The story: Oasis play "Morning Glory" at Oracle Arena, Oakland.

As I enjoyed the tasteful production design of Oasis' Dec. 3 show and wondered just how many trucks they had parked in the lot, Prof. Fluffy turned to me and yelled, "I'm scared of the singer. He looks like he wants to jump off the stage and poke someone in the eye."

Perhaps it was the way the black-shirted Liam Gallagher was holding his tambourine at the opening of their not-quite-sold-out Oracle Arena show - posing like a statue at the front of the stage with the offending instrument between his teeth. He resembled a skinhead terrier.

He had a right to be proud: solid playing from the band - though they seemed a mite disengaged, likely, due to the audience, who were subdued next to their European fans. The majority of the football-like chanting came from the English- and Irish-accented crew behind me. They marveled that they were able to get such good seats so close to the date of the show.

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 08:53 AM | Comments (0)

By Marke B.

A sad week -- possibly, see below -- for queer punks and their admirers: beloved monthly Trans Am, which has torn up the floor of Club 8 (and confused quite a few Korean tourists expecting a campy tranny floorshow) for two whole years is calling it quits. Dangit!

The mad punk spirit will live on at weekly dragtastrophe Charlie Horse and Trans Am promoters Bill Picture and DJ Dirty Knees's other monthly joint Chrome, but Trans Am booked a ton of live talent that wouldn't have gotten as much exposure without them. Plus, there were always a few hot boys.

I asked Picture about the club's tearjerking demise and plans for the future (drag ball!). His comments after the jump:

Continue reading "Super Ego: Trans Am effs off" »

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Posted by SFBG at 08:25 PM | Comments (0)

So sad - and the folksinger legend was just in SF for Hardly Strictly Bluegrass! Here's a link to the Associated Press announcement.

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 04:48 PM | Comments (0)

By Kimberly Chun

Jack White and company push forward with their passion for American roots music with this video collaboration - a rework of the Raconteurs' single, "Old Enough," shot by rock photographer Autumn de Wilde - alongside longtime bluegrass revivalist Ricky Skaggs and country vocalist Ashley Monroe.

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 03:31 PM | Comments (0)

By Daniel N. Alvarez

Part of a continuing series: Britpop Faves.

When Pulp, the perpetual Britpop outsiders, went into the studio to follow up their first taste of commercial success, the Gold-certified His 'n' Hers (Island, 1994), few would have guessed the unassuming quintet would craft a groundbreaking album that would transcend the Britpop scene, while also creating a recording that was quintessentially British.



While Different Class (PolyGram/Island, 1995) contains the same new wave/glam hybrid of His 'n' Hers, it surpasses their previous effort due to frontperson Jarvis Cocker's development into the most compelling, perceptive figure in rock music at the time. The full-length sees Cocker, a cross between Robert Smith and Morrissey with a keen understanding of sociology, come into his own as a songwriter, weaving tales of sex, drugs, and the rigid, enduring class system that has afflicted England for centuries. Though many UK bands played with the class system (the Verve, the Happy Mondays), none of them investigated it - and rallied against it - like Cocker.


For the love of...: Pulp's "Common People."

Continue reading "Britpop Faves: Pulp pulverized" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 11:09 AM | Comments (0)

Say hello to my little invisible friend: Los Amigos Invisibles' "Cuchi Cuchi."

Ask and the city provides - good times and solid sounds for all. Here's the good schtuff that didn't make it to print.

WU-TANG CLAN
The Wu is with you - though RZA and Ghostface Killah were MIA when the group last played Ess Ef. Wed/3, 8 p.m., $45. Grand Ballroom at Regency Center, Van Ness and Sutter, SF. (415) 421-8497.

LOS AMIGOS INVISIBLES
This year the Venezuela group impressed at Outside Lands and threw out its first live DVD - and a new studio album is said to be in post-production. With Funky-C and DJ Felina. Thurs/4, 9 p.m., $22. Independent, 628 Divisadero, SF. (415) 771-1421.

Continue reading "Sonic Reducer Overage: Mixmaster Mike, Los Amigos Invisibles, Wu-Tang Clan, Morning Benders, and more" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 11:22 PM | Comments (0)

WILD BEASTS
Limbo, Panto
(Domino)

By Todd Lavoie

I find myself flirting with hyperbole when I ponder the preening, careening chaos that is Limbo, Panto, the debut from Leeds, England's elegantly lurid Wild Beasts - and I fear I may give in.

