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Four Shows: Neon Spandex and Hair Metal Redux, Thurston Moore & John Zorn’s Dream Team

(Flyer via Union Pool/ Facebook)

(Flyer via Union Pool/ Facebook)

Ereptile Destruction, Growler, Shitkill
Tuesday November 22, 9 pm at Union Pool: $8

Once in a while, it helps to forget everything that’s happened to metal since nu metal hit, and take a trip back to our roots. Growler, a Brooklyn-based act that describes itself simply as “hard and loud” helps get us there, mainly by defying the trend toward increasingly humorless, doomed and/or blackened what-have-you. Lately, it feels like we’re so chin-deep in sludgy muck that it’s easy to forget where we started. Growler’s throwback sound plops us back in the early ’80s, with their high-pitched, falsetto, bordering on operatic vocals that recall Iron Maiden and Judas Priest.

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When You Shotgun a Beer and Set Off an Alt-Right Hate Storm

(Screen grab from video by Contessa Stuto)

(Screen grab from video by Contessa Stuto)

The video shows Contessa Stuto pretty much topless in the middle of an Election Night party on the Bowery, with a submissive dog-girl yipping wildly at her feet. According to the musician and founder of the Cunt Mafia record and fashion label, there was nothing too crazy about this. “That’s just me in the club anyway,” she explained. 
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Four Shows: Drown in Sound if Feeling Down, or Just Say Cheers to a Jolly End

(Flyer via Alphaville)

(Flyer via Alphaville)

Video Daughters, Quin Galavis, 2;Frail, Drome
Wednesday November 16, 8 pm at Alphaville: $8

The good people at Alphaville haven’t been mincing words about their views on the election, that’s for sure. Actions, of course, scream louder than words, but music, also, is technically much louder than chatter. Thankfully, there’s the grinding, cathartic freakout music of Video Daughters to help bridge the gap. See them in person and it might just be the energy jolt that so many of us so badly need to pull ourselves out of this Trump Slump before we’re sucked down further than our current near-hopeless position of in-chin-deep.

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Week in Sound: Alphaville Turns Two, The Julie Ruin, and More

(Flyer via Mutual Crush)

(Flyer via Mutual Crush)

Mutual Crush VII: Mzungu, Drunken Sufis, Amar
Wednesday November 11, 8 pm at Elvis Guesthouse: free

Ongoing live music series Mutual Crush returns with a show that “focuses heavily on noise/ambient music,” and a reminder that such sounds tend to “evoke a meditative reaction in the listener”– lord knows that’s just the ticket to sliding back into some semblance of normalcy after all this election garbage crap.

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Killer Shows: UFO Landing, Taking Back the ‘Demon’ Inspired by Michael Brown Case

(Flyer via AdHoc)

(Flyer via AdHoc)

Trash Talk, Antwon, Black Noise
Tuesday November 1, 8 pm to 11:30 pm at Brooklyn Bazaar: $15

Here’s to hoping you made it to Aviv Monday night for the grand finale. Super sad face. Actually, the last show was more of a bittersweet bye-bye for the DIY venue since the owners have promised a triumphant return ASAP, just as soon as they find a new space. RIP for now BBs, see you on the other side and all that.

Until then, we’re facing seriously slim pickins when it comes to decent venues that don’t require you to check your soul at the door in exchange to watch your favorite bands transform into blands right before your very eyes.

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Gig Alert: Identity Tripping with Pujol, Testing the Limits of Adorable

(Image via Baby's All Right)

(Image via Baby’s All Right)

Hinds, Cold Fronts, Navy Gangs
Friday October 30, 7 pm at Baby’s All Right: $20

I’m just as averse to the term “girl band” as the next girl, but for some reason I can’t resist calling Hinds, an indie rock outfit rolling into town this week from Madrid, a babe band. Before anyone gets all riled up and loses their breakfast sandwich over the label, remember that “babe” is a gender-neutral term and, secondly, a person can qualify as a babe for a number of reasons.

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Near Future in Film: Lambchop’s Under There and Trumplandia

Yeah, he still doesn't comb his hair (Film still from "Michael Moore Goes to Trumpland")

Yeah, he still doesn’t comb his hair (Film still from “Michael Moore in Trumpland”)

Michael Moore in Trumpland
Monday October 24 through Thursday October 27 at IFC Center: $14

Yeah, yeah we know, Michael Moore is… well, he’s Michael Moore. His particular way of showing outrage feels almost obsolete by now, a bit like a relic of the Bush ere, or worse– like an old white dude who insists on putting himself at the center of his films for some reason that seems to have disintegrated long ago. For his latest film, you might expect that Moore has aimed his camera squarely at “Trumpland” aka underemployed, undereducated white men in flyover America. But that’s not the case at all, actually.

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Help Pinc Louds Go From the Garbage to the Studio (Then Probably Back To the Garbage)

(image courtesy of Pinc Louds)

(image courtesy of Pinc Louds)

Pinc Louds may describe themselves as an “imaginary band,” but the type of imagination to dream such a group up is one that is incredibly memorable. Formed about one year ago, the trio consists of Claudi Ausbury, Ofer Bear, and Rai Mundo, and together they play songs that are a magical, whimsical blend of anti-folk, rock, punk, and something wild and theatrical. Though their rather outlandish and colorful appearance could lead some to see them as just a fun concept, their “hardcore acoustic doowop” music is equally transformative, seamlessly going from kind falsetto ballads to a shrieking, raucous number and back again, all while providing fantastical lyrics, and interesting stories.

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ONWE Pemieres ‘In the City,’ a Video Inspired By Those Period Underwear Ads

You might get the feeling that you’ve already seen ONWE’s music video for “In the City.” But that’s impossible, we assure you, because it’s actually the first peep at the band’s first proper album, David Welles (out November 18 from Seayou Entertainment).

Whether or not you know ONWE from their demo days– when the Bushwick-based band released videos like “JK BB,” or maybe “Unpaid Internship,” (two  tracks that turned some heads in 2014)– there’s something familiar looming in the background.

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Get to Know ‘AfroHouse’ at Rhythm of Afrika, a Diaspora Dance Party Here to Stay

(Flyer via Rhythm of Afrika)

(Flyer via Rhythm of Afrika)

It’s rare when a music trend hits at all levels of the listener spectrum, but right now African music is resonating with everyone from pop junkies and passive, whatever’s-playing-at-the-club consumers to crate-diggers with eclectic collections and torrent combers with multiple hard drives devoted to the most obscure sounds they can find.

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