N3PTUNE – Queen City Sounds and Art

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond March 2023

The Church perform at Gothic Theatre on March 21, 2023, photo by Hugh Stewart

Wednesday | 03.01
What: Vinyl Williams w/Presentable Corpse and Aaron Dooley https://lost-lake.com/event/vinyl-williams-w-presentable-corpse-jorge-elbrecht-aaron-dooley-dj-reed-fox/lost-lake/denver-colorado/
When: 7
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Vinyl Williams is the creative moniker of Lionel Williams based out of Los Angeles whose ethereal “celestial pop” is rooted in a multimedia presentation of the music with the artist often bathed in cinematic, psychedelic visual collage. Opening the show is Presentable Corpse whose lineup will include founder, producer and record mixer of choice in a certain subset of the more hip indie music of recent years Jorge Elbrecht along with Jenna Balfe (Donzii), Bobby Amulet, James Barone (Tennis, Tjutjuna, Beach House) for a unique and certainly unusual performance.

Thursday | 03.02
What: White Reaper w/Militarie Gun and Mamalarky
When: 6:30
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Louisville, Kentucky-based garage punk band White Reaper is touring in support of its 2023 album Asking for a Ride. In addition to its more raw sound showcases the band’s knack for pop hooks without quite crossing over into pop-punk and when it does it’s in the manner of pop-punk as it re-emerged in the 2010s with its emphasis on earnest and vulnerable lyrics in its storytelling. Militarie Gun has been making waves in the modern hardcore scene with its own angular post-punk style akin to the kind of band you’d hear on Dischord in the late 80s and 90s. Mamalarky is a psychedelic pop band whose sound is reminiscent of Deerhoof in its more pop moments and with a similar proclivity for intricate yet playful and loose, layered songwriting.

Thursday | 03.02
What: Paul Cherry w/The Mattson 2 and Donzii
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Paul Cherry’s 2022 album Back on the the Music brings a quirky and whimsical energy to songs about finding fulfillment in the endeavors we think should bring them and in this case art and music but with which we often find out there’s a great deal of quixotic endeavors, repetition, disappointments, mundane necessities, social politics and certainly no guarantee of the traditional trappings of success for your efforts regardless of your talent. Cherry across the albums ten tracks finds glimmerings of hope and the core meaningfulness of the creative life in songs that sound like they wouldn’t be out of place on a weird, feel good comedy from the 80s that was allowed to happen despite its unusual and imaginative script. The Mattson 2 are a surprisingly enjoyable example of what happens when two musicians with jazz chops create chill indie rock like they took in a bit of Beach Fossils and Foxygen and created their own kind of summery vibes. The odd band on this bill is Donzii from Miami who released one of the most focused yet danceable No Wave funk post-punk disco deconstructions of the modern social and political landscape with their new album Fishbowl. Last time Donzii came to Denver was 2021 shortly after shows started happening again and turned the back room at Pon Pon into an inspired performance art zone for the duration of its set. Think Lithics, Pylon and Bush Tetras for touchstones but expect something unusual and ferocious.

Friday | 03.03
What: Otoboke Beaver w/Cheap Perfume
When: 8
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: Otoboke Beaver from Kyoto, Japan takes cultural references, tropes and frustrations and shreds them and reassembles them in a surrealistic yet cathartic bursts of mutant punk rock fury. That this process is set to hypermanic melodies that are undeniably catchy and even infectious is a testament to their deep resonance with anyone that has had to tangle with the alienation of modern hypercapitalism and the way it warps culture and consciousness unless you make a break with it and turn it in on itself the way Otoboke Beaver has done not just with that particular brand of psychological conditioning but also with the baked in misogyny of Japanese and Western culture. But this band makes it seem fun and revolutionary by virtue of making that critique seem exciting. None more so than on its 2022 album Super Champon. It’ll be in good company with the radical yet immediately relatable subject matter and the energy of Colorado Springs punk band Cheap Perfume who mince no words in their deconstruction and dismantling of sexist tropes.

Duck Turnstone in 2023, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 03.03
What: Duck Turnstone album release w/American Culture, Bobby Amulet and Bloodsports
When: 7
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: Duck Turnstone seems to have helped resurrect a 90s indiepop vibe in its songwriting with no apparent connection to that musical world or scene and is celebrating the release of its debut album Duck Tells A Story. Also on the bill are indiepop legends American Culture who lately seem to be exploring far afield of its roots in indiepop and post-punk so who can say what this show will sound like now that Chris Adolf has also been playing with Easy Ease and former lead guitarist Michael Stein had to take a sabbatical. Or has he? You’ll have to go to find out.

Saturday | 03.04
What: Street Fever w/Polly Urethane, Ani Christ and K129
When: 9
Where: Glob
Why: Street Fever has been an acclaimed artist for years from Boise, Idaho for his visually arresting performances and inventive industrial dance style that isn’t really much like anyone else. Polly Urethane always brings an unpredictable element to her performances that completely blur the line between performance art, classical music, art pop and noise. Difficult to say what this show will be like at Glob but there will probably be some element of the confrontational or at least breaking the barrier between performer and audience.

Sunday | 03.05
What: Munly & The Lupercalians w/Ryan Wong & His Country Sounds and Voight
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Jaysun Munley is perhaps best known for his membership in Slim Cessna’s Auto Club. But as an advanced practitioner of unusual folk music he has created a rich body of work under his own name and in various projects including that with The Lupercalians, named after an ancient Roman fertility festival. Imagine if The Wicker Man or Kill List were bands but no one had to die, just the drawing on primal, ancient folk imagery that perhaps goes beyond the Americana mythology invoked by the Auto Club. This will be the debut performance of Supreme Joy’s Ryan Wong & His Country Sounds. Voight will probably confuse people with their mashup of noisy shoegaze and techno and the show will be all the better for it.

Tuesday | 03.07
What: PUP & Joyce Manor w/Pool Kids
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: If you were to pick two bands that really helped put pop-punk back into vogue in the underground but in a way that wasn’t corny but retained all the fun and anthemic music with words that come right from the heart with actual persona insight, PUP and Joyce Manor both really helped to pave that road. PUP’s 2022 album, The Unraveling of PUPTheBand was so self-aware it was almost a try hard gimmick but PUP made the concept work and offered a new vista for bands to creatively work earnestness and self-deprecating humor into songwriting without feeling like a retread of what has already been way beyond done. Joyce Manor’s own 2022 record 40 oz. To Fresno is a succinct modern power pop classic that begins with a cover of O.M.D.’s “Souvenir” and then cuts to the chase with a distilled run of songs that waste no time in delivering with great energy poignant sentiments and incredible economy of songwriting.

Wednesday | 03.08
What: Chiiild w/Isaiah Huron
When: 7
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: Yonatan Ayal aka Chiiild is touring in support of his new record Better Luck in the Next Life. Early singles from the record solidify Ayal’s reputation for genre bending pop songcraft. His vocal processing borders on the realm of hyperpop at times but that serves to reinforce a sense of hazy introspection that seems to run through the album. There is a great sense of space one hears in the music like you’re invited into Ayal’s private space to contemplate and feel the moods as gentle percussion and sweeps of textural atmospherics swirl and spare guitar melodies trace the songwriter’s soulful singing.

Saturday | 03.11
What: King Tuff w/Tchotchke and The Savage Blush
When: 8
Where: Globe Hall
Why: King Tuff is the creaive moniker of Kyle Thomas who has established himself as an artist whose imaginative and eclectic songwriting has evolved over the course of several imaginative albums. His style might be traced to some roots in psychedelic and garage rock but what shines in his recorded output and performances is Thomas’ craft as a storyteller whose lyrics illuminate aspects of American life and culture through the lens of his own experiences and their grounding details. With his latest record Smalltown Stardust, Thomas reflects on the small town life hailing from Brattleboro, Vermont that shaped him and drawing on warm memories to inform a set of songs that sound like an affectionate exploration of how reconnecting with a past one left behind in pursuit of one’s life goals can enrich an appreciation of where you are now and where you’ve been. Beginning to end it’s an album of uncommonly well crafted pop melodies that feel grounding and comforting after a time of some of the greatest chaos and uncertainty for any musician hoping to share their music with a public in living memory. The record is also a celebration of the community and context of Thomas’ musical life and conceived and recorded while his housemantes Meg Duffy (Hand Habits) and Sasami Ashworth (Sasami) were putting together their own extraordinary records of the past couple of years (Fun House from 2021 and Squeeze from 2022 respectively). Some of that spirit creative spirit and good will seems to have intermingled into Smalltown Stardust as well.

Saturday | 03.11
What: Down Time with The Mañanas and Barbara
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Down Time now calls Los Angeles home but the indie pop trio has its origins in Denver where it honed its tender and vulnerable songwriting including the tracks on its 2022 album Spirit. That latest record revealed that the group had developed its electronic component to new heights and lent the songs brewed and recorded during the phase of the pandemic when no one was touring and not many playing actual live shows. So the songs have an uncommonly introspective mood but buoyed by the group’s warmth of expression. The band recorded and produced the album itself but got a mix done by Patrick Riley of Tennis fame. Across the arc of the album it sounds like we’re getting a peak into hopes and dreams that spent some time incubating and set adrift on their own in the subconscious before being reclaimed and re-examined and given musical form and interconnected with beautifully hazy edges.

Sunday | 03.12
What: Show Me The Body w/Jesus Piece, Scowl and ZULU https://www.gothictheatre.com/events/detail/?event_id=453875
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Clearly the big show of the year featuring artists pushing the boundaries of punk. Show Me The Body from NYC through its thorough fusion of noise rock, hardcore and hip-hop production and lyricism has produced a body of work that doesn’t just challenge genre convention but also provides a poignant and insightful critique of society and culture through personal narratives that hit hard even when the band is employing its acoustic side. Philly’s Jesus Piece likewise bucks expectation in its own metalcore-esque sound that threads in hardcore intensity and conviction but there is something so caustic and focused in its bursts of sound that recall artists that blur the line between death metal and grindcore like Napalm Death and Ethan McCarthy’s old band Clinging to the Trees of a Forest Fire. It’s new album …So Unknown is filled with concise exorcisms of modern angst and anxiety through amplifying those feelings to burn them out. Scowl from Santa Cruz, California sound a little like Betty Blowtorch if that band had come up through hardcore with magnetic frontwoman Kat Moss channeling the music’s aggression. And Zulu the self-styled “soul-infused power violence” band toured with OFF! This past fall and garnered a widening fanbase for its caustic and relentless style of noisy hardcore informed by a decidedly anti-racist messaging and a presentation of the music that challenges hardcore orthodoxy.

