Monday | 02.02 What: Worst Night of the Year Fest II: Clementine Was Right, Caspar Milquetoast, Al Ameda and Small Houses When: 7/7:30 Where: Hi-Dive Why: At least this is in February and not January so the name of the event is by circumstance a bit of a joke this year. And given world and national events it seems unlikely as well. But music, yes, Clementine Was Right is the band that combines vivid and heartfelt poetry with emo-flavored country and atmospheric rock and live the band is truly exuberant. Caspar Milquetoast is a band that sounds like what a lot of bands were trying to do mixing psychedelia and folk rock but opting more for an indie pop sound than Laurel Canyon retro and that has meant more original songwriting.
Hobbyist, photo courtesy the artists
Tuesday | 02.03 What: Hobbyist, Pet Traits and Reposer When: 7:30 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Chicago-based Hobbyist like many bands from the Windy City is coming at music from a different angle. This one is noise rock adjacent in terms of sensibility and yes there is guitar and bass but electronic beats and a fusion of downtempo and punk attitude. At times the band dips into a mutant kind of blues rock but its 2024 album People, Like Used CD’s sounds like edgy art pop. Think post-punk made by former theater kids who are writing music to have an emotional resonance and appeal beyond narrow genre categories. Fans of Two Ton Boa and Mecca Normal will probably find something to like here.
Buñuel, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 02.05 What: Buñuel w/Squid Pisser, Spiritual Poison and Almanac Man When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Buñuel is the San Francisco-based avant-garde noise rock/No Wave band. Fronted by Eugene S. Robinson formerly of experimental rock legends Oxbow. This newer band has a similarly menacing and intense sound that is part experiments in arrangement and rhythm that sometimes hits the ear as some kind of industrial noise rock like a sister band to Swans, Live Skull or The Jesus Lizard whose Duane Denison contributes guitar to the group’s most recent album Mansuetude. Squid Pisser is glitchy, demented grindcore from Tommy Meehand (GWAR), Michael Armendariz (Duck Duck Goose) and Seth Carolina (Starcrawler). Spiritual Poison is the “ambient” project of Primitive Man’s Ethan McCarthy and some of the best music he is making. Almanac Man are an angular noise rock band whose style of post-hardcore is rooted in both DC and West Coast punk.
Weakened Friends, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 02.06 What:Weakened Friends w/Team Nonexistent and Queen Frog When: 8/9 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Portland, Maine’s Weakened Friends released its third album Feels Like Hell in October 2025 through Don Giovanni. The trio tapped into that 90s grunge pop sound and the loud-quiet-loud sort of sound structure early on but by now has refined it into something with more nuanced emotional range. The new record seems to be informed by the existential exhaustion, exacerbated by the current social and economic climate, of feeling like maybe your closest relationship has run out of steam yet you’re not ready to let it go while taking an assessment of every aspect of it and realizing in the end that a lot of those feelings are projection and you’re really tired of yourself and how you are and the ways in which you self-sabotage. And how that reflection allows you to grow and be present for the people you care most about but maybe allowed yourself to forget along the way. Team Nonexistent is in a similar lane of music but from Denver and with a little more edge in the presentation.
Judge Roughneck, Hi-Def Photography
Friday | 02.06 What: Judge Roughneck’s 30th Anniversary Party w/Reptiles & Samurai When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Judge Roughneck’s history reaches back to 1995 when ska was entering into its ascendance in American mainstream music but instead of being the kind that plagued the airwaves for a time with a watered down version of the music, Judge Roughneck seemed to have some authenticity and musical chops. The band’s fusion of reggae and ska with soul set it apart from many of its peers and thirty years later and with the recent tragic passing of former trombone player/back vocalist David Dinsmore, the group is still fronted by lead singer and multi-instrumentalist Byron Shaw. This show celebrates its legacy of excellence that transcended genre.
Patrick Dethlefs, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 02.06 What: Patrick Dethlefs and The Still Tide When: 7 Where: Swallow Hill Why: Patrick Dethlefs has been one of the more gifted songwriters out of Colorado for more than a decade and his style of folk Americana is poetic and emotionally vibrant. In 2025 he released his latest record Patty, a collection of songs that told stories of life and made sage observations about the human psyche and society that felt both like something from another, better, era and a commentary about the present times without some kind of didactic statement or grandstanding. All of which is easy and understandable to do but the lack of which lends Dethlef’s record an unspoken elegance of expression. The Still Tide might be described as a dream pop band but one that rocks a little more at times and singer/guitarist Anna Morsett is a bit of a prodigy player with songwriting that doesn’t make that obvious because it is all folded into how captivating the songs so often are.
babybaby4ever, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.07 What:babybaby4ever album release for 4ever is a long time w/Pleasure Prince, Xenon Thief and WNGDU DJ When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Over the last handful of years discerning fans of synth pop in Denver that have been fortunate enough to witness a babybaby4ever show have an artist worthy of her influences. Lily Conrad grew up in Golden, Colorado and started playing music at a young age getting into playing guitar and then cello by her middle school and teen years. In 2016 in college Conrad started making music and performed her first show as babybaby but in the past couple of years she changed the project name so that it was more findable via internet search engines. Early on playing out in and around Denver Conrad was part of the local DIY scene playing house shows and underground venues like the now defunct Posh House. Around that time she started playing keyboards in the live version of psychedelic garage rock band Rose Variety with her friend Becc Perez. The pandemic era stretched time in weird directions but since the world opened up again Conrad started playing around more often in her solo project at venues that could better represent her developing sound and its highly developed, rich synth tone and production. The show now includes props and aspects of performance art from Conrad making a babybaby4ever show memorable both visually as well as for the finely crafted songs that have the spontaneity and vulnerability of classic indiepop and the robust and enveloping melodic tonality of 80s New Wave. In 2026 babybaby4ever releases the new album 4ever is a long time via Denver-based imprint Witchcat Records. The nine songs are loosely a kind of breakup album as breakthrough. The lyrics and moods honor the heartache and the will to move forward by embracing vital experiences and the roots of who were are and what makes our lives feel vibrant.
Midwife, photo by Alana Wool
Tuesday | 02.10 What: Midwife and Amulets w/Sunswept When: 7:30/8 Where: Chautauqua Community House 900 Baseline Why: Midwife brings her emotionally vibrant, ambient folk soundscapes to a rare appearance in Boulder. Opening is Amulets, the solo project of Randall Taylor who has collaborated with Midwife on both his records and her own and his compositions that combine pastoral drones and tape collage is definitely spiritual kin to Midwife’s own songwriting. Sunswept is a flute and synth-driven ambient project from Denver comprised of local improve and experimental music scene star Sarah Christensen.
Sudan Arhcives, photo by Obidi Nzeribe
Tuesday | 02.10 What: Sudan Archives w/Suhreetah When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Sudan Archives came up playing violin and while studying ethnomusicoloy at Pasadena City College she attended the legendary club night Low End Theory and wrote her own music and did some deep diving into violin players across cultures and by 2017 released her self-titled debut EP. Since then, Sudan Archives has made a name for herself a talented composer, songwriter and performer blurring the lines between R&B, classical music, experimental electronic composition and dance music. Her latest album is the sprawling and entrancing The BPM (2025).
Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy, photo by Christy Bush
Wednesday | 02.11 What:Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy and Friends Play R.E.M. w/Bob Goldthwait When: 7 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: For the past dozen years acclaimed actor Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy (Bob Mould Band, Superchunk, Sunny Day Real Estate) have been working together to play albums live by mutually loved artists like The Modern Lovers, The Smiths ad Neil Young. But the past two years the focus has been performing classic albums by college rock/early alternative rock band R.E.M.. Last year the duo performed Fables of the Reconstruction with four original members of R.E.M. joining them on stage for their two shows in Athens, Georgia, the hometown of the group. For this tour Shannon and Narducy will by joined by Jon Wurster, John Stirrat, Dag Juhlin and Vijay Tellis-Nayak in celebrating the 40th anniversary of the album Life’s Rich Pageant and of course the show will include some choice cuts from across R.E.M.’s catalog.
Palehorse/Palerider in 2017, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 02.12 What: Palehorse/Palerider w/Glass Human and BleakHeart When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: This will be a front to back show of heavier Denver bands that don’t fit comfortably in the realm of metal though they might each be considered within that lane of music. Palehorse/Palerider combines desert rock, shoegaze and tribal/pastoral rhythms and soundscapes in its evocation of emotional weight. Glass Human is able to navigate being an art rock band and heavy shoegaze with pop songcraft with surprising mastery. BleakHeart is like if a doom band discarded those trappings in favor of more existential, dark and heavy post-punk.
Plastik Mystik, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 02.13 What:Plastik Mystik album release w/Cherry Spit, Pale Sun and Soneffs When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Plastik Mystik is refreshingly difficult to pigeonhole because its sound hits the ears as some kind of amalgam of punk fury, dark post-punk sophistication and mutant garage rock left of center fractured song structures. After a handful of singles the past couple of years the group is finally releasing its debut album. The rest of the bill is filled out with some of Denver’s finest. Cherry Spit is a ferocious noise rock/post-hardcore quintet whose sound fuses angular, caustic sounds and impassioned vocals with a mathematical precision that breaks enough with being more calculated to be interesting. Pale Sun is arguably Denver metro’s greatest shoegaze band with former members of Bright Channel, Pinkku and Space Team Electra. Soneffs make music at the intersection of indie rock songcraft, psychedelia and shoegaze.
Salads & Sunbeams, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.14 What: The Cowboy Confessional: Sea of Heartbreak – Real Stories, Fake Cowboys w/Christie Buchule, Erin Christian, Susan Earley, Sarah Chase Fountain and musical guests Salads & Sunbeams When: 2 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: This will be an afternoon of confessional storytelling in the spirit of the subversion of the Valentine’s Day holiday. With musical guests, masterful pop band Salads & Sunbeams and their layering of poetry, 60s psychedelia and 90s indiepop.
Gentleman Deluxe, Way High album cover
Saturday | 02.14 What:Heartbreak Holiday: Gentleman Deluxe, The Schofields, Scooter James, Micah and the Mirrors & Silver West When: 6 Where: The Federal Theatre Why: Gentleman Deluxe is the solo Americana project of Aaron Howell, the charismatic frontman of MF Ruckus, White Fudge and various other bands over the years. This effort showcases Howell’s ability to write stripped down songs without losing the emotional sensitivity he can bring to a song that perhaps isn’t as obvious from his more bombastic bands but the sensibilities of which can be heard in his other songwriting. Also on the bill is former Tin Horn Prayer and Pinhead Circus member Scooter James with his own solo work and cosmic country artist Silver West.
DeVotchKa, photo by Jen Rosenstein
Saturday | 02.14 What:DeVotchKa A Tribute to the Music of Little Miss Sunshine When: 7 Where: The Boulder Theater Why: DeVotchKa was already a bigger band in Denver metro around the turn of the century that worked hard to hone and refine its masterful songwriting and sound that got pigeonholed as “gypsy punk” and Americana. But the affecting lyrics and the sophistication of its songwriting with elements of jazz composition and classic pop songcraft and a little luck landed the group’s music on the soundtrack for the 2006 film Little Miss Sunshine which adapted songs from the group’s albums How It Ends (2004) and Una Volta (2003). This is a rare chance to witness a great deal of that music live.
Turning Jewels Into Water is a project with composer/percussionist/turntablist Val Jeanty and percussionist/composer/electronic musician Ravish Momin. Formed around 2017 when the two met at a jam session at Pioneer Works in Brooklyn, New York. Recognizing a shared affinity for crafting unique rhythms and soundscapes and compatible methods of working the two artists have since worked together to explore the ways in which new technologies can be used to blend electronic and acoustic instruments in creating music that reflects the diverse cultural heritages and musical interests in common. The name of the project is a commentary on access to natural resources and howthat has been politicized in human struggles for power especially in the capitalist era increasingly so with the rise in climate change impacts. A casual listen to any of the duo’s three albums reveals a mastery of rhythmic arrangements and patterned tones for a sound that is ambient adjacent but more akin to the kind of early industrial beat-making and culture jamming sounds heard in a band like Cabaret Voltaire but steeped in modern sensibilities and production methods.
Friday | 01.02 What:Angel Band w/Ryan Wong, Fishlegs, Elaine and Nimona When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Angel Band is an indie pop band that seems to have taken inspiration from jangle pop groups of the late 80s and early 90s. Like C86-affiliated groups and acts on the Sarah Records and early Slumberland imprints. There is an enthusiasm with which the music is performed but without losing a sense of delicacy and gentleness. Fishlegs is like-minded in its embrace of the kind of charming twee pop that made 90s underground music worth seeking out. Ryan Wong is of course the songwriter and producer behind his band Supreme Joy but his solo performances can wax into his equally worthy country songwriting.
Victim of Fire, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 01.08 What: Victim of Fire, Cronos Compulsion, Aleister Cowboy, Pedestal for Leviathan When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Victim of Fire is a Denver-based hardcore/black metal band that has been at the forefront of that music out of the Mile High City. Its 2025 album The Old Lie is a sharp and ferocious dissection of economic elitist lies told to working class people to get them to give up their best interests in pursuit of enriching the wealthy at the expense of everyone. Cronos Compulsion is a death-sludge metal band also from Denver whose 2025 album Lawgiver is a bracing listen and a solid example of the caustic and brutal sonic power of the art form. Fort Collins’ Aleister Cowboy released an EP of what might be described as cosmic death metal called Neolithic Blood Rites in 2025. Pedestal for Leviathan’s flavor of black metal is the more symphonic variety but don’t worry, it’s plenty brutal as well once the songs get into gear.
Black Flag in 2019, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.09 What:An Evening With Black Flag When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Ever since replacing the most recent lineups of Black Flag with young musicians, Greg Ginn seems to want to bring some new blood into his venerable and influential punk band Black Flag. Did it work? You’ll have to go to find out but Ginn’s guitar work remains impressive and unique in the canon of punk and hardcore.
Precocious Neophyte, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.09 What: Warper, Precocious Neophyte and Blackberry Crush When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Warper released its new album Something, Sometime in October 2025 showcasing its further development from moody, atmospheric emo band into a heavier shoegaze band. The new record also showcased the band’s development as songwriters since its 2021 Lateness EP. Sure, you can hear a touch of possible influences like Hum and Sunny Day Real Estate but also newer groups like Cloakroom. Warper doesn’t shy away from demonstrating musical chops in the songs as well with evocative solos. Precocious Neophyte seems to come from similar roots but its musical instincts seem to have some noise rock and metal influences along with obvious touchstones like My Bloody Valentine with a knack for fragile melodies alongside searing guitar work and crushing heaviness. Blackberry Crush has evolved into more of a shoegaze band in the past couple of years but without sacrificing a knack for writing compelling pop hooks with some clear inspiration from 90s grunge.
Watch Yourself Die, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 01.10 What:The Pretty Shabbies, The Futons and Watch Yourself Die When: 7 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: The Pretty Shabbies sound like its music is comprised of bits of 1970s jazz and funk. There’s a chance the members listened to a lot of Zappa, a bit of Jethro Tull, modern jam bands and someone in the mix probably has every Traffic record. And yet the organic free flow of the music is not without a certain appeal because it’s not like many other local bands. The Futons are sort of a psychedelic garage punk band. But Watch Yourself Die is seemingly different every time with a strong and confrontational, transgressive performance art component which is going to make it completely divergent from everything else on this bill in the best way.
Saturday | 01.10 What:Night Fishing, Nativity in Black, Tainted Blade, Halo of Lightning When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Night Fishing is a collision of fusion, psychedelic prog, surf rock and post-rock but heavy and it includes members of other much heavier and more brutal bands. This is not gentler so much as not aggressive in its sound. Nativity in Black is a Black Sabbath cover band fronted by Chella Negro. Don’t expect the poetic Americana of her other band Chella and the Charm. It’ll be legit Black Sabbath evocation. Tainted Blade is a blackened death doom band from Denver. Halo of Lightning is a “stoner-doom metal” band from Colorado.
Circling Girl, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 01.15 What: Summer Bedhead, Circling Girl and Majona When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Summer Bedhead’s eclectic indie rock reflects the changing musical landscape of the past decade. In the band’s story songs you hear strands of the throwback to 90s rock, garage rock, dream pop and more. But it’s all channeled into the group’s own style of confessional pop songs with some bite and more than a little vulnerability. Circling Girl is a Denver-based dream pop band whose sound has some bright shimmer in the guitar melodies with vocal harmonies that are reminiscent of The Sundays, Lush in its more pop mode and a touch of Cocteau Twins. Its 2025 album Only My Veins Know is one of the better releases in the broad spectrum of shoegaze and dream pop of the past five years with its intricate and entrancing songwriting. Majona is the style of atmospheric pop that is adjacent to shoegaze but more in the realm of Mazzy Star-esque slowcore.
The Green Typewriters, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.16 What:Green Typewriters, Salads and Sunbeams and Teacup Gorilla When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: The Green Typewriters are the kind of psychedelic pop band that makes use of conceptual framing and aesthetics to deliver a unique style of music that blurs the line between Elephant6 indiepop including the experimental streak of that music, art rock and mystical psychedelia. Salads and Sunbeams engages in modern pop storytelling through the sonic lens of 60s and 70s psychedelic rock with poetic observations on modern life and the ways our current civilization works to erode our humanity and offering ways to reclaim it through imagination and honest feeling. Teacup Gorilla is a high concept art pop band that challenges conventional views of gender and identity in its songs and in its presentation of the music.
Kayo Dot, photo from Bandcamp
Sunday | 01.18 What: Kayo Dot and Abandons When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: New York-based avant-garde metal and Kayo Dot makes a rare appearance in Denver following the release of one of its most challenging and visionary records to date in 2025’s Every Rock, Every Half-Truth under Reason. The album was written against the idea of the creative act and creativity as a result of predictive modeling and its dystopian offspring, AI music and art. The songs are not in the vein of traditional metal or really something easily or at all identifiable as metal. It’s often like an organic, mutant and sprawling set of songs that at most has something in common with something like Mamaleek. But even more abstract. Abandons is not as avant in its songwriting but it is in the way the band writes music in a more improvisational mode and without seeming to try to fit in with a neat genre. Sure if you want to call them post-rock or post-metal they fit that but also noise rock and art rock and in moments with songs written with more abstract electronic ideas in mind.
Cherished, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 01.22 What:Cherished album release w/Tassles, Flesh Tape and Headslug When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Ever since switching names to Cherished in 2022 and a shift in sound more toward the shoegaze end of post-punk this Denver quintet has developed a body of work that defies easy categorization. There is some noisy, punk edge underlying the sonics and performance style but the atmospheric melodies and introspective and thought-provoking lyrics set the band apart from any obvious niche aesthetics. Its 2025 self-titled album was recorded and mixed by Seth Manchester at Machines With Magnets who is perhaps best known for working on records by Model/Actriz, Lingua Ignota, Battles, Big|Brave and Lightning Bolt. It emphasizes the more gritty side of the band’s sound without sacrificing the deep moods Cherished manifests live. Opening the show is bedroom dream pop band Tassles, noise-rock post-punk group Flesh Tape and Headslug whose sound sits somewhere between grunge pop and shoegaze.
Cthonic Deity, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.23 What: Cthonic Deity, Street Tombs and Death Possession When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Cthonic Deity is the doom/death metal/punk band from Denver that includes Paul Riedl of Blood Incantation fame. It’s much more stripped down and brutal in its guitar attack and includes members of Scolex and Ascended Dead as well. Street Tombs from Santa Fe, New Mexico are a collision of d-beat punk and thrash-infused death metal. Death Possession play the kind of death metal that sounds like it was inspired by many sessions of taking in early Slayer, early Possessed and Xasthur in a secret club house.
Dollpile, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.23 What: Gion Davis, Dollpile, Your Friend Nirantha When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Gion Davis is a poet with the indie rock band Clementine Was Right who is releasing a new book Designated Stranger that “spans years, states, genders, and climates as it confronts the concurrent apocalypses of being trans and poor in America.” Seems appropriate for the world today. Also performing is Dollpile fka Isadora Eden, a band whose dream pop is more theatrical and atmospherically dense than the genre is often known for producing. Also Your Friend Nirantha and its endearingly earnest bedroom dream/noise pop.