Hearing the disc for the first time was a bit of a blindsiding experience, and successive listens have confirmed for me what I'd felt on that initial spin: these guys are clearly out on their own, hurling every idea in their lusty little hearts up against the wall, eager to see which ones stick. Mercifully, nearly every one of the quartet's fits of whimsy does stick - many of them, in fact, do so with spectacular results.

Continue reading "Wild Beasts roar amid a tempestuous rush of ideas" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 08:58 AM | Comments (0)

By Chloe Schildhause

So many things in this world are disgusting yet delightful at the same time. For some that may be sniffing the smell of gasoline, hearing the sound of a squeaky chair, or watching someone undergo intensive surgery. Such is the case with rap artist Mickey Avalon, whose creepy look - which combines Marilyn Manson, Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow, and a character from a John Waters film - is simultaneously repellent and adorable.

I caught Avalon's Nov. 20 show at Slim's, the second show of a two-night stand, and got a taste of his lyrical genius as well as his performance style. The stage was set up to look like a sketchy dark alley with a wire fence, parking meters, a trash receptacle, and a bench tagged with the words "Mickey Avalon" and fit well with Avalon's rhymes about friends who’ve died from lead poisoning and how the performer himself must "spend another day waiting to die.”

Continue reading "Kosher salami: Mickey Avalon at Slim's" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 10:31 AM | Comments (0)

Matt Pond PA has a new free EP available for download. From the band's peeps and site:

"We took ourselves captive, and became our own producers, manufacturers, and distributors. It was a deferential revolt against inertia, a clearing of the throat to answer the quiet. Or maybe it was an inevitable reaction to seeing Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.

Continue reading "Matt Pond PA unleashes 'The Freeep" - and plenty of thoughts to boot" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 09:18 AM | Comments (0)

Change Nation: Lyrics Born's "I Changed My Mind."

You're gonna be stuffed, you're going to be stressed, you're going to be tired of watching football... Then, you'll want to go out - and be among kindred spirits fleeing family and taking refuge in solid sounds.

LYRICS BORN
You like him, you love him. The Bay MC ushers in the holidaze. With Raashan Ahmad and Mavrik. Wed/26, 9 p.m., $25. Independent, 628 Divisadero, SF. (415) 771-1422.

SISTERS OF MERCY
The band that launched a jillion black dye jobs hasn't released new material since 1993. Wed/26, 8 p.m., $35. Warfield, 982 Market, SF. (415) 421-8497.

Continue reading "Sonic Reducer Overage: Lyrics Born, M83, Herbaliser, and more" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 11:13 AM | Comments (0)

By Daniel N. Alvarez

It’s ironic that an old jazz club is one of the best places to hear rock in San Francisco. The first time that I saw a show at Bimbo’s 365 Club, I wasn’t sure I was in the right place. The venue’s plush furnishings, swanky tables, and clean, classy vibe didn’t seem to mesh well with the youngish, generally scruffy jackanapes who seemed belong at the slightly dingier confines of Thee Parkside or Annie’s Social Club.

Then Jens Lekman took the stage, and it all made sense. Bimbo’s is a great rock club, because the sound is absolutely excellent. For that reason, I was over the moon to learn that indie rock’s most fun, musically progressive band, Minus the Bear, would be gracing the stage. When a band has as many intersecting, versatile melodies as they do, sound quality is paramount.

Continue reading "Minus the Bear's masterful musicianship, angular riffs impress" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 10:12 PM | Comments (1)

Put up your ukes: Tune-yards. All photos by Jen Snyder.

By Jen Snyder

The only thing I really knew about music from Vermont before Saturday was Phish, which naturally threw a big, damp drug rug over my entire interest in seeking out and discovering new jams from the state. But about a month ago, I found out that Citay (the Guardian’s triumphant Goldie winner) was going to be playing at Amnesia with a band called Tune-yards, hailing from Vermont. A Citay band member promised, “No joke at all - this is the best music I've heard and seen in years and years. I shit you not.”

I was somewhat conflicted at first, but a post-election, Obama-esque change-is–possible wave swept over me and I decided to not judge a state I had never been to, and to check it out.

Tune-yards, which had never previously played in San Francisco, did not disappoint. The project, which consists solely of Merril Garbus and her excellent digital voice recorder, was consistently intriguing. Garbus is very self-sufficient: she loops her own vocals, drums, and chanting over what looked like a cross between a children’s fake guitar and a ukulele.

Continue reading "Getting into Tune-yards at Amnesia" »

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Posted by Kimberly Chun at 10:20 AM | Comments (3)

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)