Tuesday | 03.14
What: Wallice w/Jawny
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex
Why: Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Wallice began releasing her witty and well-crafted pop songs in 2017 but really caught the attention of a wider audience with her 2020 single “Punching Bag” and its very of the moment sentiments commenting about online culture and dating including the amusing, no budget music video. Since then Wallice has honed her skills in writing solid pop hooks as evidenced by songs like “Hey Michael” and “Off the Rails” and her two EPs thus far (2021’s Off the Rails and 90s American Superstar from 2022). With the release of the heartfelt and tender folk-inflected
“Japan” about visiting her father’s hometown in central Japan Wallice revealed that the sensitivity and emotional insight that was at the core of even a fairly sassy diss track like “Hey Michael” could sit with complete vulnerability. A commanding performer, Wallice shares the stage with one of the other stars of modern indie pop, Jawny, whose work with Doja Cat and Beck highlight his eclectic style with roots in hip-hop and R&B as well as psychedelic pop. His new single “fall in love” is much more melancholic than much of his earlier output but the lush soundscape of the song is in keeping with his ear for an immersive approach to songwriting and production.

Primitive Man, photo courtesy the artists

Tuesday | 03.14
What: The Acacia Strain, Fit For An Autopsy, Full of Hell and Primitive Man
When: 6
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: The Acacia Strain has rightfully become one of the most well known of the bands out of death metal that emerged at the beginning of the 2000s with its savage rhythms and caustic vocals. But show up early and catch the some of the heaviest death grind around with Primitive Man and the relentless and chilling drive of Full of Hell’s particular brand of powerviolence.

Ukko’s Hammer in 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Tuesday | 03.14
What: Deaf Club w/Only Echoes and Ukko’s Hammer
When: 7
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Deaf Club is the hyperkinetic, noisy hardcore band fronted by Justin Pearson of The Locust fame. Weirder than the typical hardcore band with a definitely electronic music aesthetic built into its DNA, Deaf Club’s music sounds as unhinged yet as precise as its member’s earlier projects (the aforementioned as well as AcxDC, Weak Flesh and Run With the Hunted etc.). Opening are metallic post-rock juggernauts only Echoes from Denver and hardcore outfit Ukko’s Hammer also from the Mile High.

Friday | 03.17
What: Plack Blague w/Ms. BOAN and Kill You Club DJs
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Plack Blague is the industrial dub/techno noise fetish performance art act from Lincoln, Nebraska that has established itself over the past decade and more as one of the most entertaining and unforgettable acts to have become part of the modern darkwave movement. The now duo has a handful of seven inches and other releases out there but no full album as yet and really the live show is one of the main attractions of the project because it doesn’t fully translate to the purely audio experience. BOAN is another darkwave duo but one whose music is more melodic electronic post-punk dance music. But this show will feature vocalist Mariana Saldaña solo as Ms. BOAN. In 2022 Saldaña guested on Boy Harsher’s song “Machina” from that band’s album and short horror feature The Runner showcasing the singer’s strong vocals and stage presence in a mode reminiscent of electroclash with industrial dance flavor.

Friday | 03.17
What: Weyes Blood w/Vagabon
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Depending on where you checked in on the musical development of Natalie Mering you might have heard her early forays into noise and as a bassist for experimental rock band Jackie-O Motherfucker. But these days she’s most rightfully known for her ambitious and orchestral pop music as Weyes Blood. Her 2022 album And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow is the second of a trilogy of albums beginning with Titanic Rising (2019). The arrangements on the album are not the typical stuff and it seems as though Mering has really keyed into a kind of musical narration that yields rich layers and a willingness to experiment with movements within a song and across the album. Its lush production hearkens back to some art pop record of the 70s without being hemmed in by instincts to recreating the past.

The Magnetic Fields, photo by Kevin Yatarola

Friday and Saturday | 03.17 and 03.18
What: The Magnetic Fields
When: 8
Where: Swallow Hill
Why: These shows probably should have happened at a larger venue because these performances sold out weeks ago. But the intimate setting of Swallow Hill is probably the best environment to take in Stephin Merritt’s raw vulnerability in the current incarnation of his long running band The Magnetic Fields. This isn’t the band of Get Lost or Distortion, but likely of Quickies on which Merritt stripped things down to a compelling minimum of acoustic guitar and spare electronics and his own highly expressive voice. But maybe you can find a ticket or find one of those egregiously price gouging after market tickets if you didn’t already get one.

Saturday | 03.18
What: Big Dopes, Modern Leisure and Frail Talk
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Big Dopes released its most recent album Destination Wedding in November 2021 and are now finally set to release the vinyl edition of the record at this release show. The group fronted by Eddie Schmid has a knack for telling stories in its songs that put you in a distinct place sonically and emotionally and the aforementioned album in particular has sound elements in the music that convey the impression of physically being in the setting of the lyrics. Modern Leisure hasn’t played shows in awhile and the band that is a vehicle for the songwriting of Casey Banker offers its own emotionally resonant musical insight into modern life.

Saturday | 03.18
What: Underoath w/Periphery and Loathe
When: 6
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: Underoath emerged from its early metalcore and screamo period to integrate and evolve those creative impulses to craft a body of work that seems to have culminated in its 2022 album Voyeurist. It has the honestly poignant and feral screaming vocal style and angular guitar progressions and driving percussion that has been part of its core sound since early on. The band also tackles in a more mature and philosophical fashion existential issues and the place of faith in their lives. But there is an imaginative creation of mood and atmosphere and layered songwriting that one doesn’t often hear in heavy music of this ilk and if footage of recent performances are any indicated, delivered with a spirited conviction that is undeniably compelling.

Saturday | 03.18
What: Kimbra w/Tei Shi
When: 6
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Kimbra’s soulful vocals and quietly lush, subtle production has made her one of the more acclaimed songwriters in the more creative, arty end of modern alternative pop. In January 2023 she released her new album A Reckoning and its raw and confessional yet tender lyricism and emotionally expansive presentation. Sharing the bill this night is Tei Shi who releases her new EP Bad Premonition on 3/17/2023. The title track offers an inventive rhythm and production that fans of Goldfrapp and Charli XCX will appreciate for its pure fusion of R&B and an experimental electronic soundscaping.

Saturday | 03.18
What: Unwritten Law, Authority Zero and Mercy Music
When: 7
Where: Bluebird Theater

Orions Belte, photo by Nikolai Grasaasen

Sunday | 03.19
What: Orions Belte w/Alex Siegel
When: 7
Where: Marquis Theater
Why: Norwegian band Orions Belte has been seemingly conjuring unique music for several years that sounds like an impossible but always somehow appealing and flowing blend of psych, indiepop, prog, library music, Bossa Nova, jazz and whatever seems to make this music that sounds like it was recorded high fidelity onto cassette but with the lo-fi aesthetics intact. The group just released a new single called “Silhouettes” that is vintage Orions Belte in that it sounds like it could have come out 50 years ago in the same scene you’d find Os Mutantes or W.I.T.C.H. or today.

Monday | 03.20
What: Laveda, Isadora Eden and Autumnal
When: 7
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Albany, New York’s dream pop band Laveda is touring in advance of the release of its new album A Place You Grew Up In, the released singles from which hint at an album that is both tender and vulnerable in its lush melodies and melancholic moods but not without pointed commentary. Laveda’s lyrics offer insight about the likely future facing us all and the current social and economic climate that many if not most of us have had to navigate even though it seems obvious the powers that be are steering the world into disaster. It’s an album very much of this moment and crafted with a poignancy and delicacy of feeling that honors the anxiety, pain, disappointment, disillusionment and anger with a rare grace.

Monday | 03.20
What: KEN Mode w/Frail Body, Abrams and Fathers
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: KEN Mode delivered a reliably cathartic set of songs with its new record NULL. Is it “extreme noise rock” or “extreme metal”? Yes, but with its caustic sonic powers used for scorching and purging some of the amplified despair and repressed frustration and desperation underlying the mood in much of the world as governments careen into fascism, an ideology completely inadequate to addressing global climate change, corruption, fiscal malfeasance and income inequality. Joined on the bill by a couple of prominent bands in the realm of extreme metal and noisy hardcore in Abrams and Fathers.

Monday | 03.20
What: PROBLEMS w/Heligoats, Kelly Garlick and Mr. Pacman
When: 8
Where: Glob
Why: PROBLEMS is experimental electronic and performance art legend Darren Keen whose finely crafted electronic music in a modern techno vein is pared well with his unusual, always entertaining, performance style that challenges the conventions of the format with also being directly relatable. Mr. Pacman will bring the mutant synth pop/rock costumed post-futurist performance that will be a great complement to Keen’s own musical and aesthetic subversion.

Tuesday | 03.21
What: The Church
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: The Church is the respected Australian rock band whose music falls into multiple categories like New Wave, post-punk, psychedelic rock, dream pop, art and alternative rock. But always on its own creative terms and with a body of work that is both thoughtful and passionate. Even from the beginning The Church’s lyrics have gone beyond rock and roll tropes to offer insight into human relationships and culture in a way that gets to the essence of the human condition resulting in an uncanny ability to reinvent and offer new vistas of songwriting across its entire career including its remarkable 2023 album Hypnogogue. It’s pretty much an evening of The Church but that just means a well orchestrated set of richly emotional music and a performance that establishes and sustains a shared mystique of exploring and feeling the core resonances of living.

The Residents photo for In Between Dreams Tour 2018, image courtesy Homer Flynn

Tuesday | 03.21
What: The Residents
When: 7
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: The Residents are the long running and beloved art pop band whose membership has long been obscured with elaborate costumes and theatrical stage sets that allow for its always inspired storytelling and social commentary. The group has been noted for its innovations in multimedia live shows and albums as early adopters of new technology and formats in engaging a potential audience. Its latest offering is the Triple Trouble film which will drop via Night Flight’s new platform The Movie Store. The film is the story of Randall “Junior” Rose who becomes to believe that a fungus is a threat to the human race and in typical conspiracy theory fashion, heads to the realms of the unhinged. Perhaps some of the music for the film will be performed on this night.

Tuesday | 03.21
What: ¿Téo? Sol & Luna Tour w/Maesu
When: 7
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: ¿Téo? Is an LA-based songwriter who spent a stretch of 2022 opening for Justin Bieber. But his lushly imaginative production and soulful vocals sound like a new incarnation of neo soul. The lead singles from his forthcoming album Luna, the companion tot he 2021 record Sol and as the name of the tour indicates, the set list will likely comprise choice selections from each record. A fusion of reggaeton, hip-hop and one might even point to the aesthetics of chillwave, ¿Téo?’s warmly intimate songs will probably find a larger audience in the near future so catch him at a small club if it sounds like it’s your thing.

Wednesday | 03.22
What: Kiss the Tiger w/Blankslate and Dead Boyfriend
When: 8
Where: The Squire Lounge
Why: Kiss the Tiger is a rock band from Minneapolis whose sound draws on some Americana flavor but fueled by a driven energy channeled ably by singer Meghan Kreidler. Though its vibe is very much of the present time its songwriting is reminiscent of some of the better early 80s power pop New Wave bands like The Plimsouls with a gritty soulfulness and a scrappy spirit that lends the music an upbeat immediacy. Denver’s Blankslate is likeminded in sound with its own core of confessional, moody pop. Dead Boyfriend’s recently released album battle of carthage is a concept album about licing in a New York village as a fourteen-year-old young person navigating and exploring a sense of self and of identity. Musically it’s like a true mashup of dream pop, emo and whatever confessionally poetic and insightful post-folk pop songcraft Elliott Smith was getting up to in his late 90s development as a songwriter.