Turning Jewels Into Water, photo by Ed Marshall
Saturday | 01.24 What: Turning Jewels Into Water When: 6PM doors for Artist Discussion and Q&A, concert 7:30PM Where: Bug Theater Why: Turning Jewels Into Water is a project with composer/percussionist/turntablist Val Jeanty and percussionist/composer/electronic musician Ravish Momin. Formed around 2017 when the two met at a jam session at Pioneer Works in Brooklyn, New York. Recognizing a shared affinity for crafting unique rhythms and soundscapes and compatible methods of working the two artists have since worked together to explore the ways in which new technologies can be used to blend electronic and acoustic instruments in creating music that reflects the diverse cultural heritages and musical interests in common. The name of the project is a commentary on access to natural resources and howthat has been politicized in human struggles for power especially in the capitalist era increasingly so with the rise in climate change impacts. A casual listen to any of the duo’s three albums reveals a mastery of rhythmic arrangements and patterned tones for a sound that is ambient adjacent but more akin to the kind of early industrial beat-making and culture jamming sounds heard in a band like Cabaret Voltaire but steeped in modern sensibilities and production methods. For our interview with Ravish Momin please follow this link.
Cop Killer, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 01.24 What: Vulgarian, 908, Old Skin and Cop Killer When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Denver-based, anti-capitalist, doom/sludge/crust group Vulgarian are releasing their third album Cost of a Bullet at this show. Expect caustic and brutal riffs and plenty of pointed and incisive lyrics about what a demented and corrupt civilization we’re living through right now. 908 is a grindcore/powerviolence band from Colorado Springs that includes current and former members of Aberrant, Catheter, Throcult, Upon a Field’s Whisper, Havok and Tree of Woe. Old Skin sounds like a band that came up playing stoner metal and doom but leaned into the Unsane and Cherubs end of that sound and now is almost more of a noise rock band with some sludgy grooves while still sounding incredibly menacing. Cop Killer is the hardcore band from Denver that thankfully has lyrics that are appropriate to the name of the band and a confrontational performance style worthy of the name as well.
Jim Ward, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 01.29 What:William Elliot Whitmore and Jim Ward (Sparta) When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: William Elliot Whitmore is a singer/songwriter from Iowa who earned a reputation as one of the more skilled practitioners of folk Americana since the late 90s. With releases on Southern Records, ANTI- and Bloodshot Records Whitmore’s respectable body of work has garnered him a bit of a following and he has toured with Chris Cornell, Murder By Death, Converge and Esmé Patterson, with whom he has worked, to give a sense of his broad appeal beyond the obvious for his charismatic performances and fine songcraft. Also on this bill is Jim Ward, the frontman and guitarist of Sparta and former member of At the Drive-In performing his solo material that spans genres but all graced with his vulnerable yet passionate vocals.
Call Sign Cobra circa 2006, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.30 What: Call Sign Cobra w/Friends of Cesar Romero, El Welk, Total Cult When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Back in the mid-2000s Call Sign Cobra was a bit of a local supergroup that included members of now, minus the punk cognoscenti of the day, forgotten punk bands like Scott Baio Army, The Facet, Mail Order Children and Out on Bail. It’s sound was a kind of loose around the edges garage rock and what later “neo-classic rock” bands aimed for but could never quite nail in trying to sound pro. Imagine a Memphis garage rock band of the 90s, The Dirt Bombs, Teengenerate and a glam rock band mixed together and add a horns section and you have some idea of what you’re in for. It’s raucous, ridiculous and here’s a rare chance to see the band nearly twenty years after it dissolved. Also on hand will be modern garage punk luminaries Friends of Cesar Romero and Total Cult as well as noisy post-Americana group El Welk.
The Crooked Rugs, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 01.31 What: The Crooked Rugs, Rugburn and Chroma Lips When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: The Crooked Rugs from Fort Collins live come off like a countrified psychedelic rock/shoegaze band with a deep appreciation for T. Rex. But one with a knack for memorable and transporting melodic hooks. Rugburn’s own flavor of psychedelia is more steeped in grunge and more distorted sounds in general with a bit of an edge. Denver’s Chroma Lips has more synth in the music and its motorik beats point to some inspiration from Krautrock, possibly a touch of Silver Apples and possible hints of having soaked up bits of the better end of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Black Mountain and the most inspired bits of Tame Impala but with more interesting guitar work.
Tuesday | 12.02 What:The Home Team: The Crucible of Life Tour w/Arrows in Action and Makari When: 6:30 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Seattle’s The Home Team is touring in the wake of the release of the deluxe edition of its 2024 album The Crucible of Life. The record is a combination of its post-hardcore roots, R&B and modern alt-pop with the kind of production and electronic elements one would imagine out of that melding of sounds and styles. Also on the bill is Arrows in Action who recently released their new album I Think I’ve Been Here Before (Nettwerk). Since forming in 2017 the group’s fusion of modern rock and pop songwriting with R&B vocals and electronic pop production has garnered a bit of a wide online following. But live the band’s energy and commanding performances are proving it’s more than a studio creation capable of delivering a more visceral version of the slick production of its recordings.
Death Possession, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 12.04 What:Decibel Magazine Metal & Beer Fest: Denver pre-fest with Terror Corpse, Vimana and Death Possession When: 7 doors Where: Ratio Beerworks 2920 Larimer St. Why: Decibel Magazine’s Metal & Beer Fest has been pretty reliable for booking some of the most interesting bands in the realm of extreme metal since its inception. This pre-fest event includes performances from Texas-based blackened death metal group Terror Corpse, technical death metal/grindcore band Vimana and the ominous sounds of Denver-based death metal outfit Death Possession.
Story Of The Year, photo by Ryan Smith
Friday and Saturday | 12.05 and 12.06 What: Story Of The Year and Senses Fail w/Armor For Sleep When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: Two of the better and more popular bands out of that post-hardcore and pop-punk crossover in the early 2000s are sharing the bill on this tour with Senses Fail and Story of the Year. The latter settled on the name in 2002 after forming in 1995 in St. Louis. It’s intricate yet hooky guitar riffs and emotionally charged vocals weaving between emo sensitivity and more distorted screaming meant Story of the Year was in the pocket of a popular style with younger fans of punk looking for something with more edge than the typical pop punk of the day. The band split for a couple of years in 2011 and reconvened in 2013. For this tour you may be able to hear some of the quartet’s forthcoming album A.R.S.O.N..
Blood Incantation, photo by Julian Weigand
Friday and Saturday | 12.05 and 12.06 What: Decibel Metal & Beer Festival Day 1 (12.05) Blood Incantation, Chat Pile, The Red Chord, Panopticon and Castrator, Day 2 (12.06) Acid Bath, Eyehategod, Deadguy, Primitive Man, Conan and Necrofier When: 6 (12.05) 5 (12.06) Where: Fillmore Auditorium Why: Decibel Magazine brings to Denver a generous sampling of the best of current extreme metal for a two day festival. Attendees can opt to buy a ticket that includes getting in on the beer varieties being showcased at the event or a mere “Metal Only” pass for just the music. The first night is headlined by Denver-based psychedelic, progressive death metal band Blood Incantation and one might argue also the political noise rock legends Chat Pile. The second night is indisputably headlined by influential and foundational sludge metal group Acid Bath who are reuniting for a handful of shows this year. Also on that night earlier on is Denver’s death grind trio Primitive Man who recently released their latest sprawling epic of an album Observance with its even more pointed and withering commentary on a corrupt and self-destructive society and economic order and even their own part in its continuance.
Primitive Man, photo by Vanessa ValadezWet Leg, photo by Alice Backham
Sunday | 12.07 What:Wet Leg w/Capture This and Bob Moses (club set) When: 5 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Wet Leg is the scrappy post-punk/pop band from the Isle of Wight that started garnering a bit of a cult following after the release of its debut single “Chaise Longue” in 2021 followed by the full-length including that song in 2022. The song and the band’s general presentation is frank in its depiction of sexuality but with a wit and charm and undeniable hooks that keep you coming back to listen. The full length was brimming with tales of everyday life delivered with the spirited sass that you would hope would inform the rest of the songs. The group released its sophomore record Moisturizer in 2025 and its own eclectic set of songs delivered on the promise of the debut including lead single “Catch These Fists” about not defaulting to being polite when you get harassed in public places.
House of Harm, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 12.09 What: House of Harm w/Past Self and killyouclub DJs When: 8 Where: The Crypt Why: House of Harm is a post-punk band from Boston whose sparkling melodies and melancholic vocals could be like any other band out of recent darkwave. But there seems to be a bit more emotional urgency in the singing and keen attention to the electronic end of the soundscapes that drive the music. Past Self is a darkwave/death rock band from Las Vegas with leanings toward more ethereal dream pop.
Belly, photo from the band’s Facebook
Friday | 12.12 What:Belly 30th Anniversary of King – 2 sets one night When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Belly Formed in 1991 shortly after Tanya Donelly left influential post-punk band Throwing Muses. She had spent a brief stint in the early version of The Breeders but after 1992 Belly became the singer/guitarist’s main creative focus and the 1993 release of the group’s debut album Star landed the music on regular rotation on MTV during that first great wave of alternative rock. Founding bassist, and former Throwing Muses member, Fred Abong left the outfit a few months after the release of the record to be replaced by Gail Greenwood (who would go on to play in L7 and recently Gang of Four). The new lineup would record the follow up album, 1995’s King. At the time grunge was, in face, king, and the jangle-y, atmospheric power pop of the record meant it didn’t perform as well commercially as its predecessor but artistically it was a step forward into interesting directions. Belly gets the chance to revisit those songs live with you if you show up and there’s a better than average chance that some material from the first record and 2018 album Dove will end up on one of the two sets.
Flutter, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 12.13 What:Lawsuit Models, Flutter, Black Dots, State Drugs When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lawsuit Models is the kind of modern punk band that clearly has roots in 90s and early 2000s pop punk but didn’t get stuck completely in that sound. But preserved is the best of that music and its relatable yearnings and an ability to take topical cultural references and make them into statements of more enduring human experience and struggle. The rest of this bill is also interesting because Flutter is a great power pop band who seem to have translated an older sound and sensibility into a modern context with a charismatic live show. Black Dots are a veteran punk act from Denver that has also made a transition into a more modern mix of sounds from a pop punk adjacent early sensibility to something more seemingly informed by a touch of Americana and more straight ahead rock. State Drugs come from that stand of punk that as into power pop of the late 80s and early 90s like they listened to the cooler end of The Goo Goo Dolls, Gin Blossoms and Soul Asylum and decided the songcraft in those bands and a knack for a melodic hook and earnest emotional expression was perfectly fine a well of inspiration as any other.
Jorma Kaukonen, photo by Vernon Webb
Saturday | 12.13 What: Jorma Kaukonen When: 7 Where: Paramount Theatre Why: Jorma Kaukonen was one of the members of the classic lineup of Jefferson Airplane. The latter helped define the San Francisco Sound of the late 60s and the early psychedelic rock of the era. Kaukonen came into the group as a blues guitarist who had earlier played a gig with Janis Joplin before either came to anything resembling prominence. The Airplane had hits like “Somebody to Love” and “White Rabbit” and its 1967 album Surrealistic Pillow is a classic of the 60s with songwriting that endures because it was unlike much of anything else in its then realm of rock music. Kaukonen’s instrumental “Embryonic Journey” and its elegantly intricate guitar work brought more than a touch of experimental folk to one of the great psychedelic rock albums of all time. Later in the 60s Kaukonen and some of his bandmates in the Airplane formed Hot Tuna, a group that continues to this day. Somewhere between a psychedelic country blues band and free improvisation outfit, Hot Tuna was a little difficult to pigeonhole though today would be considered on the higher end of the jam band spectrum. Kaukonen has also had an acclaimed solo career in which he can no more easily be classified but in which his energetic and free-flowing finger style guitar and seemingly endless ability to find ways for the guitar to express great feeling with nuance remains. For this tour, possibly the musician’s last on a wide scale at age 84 (soon 85 on December 23) Kaukonen will be joined on stage by heavy hitters R. Carlos Nakai & Will Clipman, David Hidalgo, Jack Casady, Justin Guip, and Ross Garren.
Silver West, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 12.16 What: Silver West (album release and Hali’s birthday) w/Marty Nation and Whitless When: 7:30 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Silver West will release her debut album Ballads of a Heartbroken Hunter at this show. The songwriter/musician is relatively new to performance but has been around music her whole life and as a sound person at various clubs and other live show situations she’s certainly been witness to her fair share of music stories as well as firsthand experience with what works best in a live music format. How much of that shaped her songwriting, hard to say, but surely in the recording there will be an uncommon level of attention to detail and production. But if you’ve seen Silver West there is a compelling vulnerability to her particular style of cosmic Americana that is refreshingly raw and thoughtful.
Takipnik, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 12.18 What:Takipnik, Lost Relics, Chew Thru and Sungrave When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Takipnik is a Denver-based heavy band that formed in 2019 and recently released its third album Awakened. The record reveals the band has a keen ear for ethereal atmospheric elements mixed in with those more distorted and raging. Think something like Agalloch and Russian Circles and you have an idea what to expect. Lost Relics bridges the gap between extreme metal and noise rock. Some of its members came out of the more interesting end of the Denver stoner rock scene of the 2000s and 2010s and found a way to sharpen the sound some without losing the ability to maintain a solid groove and thus hooks. Chew Thru has more roots in post-hardcore but still has the aggression and knack for a touch of melody that one might expect from a band with influences in 1980s thrash. Sungrave is in the metal universe as well but its sound clearly has some origins in psychedelic rock and the kind of post-metal one heard in the various incarnations of Isis and Neurosis. In moments the shoegaze fusion has Sungrave sounding more like the majestic pastoral side of Jesu.
Cop Killer, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 12.19 What: Cheap Perfume, Arson Charge, Gunk! and Cop Killer When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Arguably the punk show of the month headlined by feminist/political punk band Cheap Perfume from Colorado Springs. Its latest album Don’t Care. Didn’t Ask. really does pushes its critique of society and capitalism to new heights and connects the dots in many realms of human life in the intersectional way that the current moment requires. Arson Charge includes former members of Native Daughters, Chieftain and Love Me Destroyer and fronted by SPELLS singer Ben Roy. It’s thrashcore and Roy takes on a different vocal style than you’d expect from him and it’s potent stuff tackling issues related to deeply personal experiences with abuse and the legacy of that for one’s own life in ways that the adult mind is beginning to grapple with. Gunk! Is a like-minded hardcore band from the Springs with a raw, caustic sound. Cop Killer recently released its self-titled EP and it is five tracks of the kind of aggressive hardcore you’d hope with the verbal content you’d hope was there including an updated rework of the Body Count classic.
Salads and Sunbeams, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 12.20 What:Salads and Sunbeams and Gadget Cats When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Salads and Sunbeams are one of the premier Denver-based indiepop bands. Coming out of noteworthy previous bands Fingers of the Sun and The Pseudo Dates (among others), the band’s songs are literary and steeped in 60s and 70s psychedelic pop but informed by modern experiences in the current socio-economic context. Its songs are tonally colorful and heartfelt and filled with creative storytelling. Gadget Cats are a grunge pop group from Fort Collins whose songs released so far seem to reflect some inspiration from 90s underground punk and indiepop.
Pons, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 12.20 What:Pons w/Bitchflower and Plastik Mystik When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Pons is a mutant art punk/neo-No Wave noise rock band from Brooklyn, New York that incorporates classical instruments used in unorthodox ways. Often its songwriting sounds like it’s been influenced by experimental electronic music and left field jazz with splintered, fragmented tempos and imploded structure. Bitch Flower from Fort Collins sounds like it was inspired equally by the most jagged and confrontational punk and dark psychedelic rock like the Stooges and its own blues roots. Plastik Mystic is sort of a strange blend of psychedelic garage rock and something like moody punkers Wipers.
DJ boyhollow aka Michael Trundle of Lipgloss in 2021, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 12.31 What: A Lipgloss New Years Eve When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lipgloss has been held at various venues since starting as the prominent indie DJ/dance night in Denver and one of if not the longest running such nights in the country. Currently helmed by longtime DJ Michael Trundle aka boyollow, the night is being held perhaps for the first time at arguably the best small club in Denver, the Hi-Dive. Expect indie hits from the 90s, 2000s, 2010s and now with some sprinkling in of 80s and maybe even 70s music that inspired the music that launched the event.
Colfax Speed Queen, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 12.31 What:Colfax Speed Queen, Jesus Christ Taxi Driver and Glueman When: 8 Where: Lost Lake Why: If a night of high energy punk is how you want to spend your New Year’s Eve this is the best bet. Colfax Speed Queen is really a psychedelic garage rock band that has made a name for itself in Denver and beyond. But its charismatic and charged performances propel its whole thing into the realm of punk. Jesus Christ Taxi Driver sounds like it came out of the American southeast with its blues-infused rock and roll. But its attitude is definitely adjacent to the irreverent spirit of punk and its live shows are played with a palpable intensity. Glueman these days sounds like its members were inspired by strands of the gloriously frayed and ferocious punk from Memphis, Tennessee from the 80s to now. Just raw and unmindful of a need for clean tonal lines and tapping into some wild energy. If you’re Oblivions you’ll probably be into Glueman.
Saturday | 11.01 What: Moon Pussy w/Old Deer When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: This is your last chance of 2025 to see the noise rock juggernaut trio Moon Pussy. Whereas many noise rock bands are a permutation of post-hardcore and sludge metal, Moon Pussy is genuinely strange and both humorous and ferocious which is not a combination one sees often enough. Vocalist Crissy Cuellar’s on stage banter and absurdist (in the delivery) jokes does little to mask how smart the band’s music is or its inherent sophistication of concept and execution. Old Deer brings the doom to posthardcore in its own weighty style of noise rock.
Native Daughters, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 11.01 What:Native Daughters, Abrams and BleakHeart When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Instrumental, heavy noise core outfit Native Daughters doesn’t play out often these days and usually at bigger venues. But its epic, cinematic sprawl of post-rock post-metal has evolved to a degree of highly expressive and vivid sonic storytelling without words. Abrams is the perfect amalgamation of shoegaze and atmospheric post-hardcore like Torche and Cave-In. Fantastic, melodic harmonies and transporting guitar streams in heavy momentum and luminously gritty leads. BleakHeart will likely be in its new manifestation but probably still have the gorgeously dark and orchestral fusion of dream pop and heavy post-rock.
Ada Lea, photo from Bandcamp
Sunday | 11.02 What:Ada Lea w/Porlolo and Autumnal When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Ada Lea released her third album when i paint my masterpiece in August 2025 and further established her status as a modern master of finger picking style with expressive and beautifully intricate guitar work paired with her delicate yet assured vocals. She is currently signed to Saddle Creek Records which is fitting since an act to which she might be favorably compared is Azure Ray. Porlolo is the indie/acoustic band from Denver whose own aesthetic is adjacent to that of the headliner but Porlolo has been around considerably longer as a live act. Erin Roberts’ existential and poignant lyrics and occasionally dryly humorous stage banter with commanding vocals is what has keep the project a local favorite. Fort Collins’ Autumnal comes out of the indie folk corner of the Colorado music universe but its songs will assuredly appeal to those with a taste for pastoral slowcore and the tenderest of indiepop.
Ryan Davis, photo by Christina Casillo
What: Ryan Davis & The Roadhouse Band w/Caspar Milquetoast When: 7 Where: Larimer Lounge Why: Acclaimed songwriter Ryan Davis and his band released one of the secretly great albums of 2025 with Ryan Davis & the Roadhouse Band “New Threats from the Soul.” On the surface it’s like some indie Americana thing but not long into the first song it becomes apparent that what you’re hearing is weirder and more creative but not in expected ways. It has the dapple lap steel flourishes enhancing the melodies like you’d expect from a solid country record but there are synths in the mix and tape loops so that at times things seem otherworldly and unpredictable but in the pocket of strong songwriting. It’s a fascinating effect. Plus Will Oldham contributes vocals to the album so you know it’s definitely coming from a different kind of place. The lyrics are also like something out of a Cormac McCarthy novel but sung like an artist out of the whole Laurel Canyon scene of the early 1970s.
they are gutting a body of water, photo by Kasey Agosto
Tuesday | 11.04 What:they are gutting a body of water w/Fib When: 7 Where: Marquis Theater Why: For several years Philadelphia’s they are gutting a body of water has been stirring noise and grime into drifty, warping shoegaze to create something like the equivalent of a lo-fi cassette only release by one of those weird late 2000s bands that would have belonged on Siltbreeze. Like Times New Viking or Eat Skull. But if those bands were more into Slint and Planning For Burial. Crush yet transcendent guitar tone, left field rhythmic structures or none at all and just stretches of raw sound that drops into fragmented melodies like these people listened to a lot of Canadian band Women coming up as well. The group’s new album LOTTO pushes the songwriting into even more unpredictable territory.
