "Dead Man conjure the sounds and scents of your burnout uncle's LP collection" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 08:27 AM | Comments (0)

This is in from Merle Haggard's people:

"Merle Haggard arrived home five days after having lung surgery in a Bakersfield hospital last Monday morning, Nov. 3. It was discovered during a previous biopsy that he had non-small cell lung cancer, which has a far better cure rate than the small (oat) cell cancer. At this time, tests show that they were able to eliminate the affected tissue when they removed the upper lobe of his right lung. Upon waking up after the surgery, Hag opened his eyes, yodeled and smiled. Haggard’s post-operation progress was so rapid and successful he was discharged on Saturday night, Nov. 8.

“'Due to the surgeon, Dr. Peck, the Tylenol pushers on the fourth floor of the Memorial Hospital, and most of all, my wife Theresa, I’m feeling good…better and better each day,' says Haggard. 'If not for the love and wisdom of my wife, I might not be around today.'

"Haggard adds, 'I’d sure like to know who controls the largest shares of Tylenol. God forbid it be the oil companies!'

"Mr. Haggard and his family are respectfully asking for privacy at this time. Your prayers and good thoughts would be very much appreciated."

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 04:01 PM | Comments (0)

In this week's Super Ego clubs column, I feature some truly cutting edge homosexual dance parties to wiggle your Prop 8 blues away at. Of course, there wasn't room for all of them -- here's a couple more, with more to come, to whet your limp-wrist whistle.

To get us going, here's the brand-spankin'-new vid for "Tweaker Bitch" by SF's very own rockin' crazies Mon Cousin Belge (one of our 2008 Hot Pink List queers we love). Tweak it, Tina!

---------
All aboard for Booty

What's better than a club hosted by wild personalities that drags you into a phenomenally, artistically decorated back room to snap your photo? One that comes out with it's own freakin' calendar. Yes, I'm talking about Booty Call, Juanita More and Joshua J.'s packed weekly Wednesday night affair at the haplessly-named Bar on Castro.

This Wednesday is Booty Call's first anniversary, and they've just released their 2009 calendar, featuring hot More Boys (and one girl) photographed by the ever-cute Brandon Norris, which you can purchase here.

Booty Call Wednesdays
9pm, free
Bar on Castro
456 Castro, SF.

But wait -- there's more!

Continue reading "Clubs: Bitch, B*tch, Booty Call" »

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Posted by Marke B. at 02:52 PM | Comments (0)

CASTANETS
City of Refuge
(Asthmatic Kitty)

By Todd Lavoie

I've never been to Overton, Nevada - the tiny desert nowhere situated about an hour's drive northeast of Las Vegas - and frankly, I doubt I ever will. It sounds like a blink-and-you'd-miss-it sort of place. Unincorporated and without a single stoplight, Overton probably doesn't want any visitors, anyway.

Still, despite the town's lack of obvious welcome signs along the road, Castanets mastermind Ray Raposa decided that this was the perfect spot to plunk down his roots for a few weeks to record his fourth album, City of Refuge. While driving through town, he must have felt the tug of silence, of complete isolation, and found it too tough to resist - thus temporarily placing his road trip on hiatus, Raposa holed up in a room in a mom-and-pop motel and set out to capture the unforgiving Southwestern landscape in song.

It was an idea which he had been tossing around prior to encountering Overton, but everything began to gel once he'd set up camp in this scrap-of-humanity no one ever visits. He'd found his muse, as unlikely and foreboding as it might be to the rest of us. Having listened rather intently to the latest Castanets offering, I would venture to say that Raposa didn't merely capture the desert - the desert seems to have captured him as well. Stark, bleak, and jittering from a hushed, teeth-clenched tension from start to finish, City of Refuge is a gripping dispatch from the wobbling point between solitude and madness.

Continue reading "Seeking 'Refuge' in Castanets" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 02:44 AM | Comments (0)

By Jen Snyder

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Sound advice and the name of the game for Eric Mueller, 27, who founded Pirates Press, a San Francisco vinyl record brokerage company, in 2005. Coasting on the rise - and fall - of the CD and the renewed popularity of vinyl, Pirates Press has brought in more than $5 million in sales this year.

The walls of Pirates Press' SOMA office are coated with candy-colored singles and full-lengths - some with pictures, others with etchings. Some of these albums are as much visual art as they are musical art.
“Jocks collect baseball cards and nerds collect records," explains Mueller, trying to make sense of the variety. "A lot of people collect something. For those people vinyl is great.”

It’s amazing to me that in a world where an album is just one click away, record manufacturing is doing so well. I love records for the way they look on my shelf, the smell of the jacket, and the pop and hiss of the needle, but in an iPod world is that enough to keep a so-called dead product alive?

Continue reading "Arrr, SF's Pirates Press in the spyglass" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:10 AM | Comments (0)

By Chloe Schildhause

You can’t help but love Natalie Portman’s Shaved Head based on the sheer genius of their name. When I first read of NPSH last spring in Dazed and Confused, I knew I had to hear them. Thankfully the band's sound is as fun as its name.

