Contributors: Grant Britt, Grayson Currin, Kathy Justice, Chris Toenes
Thursday, January 4
Clang Quartet, Yellow Tears, The Cathode Terror Secretion, Nightlight
I’d hate to go blaming Yellow Tears’ urine fetish (they’re calling this the Magical Pisstery Tour, and they’ve used the motto “Have you ever been a pissmop?” at least once) on their Long Island residence, but that does seem slightly convenient. A total dudes-with-gear-in-a-garage harsh noise outfit, Yellow Tears shows surprising patience, working through slow-building, heavy-shooting industrial cataclysms with Delayed Yellow Swans mechanic. Such is not true of tourmates Cathode Terror Unit, whose prurience is a little stiff and clumsy. Maybe the passion of Clang Quartet, Scott Irving’s noise-and-junk paean to God, will let them see the light. $5/ 10 p.m. GC
CRASH, O.N.E. Jones, L in Japanese, Marvell Event Center
Believe this: MC Crash and beat-dropper L in Japanese are a dynamic duo to watch in 2007. In February, Crash drops Treating ADD With Belts, a mix of collaborations with L and various producers. L’s been raiding the airwaves on WCOM 103.5 FM at 11 p.m. on Thursdays with “The Dolla Bin,” a collection of deep-digging, hip-hop sample source material. He takes a break to bounce with his Common Ground collective tonight. Look out. 9:30 p.m. CT
Friday, January 5
Bill Lyerly Band, Hideaway BBQ
A former beach music major, Bill Lyerly made the switch to blues a few years back. But there’s still enough rock in it to keep the shaggers happy: Lyerly has been nominated for five Cammies, the beach music equivalent of the Grammy. Or, if that’s not to your liking, Lyerly can switch his gears, serving it country with material from his 2001 album with Steve Earle, Requiem Mess. $8/ 9:30 p.m. GB
Donna the Buffalo, Lincoln Theatre
Like the socially conscious Pollyanna of the jam scene, this New York-based sextet mounts a flower-power soap box with one svelte statement: “Good turn to evil, push come to shove/ We must save the world with an act of love.” If that act of love can be making eclectic music, then Donna may be well on its way to peace through a mash of bluegrass, reggae, Zydeco and old-time. $17-$20/ 9 p.m. KJ
Chris Hillman, Rod Picott, The ArtsCenter
Chris Hillman’s résumé reads like a Who’s Who? of rock (of the country sort): himself, Gram Parsons, Roger McGuinn, Jim Dickson, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Pete Kleinow. A member of The Byrds, The Flying Burrito Brothers and Manassas decades ago, Hillmana mandolin virtuoso who only started playing bass when he joined The Byrdshas returned to his roots, as highlighted by 2005’s excellent The Other Side, a bluegrass-heavy interpretation of gospel songs and the incumbent reworking of “Eight Miles High.” Rod Picott, one of the most captivating writers in Nashville, opens. $28/ 8:30 p.m. GC
Lanky, Open Eye Café
Tall and skinny songwriter Frank Stabile calls himself Lanky on stage, andif that performing handle connotes a meat-and-potatoes, heartland performerit’s a success. Lanky’s earnest acoustic pop is Starbucks fare in an independent sort of way, perfectly inoffensive but completely likeable. It’s likely to imagine Lanky as the Jackson Browne-and-Sting devotee in the Mayer and Mraz triumvirate. His angles are perfectly acute, and the shapes they make are familiar, but there’s a promising roughness in his Houston shuffle. 8 p.m. GC
Saturday, January 6
Memphis the Band, Hege V, Brown Mountain Lights, Cat’s Cradle
It’s good tunes for a good cause: Three Chapel Hill bands join to make a little School House Rock in this fundraiser for Carrboro’s Woods Charter School: Memphis the Band cashes in on deep-fried, Southern twang-rock, while Brown Mountain Lights straddles the line between Hee Haw sing-alongs and hip-swinging Presley panache. Rounding out the trifecta is Hege V, a rockabilly outfit that makes wild, hepped-up, bone-thumping tunes about broken hearts and blue jeans.They won’t break out in a chorus of “Conjunction, Junction,” either. Or with jokester Jeff Hart, who knows anymore? $10/ 8 p.m. KJ
Don Dixon and the Jump Rabbits, Sally Spring, Hideaway BBQ
Don Dixon is more accustomed to serving pop than pork. Sure, it’s been 30 years since he changed the face of pop with his band Arrogance, but he can still dish it out. “I’m not insane like I was in the ’70s when, if I didn’t pass out, I felt like I’d done a bad show,” he says. “But I can still rock pretty well.” $15/ 9:30 p.m. GB
Saludos Compay, Open Eye Café
Saludos Compay serves up a Caribbean musical feast, combining the spices of Latin America. Colombian cumbias mix with the Buena Vista Social Club sounds of the Cuban Son, the root of salsa. And for those who like their spices stirred not shaken, CS offers the smooth sounds of the bossa nova. No cover/ 8 p.m. GB
Sunday, January 7
The Curtains, Black Socks, Kings
Asthmatic Kitty’s The Curtains are a playful trio from a small town north of San Francisco, and their musicall casual piano plinks, strummed electric guitar and rudimentary percussionis autumnal and easy, the kind of stuff that turns a winter chill into nostalgia for spring or fall’s salad days. “On the road outside/ orange leaves are falling down,” they sing in one song, evoking front-porch fondness, left coast or right. Black Socksbeats of slow skitters and tones of hypnopompic reverieopen. 10 p.m. GC
Wednesday, January 10
Afromotive, Mosadi Music, The Pour House
Asheville’s Afromotive laces its blistering horns laced with dirty, dropping drums, sliding, shimmying and gyrating through intricately engineered African arias that appeal equally to R&B soul shakers and Bohemian groove makers. Mosadi Music’s emcee shirlette ammons points words like lyrical weapons, turning passion into poetry. $6/ 9 p.m. KJ