Martin Dupont, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 11.05 What: Martin DuPont w/Church Fire and French Kettle Station When: 7 Where: HQ Why: After a nearly 25 year hiatus, French coldwave/New Wave band Martin Dupont re-emerged as a live project in 2023 and a new album of re-recordings of older songs titled Kintsugi. In 2025 a record of new material dropped called You Smile When It Hurts establishing that the members of the group were capable of crafting quality resonant songs on part with its acclaimed earlier material. Church Fire is Denver’s premiere industrial dance pop group. The impassioned performance style of the band always made it a standout but with expanded production as a trio and a dynamic light show Church Fire brings a large stage show visual impact to any venue. French Kettle Station is a one-man New Age dance project with no small amount of visceral energy of his own even when he’s triggering prepared electronic passages or performing live synth.
Packaging, photo by Andy Thomas
Thursday | 11.06 What: Packaging w/Barbara, Paw Paw and DJ Ryan Wong When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Packaging is the new group formed between Daniel Lyon of Spirit Award and Daniel “Connor” Birch of Flaural. Their debut, self-titled album dropped October 10 and no surprise, perhaps, its lush and enveloping psychedelic pop benefits from the contributions of multiple artists out of the wider indie rock realm including Luke Temple (Here We Go Magic), Ash Reiter (Sugar Candy Mountain), James Barone (Beach House), Andreas Wild (Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats), Curt Kiser (Carriers) and Andy Rauworth (Gauntlet Hair). Its luminous melodies and melancholic urgency helps to set the music apart from yet another post-2010s psychedelia project. Its songs have emotional heft and the music is entrancing and commanding.
Death to All, photo courtesy the artists
Friday | 11.07 What:Death to All playing Spiritual Healing and Symbolic w/Gorguts and Phobophilic When: 6 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Death to All features former members of foundational extreme metal band Death including Gene Hoglan, Steve DiGiorgio and Bobby Koelble as well as former Cynic member Max Phelps on guitar and vocals. This tour the assembled band will perform the classic albums Spiritual Healing (1990) and Symbolic (1995), both albums that represented a progression of the band in new directions that would shape where technical death metal of the future worth listening to would go. Anyone that has caught the Death to All tours in recent years can attest to how legit the presentation and musicianship has been with some of the greatest heavy music of all time getting a live performance treatment that honors the legacy of founder Chuck Schuldiner’s vision with some of the only musicians that can make it happen.
Supreme Joy, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 11.07 What:Hi-Dive 22 Year Anniversary Night 1: Nuclear Daisies, Cleaner, American Culture and Supreme Joy When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Hi-Dive has arguably emerged as the premiere small club in Denver with solid bookings every week across a fairly broad spectrum of genres, styles and subscenes. Pick any week and there is at least one show that’s worth going to but probably really a few. It has had some of the best sound in a room of its size with a skilled sound crew. This two night celebration of Hi-Dive begins with sets from garage-psych giants Cleaner, shoegaze/indie pop legends American Culture, left-field post-punk/post-garage phenoms and headlined by noisy shoegaze dance dream pop group Nuclear Daisies.
Daniel Donato, photo by Jason Stoltzfus
Friday and Saturday | 11.07 and 11.08 What: Daniel Donato’s Cosmic Country Tour w/The Fretliners When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: Daniel Donato started developing ideas for his version of “cosmic country” while playing in bands around Nashville and coming up with a fusion of country, rock and roll, the free associating improv he heard in the Grateful Dead and folk psychedelia. Think a sound and vibe more like a honky tonk end of Gram Parsons and you’ll have an idea what you’re in for. The live shows are imbued with a spirited creativity in the performance and inspired free flowing improvisation that goes beyond where most bands operating in musically adjacent territory seem to be able to conjure. The band is currently touring in support of its 2025 album Horizons.
Melodies Never Lie, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 11.08 What:Melodies Never Lie, Salads and Sunbeams, Mouth Cathedral at Squirm Gallery, benefit for Jeanette Vizguerra When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Jeannette Vizguerra was detained by ICE on 3/17/25 with the aim of deporting the well-known immigration activist and remains in custody at the ICE detention center in Aurora. Her case received some press attention and despite the charges against her, Vizguerra’s situation parallels that of many others who are struggling with a broken and now very punitive system of immigration in the USA particularly with the involvement of the militarized and extremely politicized ICE organization which is an extension of the failed and catastrophic “War on Terror” that is now being used to persecute thousands in America and is essentially a private army of the most corrupt president in US history employed to terrorize people living in America. So this show is a benefit for one of the most visible people targeted by ICE and will hopefully help to create a ripple effect of resistance to the wave of fascism and tyranny plaguing not just America but the world. For more information helping Vizguerra click on the link in the band names. Melodies Never Lie is the ambient indie pop shoegaze solo project of Isaac Rivera whose roots in Denver underground pop, experimental rock and avant-electro goes back two decades. Salads and Sunbeams is the finely honed psychedelic indiepop group from Denver whose members came up in the DIY world and the underground scene developing skills and aesthetics that incorporate classic songwriting methods with modern sensibilities. Mouth Cathedral creates gorgeously transporting, ethereal dream pop.
Palehorse/Palerider in 2017, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 11.08 What: Hi-Dive 22 Year Anniversary Night 2: Glacial Tomb, Palehorse/Palerider, Mournful Ruin and Eagle Wing When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: This second night of the Hi-Dive anniversary celebration features music on the more heavy side. Glacial Tomb is a long-running death metal doom trio from Denver. Palehorse/Palerider makes a cinematic, unclassifiable heavy music that blends psychedelic, dark Americana and tribal post-punk. Mournful Ruin is more on the grindcore-influenced end of sludgy death metal. Eaglewing is a sort of throwback to early New Wave of British Heavy Metal sound akin to Judas Priest in moments and includes Yancy Green formerly of Aberrent and now of Roskopp.
Steven Lee Lawson, photo courtesy the artist
Saturday | 11.08 What: All Through the Night and Steven Lee Lawson When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: All Through the Night is an Americana band that sounds like it makes music for a Jim Jarmusch film set in the highways and byways of Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming meaning moody, emotionally immediate and drawing from eclectic roots rather than a more traditional country or rock and roll base. Steven Lee Lawson is a brilliant songwriter, lyricist and multi-instrumentalist whose music is also tending toward an Americana sensibility but he clearly draws inspiration from the likes of Harry Nilsson and 60s psychedelia.
Ax and the Hatchetmen, photo courtesy the artists
Saturday | 11.08 What:Ax and The Hatchetmen w/Kids That Fly When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: Chicago-based Ax and The Hatchetmen haven’t been around long enough to have played the legendary Chicago venue Lounge Ax but its brand of melodic indie rock with elements of jangle-y psychedelia wouldn’t have been out of place had the club endured through to today. Though the band has been around since 2018 its debut album So Much to Tell You debuted on October 24 via Arista Records. But the group has had EPs and singles along the way and the whole early pandemic stretched everyone’s timelines a bit so this band had time to incubate and hone its songwriting. The new record showcases how the band is able to orchestrate diverse influences into a sound that feels like a blend of power pop, turn of the century New York post-punk, soul and garage rock.
Sunday | 11.09 What: Emergence w/Voicecoil and Absynthe of Faith When: 8 Where: Club 404 Why: Emergence was one of the prominent EBM/industrial bands of the 2000s that went on hiatus toward the end of that decade. The band commanded large audiences at the time in Denver and toured nationally before splitting around 2005. In 2024 the core of the group with new collaborators reconvened to re-start Emergence with a new sound palette.
Agriculture, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 11.11 What: Agriculture w/Rhododendron and Clarion Void When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Agriculture is the black metal band from Los Angeles whose sound struck a chord among fans of noise rock for its forays into wild sonic strangeness in its songs. The group’s new record The Spiritual Sound isn’t short on classic thrash style riffs and melodic breaks yet still feral rawness in the vocals and the erupting and imploding song dynamics and escalating sense of surreal hysteria. Agriculture is currently touring in support of its excellent new album The Spiritual Sound. Presumably Rhododendron is the experimental prog noise thrash band from Portland, Oregon and Clarion Void the death/blackened doom/sludge metal band from Colorado Springs.
Boris, photo by Yoshihiro Mori
Thursday | 11.13 What: Boris w/Cloakroom When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Boris is celebrating the 20 year anniversary of the release of its 2005 album Pink. The sprawling epic of a record was and still is a peak for the group in its complete disregard for needing to fit in with being a metal band, a shoegaze group, a heavy psych blues outfit, a noise project or post-rock. The sounds have grit and edge while simultaneously ethereal and uplifting and dense with tone and texture that swims and hurtles in often unpredictable directions. Pink sounds like it could have come out in the late 70s, the early 90s or in any of the most recent two decades and still come off as something mind-altering in its maximalist sonics. Opening is the Indiana-based heavy shoegaze band Cloakroom whose 2025 album The Last Leg of the Human Table proved it was capable of not only searing and transporting psychedelia but also pop hooks worthy of the best indie rock bands. Something about Cloakroom’s music feels like it’s coming from a near future science fiction universe where the world is both in deep civilizational decay and an underground cultural renaissance transmitting the kind of music we want to hear.
King Princess, photo by Connor Cunningham
Thursday | 11.13 What:King Princess w/spill tab When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: King Princess has built a body of work that uses lush production and introspective lyrics to explore the nuances of personal psychology, social dynamics and relationships with creativity and sensitivity. The latest album Girl Violence and its masterful use of saturated synths, tonal processing and layers of atmospheric noise help to place the singer’s soulful vocals in settings that immerse the listener in the emotional moment of the song. It’s a bit of a journey of a record with contributions from Joe Talbot of IDLES fame.
Underworld, photo courtesy Magnum PR
Friday | 11.14 What: Underworld When: 7 Where: The Fillmore Auditorium Why: With the 1994 release of its landmark album Dubnobasswithmyheadman, Underworld helped to usher in an era of music fusing progressive house, techno, ambient, downtempo and psychedelic electronic music that proved influential on at least a generation of like-minded artists. The record is structured to be a little like experiencing the music at a rave with expert pacing and layers of rhythm and atmosphere to craft a sustained mood of sensuous transcendence. The duo’s latest album Strawberry Hotel (2024) is decidedly less dark and brooding than the aforementioned but still brimming with mysterious moods and the completely enveloping production one would hope to get from masters of the art.
Friday | 11.14 What: Kill You Club 8 year anniversary w/Nuxx, Puerta Negra, Lazer Bullet and Severed Reality When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Kill You Club has been bringing some of the most interesting and cutting edge darkwave/Goth-adjacent bands to Denver for several years now. The kinds of artists the more traditional Goth scene seems to bypass and be unaware exists until a half decade or more later. Possibly because Brian Castillo has his finger on the pulse of what’s cool in that realm of music whether the more electronic end or the post-punk acts that are pushing the boundaries of what that music has been. Headlining this night is the edgy, synthwave punk/industrial trip hop artist Nuxx.
Felly, photo by Olof Grind
Friday | 11.14 What:Felly w/Breakup Shoes and Lady Denim When: 7 Where: Fox Theatre Why: Felly released his latest album Ambroxyde in June further solidifying his reputation as an artist who can take the gentle and delicate and turn it into something feels like it has some emotional substance even as his vocals are often bordering on the ethereal. The title track sounds like it coalesced out of the surrounding weather and that’s a feeling you get from the new album. It’s like something that feels instantly comfortable yet able to build in energy and enthusiasm without losing a sense of intimacy. It makes the music impossible to simply dismiss as another indie folk thing as the songwriting itself is more lush and sophisticated than appears on the surface.
Suzanne Ciani in 2023, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 11.15 What: Suzanne Ciani w/Clarice Jensen When: 7 Where: Central Presbyterian Church Why: Suzanne Ciani is an innovator in synthesizer music composition with an influential career spanning more than fifty years. Her work, musical and sound effects, has been featured on soundtracks, television and in a pinball machine game called Xenon. In the 1980s her compositions became associated with new age music and by extension modern ambient. Ciani in recent years seems to have expanded her live performance itinerary and her 2023 appearance at this same venue showcased her gift for imaginative soundscaping on a large format with an inherent sense of play in the performance and songcraft.
Broken Record, photo by Chris Carraway
Saturday | 11.15 What:Broken Record album release w/Precocious Neophyte and Safekeeper When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Broken Record is a Denver-based band that formed after singer/guitarist Lauren Beecher and bassist Corey Fruin moved to the Mile High City from Connecticut in 2017. Both had roots in the underground and DIY scene in and around New Haven and in forming Broken Record around some material Beecher had been working on what emerged was music that reflected the influence of punk and hardcore, certainly in the ethos of the group, as well as the atmospheric melodic qualities of The Cure. If you caught the band early on you might be excused to hearing in the music a touch of Hüsker Dü’s emotionally rich and fierce yet gentle aesthetic. The fledgling outfit found a home in the local hardcore scene and played early shows with the likes of then relatively newly founded bands like Destiny Bond and Ukko’s Hammer. And yet Broken Record never seemed out of place even though the catharsis of its music wasn’t formed from the same set of sounds but the emotional core of the songwriting shared a similar vulnerability and intelligence in expressing emotion with a keen sensitivity in the language of emotionally charged rock music.
The quartet released its debut full-length I Died Laughing on April 24, 2020 and of course could not tour around the record due to the global pandemic. But on that album one hears the knack for melodic jangle and shimmer embedded into earnestly energetic hooks with the expert pacing and Beecher’s warmly thoughtful vocals that strike the perfect emotional coloring for songs that are often poignantly melancholic and always deeply observant. For the 2023 album Nothing Moves Me the songwriting seemed to experiment further with tone and style incorporating delicately minimal guitar leads and triumphant choruses while seeming to be able to mine the more interesting ends of adolescent angst as a lens by which to understand the sometimes disillusioning aspects of adulthood. Like an entire record of what your teenage self might have to say about your current adult self. The 2025 album Routine and its cover of suburban American would-be normalcy takes the band’s established themes further to seemingly comment with great insight into the compromises and perils of navigating life in late capitalism and how that can cast a pall over your life if you’re not equipped to find some meaning in a socioeconomic environment seemingly designed to erode your joy and ability to live a full and dignified life. But also on the album the band seems to find the threads of psychic resistance to it all in creative acts and writing songs that feel like a shaking off of the gloom with music that feels like an expression of basic human solidarity.
The Green Typewriters, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 11.15 What: The Green Typewriters, Mr. Pacman and Pythian Whispers When: 7 Where: Feldman Mortuary Why: A rare show at a mortuary in Denver with psychedelic, experimental indie pop group The Green Typewriters. The band’s songs seem to stem from philosophical concepts as projected through the lens of analog human experience and emotions. Mr. Pacman is visionary blend of synthwave and punk with performance costumes like video game characters. Pythian Whispers is a psychedelic ambient cinematic noise prog band.
Saturday | 11.15 What:Cap’N Jazz w/Rainer Maria When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: Cap’N Jazz only released one full-length album, 1995’s Burritos, Inspiration Point, Fork Balloon Sports, Cards in the Spokes, Automatic Biographies, Kites, Kung Fu, Trophies, Banana Peels We’ve Slipped On, and Egg Shells We’ve Tippy Toed Over – often called Shmap’n Shmazz. But that record proved to be a template for a realm of math rock, emo and indie rock in all its messy and frenetic glory and its core of earnest emotions seemingly unleashed at once across twelve songs in thirty-one minutes, ten seconds. It sure wasn’t for everyone because those more into pristine arrangements and established, classic pop/rock songwriting structure and sounds probably found it just completely amateurish—which is an essential part of its appeal for others. When the group split in 1995 its members went on to groups like The Promise Ring, American Football, Joan of Arc and Make Believe. Cap’N Jazz has reunited a few times since it first broke up but this is its first wider tour since the 90s and along for this journey is Rainer Maria whose own poetic emo/space rock sound seems to resonate with the emo and shoegaze fusion that has been bubbling in the past several years.
Brighde Chaimbeul, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 11.18 What: Brighde Chaimbeul When: 8 Where: The Bug Theatre Why: Brighde Chaimbeul is a Scottish musician who grew up in a musical family and herself learned fiddle and piano before setting out to play the smallpipes and bagpipe for which she is perhaps most well-known these days. She has worked with experimental pop artist Caroline Polacek and composer Colin Stetson and she recently released her latest album Sunwise. It is a rousing journey of a record that establishes a strong mood with drone and folk minimalism. It helps to expand the aesthetics of ambient with a profound sense of place through unconventional instrumentation for a sound one immediately associates with that broad genre of musical experience. It has a folkloric feel like the sense one gets when watching the 1970s films of John Boorman. It’s a deep record and one whose songs performed live are sure to mesmerize in this rare performance at one of Denver’s premier venues for the avant-garde as presented by Creative Music Works.
PORTUGAL. THE MAN, photo by Nathan Perkel
Tuesday and Wednesday | 11.18 and 11.19 What: PORTUGAL. THE MAN w/Ya Tseen When: 7 both nights Where: Fox Theatre (11.18) and Mission Ballroom (11.19) Why: PORTUGAL. THE MAN has offered plenty of left field indie/psychedelic/hard rock/punk over the years with a body of work that is immediately identifiable if not so easy to pigeonhole into a simple marketing category. In 2025 the band has released one of its albums in its 21 years with Shish. The record is an endearing and at turns entrancingly melodic and harrowingly intense tribute the band’s home state of Alaska and the search for meaning not just in an edge of the world place like Alaska but in the tentative state of the world in general perhaps as embodied in the challenges of living in a place that is often so isolated and laden with snow. Jack London would certainly recognize what PORTUGAL. THE MAN is putting out there on Shish.
The Beths, photo by Frances Carter
Wednesday | 11.19 What: The Beths w/Phoebe Rings When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: The Beths are an acclaimed power pop band with a noteworthy career offering memorable songs often informed by a euphoric sense of joy in the performance even when the subject matter waxes heavy. But there’s something different about where the music is coming from partly because the group hails Auckland, New Zealand and its members have backgrounds in jazz. So the intricacy and attention to the delicacy of the performances comes off as natural and confident and fans of Kiwi rock in general and C86-era indiepop will immediately connect with its music. The band is currently touring behind its new album Straight Line Was a Lie which is rich with heartfelt lyrics, unconventional hooks and a keen ear for small sonic details that make the songs linger with you.
Diles Que No Me Maten, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 11.19 What: Diles Que No Me Maten, Pink Lady Monster and Sunswept When: 7 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Diles Que No Me Maten from Mexico City is a band that on the surface is an odd psychedelic rock band with roots in Krautrock. But a closer listen and witnessing a live performance reveals the group seems to be coming from a background/interests in No Wave, experimental poetry and the more odd post-punk of The Fall with vocals that are part singing and part spoken word. So a good fit with Denver No Wave funk poetry weirdos Pink Lady Monster and the avant-folk psychedelia of Sunswept.
Juliet Mission in 2015, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 11.28 What:Juliet Mission, In A Darkened Room and Redwing Blackbird When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Juliet Mission is the secretly great shoegaze/alternative rock band from Denver with one of its bonafide guitar heroes Doug Seaman who among other projects was and still is in influential alternative rock band Sympathy F. Tony Morales from that group is also in Juliet Mission and its exquisite soundscapes and emotionally expansive songs are rooted in Denver’s long tradition of moody, atmospheric rock partly in helping to establish that sound inspired by late nights and the former sprawl of urban decay inviting the imagination to project one’s dreams upon forgotten and neglected spaces. Redwing Blackbird is a darkwave band more in the vein of The Cure with the sparkling guitar jangle and mastery of melodic tone.
Malkasian, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 11.29 What: Malkasian – Heavy Blues album release, Riff Dealer and A Strange Happening When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Malkasian released its latest album Heavy Blues on October 22, 2025 but you can get a copy of the vinyl at this show. The band could be described as heavy, psychedelic blues rock but it is weirder than that simple designation suggests. The vibe with its references to the occult and, um, “Long Pig,” suggest that the title of its previous album Macabre wasn’t just a throwaway descriptor. The mood is reminiscent of the 1989, spooky debut album by stoner rock pioneers Masters of Reality. A Strange Happening must be friends of someone in one of the other bands but even if not its own ambitious alternative pop songwriting and high concept storytelling in an Neil Young-esque gone indie rock vein is strong recommendation in itself.