Wednesday | 03.22
What: Disco Doom w/Taleen Kali and Pleasure Prince https://www.skylarklounge.com/schedule/disco-doomtaleen-kalipleasure-prince
When: 7
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Disco Doom is an avant-garde post-punk band from Zurich, Switzerland whose left field rhythms and off melodic tones and extensive experiments in texture are like a fusion of Sonic Youth and Pavement but somehow noisier and weirder. Its recent album Mt. Surreal is like the mutant offspring of musique concrète and noise rock. Taleen Kali with its newest album Flower of Life is an example of where shoegaze could have gone had it taken more the route of Medicine and Curve with soulful melodies and a more bold use of rhythm and more crisp songwriting. Pleasure Prince is a Denver band whose exquisite synth work and vocal melodies sit at a gorgeous nexus of jazz, IDM, dream pop and R&B.

Rayland Baxter, photo by Citizen Kane Wayne

Wednesday | 03.22
What: Rayland Baxter w/Liz Cooper and Friko
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre

Friday | 03.24
What: Palehorse/Palerider w/Git Some, Ghosts of Glaciers and Despair Jordan
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Palehorse/Palerider returns with its new lineup after the tragic passing of founding drummer Nate Marcy in 2021. The tribal doomgaze group recently reissued its 2017 album Burial Songs and its vast, sweeping soundscapes capturing the stark beauty of the desert and high plains of the western United States and its pockets of ghost towns. Sludge rock legends Git Some reconvened in 2022 to play shows with These Arms Are Snakes and now on a short run of gigs in Colorado including this night, 3.25 at Six-Two in Colorado Springs (also with Palehorse/Palerider) and an early evening show at Mutiny Information Café on 3.26.

Friday | 03.24
What: Solar Fake w/Voight, eHpH and DJ Nitrogen
When: 8
Where: HQ
Why: Berlin’s Solar Fake is one of the few futurepop bands of recent years that doesn’t sound like a pale imitation of Covenant, VNV Nation and Assemblage 23. Its 2021 album Enjoy Dystopia is more like a solid synthpop record with an electronic industrial sound palette and an upbeat if melancholic take on modern existential dread. Denver’s eHpH (pronounced “eff”) is similarly rooted in classic EBM but its presentation is more confrontational and even punk though its production is enveloping and expertly rendered. Voight might be the only band bringing guitars to execute its own shoegaze-inflected industrial darkwave akin to acts like A Place to Bury Strangers and The Soft Moon in terms of aesthetic and emotional intensity.

Friday | 03.24
What: SORROWS w/Lanx Borealis and Baby Baby
When: 7
Where: Enigma Bazaar
Why: SORROWS is the latest project from vocalist Glynnis Braan and drummer Lawrence Snell. Both are talented producers of electronic music in their own right and this band’s downtempo, sultry, nearly operatic music is like a modern update on trip-hop. Lanx Borealis is an ambient artist from Denver whose ethereal compositions demonstrate the influence of the more tranquil Krautrock and progressive New Age music. Baby Baby is Lily Conrad’s electronic-based indiepop band that fans of The Blow may enjoy.

Monday | 03.27
What: John Mellencamp
When: 7
Where: Ellie Caulkins Opera House
Why: Few artists of the stature of John Mellencamp are touring 76 dates but that’s what Mellencamp is doing now. The songwriter’s rock and pop hits of the 80s and 90s are part of the canon of American music culture beginning really with his sixth album, 1982’s American Fool and radio hits “Hurts So Good” and “Jack & Diane.” For his entire career Mellencamp has offered a poignant and poetic portrait into everyday life in a way relatable to most people with a particularly keen insight into working class life in a way that resonates broadly and garnering him prestigious acclaim like the John Steinbeck Award, The Woody Guthrie Award and the Americana Music Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Nevertheless Mellencamp has continued to be a prolific songwriter and visual artist. Expect the artist’s typically engaging and witty performance in a venue that feels like getting to see a show in a large, particularly well-appointed high school recital hall, lending any concert there a touch of intimacy not present over other rooms in town of comparable size.

Monday | 03.27
What: HIDE w/HARPY and BENT (updated HARPY had to cancel and 00.AUR is now performing)
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: HIDE is an industrial noise duo from Chicago whose sample-based compositions offer a harrowing and cathartic commentary on the identities imposed by traditional culture, misogyny, environmental destruction and a sonic expression of liberation from oppression from without and internalized and imposed from within. All of its albums are a fascinating exploration of these themes and others but 2021’s Interior Terror decidedly goes off the map of conventional songwriting style or structure (not that HIDE every really made many concessions to that kind of accessibility) and going for the rhythms and frequencies in establishing a powerful, confrontational mood. Seems as though Providence, Rhode Island’s HARPY is having to cancel this date due to COVID but fans of industrial drone and, frankly, HIDE, should check out the band’s music on Bandcamp. BENT is a like-minded project from Colorado Springs that fuses harrowing industrial noise with glitch and breakcore.

Airiel at 3 Kings Tavern in 2007, photo by Tom Murphy

Monday | 03.27
What: Airiel w/Wave Decay and Shadows Tranquil
When: 7
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Airiel is a long-running shoegaze band from Chicago that’s been popular among connoisseurs of the genre despite the band not having a copious, readily available recorded output. Its particular flavor of the music incorporates electronic sounds and musical sensibilities giving its songs an especially tonally rich and immersive quality. Sharing the stage are two of the best Denver shoegaze practitioners with the more Krautrock-inflected Wave Decay and the darker moodier yet uplifting soundscapes of Shadows Tranquil.

Tuesday | 03.28
What: Protomartyr w/Immortal Nightbody
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Detroit post-punk band has been on quite a trajectory since forming in 2010. When the group first played in Denver at a basement show in 2014 and similar situations on that early national tour it had garnered some critical acclaim for its then new album Under Color of Official Right on Hardly Art. But it quickly garnered high profile fans like Iggy Pop, Greg Dulli, David Bazan and Kelley Deal (who joined Protomartyr for a 2020 tour) for its stream of consciousness lyrics, its highly evocative and dramatic blend of introspective moods and gritty dynamism combining garage rock roots with artier ambitions. As well as its live shows that seem to teeter on the edge of coming off the rails in a loosely controlled release of tension in cathartic bursts. On June 2, 2023 the band will release its new album Formal Growth in the Desert on Domino.

Tuesday | 03.28
What: Morbid Angel w/Revocation, Skeletal Remains and Crypta
When: 6
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: Morbid Angel is one of the foundational bands of death metal having formed in 1983 as more of a thrash band. But by the time of its highly influential 1989 debut album Altars of Madness. The record admittedly offered themes of supernatural horror that one heard in the darker corners of extreme metal of the time and since but its threading together of fast and brutal guitar rhythms and leads in a fashion taking what Slayer, Celtic Frost and Venom had already done and pushing that in an even more extreme direction along with truly sepulchral vocals became a template for much of death metal and perhaps black metal since.

Wednesday | 03.29
What: Sell Farm, Sky Creature, French Kettle Station and Pink Lady Monster
When: 7
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Sell Farm has been exploring an unusual but fascinating creative trajectory for the past few years seeming to create an unlikely combination of indiepop, dub and industrial music. New York City’s Sky Creature is an eclectic fusion of punk energy, dream pop and art rock. French Kettle Station has often defied easy categorization but might be loosely be considered to make music expanding beyond a brilliant nexus of dub, glitchcore, New Age music and ambient. Pink Lady Monster might once have been considered a “dream pop” band and there are elements of that there but the trio and maybe quartet at this point has moved more into the realm of post-psychedelic rock free jazz prog while having become one of Denver’s best bands not yet widely acknowledged as such.

Hermanos Gutiérrez, photo by Larry Nlehues

Wednesday and Thursday | 03.29 and 03.30
What: Hermanos Gutiérrez
When: 7
Where: Washingon’s (03.29) and Boulder Theater (03.30)
Why: Hermanos Gutiérrez, as the name suggests, is brothers Alejandro and Estevan Gutiérrez who have an Ecuadorian mother and Swiss father. With frequent trips to Playas, Ecuador growing up the brothers absorbed the culture and music of both family backgrounds. The duo formed its current project in 2015 in a jam session that apparently created an evocative sound that had roots in surf rock and Latin musical styles. By 2020 a sound more akin to Ennio Morricone’s soundtrack work became an element of the band’s style expanding its emotional or at least tonal range and lending its already compelling instrumental music even more nuance and emotional shading. The brothers Gutiérrez seem to play as one instrument with their various elements on guitar and percussion in perfect sync and working toward telling introspective and thoughtful stories without lyrics and operating on pure mood and the poetry of their shared expression through sound. Hermanos Gutiérrez toured in Fall 2022 in support of its then new album El Bueno y el Malo produced by Dan Auerbach for his label Easy Eye Sound and for this tour one can expect a reprise of that set of music for the shows at Washington’s in Fort Collins and Boulder Theater.

Friday | 03.31
What: Muscle Beach, Endless Nameless and Limbwrecker
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Endless Nameless released its debut album Living Without via Silent Pendulum Records on March 24, 2023. The Denver-based band has been establishing its reputation for a uniquely creative sound that is math rock, emo, progressive metal and punk and for its cathartically energetic live shows that feel like an extended flow of enthusiasm and emotional upswing. Sharing the bill this night are hybrid hardcore-extreme metal legends Muscle Beach and grind/hardcore/thrash group Limbwrecker.

Friday | 03.31
What: N3PTUNE w/Rusty Steve, Neon the Bishop and Cain Culto
When: 7
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: N3PTUNE has against the odds turned his inspired R&B, glam rock, futuristic funk and dream pop inclinations into a band that seems unbound by narrow genres. The live show is theatrical, dramatic and powerful in a way that one doesn’t often see in local music like the offspring of Prince and David Bowie.

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond September 2022

Boris performs at Bluebird Theater with Nothing on 9/14 , photo by Yoshihiro Mori

Nine Inch Nails at Red Rocks in September 2018, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday and Saturday | 09.02 and 09.03
What: Nine Inch Nails w/Yves Tumor
When: 7
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Nine Inch Nails is too famous and for too long and rightfully so to bother to get detailed about its significance in popularizing industrial and electronic music and even ambient. The band’s shows are always innovative and pushing the performance envelope in some way whether that be in the visual presentation, with the sound production end, with sets that change throughout the show or playing with how the band itself presents its music as a live act. Nine Inch Nails doesn’t skimp on putting on probably the best show you’ll see this year or among the top tier at the least. And Trent Reznor or someone in the NIN camp always finds one of the coolest, up-and-coming, genre boundary challenging, innovative musical project going and for these two shows it’s Yves Tumor the experimental electronic and R&B artist whose shows are part Prince, part HEALTH, part Janelle Monáe but very much his own glorious earth alien charismatic psychedelia.