The group - composed of four June babies, Luke Smith, Shaun Libman, David Price, Liam Downey Jr., and Claire England - released their self-released debut, Glistening Pleasures, this summer. But they’ve been performing and developing a following since 2005.

I talked with England via phone about NPSH’s evolution. “I set up the first show for these guys before I was even in the band” she said. The combo’s first performance was for 826 Seattle.

Continue reading "Hair they come: Natalie Portman's Shaved Head" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 08:54 AM | Comments (0)

By Chloe Schildhause

LA's Jeremy Jay has been preparing for his San Francisco performance at the Rickshaw Stop this Thursday, Nov. 6, by relaxing in Paris.

After his European Tour, Jay decided to stay a little bit longer in what he calls “one of the best cities in the world.” He was in the City of Light when we spoke by phone. “I will be also living in Paris starting Jan. 1," he said. "I already have a flat here, too. I love it here in Paris.” This month he reluctantly returns to the States to perform for his American fan base.

Jay’s deep voice perfectly accents the slow rhythms of his music. He sings of slow dancing, wearing blue fur coats in Aspen, and heavenly creatures who cast “their tracks in wet cement ground.” "Slow Dance" is Jay’s personal favorite off his new LP, which comes out in March ’09. The tune could totally fit into The Labyrinth: Jay’s dramatic singing wafts alongside '80s-vibe piano scales. The tune is ultra-mystical.

Continue reading "Jet-setting with Jeremy Jay" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 03:37 PM | Comments (0)

From my old neighborhood in Detroit, heh. I'll break this out tomorrow, oh, around 7:30pm probably ...

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Posted by Marke B. at 01:31 PM | Comments (1)

By Michelle Broder Van Dyke

Like the pitter-patter of raindrops heard above, as they strike the roof, and below, as they fall into puddles outside of the comfortable protection of your apartment, on a typical gray day in San Francisco, Toumani Diabaté’s kora playing on his February release, The Mandé Variations (Nonesuch), creeps and seeps inside, infecting you with its melancholy minor key and uneven intervals while surrounding you with the cozy pleasure of your insulated bedroom and warm flannel sheets.

The kora is a 21-string West African instrument often characterized as what the offspring of a harp and lute might look like. But this depiction dismisses detailing much of the magic and charm of the instrument, which is perhaps beyond description and can be best felt in listening to the mesmerizing stories the instrument tells.

The kora is built from a large calabash, cut in half and covered with cow skin forming a resonator, and it has a notched bridge like a lute. Diabaté uses one thumb to pluck the bassline, while the other plays the core melody, and the two forefingers are for improvisation. The remaining fingers are used to hold the sticks on either side of the strings and to secure the instrument.

Continue reading "Let Toumani Diabaté's kora music reign" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)

By Michelle Broder Van Dyke

Watching Lykke Li bounce her nimble, lithe body, holding her hand to her head, as she warms up before screaming into a megaphone in the “Breaking It Up (Alternate Take)” video reminds me of a simple fact: sex sells. Better yet, cute Swedish girls who exude sexuality sell.

A standard formula we all know, but these days it has got a twist: GAWS majors and hipster boys wearing their sister’s pants reflect a shift in the standard norms of sex stars from the typical Paris Hilton and Christina Aguilera wannabes, and the spectrum has been widened to less conventional icons like Maggie Gyllenhaal and Swedish pop sensation Lykke Li.

Lykke Li dances with a lot of hopping and arm flinging, which makes her resemble a sexier, less crazed, but still spastic Ian Curtis. She stares into the camera as if she’s looking at you, drops her eyes, and even though she’s breaking up with you, you’re already addicted by the time the catchy hook comes.

Easy to do: the official "Breaking It Up."

Continue reading "Dance, dance, dance with Lykke Li - and mixed emotions" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:03 AM | Comments (0)

AXTON KINCAID
Silver Dollars
(Free Dirt/ Trade Root Music Group)
By Todd Lavoie

Bay Area three-part-harmony whizzes Axton Kincaid might no longer remain as geographically close to each other - three-fifths of the band recently relocated to Portland, Ore. - but their musical kinship appears as mighty as ever with their latest release, Silver Dollars.

Dishing out 11 barnburners, honky-tonk stompers, and beer-sobbers over the course of 35 minutes, these folks are the real deal: genuine, heartfelt, and pleasantly irony-free. While some of the younger, urban exponents of rootsy sounds tend to approach country, folk, and bluegrass idioms with a bit of emotional distance, Axton Kincaid feel closer to the source - not to mention more reverential to the material which inspired them in the first place.

Many months ago, I’d described the band as an updated Carter Family. The assessment still rings true, but I’d also stick them in the same class as the Be Good Tanyas, Freakwater, or the Walkabouts, all of whom display an obvious love for classic twang while still bringing a little contemporary attitude along the way.

Continue reading "Axton Kincaid gets close to the source with their new release" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:49 AM | Comments (0)