Shonen Knife is a pioneering Japanese punk band that started out in Osaka in 1981 inspired by the kind of music that influenced the Ramones like 60s girl groups and by the Ramones themselves. The trio were a rarity in Japan in the early days as an all-female group and its lyrics about food, animals and pop culture paired with infectiously upbeat melodies were all but a precursor to pop-punk and a focus on everyday joys over the horrible things we often face in the world we experience. After all, if you only focus on the negative it’s harder to get through tough times. Shonen Knife embraced by American artists and labels like K Records in Olympia, Washington and Sub Pop out of Seattle and Sonic Youth, Red Kross and Nirvana who were instrumental in getting the band a record deal with Capitol Records in 1992 for the release of its 1993 album Let’s Knife. Shonen Knife has remained a bit of a cult band since and its reliably fun music and charming and energetic live shows has justified its legendary status. The outfit’s latest album Our Best Place got a 2025 vinyl reissue available on the tour and afterward through the Good Charamel website. The album is vintage Shonen Knife with fun and sometimes surreal songs about good times, beloved food and personal empowerment.
Listen to our interview with Shonen Knife co-founder, vocalist and guitarist Naoko Yamano on Bandcamp and follow Shonen Knife at the links below. The band performs at HQ in Denver, Colorado on October 9, 2025 with The Pack A.D..
Wednesday | 10.01 What: Modest Mouse w/Built to Spill When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Coming off the heels of a summer co-headlining tour with The Flaming Lips, alternative rock icons Modest Mouse is now touring with fellow Pacific Northwestern alt-rock legends Built to Spill. Modest Mouse’s idiosyncratic melodies and emotionally charged vocals that range freely from the vulnerable to the nearly unhinged and cathartic has made the group a cult band from its early underground days to international stardom. Built To Spill came out of the psychedelic post-punk band Tree People to carve out a legacy of being steeped in both punk and psychedelic improvisation. The group’s coherent yet eclectic style has been considered shoegaze by some or more deconstructed, slackery power pop by others but all held together by singer and guitarist Doug Martsch’s introspective poetry and colorful songwriting imagination informed by the broad swath of human experience layering melancholia with joy. Both bands started in 1992 and have managed to release vibrant later career material unlike many bands over thirty years into their existence.
Patriarchy in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 10.01 What: Patriarchy w/Spiritual Poison and Kill You Club DJs When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Patriarchy is the Los Angeles-based electro death rock band whose edgy lyrics and just as edgy stage appearance and performance art style has garnered it a wide underground following. Fortunately the band’s songs are more than the bombastic live show with commanding vocals and refraining from the usual tropes of modern darkwave and leaning into rich tones and embracing the industrial underbelly of the music as well as glitchy witch house and ambient washes of foggy harmonic gloom. Currently on tour in support of the new album Manual For Dying.
Malena Cadiz, photo by Mikael Kenedy
Thursday | 10.02 What: Malena Cadiz and Anna Ash When: 7 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Malena Cadiz’s 2023 album Hellbent & Moonbound seems to be inspired by snapshots of experiences of life during an average week in Los Angeles and walking the neighborhood and imagining the lives of strangers based on intuitive observations and mixed with more than a touch of autobiography to breathe life into the storytelling. The songs are in the realm of Americana pop but with vibrant electronic touches that combine with spangled guitar flourishes that anchor the songwriter’s words in your mind. She is touring with Anna Ash who like Cadiz was born in Michigan but now calls the City of Angels home. Her own style seems more stepped in country but the kind that emerged from the folk pop and rock that spawned the likes of Phoebe Bridgers. Meaning some luminous moods, strong cadence and expressive vocals and stories that sound like they came out of astutely collecting anecdotes while working in the service industry and thus imbued with an undeniable authenticity.
Anna Ash, photo courtesy the artistFlutter, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 10.04 What: Flutter and The CDs When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Flutter is a Denver-based power pop band whose 2025 EP When You Love Somebody hearkens back to late 70s power pop. Its earnest lyrics about the nuances of love and relationships and how one’s emotions can be so strong but feel so complicated paired with sparkling, jangle-y guitar melodies render the band’s songs memorable beyond any tinges of nostalgic tone. Live the group has a surprisingly passionate performance style that elevates the music even further.
Die Spitz, photo by Pooneh Ghana
Sunday | 10.05 What: Die Spitz w/Flowers For the Dead When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: Austin-based Die Spitz taps into the more melodic end of 90s grunge but clearly with a foundation in pop punk energy and knack for melodic hooks. Its 2025 album Something to Consume is moody and smoldering in tone and often reminiscent of early 2000s post-hardcore emo with some edge and vulnerability mixed in with the bombast. Some nice atmospheric layers and for the song “Throw Yourself to the Sword” an obvious taste for thrash metal somewhere in the band’s DNA makes Die Spitz a band that isn’t beholden to a narrow musical traditions.
Riki, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 10.06 What: French Police w/Riki When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex Why: French Police is a Chicago-based post-punk band with a bit of a cult following for its melodic coldwave style with subdued moods and narrowly atmospheric melodies. Riki is an enigmatic synth pop artist from Los Angeles who has a bit of a following of her own among connoisseurs of darkwave for her dance music adjacent beats, vivid washes of synth and commanding vocals reminiscent of 1980s New Wave acts. With only two full length albums under her belt for the Dais imprint out in 2020 and 2021 respectively, Riki recently released a two song EP Pulser (2025) that hints at further newly developed material that may be experienced at this performance.
Dark Angel, photo from Facebook
Monday | 10.06 What:Dark Angel w/Sacred Reich, Vio-Lence, Midnight and Interceptor When: 5 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Dark Angel formed in the early days of Bay Area thrash and its early music was understandably compared to Slayer with the wild and menacing guitar pyrotechnics and urgent rhythms that broke and changed direction in an instant to switch up the tone of the song. Its most coherent early statement of style was the caustic and thrilling 1986 album Darkness Descends. It was the first to feature legendary drummer Gene Hoglan whose contribution to the sound and style of the better heavy metal of the era and since is undeniable as a pioneer of thrash and death metal. The group’s final album before splitting for the first time in 1992 Time Does Not Heal was primarily written by Hoglan and instead of occult themes it delved into issues mental health issues and the impact of culture, religion and failed political policy (including a complete lack thereof) on the individual and thus society generally. It was ahead of its time as a kind of masterpiece of progressive thrash. The band would not release another record until 2025’s Extinction Level Event, the first album following the death of founding guitarist Jim Durkin in 2023 to whom the record is dedicated. Also on this bill are other luminaries of 80s thrash like Sacred Reich and Vio-Lence.
Patrick Shiroishi, photo courtesy the artist
Wednesday | 10.08 What: Patrick Shiroishi: Forgetting is Violent Tour w/M. Sage https://hi-dive.com/listing/patrick-shiroishi-forgetting-is-violent-tour/ When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Patrick Shiroishi is a multi-instrumentalist composer based in Los Angeles who is most known for his imaginative and explorative saxophone work as a solo artist and as an inspired collaborator with projects like Fuubutsushi, We Bow to No Masters, Upsilon Acrux. This year he released his latest record Forgetting is Violent, a masterclass in using the idiom of music as abstract free jazz, field recordings and ambient composition to express ideas about colonialism and racism and its legacy for today and how both threaten human existence and yet both of which need not lead to dire inevitabilities when acknowledged and confronted with honesty and integrity. M. Sage is Matt Sage who was a pillar of the DIY music world on the front range when he was based in Fort Collins in the 2000s and 2010s before relocating to the Midwest for a spell and there further putting out cutting edge ambient and pastoral folk records on his Patient Sounds imprint. Lately, Sage has expanded his musical range further into the realm of avant-garde improvisational and electronic music.
Oliver Hazard, photo by Ross Bustin
Wednesday | 10.08 What:Oliver Hazard & The Last Revel: Head West When: 6 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Oliver Hazard is an indie folk band from Waterville, Ohio that recently released its latest album Raindrop River on Nettwerk. The band started prior to the 2020 pandemic and thus earned its audience the hard way through extensive touring in livingrooms and small venues and now headining theaters like The Gothic. The band’s delicate melodies and uplifting, bright energy ads a lift to songs that seem honest about everyday life struggles and simple joys, about tough choices and heartache and affection and a broad spectrum of human experience.
Shonen Knife, photo by Tomoko Ota
Thursday | 10.09 What:Shonen Knife w/The Pack A.D. When: 7 Where: HQ Why: Shonen Knife is a pioneering Japanese punk band that started out in Osaka in 1981 inspired by the kind of music that influenced the Ramones like 60s girl groups and by the Ramones themselves. The trio were a rarity in Japan in the early days as an all-female group and its lyrics about food, animals and pop culture paired with infectiously upbeat melodies were all but a precursor to pop-punk and a focus on everyday joys over the horrible things we often face in the world we experience. After all, if you only focus on the negative it’s harder to get through tough times. Shonen Knife embraced by American artists and labels like K Records in Olympia, Washington and Sub Pop out of Seattle and Sonic Youth, Red Kross and Nirvana who were instrumental in getting the band a record deal with Capitol Records in 1992 for the release of its 1993 album Let’s Knife. Shonen Knife has remained a bit of a cult band since and its reliably fun music and charming and energetic live shows has justified its legendary status. The outfit’s latest album Our Best Place got a 2025 vinyl reissue available on the tour and afterward through the Good Charamel website. The album is vintage Shonen Knife with fun and sometimes surreal songs about good times, beloved food and personal empowerment.
The Chameleons, photo by Mick Peek
Thursday | 10.09 What: The Chameleons w/The Veldt When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: The Chameleons are the legendary post-punk band that innovated a type of atmospheric and emotionally charged sound with two guitars playing off each other almost as one instrument. The effect and aesthetic is a sound that seems to have heavily influenced the shoegaze bands of the late 80s and early 90s by showing how effected guitars layered with synth could be a unified element in songwriting. Add Mark Burgess’ socially conscious yet deeply personal lyrics and commanding voice and you have a body of work that has aged well from the 80s and a clear inspiration for modern darkwave whether those bands know it or not. The band hadn’t released a new album since 2001 until this year with Arctic Moon, the first since the return of original guitarist Reg Smithies. The record’s songwriting reconciles the more acoustic rooted songwriting of the group’s later albums and the ambient moods of its classic 80s material for a surprisingly effective late era effort from one of the greats of 80s. Get there early to see The Veldt, one of the great, lost shoegaze and psychedelic post-punk bands of the 90s through today with a sound like a mix of R&B and dream pop.
Martin Rev, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 10.10 What: Martin Rev (and VJ Divine Enfent) w/Loveshadow (SF), Fergus Jones (DJ-Denmark,Scotland) and Kill You Club DJs When: 7 Where: The Aztlan Theatre Why: Martin Rev is one half of pioneering punk/post-punk/electronic band Suicide. The latter pre-dated the classic CBGB’s scene while also part of that. Its confrontational/borderline dangerous early live shows are remembered vividly by those who were there with former lead singer Alan Vega alternatively swinging a motorcycle chain during the performance to crawling over broken glass into the crowd and other refinements. Rev’s more modern solo music is an adventurous foray into noise, playful soundscapes, abstract industrial and what might be described as harsh ambient.
The Milk Blossoms, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday and Saturday | 10.10 and 10.11 What:Aurora Borealis Festival When: 4:30 Where: High Prairie Park at Painted Prairie Why: This event promises an array of vendors and food and live music set to unique visuals inspired by the Northern Lights and taking place in the furtherst northeast reaches of Aurora, Colorado probably the final weekend of the year when it may not be too cold to hold an outdoor event. The first night of the festival is headlined by R&B pop and soul artist Kayla Marque whose songs stretch beyond the preconceived boundaries of genre with a commanding voice and charismatic stage presence. Also on that night are Destiny Shynelle, Kalpulli Mikakuikatl, Jade Oracle and DJ Polyphoni. The second night of the festival will be headlined by experimental dream pop quartet The Milk Blossoms who have been writing new music that expands what pop music can sound like with deeply poetic lyrics that invite you to feel your own emotional turmoil fully as a vehicle for personal transcendence through immersion in creative work. Earlier on that evening you can also witness Miss Flowers, Kalama Polynesian Dancers, Eye Yoob and DJ Rewild.
Bambara, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 10.11 What:Bambara w/Midwife When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Brooklyn-based post-punk band Bambara released its new album Birthmarks in March and built further its reputation for transporting and moody deathrock with bluesy vocals. The combination hearkens back some of the 80s bands that combined soul and R&B with dark, experimental rock. Live the band has a bit more grit than one would expect from the the records. Midwife is the internationally renowned underground artists whose pastoral, ambient, “heaven metal” has crossed from the indie and experimental/ambient realms of music into the heavy music world for the weightiness of her lyrics and the quiet intensity of her performances. The music frankly packs an emotional gutpunch more than virtually all metal bands and that makes a massive difference.
PUP + JEFF ROSENSTOCK, photo by Nestor Chumak
Saturday | 10.11 What:PUP & Jeff Rosenstock and Ekko Astral When: 6:30 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: When PUP from Toronto, Canada started out in 2010 it was part of a wave of underground bands that came up in punk, perhaps even 2000s hardcore, that seemed to figure out they could find a way to make fun, catchy songs in a pop punk vein with some integrity that realm of music had lost like its connections to punk spirit and ethos were more or less gone. So PUP and bands across North America in pockets seemed to come up with a similar idea around the same time without necessarily knowing about each other. And PUP absolutely tapped into that sound and that anthemic and heartfelt pop-punk and even emo aesthetic with lyrics that truly captured working class struggles, everyday challenges that anyone with any heart could relate to and the attainable triumphs that can sometimes seem so elusive. In 2025 PUP released its new album Who Will Look After the Dogs? On that record the group worked with Jeff Rosenstock who is co-headlining this “PUP + JEFF ROSENSTOCK PRESENT: A CATACLYSMIC RAPTURE OF FRIENDSHIPNESS” tour and of course they’ll play some or all of their collaborative material together with separate sets. Rosenstock has been in bands since the 1990s like The Arrogant Sons of Bitches and Bomb the Music Industry but he has rightfully earned his plaudits for his solo albums with his incredibly catch songs with scrappy energy and tenderness and an acute awareness of the things that make life challenging for everyone.
eHpH, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 10.12 What: Laether Strip w/Cervello Elettronico and eHpH When: 7 Where: HQ Why: Leæther Strip is the well-known electro-industrial/EBM band from Denmark that was part of the second wave of that music in the late 80s but which didn’t succumb to the temptation of the bland future pop trend of the late 90s and 2000s. The latest release from the project is Æppreciation VIII, a tribute album that includes versions of songs originally written by the likes of Garbage, Boy Harsher, Yaz, Robin, Ladytron and Madonna. Local opener eHpH has been on a bit of a mini-hiatus for a couple of years but has always been an example of how a project can draw from EBM and electronic-industrial and not be caught up in the tired tropes of that style of music. The band’s lyrics are often a poignant and sharply observed social commentary and the production more layered and deeply creative than that of many of their peers in the broader realm of modern industrial music.
The Mayday Parade, photo courtesy the artists
Sunday | 11.12 What: All Time Low w/Mayday Parade, The Cab and The Paradox When: 6 Where: Red Rocks Amphitheater Why: Mayday Parade is in the middle of releasing a three part album in 2025 to commemorate 20 years as a band. Sweet released in April and the second installment Sad dropped October 3. The group formed in 2005 around the time when the pop punk and emo scenes nationally were basically floundering but Mayday Parade came as a result of two other bands in Tallahassee, Florida coming together. The 2007 full length A Lesson in Romantics and its mix of earnest songwriting and humor won over detractors of the band’s early efforts as the group has set itself apart from late era pop punk. Since then the group has refined its sound while maintaining a knack for tapping into the sensitive emotional core that is at the heart of its stylistic roots and finding new ways of writing about experiences that people go through no matter what age. Headlining is All Time Low who slightly predate Mayday Parade but have been in a similar musical lane in anthemic power pop and emo. In one of the opening slots is The Cab who also came up in the mid-2000s pop punk milieu and were signed to the Fueled By Ramen imprint along with All Time Low. But The Cab’s sound seemed to be more informed by 90s R&B and mainstream pop and its electronic production than most of the band’s pop punk peers and because of that its music is decidedly different from any standard issue punk.
Superchunk, photo by Alex Cox
Monday | 10.13 What:Superchunk w/Case Oats When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Superchunk is one of the most well=known of the alternative rock bands of the 90s who helped ot not just define a sound with its upbeat, melodic punk at a time when punk had become mostly an underground scene. The group also helped to push other left field rock bands well past the 90s with its Merge imprint and though its own music is respectable and easily worth a listen for the wit and expert songcraft that larger effort of creating an environment in the culture for its own type of music thrive and be accepted is a massive legacy. Superchunk is now touring in support of its 2025 album Songs in the Key of Yikes, a record that not only has some of the group’s finest songwriting of recent years but a title and content that is very much a poignant summation of this moment in history and of the culmination of recent years to boot. Not enough bands have done so with such hummable conciseness. Case Oats is an Americana band based in Chicago fronted by Casey Gomez Walker that put out its debut album on August 22, 2025. Titled Last Missouri Exit it’s a reference to a sign near the Illinois border. Walker’s vocals are earnest and have enough raw vulnerability to give her performances an authenticity that lend her tales of growing up and growing beyond one’s place of upbringing a poignancy that is reminiscent of Rilo Kiley with a similar deftness in crafting turns of phrase that hit like sparks of the truth that can warm and sting at once.
Case Oats, photo by Braeden LongAcid Mothers Temple perform at Larimer Lounge on April 8. Photo by Tom Murphy
Monday | 10.13 What:Acid Mothers Temple w/The Macks and Los Toms When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: You don’t go to an Acid Mothers Temple show to see the legendary, Japanese psychedelic rock expecting they’ll play your favorite song from their copious recorded catalog. You go because it’s going to be pure musical weirdness and an experience to take you out of mundane reality for several moments and right now that kind of musico-psychological transmogrification is a welcome respite from a world in unfortunate historical times. Fans of space rock, shoegaze, heavy psychedelia, freak folk, ambient and noise generally will get something positive about witnessing this band’s wild live performances.
Bitchin Bajas, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 10.13 What: Bitchin Bajas w/Prairiewolf When: 7 Where: Glob Why: Bitchin Bajas is a Chicago-based psychedelic ambient and experimental synth band and a side project of Cooper Crain of Krautrock/post-rock group CAVE. This is much more chill than CAVE but the gentle, hypnotic qualities of the music is more in line with an experimental electronic band even though aspects are generated by live instruments like sax and keyboards. The new album Inland See is like a cosmic New Age jazz with pop leanings like something composed on a paradisiacal island in a more pastoral future where everyone’s basics are covered and we can all live out extended lives indulging our passions and even our whims, perchance exploring creative ideas that benefit all.
Goya, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 10.14 What: Goya w/In the Company of Serpents and Church Fire When: 7 Where: The Crypt Why: Goya from Phoenix, Arizona is a fusion of doom blues and heavy psychedelia and its 2025 album In the Dawn of November was engineered by legendary grunge scene producer Jack Endino. So the crushing hits land perfectly and so do the warping melodic passages and the songs have both a bite and some swing to them that a lot of heavy bands don’t. Think equal parts TAD and Sleep. In the Company of Serpents these days has evolved well beyond the devastating heaviness of its early records into its own psychedelic, Western doom. Its new album A Crack in Everything is the band’s most personal statement yet on issues of addiction and identity with burnished guitar work and elegant yet weighty rhythms. Church Fire may seem like an odd choice for this show but its own music has a heavy impact in terms of the intensity of the music and its emotional heft. Also the band has been known on at least one occasion to play a show as a cosmic black metal band. But this night it’ll probably “just” be the politically charged, industrial synth pop that has turned the group into a bit of a cult band.
Shiner, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 10.15 What:Shiner w/No Fauna and Brass Tags When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Shiner was a respected band in the post-hardcore lane but the type that really crossed over into realms of experimental, atmospheric rock bordering on shoegaze/space rock before splitting in 2003. It was inspired by noisier shoegaze bands as well as the major noise rock bands of the 90s and space rock/hard rock crossover act Failure. The outfit is currently touring in support of its new record BELIEVEYOUME, which definitely showcases its gift for drawing upon disparate influences to produce something almost orchestral in its use mastery of evocative noise.