Courtney Barnett, photo by Mia Mala McDonald

Saturday | 09.03
What: Here and There Festival: Japanese Breakfast, Courtney Barnett, Arooj Aftab and Bedouine
When: 4 p.m.
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Courtney Barnett’s “Here And There” Festival makes a stop in Denver at the Mission Ballroom on September 3 with a unique lineup that for the Denver date in addition to Barnett includes Japanese Breakfast, Arooj Aftab and Bedouine.

The concept for the event was born of Barnett’s love of curation. As the owner of Milk! Records for the past decade Barnett has championed and released music by artists from her home town of Melbourne, Australia as well as US artists like Sleater-Kinney, Chastity Belt, Hand Habits and others.

Over the course of the tour from August through September, lineups will include all of the following artists: Alvvays, Arooj Aftab, Bartees Strange, Bedouine, Caroline Rose, Chicano Batman, Courtney Barnett, Ethel Cain, Faye Webster, Fred Armisen, Hana Vu, Indigo De Souza, Japanese Breakfast, Julia Jacklin, Leith Ross, Lido Pimienta, Lucy Dacus, Quinn Christopherson, Sleater Kinney, Snail Mail, The Beths, Waxahatchee and Wet Leg.

Barnett quickly went from a beloved and critically acclaimed indie artist known for her masterful use of the English language and powerful and imaginative guitar work and songwriting when her early EPs released 2012-2013 to widely celebrated singer-songwriter of no small cachet by the time of the 2015 release of her debut full length album Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit. With each record Barnett has distinguished herself as a songwriter able to expose her vulnerabilities and anxieties in a way that conveys a solidarity with other people and their own struggles.

Sharing the bill is Japanese Breakfast, the band lead by Michelle Zauner whose own trajectory as an artist parallels that of Barnett going from playing all the small clubs on the same circuits a little under a decade ago and delivering emotionally arresting pop songs that aren’t short on musicianly artistry. In 2021 she released her memoir Crying in H Mart to great acclaim in its poignant and loving depiction of her life coming up with a Korean mom, coming into playing music and the passing of her mother from pancreatic cancer in 2014. Her own pop music has as much in common with art rock in its creative ambition and songwriting with her songs easily fitting into the categories of dream pop, shoegaze, psychedelia, indie rock and R&B.

Arooj Aftab is the US-based Pakistani singer and songwriter who is the first person of Pakistani origin to be awarded a Grammy for Best Global Music Performance for her song “Mohabbat.” Her style is a hybrid of experimental folk, jazz and more traditional Pakistani music with elements of her 2021 album Vulture Prince reminiscent of Qawwali, the devotional music of Sufism. But her orchestral arrangements and powerfully tranquil yet emotionally rich vocal delivery defies easy categorization.

Bedouine aka Azniv Korkejian is a Syrian-American musician who grew up with both mainstream music via MTV and traditional Armenian and Arabic music. Her third album Waysides (2021) is a masterful evocation of loss, isolation, yearning and introspective insight cast in the sounds of Laurel Canyon era folk.

Jim Ward, Feb. 19, 2020, in El Paso, Texas. Photo by Ivan Pierre Aguirre

Sunday | 09.04
What: The Get Up Kids w/Sparta
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: The Get Up Kids from Kansas City were one of the defining bands of 90s emo but stylistically never quite trapped in the tropes of the genre and its songwriting came to include keyboards and more focused pop songcraft without sacrificing the energy and intensity of its early music. Like Jawbreaker, The Get Up Kids made music in a style that isn’t cringey decades later unlike that of some of their peers. For this tour the band will perform its debut full length album Four Minute Mile as well as the Woodson EP in their entirety. Jim Ward of Sparta came up through similar circles of 90s underground punk and post-hardcore as a member of the influential and incendiary At The Drive In. But when the latter split in 2001 and part of the group went on to form The Mars Volta making music of a very different style, Ward continued to refine the style of music he’d helped develop in ATDI. The angular punk with searing emotional energy and intellect informing the lyrics. The group went on hiatus in 2008 and outside of a brief reunion in the early 2010s didn’t fully come back together until 2017. During the interceding years wrote and released music under his own name and with Sleepercar and honed his songwriting so that when Sparta returned to write and release 2020’s Trust the River the artistic growth was obvious and what has been put out from the forthcoming self-titled Sparta album is like a fusion of that fiery sonics of early Sparta and a more refined focus in the dynamics and structure of the songs to hit with emotional precision.

Sunday | 09.04
What: Echo & The Bunnymen w /Cayucas
When: 7
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: Echo & The Bunnymen were and are one of the classic bands out of the second wave of UK post-punk with a rooting in the first. The Bunnymen brought a romantic sensibility to the lyrics and a sense of mystery and tenderness to the music that has made its songs age exceedingly well apparently having formed outside immediate and obvious influences rather drawing inspiration from across decades of music and aiming to craft their own creative mythmaking. You’ll hear the hits, probably, but also deep cuts that will please true fans of the group’s deep well of great material.

Peter Hook at the Royal Albert Hall on September 29, 2018, photo by Jody Hartley

Monday | 09.05
What: An Evening With Peter Hook & The Light – Joy Division: A Celebration
When: 7
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: Peter Hook is of course one of the founding members of influential post-punk band Joy Division. For this occasion Hook will make an evening of a broad spectrum of that band’s songs. Anyone that has seen Peter Hook & The Light knows that Hook isn’t phoning in some greatest hits set. The band conjures the spirit of the original music and Hook’s own bass lines are iconic and foundational the sound, the mood, the cadences of post-punk and by extension through New Order pop and dance music. He brings a commanding presence and no small amount of his own fire to the performances though he shares bass duties with his son Jack who some may have seen play in The Smashing Punpkins. Hook’s three books The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club (2010), Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division (2012) and Substance: Inside New Order (2016) are essential reading for not just entertainment value but for the perspective and sense of history and culture that Hook was there to witness and in some ways shape.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday | 09.05, 09.06, 09.07
What: Flume ( w/Pospa, Sega Bodega at Mission on 9.05 – w/TSHA, Porspa and Oklou on 09.06 – w/Eprom, Shlomo and Oklou on 09.07
When: 7 p.m. for 09.05 and 5 p.m. for 09.06-09.07
Where: Mission Ballroom (09.05) and Red Rocks (09.06-09.07)
Why: Harley Streten has come a long way since learning basic production from a DJ and mixing program CD he got from a box of Nutrigrain. From early smaller club shows far afield from his home home town of Sydney, Australia, Streten as Flume steadily but fairly rapidly established himself as one of the more innovative ED artists of the 2010s whose facility with sculpting atmosphere and melody and merging it seamlessly with unconventional beats to make for music that has been able to evolve, absorb and move beyond micro-stylistic shift in the world of electronic dance music and today he’s one of the most popular artists in a realm of music that has remained important but seemingly plateaued in its cultural impact. But Streten’s musical imagination and skills have consistently kept him ahead of the curve and in mentoring newer artists in an organic way his shows are not just a showcase for his own work but that of potential future stars already doing interesting work.

Thursday | 09.08
What: Alphabet Soup #52: Felix Fast4ward, Reed Fox, Furbie Cakes, Sky Floor and Green Leader https://blackboxdenver.co/events/alphabeat-soup-sep8
When: 9
Where: Black Box
Why: Long-running experimental electronic dance-oriented music showcase Alphabet Soup returns with some of the local scenes more daring producers and imaginative soundscapers.

Kal Marks in October 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 09.09
What: Kal Marks – My Name is Hell Tour w/Moon Pussy and Cherished
When: 9
Where: Lion’s Lair
Why: Boston’s Kal Marks recently released its new album My Name Is Hell. The record out on NYC label Exploding In Sound is a further development of the group’s hybrid of emo, noise rock, pop collage and post-punk. The live band brings a visceral energy that takes the core of the recorded material and transforms it into cathartic performances that seem simultaneously passionate and vulnerable. Also playing this show is the crackling ball of nervous energy and roiling angular dynamics that is Moon Pussy whose fractured soundscapes and raw power transforms anxiety and amused outrage into inspiration. Cherished has become one of the most emotionally charged, melancholic shoegaze bands in Denver and elsewhere and the melodically gloomy counterpart to the other bands you’ll get to witness at this show.

Friday | 09.09
What: Gary Numan w/I Speak Machine and DJ Slave1
When: 8
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Gary Numan probably needs no introduction and this is a show rescheduled from the spring for the foundational synth pop and industrial rock songwriter and musician. Maybe you only know “Cars” or “Down In the Park” but Gary Numan has had a long and consistently boundary pushing career and whose body of music is like a distinguished career in the kind of science fiction as song that puts the human experience at the center and thus it has aged well and his intense and riveting live shows are proof positive of the enduring vitality of his creative genius.

Flogging Molly 2021, photo by Katie Hovland

Friday | 09.09
What: Flogging Molly & The Interrupters w/Tiger Army and The Skints
When: 5
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Celtic punk can be a bit niche for many but Flogging Molly’s songwriting transcends that niche partly due to the exceptionally powerful vocals courtesy actually Irish lead singer Dave King. Though often lumped in with the pop punk world in which its spirited performances seem to find a natural home, there is a charming nuance of sound and style in the group’s music that lend its tales of poverty, love, death, revelry and struggle an artfulness to its clearly authentic sentiments. The band’s latest album Anthem includes “A Song Of Liberty” that starts out, at least in the music video and in the lyrics, to be a show of solidarity for the people of Ukraine against Russia but extends that solidarity with struggles for national liberation across decades and across continents. There’s nothing performative or phony about that messaging in the music nor in the band’s general, internationalist working class solidarity born out of basic compassion for other humans.

Emerald Siam in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 09.09
What: Munly & The Lupercalians w/Church Fire and Emerald Siam
When: 7
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: Munly & The Lupercalians, longtime project of Jay Munly of Slim Cessna’s Auto Club, is celebrating the release of its latest album Kinnery Of Lupercalia; Undelivered Legion with this show at the Bluebird. This band is also an Americana band in a dark vein akin to that of some of SCAC’s own style but generally darker, more overtly literary and conceptual and in the live setting often accompanied by an element of the ritualistic. Breaking with local scene custom, and all the better for that, the opening bands aren’t going to be Americana at all except in the larger sense that political, darkwave industrial band Church Fire wouldn’t emerge anywhere but America where its incisive critique of the perils of patriarchy and religion as infused into the culture and politics as a lived experience perhaps has the greatest impact, or that Emerald Siam’s own moody, garage rock noir flavored post-punk would seem like an odd affectation coming from anyone but people who have breathed deep in what it’s like to live and struggle in the fractious society that is the USA.

