Queen City Sounds and Art

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

To Be Continued…