I’m With Here, photo by Alysse Gafkjen
Wednesday | 10.15 What: I’m With Her w/Jon Muq When: 7:30 Where: The Paramount Theatre Why: I’m With Her is an Americana and bluegrass supergroup comprised of Sarah Watkins (Nickel Creek), Sarah Jarosz and Aoife O’Donovan (Crooked Still) . Each of the singers and musicians has a renowned solo career as well as their work in their respective bands. All grew up playing music and Jarosz met Watkins when the former was a kid and came to the attention of O’Donovan as a teen. This group came together in 2014 at a workshop during the Telluride Bluegrass Festival, and thus a somewhat local connection. The group has thus far only had two albums, other obligations clearly demanding of their time, including its new album Wild and Clear and Blue (2025) for which the trio is touring. The new album has a sense of wonder and seems imbued with an inner light that informs songs about reconciling the lessons of one’s past to help in getting through the tumultuous times and not losing sight of there being goals to reach for that matter even with clear and present dangers and challenges to navigate.
Ches Smith’s Clone Row, photo courtesy the artists
Wednesday | 10.15 What:Ches Smith’s Clone Row When: 7 Where: The Federal Theater Why: Ches Smith is a drummer, percussionist and composer originally from California and now based out of New York. His career as a musician has been varied and acclaimed including playing on albums with and playing with the likes of John Zorn, Mr. Bungle, Xiu Xiu, Fred Frith, Pauline Oliveros Terry Riley, Marc Ribot (as a member of Ceramic Dog), Secret Chiefs 3, Nels Cline and Dave Holland. Smith’s mastery of technique is not divorced from a creativity in crafting rhythms to whatever musical style and mode or mood he finds himself contributing to or writing himself with his various collaborators. In 2025 Ches Smith offered his latest opus, Clone Row which includes performances from avant-garde guitar legend Mary Halvorson, jazz luminary Liberty Ellman and multidisciplinary sound artist Nick Dunston. It’s an album of music that moves with imaginative flow of layered rhythms and tones like if one of those more gifted 2000s math rock bands like Hella and Battles were more into fusion and free jazz. Although instrumental the songs speak musically with a cinematic quality.
Matt Maltese, photo by V Petersen
Wednesday | 10.15 What: Matt Maltese w/Cornelia Murr When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: For his sixth album Hers, UK singer-songwriter Matt Maltese sounds like he immersed himself in the film and music of the late 60s and through the mid-70s. Perhaps especially the albums of Jacques Brel and Scott Walker and the cinema of Jean-Luc Godard. There is a vivid yet hazy tone to his songs that suggest an introspective and reflective spirit and a timeless, classical sensibility that the aforementioned seem to exude as well. A fortunate pairing of an opener in Cornelia Murr is in store for anyone catching the show when it starts at 8. Murr’s 2025 album Run to the Center builds out her lush, experimental dream pop sound into the realms of songwriting sophistication one would expect of a creative visionary like Aldous Harding. Murr’s orchestral arrangements and literary storytelling is instantly captivating and her otherworldly energy and charisma as a live performer are undeniable.
Goon, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 10.16 What: Goon w/beaming and The Milk Blossoms When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Goon is a dream pop band from Los Angeles that over the summer released its third album aptly titled Dream 3. The songs on the record have a quality like short films based on the memories of dreams in which the strong emotions and experiences of your waking life haunt the subconscious and filter back through as strong but hazy emotional resonances. Often the songs are gorgeously ethereal and in others noisy and tense and overall the record is like a psychedelic pop affair that fans of Black Moth Super Rainbow and Spirit of the Beehive might like. Indie pop project beaming is a collaboration built around making playful and explorative pop songs with creative production choices lending the songs a unique flavor if the elements might seem familiar. The Milk Blossoms are the experimental indie rock band from Denver whose literary sensibilities and emotionally vibrant songs seem like a vivid sonic experience of stories based in memories and the feelings those memories elicit. Listening to a song by the band is akin to reading a short story so poignant and poetic it sticks with you as a true thing because they elicit such deep responses if you’re open to having them.
Patrick Wolf, photo courtesy the artist
Sunday | 10.19 What:Patrick Wolf When: 7:30 Where: Bluebird Theater Why: Patrick Wolf is a singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from the UK whose musical style is refreshingly challenging to pigeonhole. He combines electronic pop with more classical sensibilities for a sound that is like an experimental, even conceptual, folk especially on his new album Crying the Neck the lyrics for which seem to tap into the lore of his home region of East Kent. Prior to the album and the 2023 EP The Night Safari, Wolf had taken a decade plus hiatus from music during which he dealt with personal misfortunes and tragedies including the death of his mother. The new album is a meditation on processing losses personal, cultural and collective socially through the use of the imagery and references of his immediate environment rich in its own traditions and unique spirit.
Gina Birch by Dean Chalkley
Monday | 10.20 What: Miki Berenyi Trio and Gina Birch & The Unreasonables When: 7 Where: Larimer Lounge Why: Miki Berenyi is of course the charismatic and ironic co-singer and co-guitarist of pioneering shoegaze band Lush. The latter even in its time was innovative in its incorporation of electronic musical elements into the songwriting and sound, especially on its later records. The trio got off to what might be seen as a fragile start when KJ “Moose” McKillop was unable to do the early touring but this time around he will be able to and the trio’s new album Tripla picks up where Lush’s mid-90s dream pop leanings left off with an even more robust electronic production undergirding the expansive melodies and Berenyi’s soulfully ethereal vocals. But of equal interest is Gina Birch & The Unreasonables. Which is the latest band from Gina Birch, former bassist of legendary and influential post-punk group The Raincoats. The latter opened up what post-punk could sound like and essentially paved the way for left field rock and pop being an inspiration for the likes of Half Japanese, Beat Happening, Nirvana and Hole. In 2023 Birch released her acclaimed debut solo album I Play My Bass Loud and proved herself once again an artist with deep creative vision and a strong experimental streak utilizing dub techniques in the production and wide-ranging sonics. The 2025 album Trouble continues with boundary pushing songwriting and politically-charged lyrics.
Conan Neutron & The Secret Friends
Monday | 10.20 What: Conan Neutron & the Secret Friends w/Plastik Mystik and The Better Selfs When: 7 Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: Conan Neutron and his various bands have been a wonderfully eclectic yet coherent example of doing whatever kind of music an artist might want to do whether that’s weird noise rock post-punk, mutant Americana or whatever it is The Way of the Neutron album (2025) might be dubbed with contributions from members of Melvins, Coliseum, Replicator and Trophy Wives. It sounds like a groove-driven sludge rock band with a knack for the psychedelic in a vein that doesn’t sound like the sort that got popularized in the 2010s. The Better Selfs is what happens when you collage heartfelt, Neil Young-esque Americana with equally emotionally vulnerable emo that isn’t afraid to spill over the edges with its sound and feelings in the performance of the music. Plastik Mystik is technically a garage psych band but only if that band leaned more into Kiwi Rock weirdness and the haunted dead end town desperation and edge of Wipers.
Purity Ring, photo by yuniVERSE
Tuesday | 10.21 What: Purity Ring w/Washed Out (DJ Set) and yuniVERSE When: 8 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Purity Ring’s innovative approach to production and songwriting was evident with its 2012 debut album Shrines paired with an idiosyncratic live show that included unique controllers and multi-media elements. A lot of artists that use side-chaining really waste our time by merely making bad hip-hop and pop. Purity Ring uses that technique to create mind-expanding rhythms and tonal colorings. It’s difficult to know how to sum up the band’s sound because it does sound like it’s coming to us from a realm of human existence that is separate from mundane reality. Fitting for the duo’s 2025 self-titled record which is a concept album intended as a soundtrack to a fictional fantasy video game with a similar emotional and creative resonance and expansive sense of wonder. At times the album is reminiscent of the kind of glitch pop we heard from early 2010s Crystal Castles with the expert pitch shifting and rhythm splicing but pushed to another realm of production expertise.
Wednesday, photo by Graham Tolbert
Thursday | 10.23 What: Wednesday w/Friendship When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Wednesday has been one of the bands of choice among aficionados of boundary pushing and blurring guitar rock. Its early output combined shoegaze atmospherics and tonal bending, emo-inflected math rock and arty post-punk but with a knack for memorable hooks and melodies. With 2023’s Rat Saw God the band was exploring deep into songcraft with some countrified tunes that also didn’t skimp on mood and a bit of an edge in the guitar sounds. The record also continued startlingly vulnerable lyrics and astute observations of social and interpersonal dynamics. The 2025 record Bleeds builds upon the tense but cathartic energy that made its predecessor so arresting and risks even more in the emotional openness of the songwriting. Live the band has been glorious exuberant and charming with a raw quality that invites the audience in for the collective catharsis.
Peel Dream Magazine, photo by Matthew Schmohl
Friday | 10.24 What: Peel Dream Magazine w/Wave Decay and Bellhoss When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Peel Dream Magazine is currently touring in the wake of the release of its 2025 mini album Taurus which dropped October 1. The record continues in the experimental vein of its predecessor with deep, gossamer atmospheres and left field pop songcraft with no allegiance to established styles or tradition making the album refreshingly out of frame with prevailing musical trends. Denver Krautrock-inflected shoegazers Wave Decay are also on the bill with its massive sounds and electrifying tone. Bellhoss will bring its own masterful songwriting and willingness to go off the rails sonically and emotionally in its particular style mashup of indiepop, shoegaze and emo.
Entrancer, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 10.24 What: DJ Earl w/Entrancer and Sinistarr When: 8 Where: Glob Why: DJ Earl is a Chicago based house and footwork producer whose work shows how there’s really no difference between Chicago house and hip-hop production. Eclectic beats and bright electronic melodic and rhythmic layers and a sense of play that one heard in the work of J. Dilla. Entrancer is a Denver-based techno/ambient artist whose compositions for synth have been informed by 90s hip-hop and his time in Chicago experiencing that city’s electronic music firsthand as well as the experimental electronic, pop music and noise he came up with in Denver. His recent work is emotionally stirring and expertly references the sounds, emotions and spirit of his whole career as an artist at once.
Between the Buried and Me, photo by Randy Edwards
Friday | 10.24 What: Between the Buried and Me at w/Hail the Sun and Delta Sleep When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: Progressive metal band Between the Buried and Me were trying to figure out its place in the world of music on its 2021 album Colors II. With the 2025 album The Blue Nowhere it appears that some decisions or conclusions were made or an embrace of notions with the music seemed clear. Not that the group hasn’t incorporated elements of pop songwriting and hooks into its sound but the new album other than the masterful musicianship in a clearly progressive rock mode is basically a pop record but one that hits as introspective and expansive, one that sounds like it came out of spending time taking stock and considering what one’s life is really, deeply about and not ignoring the feelings that might crash in on you in middle age, but feeling them and giving them voice in the music.
Hayden Pedigo, photo by Jackie Lee Young
Friday | 10.24 What:Hayden Pedigo w/Jens Kuross When: 7 Where: Swallow Hill Daniel’s Hall Why: Fingerstyle guitarist and left-field songwriter Hayden Pedigo is having quite a year with his new album I’ll Be Waving as You Drive Away coming out on June 6. The record is a fascinating set of songs that come across as gently psychedelic and pastoral Americana folk at once and consistently too weird to fit into a narrow box of music. The textures and informal rhythms he employs in creating his melodies stands out as decidedly different but soothing to the mind. He also worked on a collaborative album In the Earth Again with fellow Oklahoma City residents, sludge metal, political doom band Chat Pile with both sets of artists fusing their aesthetics for a heavy record imbued with otherworldly elegance.
Friday – Sunday | 10.24-10.26 What: Denver Noise Fest 2025 When: F 10.24 7pm, S 10.25 12p.m and 8 p.m., Su 10.26 11 am Where: The DMV (10.24, 10.25 8pm and 10.26) and The Aztlan Theatre (10.25 12 p.m. Why: Denver Noise Fest returns in full with three days of boundary pushing noise art. Friday’s showcase includes Now That We’re Alone, Animal / Object, Phil Stearns, Eric Drasin, Carl Ritger, Eliza Miller and Bl_ank. Saturday afternoon’s event at the Aztlan will feature ETAM, Bat Mob, EM.BALM, Dream Cheese, Andrew Weathers and Cantare Montibus. Saturday night’s proceedings will include performances by Her Mortal Form, Many Blessings, EXREMADURA, Sick Tisk, Novasak, Page 27 and PCRV. The Sunday morning/afternoon concluding happenings is what’s called Harsh Toast that is sort of a potluck and improv noise sets. For tickets and more information please visit denvernoisefest.com.
Molly Tuttle, photo by Ebru Yildiz
Saturday | 10.25 What: Molly Tuttle w/Joshua Ray Walker and Cecilia Castleman When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: Molly Tuttle’s 2025 album So Long Little Miss Sunshine has been described by critics as essentially her swing to pop country. But of course the bluegrass leanings in the guitar lines keep the music from losing the essence of Tuttle’s appeal as an artist who writes with an intimate feel and a facility with portraits of everyday experiences with subtly deft turns of phrase. The new record has some exquisite moments of personal insight commenting on one’s inner life and relationships. Also the concluding track “Story of My So-Called Life” is a nice title nod to the classic TV series while embodying the overall mood and story of the show as something that resonates with one’s adult self.
The Wombats, photo by Julia Godfrey
Saturday | 10.25 What: The Wombats w/Only The Poets and Red Rum Club When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: The Wombats are a band that hasn’t limited itself to a popular trend in style and sound from early on. Not choosing to be a pop band over being an art band that engages in sometimes dark and self-deprecating humor and eccentric songwriting. Its new album Oh! The Ocean is no exception and you have to appreciate a band that is willing to have a video like the one for “Can’t Say No” in which a man in his morning robes is chased down the street by his own car guiding itself by the rear camera with the parking sight lines in plain view. The record itself is brimming with the exuberance and expertly crafted moods and the kind of commentary on the wild, dystopian and tragically historical times we’re going through in this moment of human history.
Tuesday | 10.28 What: Viagra Boys w/Black Lips When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Viagra Boys have been the post-punk band of choice for nearly a decade with its driving, commanding and raw musical performances and lyrics that are at once smart, poetic, wickedly humorous and vulnerable. The latter one might not expect from the same band that writes pointed songs about authoritarian culture and human folly generally but on the new album Viagr Aboys (2025), with hints on earlier records, the tender side of the band is at this point undeniable. But don’t worry, Viagr Aboys is still imbued with the high concept art punk that has fueled its songwriting and performances up to now. Black Lips pre-dated Viagra Boys with their own spirited garage rock-inflected punk and were critical darlings for years with their own incorporation of experimental art concepts into its songwriting and performance style.
The Legendary Pink Dots in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday and Saturday | 10.31 and 11.01 What: The Legendary Pink Dots w/Orbit Service, Dead Voices On Air and DJ Mudwulf (10.31), on 11.01 also Edward Ka-Spel solo set When: 7 Where: HQ Why: The Legendary Pink Dots is a psychedelic rock/folk/electronic band that formed in 1980 and influenced generations of more left field, experimental bands of various stripes including the likes of Skinny Puppy, MGMT and Dresden Dolls, at least according the band’s Wikipedia article. But you really only have to listen to those bands after taking a sampling of the Dots’ extensive output to recognize that it’s likely true. Singer/keyboard player Edward Ka-Spel’s existential poetry and psychological/social analysis delves deep into our personal narratives and those which touch upon and are touched by others and the collective stories that course through our civilization. But Ka-Spel isn’t a mere, disinterested observer and commentator upon human doings, he comes from a place of someone who is living it and affected by things and processing his own psychological reactions to it all as well as his own place in it. The band’s records blend folk songcraft (and that music’s own spooky and atmospheric possiblities), ambient soundscapes, psychedelic rock and electro-industrial aesthetics with a keen ear for sound design. The latest album So Lonely In Heaven explores the current and future state of the panopticon of late capitalism and how it has infiltrated the most intimate spaces of our lives and consciousness and how we may not be able to disentangle ourselves from the techbro oligarchy without transforming the very nature of our socio-economic-psycho-spiritual existence. Orbit Service is Denver’s premiere ambient industrial duo which includes Randall Frazier whose music is clearly touched by the influence of the Dots but whose sound is also directly tied to noise, the broad spectrum of psychedelic rock and downtempo aesthetics. Also not short on incisive social commentary and a deep evocation of the struggle of existing as a human in a world challenging to the very notion of living a dignified life. Dead Voices On Air is the project of Mark Spybey who some may know for his pioneering work in Zoviet France. DVOA is even more abstract yet possibly even more human in the emotional resonance of the finely crafted sonics and cinematic sound design. For this show and other performances he will be joined by Nathan Jamiel of The Drood.
Wednesday | 09.03 What: Young Widows w/Moon Pussy and Almanac Man When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Young Widows is a noise rock/post-hardcore trio from Louisville, Kentucky that emerged from the the remains of influential mathcore group Breather Resist. The new band was more overtly melodic but retained the energy and intensity of the earlier group. In March 2025 Young Widows released its new album Power Sucker, its first record in 11 years. It dives headlong into existential crises and meeting the challenge of finding meaning when so many things in modern life seem to undermine finding a secure footing in a rapidly changing social and economic landscape. Almanac Man is the angular noise rock threesome from Denver that includes Ghost Canyon Fest founders Brian Dooley and Sean Dove. Though clearly influenced by DC post-hardcore its core sound is rooted in the heavier end of noise rock. Moon Pussy is almost less a band than a glorious and awe-inducing sonic science experiment gone off the rails but so right and always an entertaining and riveting live act.
Lydia Lunch, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 09.04 What: An Evening with Lydia Lunch (film, spoken word, Q&A) w/Redwing Blackbird and DJ Christina Graves When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lydia Lunch is the legendary and foundational artist that first came to wider circles of awareness via her connection with the No Wave scene of New York City with her bands Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and 8 Eyed Spy. But throughout the 80s and 90s she made major waves as a spoken word performer, actress, writer and maker of avant-garde music. Since the 90s Lunch has built on her reputation for challenging social commentary delivered with her creative and confrontational style. For this show Lunch will screen her film with Jasmine Hurst called Artists, Depression, Anxiety & Rage.
She’s Green, photo by Rhianna Hajduch
Thursday | 09.04 What: Slow Pulp w/She’s Green When: 7 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Madison, Wisconsin’s Slow Pulp headlines this show with its charming blend of pastoral Americana and shoegaze. Its 2020 album Moveys (which got a major re-issue this year with live tracks) is brimming with hazy melodies and introspective lyrics that pair with a sound that might also be described as psychedelic slowcore. She’s Green from Minneapolis is a fitting opener for this show with its tranquil dream pop and slowly-unfurling dynamics. Its own soundscape is more gossamer in tone and texture with sparkling streams of tone that take on a vibrant warmth through a touch of fuzz tone. The band’s new EP Chrysalis sounds like a missing link between Slowdive and Letting Up Despite Great Faults.
Church Fire, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday and Saturday | 09.05-09.06 What:Colorado Goth Fest When: 6 pm Where: The Pearl Why: In its tenth iteration Colorado Goth Fest is split between two nights at The Pearl fka The Mercury Cafe. The first night kicks off with sets from dance-industrial revolutionaries Church Fire, electro-industrial project Clockwork Echo, synth pop band Cruel Mourning, darkwave/prog adjacent group Future Club from Albuquerque and synthwave outfit Tetrakroma Saturday night is headlined by influential U.K. post-punk/death rockers Ausgang after performances from premier deathrock/post-punk/New Wave hometown heroes Plague Garden, horror punkers America’s Most Haunted, Seattle-based Goth rock band Eve’s Black Heart and Xmal Deutschland-esque, dark post-punk band Funeral Process hailing from Albuquerque.
Plague Garden in 2023, photo by Tom MurphyJapanese Breakfast, photo by Pak Bae
Saturday | 09.06 What: Japanese Breakfast w/Ginger Root When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: The fourth Japanese Breakfast album For Melancholy Brunettes (& Sad Women) was, according to a piece in Stereogum, inspired in part by Michelle Zauner’s reading of a John Cheever short story collection and thus the title and its almost archaic literary pretensions, tongue firmly in cheek. The sounds are a little softer in some of the vocal inflections but the songwriting is just as finely crafted with the sounds balancing the organic, the atmospheric and the textural perfectly with the usual expansion of the sound palette. Elegant piano figures grace the songs like something out of a late 80s Talk Talk record and on songs like “Honey Water” you can hear Zauner stretching as an artist into ambitious sonic territory with the instrumentation soaring as high as it did on Soft Sounds From Another Planet (2017). And yet this set of songs seems very grounded and personal as well.