Friday | 09.09
What: Westword Music Showcase Part 1
When: 7
Where: Various Venues in RiNO
Why: This is the first night of the Westword Music Showcase and it’s free. So some best bets no explanations given because there’s a lot going on this night.
7pm: Honey Blazer
8 pm: Bellhoss, Plasma Canvas or Kayla Marque
9 pm: Endless Nameless, Ritmo Cascabel, Bluebook
10 pm: Julian St. Nightmare
11 pm: Despair Jordan
12:20 am: Pink Fuzz or Citra

Friday and Saturday | 09.09 and 09.10
What: Brandi Carlise ( w/ Lucius and Allison Russell on 09.09 and w/Indigo Girls and Allison Russell on 09.10)
When: 6
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Brandi Carlisle is rightfully an incredibly famous and commercially successful singer-songwriter for her broad stylistic and emotional range as an artist with a powerful and expressive voice. Her latest album is In The Canyon Haze. Opener Allison Russell is a Canadian multi-instrumentalist, singer and songwriter whose debut solo album Outside Child released in 2021 on respected jazz, folk and Americana label Fantasy. Her orchestral yet spare arrangements bring her powerfully soulful vocals together in a style that might be described as Appalachian jazz R&B yet it works because Russell’s commanding presence and facility in playing multiple roles in performance is riveting for both its instrumental virtuosity and emotional resonance. See her band’s performance on KEXP below.

Saturday | 09.10
What: Westword Music Showcase Day 2
When: 12
Where: Various Venues Around Mission Ballroom
Why: This is the Westword Music Showcase day where you need to buy a ticket and here are some recommendations with no details.
2 pm: The Mañanas
2:35: Cannons
3:20: Ramakhandra
4:05: Wet Leg – canceled
5: Don Chicharrón
8:40 N3PTUNE
9:30: The Flaming Lips

Monday | 09.12
What: The National w/Lucy Dacus
When: 6:30
Where: Red Rocks
Why: The National rose to prominence in the 2000s and its brooding, atmospheric pop songs has certainly been one of the templates of modern indie music. Even early on its lush production and layered, orchestral arrangements felt like a natural successor to 90s indiepop and its contemplative lyrics can’t help but strike a chord with anyone that actually takes them in. Matt Berninger’s vocal delivery always seems to come across like he’s reading from a memoir from some future decade and having a poignant memory to relate, the kind that takes you back vividly to that time in a way that makes it possible to articulate with the benefit of life experience—something not everyone can do as well as Berninger does. After a eight acclaimed albums The National has returned with material for the upcoming ninth album and performing some of that at its 2022 live shows. Opening the proceedings is accomplished songwriter Lucy Dacus. Some may know Dacus more for her membership in supergroup boygenius with Phoebe Bridgers and Julien Baker. But Dacus’ records under her name are a body of personally insightful and emotionally fortifying songs that the songwriter delivers with an understated cool that nevertheless doesn’t mask the feelings and examinations thereof that went into distilling them into musical poetry. Even on her first album No Burden (2016), Dacus displayed a sophistication of songwriting at twenty one that can take many more years to attain. 2021’s Home Video has moments of almost uncomfortable rawness and honesty that aren’t made easier to hear with the gentle performances. Rather the songs are a vivid trip through psychological spaces perhaps we all experience but sometimes try to forget and Dacus makes it seem okay to think and feel these things because emotional self-honesty can be as healing as it can be searingly painful and haunting. Dacus brings that kind of compassionate energy and sense of mystery to her live performances as well so clearly a fine match for the headliner.

Tuesday | 09.13
What: Stereolab w/Fievel is Glauque
When: 7
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: Stereolab is the long-running experimental rock and electronic band formed in 1990 in London with former members of leftist political pop band McCarthy, Tim Gane and Laetitia Sadier. The new group would adopt lo-fi pop aesthetics, Krautrock, avant-garde electronic and musique concrète into its ever evolving sound so that the “groop” could never get fully stuck in its own stylistic rut. Stereolab has become one of the most respected and beloved cult bands of the 90s that endured through the late 2000s before going on hiatus for a decade until 2019. Its most recent release is the 2022 compilation album Pulse of the Early Brain: Switched On, Vol. 5 which brings together tracks from across its career including a 1997 collaboration with arch experimentalists Nurse With Wound and other non official album tracks that have formerly been hard to come by including the 1992 Low Fi EP that marked the first appearance with the group of the late Mary Hansen and longtime and current member Andy Ramsay. The live shows are a combination of impassioned performance and sultry cool.

Tuesday | 09.13
What: Full of Hell & Blood Incantation w/Vermin Womb, Mortuous and God is War
When: 6
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Might be the noisy heavy show of the month. Death grind legends Full of Hell whose 2021 album Garden of Burning Apparitions is as relentless as it is unsettling in its haunting vibes co-headlines with progressive death metal weirdos Blood Incantation from Denver who recently released an entire synth album though you probably won’t hear much of that for this show. Vermin Womb just release the blistering and thrillingly punishing Retaliation EP and will probably hit the stage hard with economical precision in its sonic brutality and exit before you’re full aware of what hit you.

Wednesday | 09.14
What: Boris w/Nothing
When: 7
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: For the past thirty years Japanese rock band Boris has truly explored so many different styles of heavy and experimental across its prolific career that one would have to be hesitant to try to define the group’s aesthetic because from album to album it’s always been an exploration of the trio’s interests at the time from gear to songwriting to genre. In addition to the impressive and influential body of work under its own name, Boris has multiple collaborative albums with noise legend Merzbow, albums with Michio Kurihara of psych legends Ghost (not to be confused with the Swedish heavy metal band) and an album with respected Japanese avant-garde musician Keiji Haino. Its most recent album is its 2022 and second album titled Heavy Rocks. And as advertized it’s a rock album that is heavy but this time more in the vein of a strange and fascinating hybrid of punk, glam rock and heavy psychedelia. Live Boris has a mystique that renders all of its music strange and alluring rendered with a forceful intensity. Also on this tour is post-hardcore/noise rock band turned heavy shoegaze outfit Nothing whose 2020 album The Great Dismal is a great exercise in mood sculpting through hazy melodies and introspective vocals making observations on the decay of society and a fragile hope for things in the world to flow toward the better.

Wednesday and Thursday | 09.14 and 09.15
What: Kikagaku Moyo
When: 7:30 (09.14) and 7 (09.15)
Where: Fox Theatre (09.14) and Ogden Theatre (09.15)
Why: Legendary psychedelic folk prog band Kikagaku Moyo from Tokyo is taking its live show on the road one last time with two shows in Colorado. In May 2022 the group released its latest and likely final album Kumoyo Island and revealed the influence of cosmic funk on its sound in addition to the fusion of Japanese folk and Krautrock.

Wednesday | 09.14
What: Wilco w/Margo Price
When: 6:30
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Wilco is of course one of the most critically acclaimed indie rock bands going on three decades now and deservedly so. There isn’t a Wilco record that isn’t worth an earnest listen. Its 2022 album Cruel Country isn’t just brimming with solid songwriting and performances but the social commentary is poignant and personal in a way worthy of early Bob Dylan. The title track addresses youthful misconceptions about the country of one’s birth and the evolution of one’s nuanced understanding not just of countries but one’s own place in them. Perhaps unintentionally but one hears a touch of the Grateful Dead’s American Beauty on this record but that just gives it a cultural resonance across decades that is probably warranted in making meaningful and creative statements about society in the times we’re in now rather than hit issues of national identity on the nose. Of course the show will include material well beyond the new album and Wilco is reliably delivers a lively and highly entertaining performance. Opener Margo Price is one of the rising stars of modern country music but of course this means she’s not just a charismatic performer but her own songwriting expands the boundaries of what that music can be. Her new single “Been To The Mountain” borders on the psychedelic and is reminiscent of more adventurous country artists of the past like Lone Justice and Green on Red.

The Head and the Heart, photo by Shervin Lainez

Wednesday and Thursday | 09.14 and 09.15
What: The Head and the Heart w/Hiss Golden Messenger
When: 6:30
Where: Mission Ballroom (09.14) and Red Rocks (09.15)
Why: The Head and the Heart has established itself as one of the definitive artists of indie rock of the past decade and more. Earnest vocals and spacious arrangements and expansive melodies are components of its sound from early on but the Seattle based sextet has a knack for crafting pop hooks and imaginative arrangements that easily get stuck in your head but you don’t mind because it’s not repetitive or insipid, just heartfelt and memorable. Its 2022 album Every Shade of Blue seems to have pared its usual sonic mode to a spare minimalism that may not be what some fans are expecting from The Head and the Heart but within each one hears an experiment with where the group will go with its next album. Coming out of the pandemic every band can probably be excused for indulging a wide range of songwriting ideas that can make their new album sound like a transitional effort and maybe that’s what the sound of this record may come across as being yet there are undeniable gems on the record including the title track. At the very least at the show you’ll get to see old favorites live and see how The Head and the Heart pulls off material from the new record.

Thursday | 09.15
What: HEALTH w/Perturbator and Street Sects
When: 6
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: This tour features some of the most inventive modern electronic industrial artists going. HEALTH got its break as one of the most prominent bands to come out of the DIY music scene around the non-profit venue The Smell in the mid-2000s. Weaving together noise, electronic dance music and darkly urgent post-punk, HEALTH has garnered a global audience with its ferocious live shows and idiosyncratically stylish aesthetics. Perturbator is more in the vein of blending industrial rock with 1980s horror movie synth soundtracks but delivered with a confrontational energy. James Kent aka Perturbator has a background in black metal and brings that attitude to his compositions and performance. 2021’s Lustful Sacraments turns down the aggression of Perturbator’s sound a little in favor of a touch of ethereal guitar melody and creative use of space in the mix lending the overall sound a haunting undercurrent. Street Sects is an industrial punk duo from Austin, Texas whose use of drastic dynamic shifts and spiky rhythms in a cloak of fog and metallic percussion that has been a flagship band of the experimental music label The Flenser. Its shows can have an unhinged intensity with a sense of danger to them though lately they haven’t as often brought out the bladeless chainsaw to change out into the crowd.

Pink Turns Blue, photo by Daniel Vorndran

Thursday | 09.15
What: Pink Turns Blue, Radio Scarlet, Redwing Blackbird
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Pink Turns Blue is the influential post-punk/darkwave band from Berlin, Germany that made waves in the 1980s through the mid-1990s for its moody yet triumphant songs imbued with a political awareness and sense of urgency within its gloomy melodies and dynamically measured paces. The group got back together in 2003 after the so-called post-punk revival that happened shortly after it broke up the first time and prior to the development of the modern darkwave scene yet clearly, directly or otherwise, exerted a bit of influence on artists in both periods. TAINTED is the 2021 record by the band and contains some of its most poetic and poignant political material of its career in challenging the world’s mishandling or really ignoring of the climate crisis and the rise of authoritarianism and income inequality—all seemingly so pressing now.