The Milk Blossoms, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 09.06 What: Slow Teeth w/The Milk Blossoms and Nina de Freitas When: 7 Where: Better Barnum Animal Center Why: Slow Teeth is a shoegaze-adjacent indie folk band from Durham, North Carolina whose 2025 album I simmers with soaring vocals and cinematic soundscapes in a post-rock mode. Nina de Freitas’ husky and soulful vocals lend her delicate guitar work and psychologically insightful lyrics an emotional power that hits you unexpectedly as her songs progress. In her music you hear a touch of blues, jazz and R&B but all channeled through a more sonically expansive creative lens. The Milk Blossoms have been crafting their most heart-searing and experimental music thus far with its new songs not yet on a record. The stories speak to the exploration of the ghosts that haunt our waking memories from which we can’t escape into a flight of imagination except to use our creativity to alleviate some of the worst emotional pain of our lives. The music is masterfully arranged and orchestrated to really express that shadow work in real time making the songs both unforgettable and deeply affecting.
W-Th | 09.10–09.11 What: Ani DiFranco w/Tune-Yards When: 6 Where: Chautauqua Auditorium Why: Ani DiFranco is the popular and influential alternative folk artist whose early DIY ethic was rooted in the same values as punk and her spirited performances garnered her a cult following long before any labels came sniffing around. Selling albums out of the trunk of her car after shows and the like. DiFranco’s own Righteous Babe Records imprint she launched in 1989 at age 19, showing more initiative than a lot of young artists. 20 albums and thirty-some years later DiFranco is still playing high energy, charismatic shows with wit and thoughtfulness. Opening the show is art pop duo Tune-Yards. The latter first made waves for its innovative use of loops and transforming the use of vocals and ukulele into almost a samples-based songwriting approach so that a Tune-Yards song with Merrill Garbus’ soulful and layered vocals lending an R&B flavor with a touch of psychedelia. In 2025 Tune-Yards released its first record in four years with Better Dreaming. The record is an attempt to dive into deep focus in an age of distractions in the face of fascism and to deliver uniqueness and joy when a lot of what is being fostered is perilous conformity and destruction. The unconventional rhythms and melodies going into the album and its emotional honesty make a solid case for an effort in at least turning the internal tides against despair which is where it needs to start.
Bellhoss at Sarahfest 2024, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 09.13 What:Sarah Fest: Sunstoney, Machetè Mouth, Soy Celesté, Bellhoss, Fair Elle, DJ sets by Mis/s Flowers and clexstial 10 When: 10AM into the evening Where: Manos Sagrados Why: The femme-forward DIY music festival Sarah Fest is taking place for its second year but moving operations to Manos Sagrados in downtown Aurora. The lineup is no less noteworthy. The whole affair begins with workshops during the day and food trucks, vendors, tattoos, yoga, tarot and a size-inclusive clothing swap will be part of the event. Sunstoney’s bedroom/dream pop sound is soul-inflected and like the kind of music that would be perfect for modern, late night, roller skating. Machetè Mouth doesn’t fit into a genre box but Elise’s powerful and emotionally rich vocals imbue its hybrid of dream pop, blues, synth pop and R&B with a commanding energy that is vulnerable, vibrant and inviting. Soy Celesté is a punk artist whose lyrics are filled with a spirit of personal liberation that speak powerfully to the oppression of culture and toxic relationships of all varieties. Bellhoss writes the kind of indie rock that sounds like it came out of a youth spent listening to pop punk songs about heartbreak and the more poetic, Americana-tinged indie music like Rilo Kiley that sketches out the granular details of lingering melancholia but delivered with a defiant exuberance. Fair Elle is a singer-songwriter whose luminous R&B songs sound like anthems to overcoming soul searing heartsickness by discovering some forgotten lightness within oneself.
The Picture Tour in 2024, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 09.13 What: Owosso and The Picture Tour When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Owosso includes former O’er the Ramparts and Magic Mice member Aaron Betcher who is curating some of these afternoon shows at Mutiny Information Cafe since March pairing bands that might not be much alike but should be playing together. Owosso is like a combination of Guided By Voices-inflected noise rock and DC post-punk. The Picture Tour is the project fronted by former Emerald Siam guitarist and The Bedsit Infamy songwriter/producer/multi-instrumentalist Billy Armijo. For this band he is able to unfurl the shoegaze and moody-post-punk fusion that has been at the root of his more rock-oriented sound but informed by his gift for hooks and pop songcraft.
Circling Girl, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 09.13 What:Circling Girl album release w/Genevieve Libien and Look at Fiona When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Denver-based dream pop group Circling Girl is celebrating the release of its latest album this night. Its intertwining, melodious guitar work and ethereal tones are reminiscent of an unlikely fusion of Throwing Muses, Lush and The Sundays but with songwriting and structures more in line with more modern indie rock blending of aesthetics and the songs sound like they were worked out on acoustic instruments to lock in naturally complementary dynamics. Look at Fiona is one of the few Denver bands in the shoegaze realm that seems to have studied how classic bands like Slowdive and Pale Saints sculpted soundscapes into the shapes of songs to get lost within and swept away by and then injected it with their own idiosyncratic sensibilities.
OK Go, photo by Piper Ferguson
Saturday | 09.13 What: Indie 102.3’s Indieverse OK Go w/Dehd, Bartees Strange, Dead Pioneers, Pink Fuzz When: 4 Where: Levitt Pavilion Why: Denver’s indie music radio station Indie 102.3 is having this sort of capstone event at Levitt Pavilion to close out the summer. Headlining is the renowned, Chicago (now based out of L.A.) rock band OK Go. The group endeared itself to fans of early 2000s indie rock with its earnest and fresh melding of Kinks-esque Mod pop and high energy power pop. Its eccentric and elaborate music videos helped to popularize the band in an organic way that predated “going viral” in the way of social media marketing since the early 2010s. OK Go seems to embrace its eccentricity and its presentation and live shows invite the audience to do the same and have fun along with them. In April 2025 the group released its first album in eleven years with And the Adjacent Possible. Also on the bill is post-punk band Dehd (also from Chicago), soul-inflected, experimental indie pop genius Bartees Strange, politically-charged punk ragers Dead Pioneers and psychedelic stoner rock trio Pink Fuzz.
The Milk Blossoms, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 09.13 What: The Milk Blossoms w/Holy Garden District and Babelshack When: 8:30 Where: The Broadway Roxy (free and all ages) Why: Holy Garden District is an instrumental rock band including producer and musician Ben Clary based out of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Think something like a post-rock late 70s Genesis but imbued with pastoral aesthetics and an undeniably haunted quality that courses though its often gentle, glimmering and moody compositions. Babelshack sounds like they listened to a lot of 90s grunge, the better stuff like Mudhoney and the more post-punk and garage rock end of that like Gas Huffer and Love Battery. The Milk Blossoms close out the night with its deeply affecting songs with vivid storytelling and memorable melodies that convey a rare emotional complexity that upon repeated listens opens up depths of feeling and poetic expression of the nuances of human experience that may not have been immediately obvious the first time or three hearing the music and experiencing it live.
IDLES, photo by Tom Ham
Saturday | 09.13 What:Deftones w/IDLES and The Barbarians of California When: 5:30 Where: Ball Arena Why: Deftones are one of the most popular bands in modern heavy music. But the group switched gears in a major way with its 2000 classic album White Pony when the music took on a more soundscape-y feel and was more like a heavy shoegaze sound before that fully became a thing a decade or so later. On subsequent albums the band continued experimenting and couldn’t safely be pigeonholed in terms of genre, a good place to be if you’re a band that doesn’t want to get bored as the years go on. One of the opening acts IDLES is indisputably the most popular post-punk band of the current wave of that thing out of the UK. The group’s songs are informed by a compassionate and working class ethos but the live show is a barn burner with Joe Talbot relating heartbreaking and life-affirming stories in the songs that hit with a vulnerable immediacy that has endeared the band to increasingly larger audience since the group began touring small clubs pre-pandemic. Embracing a critique of white privilege, the cruelty of traditional masculinity and an examination of class and support for immigrant communities, IDLES minces no words and does so with a spirited delivery.
Fred Frith and Janet Feder, photo courtesy the artists
Tuesday | 09.16 What:Janet Feder and Fred Frith When: 6 Where: Bug Theater Why: Janet Feder is considered one of the world’s most inventive and innovative guitarists and she has been a fixture of Denver’s local avant-garde/experimental music scene for decades as a musician, songwriter and educator. Her prepared guitar technique has yielded a sound like a miniature orchestra of sounds, textures and rhythms. Feder grew up playing music in a more traditional style as a guitarist including folk and rock styles but discovered a new world of technique and creative outlet upon witnessing a Thinking Plague show and seeing Mike Johnson and the band going beyond mere progressive rock to something that challenged even what that could sound like. From there Feder became part of the Denver avant-garde as a respected artist in her own right. The guitarist has several albums to her name going back to the mid-90s including collaborative albums with the likes of Mighty Fine Productions head and sound engineer/multi-instrumentalist Colin Bricker, composer Paul Fowler and the legendary Fred Frith. The latter was a founding member of Henry Cow, one of the leading lights of the “Rock in opposition” movement turning convention on its head. His list of collaborations are lengthy and include working with and/or contributing to the works of The Residents, Jad Fair, John Zorn, Brian Eno, Bill Laswell, Robert Wyatt and Mike Patton. In 2006 Feder and Frith released an album called Ironic universe that showcased their chemistry as high level practitioners of improvisation and imaginative musicianship.
In 2017 Frith and Feder performed at show at the studio space for Mighty Fine Productions and recreated the magic of that collaborative album while hinting at further refinements in their technique developed during the intervening years. On September 16, 2025 the two guitarists perform live again at The Bug Theater in Denver for another display of left field musical creativity and practice courtesy Creative Music Works.
Listen to our interview with Janet Feder on Bandcamp.
Sextile, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 09.17 What:Sextile w/Automatic and Mick Jeets When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex Why: Early on, Los Angeles-based band Sextile had more of a shoegaze-adjacent post-punk sound that swung more moody and dark by the end of the 2010s. But by the time of its 2023 album Push the influences on the group’s sound were clearly 90s Big Beat, 2000s deep house and dance-infused ambient music of the 2010s and 2020s. The 2025 album yes, please delves further into the kinds of aesthetic that would have been entirely welcome in underground raves of the past decade and a half as well with expertly crafted, kinetic beats like a more psychedelic form of gabber.
Thursday | 09.18 What:The Rapture When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: The Rapture were one of the early groups out of what was called then and retrospectively as the post-punk revival. But The Rapture’s core sound was something more experimental and while undeniably creating infectious dance grooves indulged in a gloriously disorienting noisiness. Like they took inspiration from the more wild edges of what The Gang of Four was doing on its first four records. Live the band also had an unhinged energy that delivered at what the records merely hinted at, securing The Rapture as one of the great live acts of the 2000s. Its singles like “House of Jealous Lovers” and the title track to the 2003 album Echoes are bonafide classics of post-punk. Not so long ago it was assumed The Rapture was completely defunct but in 2025 singer and guitarist Luke Jenner announced The Rapture would be doing a series of live dates even without longtime members Vito Roccoforte and Gabriel Andruzzi and this is your chance to see the new incarnation.
Everclear, photo by Brian Cox
Friday | 09.19 What:Everclear Sparkle and Fade 30th Anniversary Tour w/Local H and Sponge When: 6:30 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Everclear’s second album Sparkle and Fade (1995) broke the band to the mainstream with the single “Santa Monica.” At a time when the alternative rock wave was breaking and fading into relative irrelevance, the spirited performances on the album, its undeniable hooks and lyrics that were passionate yet vulnerable meant the band would survive the then burgeoning backlash in mainstream culture to “alternative rock.” Singer and songwriter Art Alexakis during interviews came across as such a genuine and thoughtful person it added a dimension to the music the revealed that source of the pain, perseverance and sensitivity in the songwriting transcended obvious commercial appeal. As with tours in recent years Everclear is bringing along other noteworthy bands of the 90s and this time out peers like Local H and Sponge who came up around the same time as Everclear and who probably toured the same circuits in the early days and well into the 90s so the spirit of camaraderie will probably permeate the show.
Friday and Saturday | 09.19 and 09.20 What: The Federal Theater Grand Opening When: 7 Friday 6 Saturday Where: The Federal Theater Why: The Federal Theater re-opens with two free shows (with registration) this weekend with local heavy hitters in psychedelic rock and punk both Friday and Saturday. Izcalli and Los Mocochetes grace the stage on Friday night with hard rock and Chica-inflected psychedelia. Cobranoid’s hardcore and thrash infusion alongside the punk of Clusterfux, The Pitch Invasion and Vitrify bring the fire on Saturday.
Saturday | 09.20 What: Hooper and Dulled Arrows When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Hooper is the kind of band that formed over a decade ago before the emo and melodic hardcore fusion came back into vogue and so its sound is not fully grounded in either and has touches of Americana in the mix. Some nice shimmer in the rhythmic guitar leads like its own taste in emo was more in the realm of Hum and Sunny Day Real Estate. Dulled Arrows come out of a similar realm of local post-hardcore with a lineup that includes former Ghost Buffalo and Jagtown musician Tom Ventura.
Saturday | 09.20 What: B.E.E.F. LLC, Emmanuel Looney, Modern Devotion and Staggered Hook When: 7 Where: Pablo’s (East Colfax location) Why: All forward thinking, richly conceived experimental electronic projects in the realms of industrial techno and gabber.
Dildox, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 09.20 What: Dildox (Los Angeles), Deth Rali, Plague Garden and As In Heaven As in Hell When: 7 Where: The Crypt Why: Dildox is an industrial post-punk act from Los Angeles whose immersive darkwave dance sound is reminiscent of early, electroclash Ladytron and early ADULT. Deth Rali is a psychedelic, glam rock post-punk band from Denver with a flair for the performance art-adjacent on stage presence with costumes. Plague Garden is probably Denver’s best deathrock band with rich New Wave and industrial synth soundscapes and commanding vocals. As In Heaven As In Hell is the project of John Bueno who used to be in punk bands and was one of the great local comics artists but with this he straddles the line between noise, industrial post-punk and dark synthwave.
Hibou, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 09.20 What: Hibou w/Corsicana When: 7 Where: Better Barnum Animal Center Why: Hibou used to be based out of Seattle but now hails from the South of France and his new album It Seems To Me (2025) sounds like a complete fusion of his early bedroom pop material, chillwave and some kind of immersive ambient dream pop of the moment now. Corsicana is on the more delicate end of shoegaze with some roots in more indie folk sounds and sensibilities and chamber pop aesthetics.
Jill Sobule, photo by Shervin Lainez
Sunday | 09.21 What: Jillith Fair When: 6 Where: Elaine Wolf Theater 350 S. Dahlia Why: This showcase benefit Jill Sobule’s It Was a Good Life Foundation put together by Doug Gertner and Tim Campbell, hosted by Ron Bostwick from 105.5 The Colorado Sound, performances from Hal Aqua, Liz Barnez, Rabbit Joe Black, Mollie O’Brien & Rich Moore, Carla Sciaky and Tony Trischka possible Harry Tuft health permitting. Sobule was the beloved singer-songwriter whose heyday was adjacent to that of the alternative rock era and her social commentary, thoughtful lyrics and unique songwriting garnered her a much-deserved cult following. Sobule passed away on May 1, 2025.
Pulp, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 09.22 What:Pulp When: 7 Where: Red Rocks Why: Pulp was a post-punk band from Sheffield influenced by that city’s experimental rock and pop scene of the 70s and 80s and outside of some perhaps local notoriety didn’t make many waves until its spectacular 1994 album His ‘n’ Hers and its great leap forward in songwriting and storytelling although the 1992 album Separations was plenty promising on its own. But from then on Pulp became a bit of a phenomenon in the Britpop world and its tales of working class British life struck a resonant chord beyond the band’s home country. 1995’s Different Class rendered Pulp legends of the time with heartbreaking portraits of class and love and yearning and striving for living a life with some meaning and inherent dignity and showing a way to have some of that for yourself against the odds. Then in 2002 and 2 later albums Pulp went on indefinite hiatus until 2025 with the release of its new album More. which hearkens back to the themes of its 90s records but updated for more adult, mature sensibilities but everyone that isn’t dead inside probably feels some of the same romantic yearnings, has the capacity to find a vital strand in their soul to cling onto when the world seems to horrible at times and Pulp’s music is now and always has been a bit about these eternal truths of the human spirit of wanting to feel the vitality of life and all the good things that come with that.
Oracle Sisters, photo by Ella Hermë
Wednesday | 09.24 What:Oracle Sisters w/Sabrina McCalla and Casey Jane When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: Oracle Sisters is a band based in Paris, France but its members are from elsewhere in Europe (Denmark, Northern Ireland and Finland) and its sound seems to tap into a sort of 1970s, hazy folk pop aesthetic with a dreamlike aspect to the backdrop of its expansive melodies. The songs on its new album Divinations are both introspective and outward looking. The music videos for the album are reminiscent of late 60s Godard films but more whimsical and as playful as the music. There is something inherently hopeful to the band’s songs that even when they wax melancholic it’s implied that the low times are as impermanent as anything else in life can be.
Sunday Mourners, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 09.25 What: Sunday Mourners, Tassles, Critter and Sonic Chick When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Sunday Mourners from Los Angeles bridge the gap between upbeat power pop and moody post-punk with a sound like they could have come out of the late 60s but would have seemed like aliens from another era. Tassles is a bedroom synth pop/lo-fi shoegaze artist from Denver whose 2025 album net worth is one of the most refreshingly unvarnished pieces of psychedelia-adjacent indie rock to have come out since chillwave first burst onto the scene eighteen years ago.
The Haunt, photo by Ima Leupp
Thursday | 09.25 What: The Haunt w/Magic Whatever When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: Florida’s The Haunt recently released its new album New Addiction. The sounds somehow successfully blend glitchcore and grungy-punk so that it sounds simultaneously like an alt-pop band and something more in the realm of what might be called industrial garage rock. That the group is difficult to pin down to something we’ve heard done so often before is part of its appeal. Its ability to project vulnerability and ferocity simultaneously with lyrics about struggling with interpersonal adversity is a formula that has garnered the group a bit of a cult following.
Cherry Spit, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 09.26 What:Cherry Spit, Replica City and Scorplings When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: If one were to make a short list of Denver’s best post-hardcore/post-punk/noise rock bands every one of these acts would be on it. Cherry Spit is a little more wild in its guitar gyrations and feverish energy and confrontation. Replica City a little more angular, a little more DC 90s, a little more Pacific Northwest 90s underground too. Scorplings dip into that mid-west, math-y, jangle-jagged guitar noise that waxes into left field psychedelia around the edges.
They Might Be Giants, photo by Jon Uleis
Friday and Saturday | 09.26 and 09.27 What: They Might Be Giants When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: They Might Be Giants from Brooklyn, New York is one of the few acts to pre-date the alternative rock era of the early 90s and made it through the end of the decade and maintained some critical and commercial success through to the present. Its clever, catchy, eccentric and endlessly creative songwriting and approaches to songcraft have evolved over time and thus while there is a musical essence at the core of the band that comes from a spirit of playfulness and a capacity to write sensitively about difficult subjects and with an absurdist fervor when the occasion calls for it, you can expepct that every album will be an exploration of ideas that invite you along for the ride. And the live shows are a reflection of all of that and extravaganza of sights and sounds that is endearingly idiosyncratic.
Burning Sister, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 09.27 What: Almanac Man and Burning Sister When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Almanac Man is the Denver band whose angular take on post-hardcore noise rock is reminiscent of both Bay Area and DC post-punk. Burning Sister sounds like it listens to a whole lot of White Hills, Bardo Pond and Sleep. Its “Lethe//Oblivion” single was mastered by Tad Doyle of Tad which says a whole lot for the roots of the band. Also a little like if you slowed down a fast Butthole Surfers song in moments for a bit of the group’s output.
Swans, photo by Josef Puleo
Saturday | 09.27 What:Swans w/Little Annie & Paul Wallfisch When: 7 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Swans is the legendary New York City band that influenced generations of not just noise rock, post-punk, industrial and any band doing left field music that defies easy categorization and which challenges musical orthodoxy. Its early records were abrasive, punishing and inspired in their evocation of human spiritual agony and expression of resistance to the oppressive cultural environment of the 1980s. Later in the decade when the lineup had changed some and included former singer and multi-instrumentalist Jarboe. The latter brought an elegance of vocal expressiveness and a new realm of melodic transcendence that helped to broaden the appeal of the band’s instincts for experimenting in musical form and style. The band’s first run ended by the late 90s following the tour for its ambient/industrial masterpiece Soundtracks For the Blind (1996). But in 2010 Swans reconvened without Jarboe and has since released seven ambitious albums that expanded its avant-folk palette and rhythmic layers while maintaining lyrics of literary sophistication that have delved into mortality, spiritual struggles and commentary on the nature of human society and civilization. By the time of Leaving Meaning. (2019), Gira had changed the nature of the band with various members being part of future albums not unlike the members of a jazz band but for experimental rock. The latest record Birthing (2025) seems to take on themes of personal mythology in a simultaneously symbolic and vividly concrete and human terms. This is supposedly the group’s final full tour and along for this jaunt the opener if Little Annie & Paul Wallfisch. Little Annie is the musician that in the late 70s and early 80s was part of the NYC post-punk underground who has worked with the likes of Current 93, Coil and Nurse With Wound.
Slow Crush, photo by Stefaan Temmerman
Saturday | 09.27 What:Slow Crush w/Faetooth and NVM When: 6 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: On August 29, 2025 Belgian, heavy shoegaze band Slow Crush released its new album Thirst. Even more than its excellent previous releases the material for the new album showcases how the band perfectly balances dense atmospheres with engulfing melodies and weighty yet dynamic rhythms. Live the band’s sound is oceanic and uplifting with melodies that move through your body that only the type of shoegaze with a keen ear for low end can accomplish. Faetooth from Los Angeles also engages in the use of heaviness in its own “fairy doom” style that blurs lines between dream pop and gritty doom metal. Its album Labyrinthine (2025) is a record that seems to explore themes of beginnings, endings and the mysteries of transcending the usual experiences of mortal existence. Definitely for fans of SubRosa.
Big Wild, photo by Kelly Nguyen
Saturday | 09.27 What: Big Wild w/Shallou When: 8 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Big Wild is the stage name of Jackson Stell who cut his teeth making hip-hop beats as J Beatz in his early teens. But by the time he graduated from college and moved to Los Angeles he had cultivated an interest in electronic music, which of course these days is a natural progression from hip-hop beats in the modern era and a transition that seems to have suited his eclectic style. In August 2025 the new Big Wild album Wild Child dropped and revealed even more of the artist’s gift for updating a fusion of downtempo and the kind of dance music people like Fatboy Slim and Moby were bringing to wide audiences in the late 90s and early 2000s. But Wild Child adds a kind of smooth psychedelic mood to the music that gives it unique twist.
Samia, photo by Graham Tolbert
Saturday | 09.27 What:Samia w/Renny Conti When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Samia’s new album Bloodless (2025) has the hallmarks of her previous records with the exquisitely crafted guitar shimmer and texture and her warm melodic vocals delivering emotionally vivid lyrics and creative storytelling. But if you see any of the music videos and artwork you come to appreciate that the artist is going for something darker like she’s leaning into the edges of personal darkness and how that can haunt you like an “elevated horror” film. But the music doesn’t sound like that sort of thing and the contrast is what lends the new material a creative dimension that perhaps Samia hasn’t explored as a songwriter as much in the past.
Bonnie “Prince” Billy, photo by David Kasnic
Saturday and Sunday | 09.27 and 09.28 What: Bonnie “Prince” Billy w/Tim O’Brien and Jan Fabricius When: 7 Where: Swallow Hill Why: Will Oldham is one of America’s most acclaimed songwriters and performers whose musical curiosity spans decades and styles though he is perhaps most best known for his work in the realms of folk and country whether with his old project Palace (and its various monikers) or under his adopted name Bonnie “Prince” Billy. His catalog is prolific and you could start anywhere and find something worthwhile and fascinating. But his latest, The Purple Bird, though expressed in the language of bluegrass and a kind of left field Americana has some of the most poignant and pointed social commentary to be put on a record in 2025 or in recent years and that alone in the form of immediately accessible music is no mean feat.
Rico Nasty, photo by Devin Desouza
Sunday | 09.28 What:Rico Nasty w/SadBoi When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: Rico Nasty was shifting away from her signature sugar trap sound with her 2022 album Las Ruinas with forays into post-punk and industrial in the mix. Her new album Lethal (2025) consolidates her creative impulses as an artist while incorporating noisier glitch pop sounds so that her trap beats don’t sound stuck in the late 2010s and early 2020s when that music was sounding stale. Rico Nasty and her producers have instead crafted an entrancing set of soundscapes perfectly suiting the rapper’s swagger-laden stories of self-affirmation and catharsis.
CJ Boyd in 2015, photo by Tom Murphy
Monday | 09.29 What: CJ Boyd, Church Fire, Luke Leavitt and Quinn Boudeleaux When: 8 Where: Glob Why: Composer, bassist and ambient artist CJ Boyd spent roughly a decade on what he called the “InfiniTour” from 2008 playing DIY spaces, art galleries and other DIY situations with his experimental soundscapes and pastoral avant-folk songs as well as deep forays into non-Western music and abstract jazz. He is now on tour again (but not on a permanent basis) with a stop in Denver with old friends the industrial dance trio Church Fire, avant-garde funk/ambient composer Luke Leavitt and multi-media electronic soundtrack artist Quinn Boudeleaux.
múm, photo courtesy the artists
Tuesday | 09.30 What: múm w/Mr. Silla When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Why: Icelandic dream pop experimentalists múm released its first album in 12 years, History of Silence on September 19, 2025. The album has a minimalist yet orchestrated feel like something that might be offered by an avant-garde chamber pop band. But the songs feel like the snapshots of dream-like meditations on love, yearning and affection. Its organic elements are perfectly melded with the more transcendently electronic harmonics that have been one of the band’s charms since its early days as well as unconventional sound sources and a sense of being welcome into emotionally intimate and tender psychological spaces. The live show is sure to reflect this and the group hasn’t been to the Denver area since playing the Gothic Theatre in 2007 so here’s your chance if you’re in town.
Mannequin Pussy, photo by Millicent Hailes
Tuesday | 09.30 What:Turnstile w/Mannequin Pussy, SPEED and Jane Remover When: 6 Where: Denver Coliseum Why: Turnstile is the Baltimore-based melodic hardcore band whose style has evolved so much from its early days that is new album Never Enough is practically a punk infused shoegaze albums with moments of ethereal dream pop. In that way it has been on a similar arc as bands like Nothing and Ceremony but with more extensive and obvious use of synth melodies to lend the music a touch of psychedelia. Mannequin Pussy from Philadelphia started the same year as Turnstile (2010) and more than likely crossed paths in the endless tracks of the underground American touring circuit. Its own raging punk rock and willingness to indulge atmospheric melodies inside indisputably cathartic songs against the trespasses of sexism, religious trauma and other forms of abuse one can be subjected to as a young woman. The group’s 2024 album I Got Heaven is a revelation of some of the most righteous invective recorded by a band of recent years paired with memorable hooks and melodies.
Latter performs at Ghost Canyon Fest on Saturday, August 22, 2025, photo by Vanessa ValdezMSPAINT in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 08.01 What:MSPAINT w/American Culture, Lip Critic and Pat and the Pissers When: 7 Where: Marquis Theater Why: MSPAINT came out of the hardcore underground as a band that didn’t have a guitarist instead took the attitude and applied it to a more synth-and-bass driven post-punk. Since then the group has evolved a sharp critique of American society and culture while maintaining a compassionate stance toward human vulnerability with an analog to what Chat Pile has been putting out. Its latest release is the No Separation EP on which the group expand its more experimental soundscaping tendencies while still having an arresting and commanding delivery. American Culture has had its own evolution as a band from earlier indie-pop-turned-atmospheric post-punk band but along the way it absorbed the influence of modern hardcore, The Cure and 90s Britpop simultaneously. It has resulted in a band that is not much like anything else going either.
Down Time, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 08.01 What: Down Time, Bluebook and Fingertip 57 When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Down Time is now based out of Los Angeles but cut its teeth in the Denver indie rock scene where its sophisticated songwriting and tender melodies struck a chord locally in certain circles. Since then the group has developed its fusion of synth pop and a more baroque sound that hits as timeless and very analog in its aesthetic so that it’s songwriting has a very tangible quality in its saturated tones. Bluebook is one of the premier art pop bands in Denver fronted by the enigmatic and charismatic Julie Davis backed by former Monofog frontwoman Hailey Helmericks, gifted songwriter Jess Parsons and Still Tide’s guitar genius Anna Morsett.
Entrancer at Listening Lawn I, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 08.02 What: Listening Lawn V: Flyvee, Moth Sanctuary, Snowswept, Suo and Entrancer When: 5-8 Where: Carpio Sanguinette Park Why: This is an event organized by Multidim records and it’s for the experimental electronic heads who miss a time when this music had wider places to be experienced before Nü Denver came in and rapidly gentrified most corners of the metro area by the time the COVID-19 pandemic crashed into the headlong rush of all of that. This event will include notable producers and composers in the electronic realm including longtime forward thinking techno artist Entrancer. The event takes place in a park that is part ruin, part forgotten pocket of Denver and between complete corporate dominance and industrial land use. A perfect setting.
Lifeguard, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 08.02 What:Lifeguard w/Autobahn and The Red Scare When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lifeguard is touring in support of its full-length album Ripped and Torn out now on Matador. The noisy post-punk discordant aspect of the band’s sound with the dub-like tonal ripple baked into the guitar riffs as they interact at odd angles with the rhythm might be something one has come to expect from Chicago’s rich noise rock and post-punk scene generally but Lifeguard sounds like it’s on the edge and expressing the nervous energy and fragility that seems ambient in the world at the moment.
Badvril, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 08.04 What: Badvril, Surprise Soup, BabyBaby and Headslug When: 7:30 Where: The Skylark Lounge Why: Badvril is a shoegaze band from San Francisco that is touring behind its new record In Heaven. If you’re into stuff like Letting Up Despite Great Faults and Wild Nothing you’ll probably enjoy what these people are doing. BabyBaby is a standout synth pop artist whose rich electronic melodies and effervescent spirit elevate any show of which she is a part. Surprise Soup is a Denver trio that sounds like it took a bit of inspiration from math rock bands of the late 90s, Pavement and Death Cab For Cutie. Headslug can be sorta ambient or shoegaze-adjacent but also lo-fi slowcore but always surprisingly interesting.
MØAA, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 08.04 What:MØAA w/Tassles When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: MØAA is a Seattle-based artist whose 2021 album Euphoric Recall was a crossover hit in underground shoegaze and Goth/post-punk for the moody yet tonally rich guitar work and expansive drift. The breathy vocals and sense of space on the project’s 2023 album Jaywalker paired with the electronic beats is reminiscent of mid-2000s Ladytron but with decidedly modern flavor. Denver’s Tassles is hard to pin down to anything except the music sounds like shoegaze made by someone who has spent a lot of time listening to Black Marble and corporate training video music but somehow transcending the limitations of both. The recently released Net Worth album has a breezy quality that is summery without feeling similarly insubstantial. Psychedelic warping and techno beats and hazy around the edges production make it one of the more original entries into the crowded modern shoegaze field.
Angel Band in 2025, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 08.05 What: Angel Band tour kickoff w/Sonic Chick, Fragrant Blossom and Scorplings When: 7 Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: Angel Band is taking its twee jangle pop on the road and leading off with this show. Fans of Sarah Records bands and their fresh energy and borderline naive style songwriting or newer bands like Denver’s The Maybellines will find a great deal to like about Angel Band and its charismatic live show. Fragrant Blossom is more like an arty abstract jazz and New Age pop project that includes Ben Donehower aka Petite Garcon. Scorplings will bring an angular, Chicago scene style noise rock and Yo La Tengo bleeding edge pop sound to this show.
The Milk Blossoms in 2025, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 08.06 What:The Milk Blossoms When: 5-8 pm Where: Granby Ranch Why: Denver-based art pop heartbreakers The Milk Blossoms make a rare trip to the hinterlands to charm and entrance an audience for a three hour set in a beautiful outdoor setting away from the baking heat of Denver in August. Likely the group will break out some of its older material to extend the set so if you’re lucky enough to be there you’ll get to experience a full range of the band’s songwriting, all of it poignant, deeply evocative and cathartic in the way that only songs that truly tug at the heartstrings and stir the imagination simultaneously as deftly as The Milk Blossoms’ material can and always does.
Dispatch, photo by Shervin Lainez
Thursday | 08.07 What:Dispatch w/John Butler, Donavon Frankenreiter and Illiterate Light When: 6 Where: Red Rocks Why: Dispatch is mostly known as an indie and roots rock band in the past decade and a half or so that it’s been back together. But its new album Yellow Jacket hearkens more back to its early days when the group was more steeped in a reggae and ska sound blended into its more folk rock sound. Of course it’s an update and the band’s songcraft is more honed than in its earlier incarnation but the songs are still informed by a spirit of human liberation and the joy of living with the ups and downs inevitable with human existence. The new record includes an acoustic song with Ani DiFranco that sounds like a 60s folkie protest song and all the better for it. Live the band brings a passion to the performances that elevate what might be perceived as more introspective and tranquil material.
White Rose Motor Oil, photo by Tammy Shine
Friday | 08.08 What:White Rose Motor Oil, Graveyard Choir and Chella & The Charm When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Why: This is a stacked lineup for local Americana but one in which none of the bands are really even remotely alike. White Rose Motor Oil combines a rockabilly sound with stripped down country rock without compromising the passionate delivery. As a duo WRMO are surprisingly exuberant and warm in their performances. Graveyard Choir is a country rock group fronted by former In The Whale guitarist and singer Nate Valdez. The songwriting is more blues driven with more honky tonk bar style ragers but with more tonally expressive guitar than expected with that style of music. Chella & The Charm threads together alt-country creativity in the realm of Americana with lyrics that aren’t just sharply and sensitively observed but which offer a keen insight into social and psychological dynamics. And also performed with a commanding presence.
Sharpie Smile, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 08.08 What: Sharpie Smile, Pink Lady Monster, Chroma Lips When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Sharpie Smile from Los Angeles just put out its new album The Staircase on Drag City. The mix of minimalist left field rock and hyperpop with ambient and industrial soundscaping lends its songwriting futuristic feel like music you’d more expect on a label like Ninja Tune or Warp. Its expert use of jump cut swells and subtle pitch shifting renders the music both accessible and pleasantly disorienting. Pink Lady Monster won’t be one for small minds either with its alchemical fusion of No Wave funk, avant-garde performance pop and skronk-infused free jazz. Chroma Lips is a psychedelic garage rock band from Denver that ditched the trendy sound of the 2010s and adopted the more krautrock end of shoegaze as a driver of its sound.
Victim of Fire in 2023, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 08.09 What: Victim of Fire album release w/Speed of the Sorcerer, Womb of the Witch, Spear of Cassius and Ukko’s Hammer When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Victim of Fire is celebrating the release of its new record The Old Lie with a stacked lineup of other bands within the wide realm of its own amalgam of d-beat, hardcore, black metal and crust punk. The fast-forward avalanche of both distorted and melodic guitar work and feral vocals suits well its songs about the deceptions of society and government regarding the organization of our resources toward war as part of an ongoing and age old charade of actions for the betterment of the country or our in-group. Speed of the Sorcerer, Womb of the Witch is a death doom band from Denver who seem to have fused perfectly classic death metal with melodic thrash including song titles that fuse ideas and concepts in an over-the-top and absurdly humorous fashion but which definitely conjure an image. Spear of Cassius is more of a screamo and power violence band with vocals that sound like they’re both distended and compressed with melancholic musical passages that suggest a great nuance of emotional expression than one often comes to expect from extreme metal. Ukko’s Hammer is classic crossover hardcore with caustic urgency in the vocals and percussion that seems to persistent it feels like the world drops out carried by the sheer momentum of the rest of the music and Zach Reini’s vocals over a chasm before re-engaging.
Bad Luck City in 2015, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 08.09 What:Munly & The Lupercalians, Let the Dead Eat the Dead (feat. Members of Bad Luck City) and Weathered Statues When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Why: Drummer and visual artist Andrew Warner is celebrating his birthday by playing sets with three of his bands. Munly & The Lupercalians is potent fusion of dark Americana and post-punk with folkloric lyrics. Weathered Statues is one of the few genuine death rock bands from Denver but one that utilizes soaring vocals and synths with sharp guitar work and some of the most powerful bass lines of any band in Denver or anywhere. Let the Dead Eat the Dead, though, is like a new incarnation of the great Americana band Bad Luck City. Fronted by the charismatic Dameon Merkl, BLC was clearly influenced by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds but with unique and often darkly humorous lyrics and noir storytelling that made it a local favorite for years.
In the Company of Serpents, photo by Kate Rose
Saturday | 08.09 What: In the Company of Serpents w/Palehorse/Palerider, Church Fire and Cronos Compulsion When: 7 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: In the Company of Serpents has completely reconciled its musical impulses on its new record A Crack In Everything. It is one of its heaviest and most crushing records but infused with the atmospheric desert rock psychedelia that has been a part of its sound over the past decade and with lyrics that capture the emotional tenor of the moment through the expression of personal struggle. Fitting that psychedelic, experimental heavy folk outfit Palehorse/Paleride shares the bills as does politically charged industrial dance phenoms Church Fire and its live show to suit the name of the band.
Shannon Lay, photo by Kai Macknight
Thursday | 08.14 What: Shannon Lay w/Cyrena Rosati and Ryan Wong When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Shannon Lay probably became known to underground music audiences as a member of indie rock/punk band Feels even before leaving the group in 2020 her solo work has taken on different dimension entirely. Quickly evolving from a more bedroom pop sound to experimental yet earnest folk Lay signed with SubPop for two albums. August (2019) proved that Lay had a great command of what might be called cosmic, existential indie folk with an arresting sense of intimacy. Her 2021 album Geist found Lay shedding any and all adopted styles and personae for an album that was moving and tranquil with elegantly inspired guitar work. Cyrena Rosati may now be known for her commanding bass work in Quits, Cherry Spit and Supreme Joy but before all of that she made beautiful dream-pop infused indie rock as Sweetness Itself. Who can say what this solo set will sound like but it will be worth showing up early to see. Same with Ryan Wong, frontman of Supreme Joy and member of The Fresh & Onlys. His own expertise in the realms of psychedelic and garage rock and post-punk will likely shine through on this rare solo set as well.
Entrancer, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 08.15 What: Entrancer, Lanx Borealis, Staggered Hooks, Quinn Boudeleaux, 4 Digit Visuals When: 8 Where: Glob Why: Entrancer has recently been mixing some older DIY, lo-fi electronic aesthetics into his masterful modern techno made with analog and digital synths. The result is audio time traveling layered together to great evocative effect like some 2020s rave music thoroughly blended with early witchhouse and 8-bit composition. Nothing like it. Lanx Borealis makes ambient music that integrates circuit bent devices and minimal synth. Staggered Hooks is Dean Inman who some may know for his involvement in the 2010s Denver rave scene but also for his fusion of hardware based dance music and noise with this project.
Wilco, photo by Peter Crosby
Saturday | 08.16 What: An Evening With Wilco When: 6:30 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Wilco helped to pioneer and influence indie rock as we know it with eclectic yet coherent musical vision ever evolving past previous limits. Partly because the songwriting has always been imaginative and daring in its sonic creativity and also due to the insightful and poignantly earnest lyrics with a literary flavor minus the pretentious baggage. For this tour the band is playing choice selections from a large swath of its impressive and consistently quality catalog. Which could be mere fan service but Wilco is a band that brings a passionate delivery with the live show and at this point a nearly orchestral sound that elevates what indie rock and Americana music can be.