Alice Glass, photo courtesy Sacks & Co 2018

Thursday | 09.15
What: Alice Glass w/Uffie
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf
Why: Alice Glass is perhaps most widely known for her work in electronic duo Crystal Castles where her expressive and otherworldly yet intimate vocals were a large part of the appeal of the project. After parting ways with Crystal Castles in 2014 later accusing her bandmate of assault and sexual misconduct, Alice Glass has emerged a solo artist whose work has a unique emotional resonance and vulnerable intensity that vibes perfectly with the inventive and mysterious beats in a style that sounds like it’s taken elements of hyper pop and the 8-bit electronic production of her earlier music and pushed it in a direction that suited the likely painful subject matter of her songs. After a 2017 debut EP Glass had some conflict with her label and parted ways but released her debut full length PREY//IV in February 2022 and she’s still putting out some honest words that speak truth about the kind of struggle and pain a lot of people go through every day especially people that have experienced abuse and in doing so provides maybe a tiny bit of catharsis with the music and with her powerful live show.

Friday | 09.16
What: Melvins w/We Are The Asteroid and Taipei Houston
When: 7
Where: Fox Theatre
Why: Melvins are one of the foundational bands of the heavy punk scene out of the Pacific Northwest and one of the primary influences on the bands that became the first wave of grunge. But Melvins never got stuck there or with that legacy even as it evolved its early sound and went on to explore a multitude of ideas in the music they made and how it was presented and where they would play and the kinds of tours they would tackle including the time they played every U.S. State in fifty days. All along the way Melvins have left us an impressive body of albums that push the boundaries of what heavy music can be and with every album Melvins offer something very different from the one that came before. This time around for the newly released 2022 album Bad Moon Rising there has been little advance promotion or videos or really much of a peak into what it sounds like. Making it a good excuse to go see one of the most entertaining and consistently impressive live rock bands of the modern era.

Friday | 09.16
What: George Cessna & His Band perform Lucky Rider w/Rose Variety, Fainting Dreams and DBUK
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: George Cessna & His Band will perform the 2021 album Lucky Rider in its entirety. The existential and haunting, lo-fi record distills the essence and spirit of being a creative and thoughtful person in the current time dealing with a multitude of challenges from those of the pandemic, to an increasingly neglectful media environment for the arts especially those local, trying to navigate personal challenges while reaching deep into self to find a reason to keep doing creative work when all sensible arrows point elsewhere. It is one of the most poignant personal music statements in the last few years and worth getting to witness in the live setting.

Friday | 09.16
What: Grace Ives w/Super Bummer
When: 8
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Grace Ives’ 2022 album Janky Star has likely snuck onto the year end best lists of more than a few music critics because not only are her eccentric pop songs imaginative crafted but speak to the current cultural moment. There is a meta self-awareness that is employed to make earnest commentary on mental health and seeking out deeper meanings in a cultural environment where so much is thrown your way often decoupled from context. All the songs on the album are short and to the point but rich with ideas. Ives says a great deal in a small space without overwhelming the listener. Somewhere between synth pop, hip-hop and even some bit of progressive rock Ives’ music has obviously absorbed a lot of modern music and come out more surprisingly original for it.

Friday | 09.16
What: Patched Out – Live Electronic Dance Music Party: Acidbat, Paul City, Love Cosmic Love, ALX-106
When: 9:01
Where: Black Box
Why: This is a more than ordinarily experimental electronic music showcase featuring local artists who pull from not only electronic dance music but noise and industrial styles. Minimal techno, glitchy acid house, mutant deep house grime.

Friday | 09.16
What: Wild Rivers w/Violet Skies
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Toronto-based indie folk trio Wild Rivers released its sophomore album Sidelines in 2022, the follow up to its 2016 self-titled debut. Like most bands Wild River basically had to take a couple of years off from performing live and maybe rediscover and reimagine its sound some but in this case Wild Rivers leaned into its superb use of space and minimal instrumentation for a good deal of the material to allow for the gentle, warm and expressive touch of the vocals to sit center but also in allowing the percussion and rhythm to guide the music subtly but firmly, a feature of music one doesn’t often hear so clearly in folk-oriented music.

Porridge Radio, photo by Matilda Hill-Jenkins

Saturday | 09.17
What: Porridge Radio w/Blondshell and Moodlighting
When: 8
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Porridge Radio is a post-punk band from Brighton, UK formed after songwriter and lead vocalist Dana Margolin realized she needed a band to fully bring to life the songs she had been crafting and mainly performing at open mics and her own bedroom. There is a grittiness to the atmospheric music that can be found rooted in Margolin’s raw and tenderly honest lyrics and the way the band manifests the layered the contrasting emotions the singer/guitarist brings to bear and let out in often unexpected and engulfing outbursts that make it obvious you’re not listening to a conventional indie band because Porridge Radio doesn’t try to smooth over the rough edges. Its new album Waterslide, Diving Board, Ladder to the Sky (2022, Secretly Canadian) is rich with poetic metaphors for relationships fracturing and the struggles of one’s inner life that are too often kept bottled up and never addressed. Porridge Radio lets that anxiety out in a gripping sustained catharsis. Tourmate Blondshell aka Sabrina Teitelbaum is a songwriter based in Los Angeles whose own vulnerabilities and insecurities are also laid out in exuberant pop songs. Blondshell’s sound, though, is more akin to 90s alternative rock in its liberal use of fuzz and bombastic song structures to give some sonic and emotional boost to songs about the kinds of thoughts and experiences that can make us feel like we’re falling apart and failing ourselves yet finding some redemption and positive transformation in being willing to own the feelings and work through them. Moodlighting is a dream pop band from Denver whose fragile and winsome melodies are charged with an ethereal melancholy that lends the music more depth than seems obvious on first encounter.

Saturday | 09.17
What: Sick of It All and Agnostic Front w/Crown of Thornz
When: 7
Where: Oriental Theater
Why: Agnostic Front may predate the existence of Sick Of It All by six years and technically part of the first wave of hardcore, but New York City hardcore didn’t really get its due or hit its stride until later in the eighties and these two bands were a couple of the leaders of that punk milieu along with Cro-Mags, Murphy’s Law and others.

Saturday | 09.17
What: Colin James
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Soiled Dove Underground
Why: Colin James is a Canadian blues and rock guitarist/vocalist who got his big break into a national and international music world when his band was tapped to open last minute for Stevie Ray Vaughan in 1984 when another opening act was no longer available. Since then James has expanded upon his electric and acoustic blues style and was an early adopter of swing in the early 90s when straight ahead blues wasn’t as much in favor for a number of years and his Colin James and the Little Big Band project enjoyed some success when the swing revival was under way throughout the 90s. But in the 2000s and 2010s it seemed as though blues enjoyed a bit of a renaissance including the popular Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise and numerous blues festivals that have come about since the turn of the century. James’ most recent album, 2021’s Open Road, is a collection of interpretation of blues classics and original material that showcases the musician’s masterful command of the musical idiom and ability to innovate within it.

Sunday | 09.18
What: Bob Mould Solo Electric: Distortion and Blue Hearts!
When: 7
Where: Oriental Theater
Why: Bob Mould is of course the co-founder of Hüsker Dü and Sugar but his solo albums have provided some of his best and most refined songwriting to date. This tour will be a chance to see Mould perform from across his solo catalog including the 2020 Blue Hearts album which included Jon Wurster of Superchunk fame and Jason Narducy also of Superchunk filling in for Laura Ballance. So this performance will probably include both of those guys and Mould’s own lively presence.

Snotty Nose Rez Kids, photo by Brendan Meadows

Sunday | 09.18
What: Snotty Nose Rez Kids w/Freedom Move…
When: 7
Where: Moon Room at Summit Music Hall
Why: Snotty Nose Rez Kids are a First Nations hip-hop duo from Kitamaat Village, BC but now based in Vancouver. Darren “Young D” Metz and Quinton “Yung Trybez” Nyce have a style that people that appreciate trap and hyper pop would appreciate including the meta self-awareness required to pull that off with creativity and artistry. So of course there is a deep sense of play and humor in the music but so many of its songs hit as poignant and as powerfully as the best hip-hop especially in painting a portrait of life in their First Nations community and the unique struggles attendant with that experience.

Monday | 09.19
What: Pavement w/Annalibera
When: 6:30
Where: Paramount Theatre
Why: Almost all indie bands of any originality worth listening to can trace their roots to the idiosyncratic and masterful guitar rock of Pavement. The group long made a virtue of unconventional song structure, Stephen Malkmus’ unusual vocal style and an almost free associating lyrics. Its loosely arranged guitar jangle both loping and angular leaves room for truly creative improvisation that have yet to be fully appreciated by many fans who might be put off by how much Pavement’s music resonates with free jazz and a psychedelic blues jam. Live Pavement has remained a brilliant head scratcher which is really the reason to see them live if you can afford the exorbitant ticket price because even though the influence on modern music is obvious no one has really been able to quite mimic the idiosyncratic melodies and bizarre observational lyrics.

Wednesday | 09.21
What: of Montreal w/Locate S, 1 and Duck Turnstone
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: of Montreal is one of the longest running bands that emerged out of the 90s indiepop milieu with roots in the Elephant6 collective (i.e. Apples in Stereo, The Olivia Tremor Control and Neutral Milk Hotel). Its colorful album cover imagery and borderline performance art stage personae come from a real place of genuine eccentric creativity informed by an experimental literary approach to lyrics and not just conceptual album arcs but individual songs as well. There is a deep imagination discernible on any of its albums including the 2022 offering Freewave Lucifer F<ck F^ck F>ck. This new music sounds even more like a collage of psychedelic pop and space rock glam.

Wednesday | 09.21
What: PROBLEMS w/Goo Age, Andy Loebs, DJ Arman and DJ Fresh Kill
When: 8
Where: Glob
Why: Daren Keen has been responsible for some of the most creative electronic and noise music of the past several years and with his project PROBLEMS it’s like he is mixing techno with surreal spoken word, hip-hop and electronic dance music as a vehicle for what might be musical autobiography as exposure of neuroses and insecurities inverted bravado.

Thursday | 09.22
What: Dan Deacon w/PROBLEMS
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf
Why: Dan Deacon is one of the most prominent experimental electronic pop artists to have emerged from the American DIY underground whose graduate degree in electro-acoustic and computer music he has put to direct use as a composer and songwriter whose work can be found across a long career of high concept albums and film scores. The former also serving as sage commentary on modern American culture. His shows tend to be incredibly interactive involving audience participation which may make the stage at Meow Wolf more conducive to such adventures than more traditional concert venues. Also on the bill is PROBLEMS mentioned above for that date at Glob.