King Yosef, photo by Harper King
Tuesday | 08.19 What: Youth Code w/King Yosef, Street Sects and Insula Iscariot When: 7 Where: HQ Why: Stars of modern industrial hardcore for the entire night. King Yosef will have just released his new album Spire of Fear on his own imprint BLEAKHOUSE when this show happens and it includes contributes from space rock/black metal/shoegaze legends Holy Fawn. The album recorded and mixed by Kurt Ballou is an abrasive, disorienting and relentless listen with vocals that sound like they’re giving voice to the accelerated and amplified collective outrage over current world events with a direct personal resonance that may be reminiscent of Ballou’s main band Converge but with an aesthetic that more closely reflects King Yosef’s own work as a producer in the realm of electronic industrial music. A few years back Yosef worked with co-headliner Youth Code who were the industrial hardcore band of note around 10-12 years ago on a collaborative album called A Skeleton Key in the Doors of Depression (2021) that revealed his ability to enhance the virtues of a like-minded band in which each could complement each other perfectly. Youth Code returns with a new EP titled Yours, With Malice which showcases the duo in classic form with edgy, caustic and emotionally-charged EBM-infused hardcore. Street Sects are an Austin duo that pioneered a different edge of industrial hardcore with its fog-enshrouded yet confrontational live shows and manic energy. The music itself could be lost in the theatrical aspect of the show but listening to the records it was obvious they had incorporated elements of noise and dance music into the mix. This has become even more obvious with its “side project” Street Sex and its new album Full Color Eclipse with its fusion of industrial and synth pop like a disco darkwave with some gritty highlights. Street Sects is simultaneously releasing its new album under that name called Dry Drunk that is more in the vein of what you might expect but the sounds are often like a collection of samples assembled in a beautifully jarring fashion that also flows with pointed social commentary. The album cover looks like Charles Burns doing a tribute to Raymond Pettibon. Perfect for what you’ll hear on the record. Insula Iscariot is a death industrial act whose new album is out on Yosef’s BLEAKHOUSE imprint.
Street Sects, photo by Ismael Quintanilla IIIBlack Eyes, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday – Sunday | 08.21-08.24 What: Ghost Canyon Fest When: Varies by Night Where: What’s Left Records (8.21), The Skylark Lounge (8.22), Hi-Dive (8.23-08.24) Why: Ghost Canyon Fest is in its third year with yet another stellar lineup of bands from a broad spectrum of noise rock and experimental rock including Church Fire and Scorplings the first night and sort of pre-festival proper event at What’s Left Records in Colorado Springs, The Milk Blossoms and Pink Lady Monster with Honduh Daze at The Skylark on the second night, Flesh Tape and Flowting Clowds the afternoon of 8/23, Suicide Cages, Latter, Still House Plants and Black Eyes the third night at Hi-Dive (8/23), Moon Pussy and Dug the afternoon of 8/24 at Wax Trax, and Buildings and Cloakroom the concluding night Sunday 8/24 at the Hi-Dive. Look for our more comprehensive guide to the festival and interviews coming soon.
Horsegirl, photo by Ruby Faye
Tuesday | 08.26 What: Horsegirl w/Godcaster When: 7 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Chicago’s Horsegirl made waves when it released its debut single “Forecast” in 2019 and became a much hyped act out of the Windy City’s post-punk scene. Its minimalist guitar work and delicacy of feeling was reminiscent of the likes of a slowcore Raincoats or Young Marble Giants. The group’s new album Phonetics On and On was written when most of the trio have been students in New York and the introspection and evocation of uncertainty heard throughout the album lends it an emotional resonance that may suit young adulthood specifically but also reflects how in the current time things feel so fragile and tentative and the way you can navigate the energy with integrity is to approach things with intention and a sense of creating a normalcy rooted in exploring new expressions of confidence and a sense of play. The result is a song that is rewarding for its bold and sharply observed lyrics and paring the music to its absolute sonic essentials without skimping on a full sound.
I’m A Boy in 2008, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 08.29 What:I’m A Boy w/Toddy Ivy, Gata Negra and Red Tack When: 8 Where: Lost Lake Why: I’m A Boy’s original lineup of singer/guitarist Jimmi Nasi, bassist/singer Whitney Rehr and drummer John Shipe are reuniting for a show that’s a bit of a celebration of its spectacular 2012 album Sensation. The record benefits from not just masterful musicianship from its three members with no shying away from technical flourishes. But it’s not showing off for the sake of doing so, it all serves the songs which are an unusually and refreshingly insightful take on what it is to be an adult that hasn’t lost the love of art and music as a valid art form and avenue of expressing and exploring the grown up psyche and looking back and remembering what made life feel vital and bringing that energy into the present and finding that essence in the context of where you are now. Looking back it’s a classic of Denver underground rock for the sophistication of the songwriting and the sheer moxy of its performances. Many bands of that time were trying to mimic classic rock glory in a fashion that felt try-hard. I’m A Boy always seemed to live and embody the spirit of its influences by writing songs that didn’t feel derivative but also in spirit not so far removed from its roots. For this show it’s not just the band reuniting but also Rehr’s excellent garage-blues adjacent Gata Negra, Red Tack (fronted by former Baldo Rex frontman Ted Thacker) and his own take on reinventing punk rock spirit into gritty singer-songwriter style music and longtime friend of everyone involved with this show Toddy Ivy aka Toddy Walters.
Thursday | 07.03 What:Planning For Burial w/Volunteer Coroner, Verhoffst and Patience, Ophelia When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: It’s Closeness, It’s Easy, the latest transmission of deep, troubling thoughts as slow and unsettling, yet beautifully rendered, musical exorcism from Planning For Burial is the kind of record any of us with life experience need in this moment. The grinding light of its most headlong moments of gritty black metal-shoegaze alchemy burns off a touch of the middle age angst and despair at discovering you are well into and halfway through adulthood and a lot of what you were told mattered, or worse the things you told yourself mattered, don’t amount to much. And living with friends passing away in seemingly rapid succession and the lives of those around you crumbling in this sick excuse of a fake advanced industrialized country hollowed out by the savage neglect of late capitalism with no end in sight. But the album is also about finding the flickering of meaning and significance and emotional resonance among those ruins and scraps and holding on to what and who moves you the most with a tightness that you might not have understood without having gone through all the things that don’t affirm your dreams and fantasies but instead attempt to chisel them into nothing yet failing just a little. It’s also just a gorgeously heavy, atmospheric work of borderline lo-fi, scuzzy shoegaze with heartfelt lyrics and an irresistible uplift. Opening are harsh noise soundscape sculptor Volunteer Coroner, power electronics ambient composer Verhoffst and ambient bedroom pop band Patience, Ophelia which includes Samuel Rupsa and Madeline Johnston (Midwife).
Meet the Giant in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 07.03 What:The Frickashinas w/The Born Readies and Meet the Giant When: 7 Where: Lost Lake Why: The Frickishinas are a melodic skate punk type of band from Denver in that sort of melodic hardcore borderline emo vein. The Born Readies are a kind of hybrid of hard glam and garage rock band also from the Mile High City. Meet the Giant, though they rock hard enough, are more of an alternative rock band steeped in electronic music aesthetics and deep mood atmospheric music so they might be considered a shoegaze outfit by some or leaning post-punk and even downtempo by others, there is an intensity and emotional depth to the music that reaches further than most more straight forward rock and roll.
The Milk Blossoms, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 07.08 What: Jackson & The Janks w/El Welk and The Milk Blossoms When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Jackson & The Janks is one of those retro old timey rock and roll and R&B bands with some garage rock spirit and gospel sensibility in its sound from New York City. El Welk is the new band from George Cessna who many may know from being a member of his father’s band Slim Cessna’s Auto Club or his former Americana outfit Snakes. But his solo albums have long been worthwhile for having existential lyrics and a spare and economic style. The Milk Blossoms is one of the best indiepop bands in the land at the moment with ear worm melodies and lyrics of uncanny poetic insight and imagination.
TopHouse, photo by Electric Peak Creative
Tuesday | 07.08 What:Fruition and TopHouse When: 6:30 Where: Denver Botanic Gardens Why: TopHouse is a Montana-based band whose roots in indie Americana and its bluegrass influences have been fully integrated into its heartfelt songwriting. In 2025 the band released two EPs: Theory in May and the newly released Practice. Obviously there is conceptual wit behind naming the two sets of songs but with the earlier EP was more upbeat and summery, the latest delves into struggle and self-re-discovery. The band’s masterful musicianship combines a sense of orchestral arrangements with emotional intimacy.
Howling Giant, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 07.10 What: Howling Giant, Abrams, Voidlung When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Stoner rock went out of style more or less around the turn of the 2010s but was replaced by its modern equivalent, psychedelic doom metal. But Howling Giant skipped the trend morphing and offered the kind of heavy music that is melodic yet hard hitting and and imbued with a sinuous rhythm style that gives the music a bit of sway. Denver’s Abrams clearly has similar musical inspirations as the headliner but with more than a touch of post-hardcore and post-rock.
Salads and Sunbeams, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 07.12 What: Salads and Sunbeams w/Air Moons (first show) When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Salads and Sunbeams is a psychedelic indiepop band whose gorgeously lush songs and literate lyrics sound like something from another era when creative songwriting was at a premium. Yet it’s sound isn’t stuck in the past even if you hear the songs and they have the strong production and ear for impeccable melodies that you’d expect on a Harry Nilsson or Apples in Stereo record. It’s new album Into the Starless Night is front to back a masterpiece of modern pop songcraft imbued with psychological insight and delivered with fantastic vocals both lead and in harmony.
Moon Pussy, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 07.12 What: Lost Relics w/Moon Pussy and No Comma When: 8 Where: The Crypt Why: Lost Relics’ juggernaut fusion of Unsane-esque noise rock and post-metal circa Neurosis will headline this show which includes the mutant noise rock tricksters Moon Pussy who absolutely blur the line between Butthole Surfers, Big Black and Shellac in style, methodology and substance. All the bands are from Denver and No Comma doesn’t play often but it will bring a blunt and clipped hardcore and noise punk aesthetic to the proceedings.
Lyle Lovett, photo by Michael WIlson
Sunday | 07.13 What:Lyle Lovett w/The Five Blind Boys of Alabama When: 7 Where: Fiddler’s Green Why: Lyle Lovett is one of the most popular artists in modern country whose career spans over four decades. He first burst into popular consciousness with his 1986 self-titled debut and his hit song “Cowboy Man.” In an era when pop country lacked a certain authenticity of expression Lovett distinguished himself with a style that’s eclectic and drew on swing, jazz, folk, gospel and blues but with his lyrics somehow tied it all together to be more authentically country than a lot of what else was going on as true to form for a genre that itself was made up of a rich tapestry of influences. This time out Lovett is touring with his Large Band so you’ll get to see those classic songs and newer favorites writ large.
J. Carmone, photo courtesy the artist
Saturday | 07.19 What: J. Carmone, Paranoid Image and Cosmic Smoke Wagon When: 5/5:30 Where: Larimer Lounge Why: The recent J. Carmone stuff sounds like a one-man psychedelic garage rock blues thing. Fuzzy melodies and simple chord and rhythm structure that’s broadly expressive even within that narrow range of elements. But in the songwriter’s bag of tricks are power pop hooks and a touch of indie jangle. Paranoid Image is an alternative rock band rooted in acoustic sounds and almost world music melodic structures. Cosmic Smoke Wagon as perhaps the name suggests is sort of a heavier blues rock quartet.
Arrows in Action, photo by Rachel Dwyer
Saturday | 07.19 What:Rain City Drive, Arrows in Action, Charlotte Sands, Taylor Acorn, Beauty School Dropout, If Not For Me When: 4 Where: The Fillmore Auditorium Why: The Summer School Tour lands at the Fillmore showcasing some prominent bands in the realm of modern alternative rock informed by pop punk and melodic post-hardcore. Rain City Drive fronted by The Voice runner-up Matt McAndrew though from Palm Coast, Florida derived its name from the city where they all met for the first time, Manchester UK. Arrows in Action from Nashville is touring ahead of the release of its new album I Think I’ve Been Here Before out soon on Nettwerk Music Group. The new, third, record is brimming with summery energy and songs informed by youthful exuberance and a spirit of rediscovering one’s joy of life. It’s a complete fusion of electronic pop and the kind of eclectic alternative rock from the late 90s that embraced production elements in the songwriting. Charlotte Sands blends glitchy alt-pop and emo for a sound that fans of Charli XCX may enjoy. Taylor Acorn seemingly takes the structure and sound of pop country and infuses it with the kind of alternative pop exemplified by Echosmith. Beauty School Dropouts do look like if Ratt reincarnated as later era scene kids. And its music is rooted in that kind of emo but one that also recognizes that processing vocals and other instrumentation can make more straight ahead songwriting sound more interesting.
Lyra Muse, photo by Adam Debary @mr.debary
Sunday | 07.20 What: Lyra Muse w/BabyBaby and Dandelioness When: 7:30/8 Where: The Crypt Why: Lyra Muse is a dream pop artist from Santa Fe, New Mexico whose command of production, layered atmospheres and vocal processing is thoroughly entrancing. Like a downtempo act that learned a bit from maybe listening to a bit of early 80s Brian Eno, Nicolas Jaar and The Knife. The music’s organic flow and intimate tones are a little like New Age darkwave. On tour with Lyra Muse is Danelioness from Taos whose music is superficially the opposite from Lyra Muse with sounds you might expect more out of an indie folk act including clear and evocative singing but the production on the recorded music suggests something that was influenced by experimental 1980s pop like Kate Bush or Marianne Faithful’s synth-infused period. And from Denver BabyBaby will thrill your ears with exquisitely crafted synth pop and enhanced by charming and idiosyncratic stage antics.
This Will Destroy You on the original Young Mountain tour in 2006, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 07.20 What: This Will Destroy You w/Jesse Beaman When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex Why: This Will Destroy You will be performing its 2006 debut album Young Mountain and likely highlights from its album since then. This Will Destroy You from early on set itself apart from the glut of post-rock by making truly cinematic and expressive guitar compositions with emotional heft and dynamism that didn’t sound just like guys jamming out on a theme. The album has gone on to be a classic of the genre and nearly 20 years later its essential appeal as a set of music that stirs the imagination is intact.
Supreme Joy, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 07.24 What:Supreme Joy and Flutter dual album release show w/Team Nonexistent and Sun Swept When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: There’s probably a numerological significance to the title of Supreme Joy’s new album 410,757,864,530 Dead Carps or it’s just a surreal semiotic exercise in the absurdity of naming an album brimming with themes of “everchanging American identity, class warfare and Debord’s spectacle.” It’s an overwhelming number which may by part of the point but the psychedelic garage rock post-punk is a sprawling and shimmering collection of sharp observations and an attempt to make sense of so much nonsense in the context of one’s own living of life which can be perilous at best but that doesn’t mean there can’t be plenty of play to be had while figuring it all out and that’s what the record sounds like in all its sonically kaleidoscopic glory. Also releasing an album this night is the great Denver power pop band Flutter and its refreshingly earnest and romantic When You Love Somebody and its full arc exploration of the course of love—the insecurities, the infatuation, the travails of being in love with a human rather than one’s image of one and coming to terms with the highs and lows. It has the exuberance of a record informed by adolescent spirit but the nuance of someone with a bit more emotional maturity making it more relevant for someone that wants to love someone for real and being willing to deal with everything that comes with it.
Wheelchair Sports Camp, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 07.25 What: Wheelchair Sports Camp, Jello Biafra and Alice Wong When: 6-10 Where: Denver Art Museum Why: Wheelchair Sports camp takes over the Denver Art Museum for an evening of performances and an interactive element in celebration of Disability Pride Month and the 35th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act. It’s a way to flip the usual narrative in which disabled folks serve as entertainment for society and instead own the spectacle rather than merely be it for the amusement of others. It’s activism as art and engagement as an act of transforming the usual dialogues and contexts. As part of the proceedings you’ll see Jello Biafra who will have some choice words and long-time disability rights activist Alice Wong, founder and Project Coordinator of Disability Visibility Project which collects oral histories of people with disabilities in the USA.
of Montreal, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 07.26 What:of Montreal – The Sunlandic Twins 20th anniversary tour When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Long-running indie pop group of Montreal is celebrating the 20 year anniversary of its 2005 album The Sunlandic Twins. The album is a bit of a fusion of the group’s signature, psychedelic pop and early Brian Eno solo album strangeness for an effect that is like listening to something just out of the frame of usual reality which is what you want from an of Montreal album. And per usual there will probably be a unique stage presentation of the music including sets and costumes to enhance the sense of being witness to something fantastical.
Whitney, photo by Alexa Viscius
Saturday | 07.26 What:Caamp w/Whitney When: 7 Where: Fiddler’s Green Why: Caamp had modest beginnings when Taylor Meier and Evan Westfall met at, yes, summer camp in middle school and then formed the band after high school while students at Ohio University. It’s upbeat indie folk apparently struck a chord with its simple but appealing melodies and intimate presentation. Its latest album is the summery Copper Changes Color. Opening is Chicago’s Whitney which came out of the now defunct psych rock band Smith Westerns when Max Kakacek and Julien Ehrlich formed the project when their old band split in 2014. What they’ve done as the band has evolved and taken on new members is write orchestral pop songs in the vein of Laurel Canyon circa 1972 psychedelic folk rock but with a modern sense of exuberance and tapping into that time’s exquisite use of tonal arrangements. The band released a new single “Darling” so maybe it’s safe to say to expect a new album in the none-too-distant future.
Sculpture Club, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 07.29 What: Sculpture Club, Flesh Tape and French Kettle Station When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Sculpture Club is a post-punk band from Dallas that sounds like it took more inspiration from the more pop inflected end of that music like some of the upbeat Smiths-esque guitar melodies were a direct influence. Its 2024 self-titled album is reminiscent of The Prids with that neo-New Wave flavor and breezy dynamics and upbeat yet moody music. Flesh Tape is a vital hybrid of noise rock grit, emo vulnerability and shoegaze soundscape songwriting style. French Kettle Station could be any incarnation of his music of the moment from New Age glitch ambient or emotionally vibrant experimental pop. You’ll just have to go and see.
Fitz and the Tantrums, photo by Matty Vogel
Tuesday | 07.29 What:Fitz and the Tantrums When: 6:30 Where: Denver Botanic Gardens Why: Fitz and the Tantrums from Los Angeles have had a successful career with its brand of fusing indie pop and neo soul and ably tapping into uplifting melodic hooks and bringing to them great mood and emotional range. Sure its songs tend to be the kind built for parties and summertime fun but there is something that seems to bridge the style and sound of decades for something that sounds like something for today in the songwriting. The group is currently touring in support of its new album Man On The Moon and its outer space imagery as a vehicle for injecting the music with some hope and romance.
Tripp Nasty, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 07.30 What: Tripp Nasty, Debaser, Sense From Nonsense and Pythian Whispers When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Full disclosure, the writer of this piece is in Pythian Whispers. But really this show includes some old school Denver DIY scene artists from the 2000s through the 2020s era. Tripp Nasty these days has brought to bear his skills as a composer and technician of electronic music to produce vibrant and imaginative analog synth music that is both avant-garde and accessible. Debaser is the drums and bass guitar solo project of Monkey Mania founder Josh Taylor. It’s like the joyous noise rock with pop exuberance that is an analog to what he brought to the original Friends Forever. Sense From Nonsense is the solo project of former Echo Beds drummer/vocalist/synth composer Tom Nelsen. Sense From Nonsense has gone through various iterations but the current version has been a vehicle for doing live versions of the music from his short films and performance art like an outsider live juke box that irreverently deconstructs unexpected hits. Pythian Whispers for over a decade has included former Tornado Alley and 900 Ancestors guitarist Tom Murphy, former Odam Fei Mud percussionist and current Animal / object multi-instrumentalist David Britton and former Great Atomic Motor and Sense From Nonsense bassist Harmony Fredere. As this band it’s left field ambient and abstract progressive rock with elements of the band members’ various influences blended and layered into dense and dynamic soundscapes.
Midwife, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 07.31 What:Midwife w/Jenny Haniver and Fainting Dreams When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Midwife is of course Madeline Johnston whose ethereal guitar work and live production transforms a core of deeply emotional and melancholic songwriting into something that feels like experiencing a dream in real time. Her records are a catalog of giving honor to the pain and loss one must bear across a lifetime as well as the more understated joys that sustain us in unexpected moments when we need them most. Jenny Haniver is a post-hardcore industrial post-punk band from Portland. Fainting Dreams might be described as a transcendent black metal band that channels the trauma and emotional catharsis of surviving the degradations and limitations imposed on us by late capitalism.
Ozomatli, photo by Piero F. Giunti
Thursday | 07.31 What: Ozomatli w/Las Cafeteras When: 7:30 Where: Arvada Center Amphitheater Why: Ozomatli kind of got dubbed a party band in the 1990s because its music was popular at celebrations of all kinds. But the members of the band met when trying to form a workers union in Los Angeles. The band’s seamless integration of elements of hip-hop, funk, Chicano rock and various cultural music from around the world has mean its sound has been evolving from the beginning and with an appeal that transcends genre boundaries. All along the band has lived its social convictions and supported farm-workers’ rights and immigration issues and decidedly anti-war in the 2000s when it seemed like Americans were encouraged to be rah rah for expanding the empire. To the band’s credit its politics have become even more relevant as has its ability to bring joy and celebratory energy to its famously exuberant live shows.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
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