Built to Spill, photos by Isa Georgetti, collage be Lea Meida

Friday | 09.23
What: Built to Spill w/The French Tips and ORUA
When: 8
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Boise, Idaho’s Built to Spill needs no real introduction as one of the bands to emerge in the 1990s that embraced a noisy punk sound and jammy psychedelia at once to craft a body of work that could express deeply personal contemplations on life as well as commentary on the nature of existence. Its new record When The Wind Forgets Your Name is one of its most gritty and bracing in years with Neil Young-esque guitar leads and Doug Martsch’s signature, haunted, playful mystic vocals offering more of the band’s unique creative vision that never seems trapped by an era or style of music thus its continued vitality.

…And The Black Feathers, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 09.23
What: …And The Black Feathers EP release w/The Trujillo Company, Jaguar Stevens and Bootleg Baldwins
When: 8
Where: Lost Lake
Why: …And The Black Feathers is a band that somehow grinds out bluesy garage rock without sounding like its trying to be some other artist. It’s tempting to compare it to John Spencer Blues Explosion but it’s not that bizarre yet there is something otherworldly to its performances and air of having come to us from the same parallel dimension that gave us Tav Falco and Kid Congo Powers. The group is releasing its first EP in a few years.

Friday | 09.23
What: Dehd w/Exum
When: 8
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Dehd is a trio from Chicago that is somehow able to be funny and incredibly poignant and powerful at the same time with an eclectic body of work that blurs the line between blues, punk, garage rock and dream pop. Its 2022 album Blue Skies is one of its more melancholic and contemplative records but as per usual there is a defiant spirit running through the music that directly translates to the live show where Dehd take minimalist elements and turn it into something that seems so gloriously bombastic and celebratory it exorcises some of the pain and disappointment that went into making the writing of the songs possible.

Divide and Dissolve, photo courtesy the artists

Friday | 09.23
What: Divide and Dissolve w/Matriarch and Vulgarian
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Divide and Dissolve is an instrumental doom band from Melbourne, Australia. And yes, instrumental but its songs crafted from saxophone, guitar and percussion are a commentary on colonialism and its corrosive effects not just on indigenous culture but on itself as an extension of a racist economic system that ultimately commodifies all things and all people and devalues life, the earth and inspires so many to rationalize its predation because they benefit from its narrow vision of sharing resources and the “proper” use of our time in what little of it we have on the earth. The music sounds like a deconstruction of that system and the 2021 album Gas Lit leaves no question about how “the legacy of greed has grown from its seed to infiltrate every place, every face, releasing a suffering recorded in stone and in bone, so old that language can’t console it.”

Friday | 09.23
What: F-ether tour kickoff w/UaZit, FOANS, Knife Band and Causer
When: 7:30
Where: Glob
Why: F-ether is one of the few producers in Denver who is steeped in both the noise, electronic dance and rock scenes who seems adept at navigating these musical concepts in crafting his own playful and imaginative tracks. He’s setting off on his latest tour and celebrating with likeminded, creative electronic artists for this show including the always powerful and engrossing Causer.

Saturday | 09.24
What: Foreign Air w/Anna Shoemaker and Ghostpulse
When: 8
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Foreign Air got together when Jacob Michael’s former rock band U.S. Royalty split in 2017 and he came to work with Jesse Clasen whose own rock bands The Bear Romantic and HRVRD had played shows with U.S. Royalty. For their band together the duo tapped into a more electronic music production approach to crafting lush pop songs. The sound is can range from lo-fi, spare but energetic post-punk flavored pop to enveloping melodic haze given solidity with organic instrumentation. The advance tracks from the new Foreign Air album Hello Sunshine finds the band using the sound palette of modern indie pop and funk with an ear toward more unconventional arrangements and rapid adding and dropping of layers to convey not just gradations of sonic saturation but in doing so the emotional as well. Anna Shoemaker’s 2022 debut album Everything is Fine (I’m Only on Fire) is a collection of sharply observed sketches of lived experience expressed through gritty guitar pop and quiet-loud dynamics akin to 90s alternative rock. But as with lyrics like on her new single “I’m Your Guy” Shoemaker’s songwriting subverts convention by threading her songs with modern electronic details that give the music some unexpected turns of phrase in parallel with her taking relationship, gender and sexuality norms in pop music and turning them over in a way that is both rebellious and gives those normally not in the usual power structure of culture another way of imagining how things can be and dispensing with othering.

Saturday | 09.24
What: Conan Neutron & the Secret Friends w/Almanac Man and An Antiquated Bluff
When: 8:30
Where: Goosetown Tavern
Why: To the casual listener Conan Neutron & the Secret Friends may sound like they listened to a lot of stoner rock and Monster Magnet before forming this band but there is something subversive in the way the group has used its music to challenge transphobia and hideously lazy and destructive thinking in general. Its 2022 split with The Erratic Retaliator Strategy is part noise rock and part philosophical exploration of social phenomena with titles like “Competitive Grief” and “The Misplaced Optimism of the Doomed.” That’s keeping it real. Also on the bill is Denver-based experimental noise rock band Almanac Man and emo Americana math rock phenom An Antiquated Bluff whose own songs examine and attempt to exorcise the anguish of external and internalized oppression.

Sunday | 09.25
What: Trentemøller w/TOM & his Computer
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Anders Trentemøller has been perfecting his particular fusion of moody rock and the electronic under the project moniker of his surname since 2006. The tonally cool downtempo of his earlier albums seemed to anticipate and transcend the forthcoming darkwave movement of the 2010s as his own minimalist compositions organically unfolded to enhance the nuanced melancholy of the song lyrics. In 2022 the songwriter released his latest album Memoria which features the usual reconciliation of thematic and musical contrasts with gritty, saturated synth and ethereal melodic drift over steady beats all conspiring to produce a dynamic that seems aimed at raising spirits against the gloom of the album’s subject matter of acceptance of when things feel off or aren’t going how one might prefer. It gives an element of complexity that feels like a process you’d need to go to shed deep seated regret and process bittersweet memories without forgetting what made them significant.

Sunday | 09.25
What: Laveda w/Isadora Eden, Nina De Freitas and Alana Mars
When: 7
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Laveda from Albany, NY is a dream pop/shoegaze band whose gorgeously lush melodies and warmly evocative singing never masks its all too real and bracing assessments of the world as it is and the challenges we face and the feelings we go through as we try to navigate a culture and society that isn’t giving an adequate response to the specter of climate disaster, fiscal malfeasance from the top, legislative and judicial corruption and all the ways the powerful are making life more difficult for those not in positions of power on a granular level. Sure, ethereal, heavy guitars but as a kind of ambient catharsis and path to staying out of the pits of despair even while giving voice to the concerns that when they hit you at once can paralyze your psyche. But also enjoyable as one of the best new shoegaze bands operating in America.

Monday | 09.26
What: Julia Jacklin w/Katy Kirby
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: On her new album Pre Pleasure, Australian singer-songwriter Julia Jacklin makes uncertainty seem so comforting and reassuring. Like her 2019 album Crushing, this new album has concepts guiding its exploration of themes one does not often hear in music written in a way that sounds like something that landed in the Twenty-First Century from the 1960s with the wash of melody accomplished with spare, organic musical elements in miniature orchestral fashion and Jacklin’s introspective vocal style that seems to draw out the nuances of emotion and psychological details of how we feel that can often be brushed under in the push of the raw, face fronting emotional experience. Jacklin emphasizes the whole picture in its lived experience. On Pre Pleasure she makes acceptance of unresolved feelings and situations seem as satisfying as we’re going to get out of so many circumstances in life.

Monday | 09.26
What: Rein w/DJ Eli and Niq V
When: 8
Where: HQ
Why: Swedish darkwave/industrial artist Rein makes a stop in Denver after her performance at the Coldwaves festival in Chicago. Her blend of synth pop and a gritty and stylized delivery that balances aggression and grace like a more Goth-y Youth Code and more steeped in 90s EBM but with the same sort of punk style and spirited performance.

Tuesday | 09.27
What: The Foreign Resort, Hapax and Plague Garden
When: 8
Where: HQ
Why: Also fresh off their performances at Coldwaves X in Chicago are Depeche Mod-esque, Danish post-punk band The Foreign Resort and the urgent and almost strident melancholic sound of HAPAX from Naples, Italy. Local support from Plague Garden’s whose emotionally charged, electronically infused post-punk is well outside the cookie cutter trendiness that can be heard in too much modern post-punk and darkwave.

Tatsuya Nakatani, photo courtesy the artist

Tuesday | 09.27
What: The Nakatani Gong Orchestra w/Ryan McRyhew and Ben Donehower
When: 7:30
Where: Scorpio Palace
Why: Master percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani brings his 10-piece gong orchestra for an intimate performance at Scorpio Palace (formerly known as Rhinoceropolis). Nakatani will conduct the ensemble in performance with bowed gong. Prior to the 10-person performance there will be a trio comprised of Nakatani and local improvisors Ryan McRyhew, aka Ntrancer who will utilize a Hordijk system, and multi-instrumentalist Ben Donehower who some may know for his avant-pop project Petite Garçon. Seating is limited for this unique performance and doors are 7:30 p.m. with the show starting promptly at 8 p.m.

Tuesday | 09.27
What: Khruangbin w/Tennis, Vieux Farka Touré and Genesis Owusu
When: 5
Where: Civic Center Park
Why: Houston’s Khruangbin has emerged as one of the most popular bands to have emerged from modern American psychedelic rock. It’s sound has trended more toward a upbeat funk and soul sound like the kind of music you’d expect to hear as a regular guest on a modern incarnation of Soul Train. On its 2020 album Mordechai it certain seems to tape into the energy and style of later P-Funk and the kind of mutant funk of early 99 Records bands. But whatever the exact aesthetic one might try to push on Khruangbin its music defies easy pigeonholing and has as much in common with the aforementioned as it does with W.I.T.C.H. and Afrobeat. Opener Owusu Genesis is a Ghanaian-Australian artist who doesn’t just make music but designs his own fashion and those impulses seem to inform each other in an asymmetrical way in that he mixes and matches styles and aesthetics to create something uniquely his own. With rich synth work and polyrhythms his music might be considered hip-hop but his vocal style is decidedly different and playful and imaginative the way one might hear an analog of in Thundercat’s solo material where it would be difficult to pigeonhole him as well. His 2021 debut album Smiling with No Teeth is a genre busting delight of experimental hip-hop and electronic pop.

Wednesday | 09.28
What: Pale Waves w/Gatlin
When: 7
Where: Marquis Theater
Why: Underneath Pale Waves’ effervescent energy and infectious melodies are lyrics that directly and sensitively deal with issues of anxiety, depression and class. Its 2018 debut EP All the Things I Never Said delivered on the promise of early singles like “Television Romance” and “There’s a Honey.” Employing a palette of wonderfully melodramatic pop punk and straight ahead pop, Pale Waves delivers music that is immediately and thrillingly accessible for anyone not looking to be alienated by catchy music but with deftly crafted, meaningful content. Pale Waves recently released its third album Unwanted on August 12, 2022.

Friday | 09.30
What: The Luka State w/Micky James
When: 8
Where: Lost Lake
Why: The Luka State from Winsford, Cheshire brings its tour to Denver ahead of the release of its sophomore full length The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same. If its new single “Stick Around” is any indication the group isn’t short on the anthemic melodies that drove its earlier releases. Its live show looks more fiery and intense than one might expect from songs coming from a place of seeming thoughtful vulnerability.

Queen City Sounds Podcast Ep. 45: Polly Urethane

Polly Urethane is the performance moniker of Amber Benton. She started performing under that name in 2021 and garnered some attention in certain Denver underground music circles for her performance art style shows in which she breaks the stage and audience barrier pretty much every show at this point. Her music combines classical music in her piano work and operatic vocals, electronic composition, musique concrète and industrial soundscaping. In 2021 Polly Urethane released her collaborative album Altruism with Rusty Steve who some may know from his work in futuristic hip-hop glam project N3PTUNE. It showcased a shared knack for pop songcraft that fused darkwave, hyperpop, industrial and R&B. Though Polly Urethane’s presentation can be confrontational the intention is to shake up expectations and arbitrary norms of the performer and audience relationship and is informed by a spirit of humor and the absurd in the intensity and mysterious aesthetic of the performance.

Listen to our interview with Polly Urethane on Bandcamp linked below and go see the band at Down in Denver Fest on Friday, 8/19/22 at 9:45 pm. For more information on the festival and on Polly Urethane visit one of the links beneath the interview.

www.downindenver.com

Polly Urethane on Instagram

Polly Urethane on YouTube

Best Shows in Denver December 2021

Napalm Death, photo courtesy the artists

Spyderland at Larimer Lounge September 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Thursday | 12.03
What: Spyderland, Princess Dewclaw and Connie
When: 10 p.m.
Where: Broadway Roxy
Why: Spyderland is the more soulful synth pop side of the songwriting of Marie Litton (Lil’ Thunder, Ghost Buffalo) and Drew McClellan. The duo’s 2021 album There’s Monsters Outside is an evocation of the challenging social and political landscape of America during a time of impending crises with no real leadership to face them with honesty and conviction leaving us to scramble as best we can while not surrendering to despair. Princess Dewclaw is like if a punk band with strident yet righteous political convictions freely associated musical ideas and didn’t bother to think electronic music can’t be part of a punk aesthetic.

Midwife at Hi-Dive September 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 12.03
What: Old Sport w/Midwife and Seer Believer
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: HQ
Why: Old Sport emerges from its long hiatus to bring its emo flavored punk to local stages again this time sharing that space with Midwife and that project’s deeply emotional, hazy art folk darkwave-esque dream pop.

Friday | 12.03
What: Lose Your Head: Vitrina (EBM), Hex Cassette (synth goth for Satan), Horse Girl, Ray Diess (synth pop), John Baldwin (pop)
When: 6:30/7 p.m.
Where: Jester’s Place (1527 Champa)
Why: A showcase of some of the newer darkwave/synth pop bands out of Denver at a new venue in the cultural wasteland of downtown.

…And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, photo by Krystal Morris

Saturday | 12.04
What: …And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead w/Death Valley Girls
When: 8/9 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Forming in Austin, Texas in 1994, …And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead has been one of the more interesting guitar rock bands out of the underground that somehow both exerted an influence on modern indie rock while remaining a bit of a cult band. Its 2002 album Source Tags & Codes defied easy classification with its eclectic and inventive range of sounds, a pattern the band maintains up to and including its 2020 album X: The Godless Void and Other Stories. Known for its incendiary live shows contrasted with thoughtful and often high concept lyrics, Trail of Dead may be underrated but always surprisingly vital. Opening the show is the psychedelic post-punk band Death Valley Girls whose own unpredictable and imaginative live shows and music is a fascinating pairing with the veteran band.

Monday | 12.06
What: She Past Away w/Radio Scarlett
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Oriental Theater
Why: She Past Away isn’t just a great post-punk band from Istanbul but one of the best bands out of that realm of music operating today. Its energetic and bright yet darkly moody music reconciles the brooding of Sisters of Mercy at their most melancholy with early Cure guitar work. Connoisseurs of post-punk may hear hints of the influence of Russian post-punk legends Kino in the music as well. Radio Scarlett is Denver’s premier death rock band.

Eyehategod at Bluebird Theater January 2014, photo by Tom Murphy

Tuesday | 12.07
What: GWAR w/Napalm Death and Eyehategod
When: 6/7 p.m.
Where: Oriental Theater
Why: Yeah, it’s that GWAR with the absurd costumes as intergalactic scumdogs playing bombastic thrash punk and still giving the middle finger to uptight, conservative American culture and sensibilities in their inimitable and outrageous manner. One might think the highly political Napalm Death is without humor but oh no, the band that is known to play their less than 2 second song “You Suffer” multiple times in a row in case anyone missed it and otherwise have fun eviscerating and sending up the horrific realities of life under late capitalism. Eyehategod will bring a similarly informed and compassionate perspective on human suffering and survival with its own darkly psychedelic sludgy heavy music.

Tuesday | 12.07
What: Thundercat w/Channel Tres at Mission Ballroom
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Thundercat is the brilliant trickster bassist of renown whose skills have helped make many other musicians sound better including Kendrick Lamar, Flying Lotus and Kamasi Washington. But his solo albums are mind-altering musical journeys in their own right and as a band leader, Thundercat ably conjures jazz-funk alchemy with deep creativity.

Moon Pussy at Hi-Dive October 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Thursday | 12.09
What: New Standards Men, Moon Pussy, SPELLS and Alien Neighborhood
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: This is the dual album release from art rock weirdos New Standards Men and Alien Neighborhood. The former never got to celebrate the release of its epic psychedelic jazz prog 2020 masterpiece I Was A Starship in 2020 for obvious reasons but the timing of the release of its companion album Spain’s First Astronaut in 2021 as well as the reissue of the earlier record on Snappy Little Numbers worked out for 2021. For the bill the group is joined by label mates and pop-punk band SPELLS and Alien Neighborhood as well as noise rock legends in the making Moon Pussy. Fans of bands on the Amphetamine Reptile imprint, Big Black/Shellac and outfits on the late GSL label or 31G will definitely have a heavy appreciation for Moon Pussy.

Friday | 12.10
What: N3PTUNE w/Rusty Steve and Hex Kitten
When: 8/9 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: N3PTUNE has already made great waves beyond Denver with a brash and sophisticated body of work that transcends easy categorization with roots seemingly in funk, R&B, soul and rock. It is perhaps facile to compare him to Prince and maybe Yves Tumor but it’s also not far off the mark. This night celebrates the release of his EP The Black and White Ball on which N3PTUNE goes deep singing about intense subject matter with a hearty honesty.

Screwtape at Gothic Theatre November 2016, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 12.10
What: Joy’s Kitchen Benefit Show: Screwtape, Ukko’s Hammer, Destiny Bond, Broken Record
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Mutiny Information Café
Why: This will be a different kind of hardcore show benefiting Joy’s Kitchen. It also signals the return of the great local hardcore group Screwtape to live performance.

Saturday | 12.11
What: Volk w/White Rose Motor Oil
When: 9:30/10 p.m.
Where: HQ
Why: Volk is a cowpunk duo from Nashville, Tennessee. Its 2021 album Cashville is refreshingly raw and catches your attention immediately with an attitude that’s reminiscent of Big Boys when that band went off the standard punk rock rails it never traversed in the first place. Also on the bill are local country rock greats White Rose Motor Oil whose 2020 album You Can’t Kill Ghosts was both a stripped down affair but one that really emphasized the essentials of the group’s songwriting with no filler. It’s more recent releases feature spirited and creative interpretations of the duo’s influences.

Friday | 12.17
What: Flaming Tongues Above, Divingbell and Discontinued Flavors
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: Formerly known as 50 Miles of Elbow Room, Flaming Tongues Above is the solo, experimental folk and musique concrète project of Amos Helvey of Old Sport. Divingbell is the solo project of Angus Smith whose own take on what might be considered a kind of folk-flavored post-rock is reminiscent of what might have happened if Jeff Buckley had joined early Low.

Friday | 12.17
What: Riddy Arman w/The Local Honeys
When: 8/9 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Riddy Arman’s 2021 self-titled debut album on La Honda Records puts the emphasis on the Montana-based songwriter’s vivid storytelling through her powerful vocals. But her expressive and creative guitar work backed by finely accented percussion and a touch of pedal steel frame the stories with a beautifully reflective quality. One of modern country’s rising stars who you can see in small venue early in her career.

Lindsey Buckingham, photo by Lauren Dukoff

Monday | December 20
What: Lindsey Buckingham w/Sammy Brue
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Boulder Theater
Why: Lindsey Buckingham is perhaps best known for his contributions to the best era of rock and pop band Fleetwood Mac. But Buckingham’s work and songwriting outside of the Mac has been noteworthy as well (see his recent performance on SNL with Halsey). Currently the songwriter is touring in support of his 2021 self-titled album, a record that displays Buckingham in fine form as a crafter of pop songs not short on sophistication, economy and emotionally resonant lyrics.

Church Fire at Larimer Lounge September 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Thursday | 12.23
What: Church Fire, Hex Cassette, Horse Girl and Verhoffst
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Church Fire has long been one of the most powerful, dark synth pop bands in Denver and anywhere with songs that don’t shy away from commenting on political and social issues with poetry and emotional force. But also on the bill are other artists in the realm of local darkwave with Hex Cassette’s brooding synthesis of synth pop and EBM and Horse Girl’s transcendent dream pop.

FEAR at Marquis Theater in June 2013, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 12.31
What: Fear w/Potato Pirates, Direct Threat and Cease Fire
When: 7/8 p.m.
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: FEAR is the legendary Los Angeles punk band that helped define an entire lineage of that style of music. The group took great pleasure in taunting self-righteous punks and conservative American culture equally with its irreverently humorous, sometimes nihilistic, lyrics and outrageous performances with lead singer Lee Ving commanding the stage like an insult comedian. The band was featured in Penelope Spheeris’ classic 1981 punk documentary The Decline of Western Civilization as well as the infamous 1981 Halloween episode of Saturday Night Live arranged by show writer Michael O’Donoghue and former SNL star and then cinema luminary John Belushi. On the show the band performed and the audience included members of Minor Threat, Cro-mags, The Meatmen and Negative Approach and mayhem ensued including profanity broadcast before the live feed was cut. So plenty of anticipation was in place when The Record came out on Slash in 1982 and it delivered some of the most caustic and boisterous punk in an era not short on such offerings. Since that time FEAR has released a handful of records, the final being 2000’s American Beer, and occasionally toured and still worth showing up to see. But with Ving turning 72 next year this may be one of your last chances, if not your last chance, to catch these heroes of punk before Ving calls it a day.