George Cessna – Queen City Sounds and Art

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond November 2024

**Washed Out performs at Ogden Theatre 11.04, photo by Landon Spears**

Saturday | 11.02
What: Blood Cult Weekend Night 1: Carrellee, Fainting Dreams, Baby Baby, Tepid
When: 8
Where: Squirm Gallery
Why: Blood Cult is a local production company promoting small shows often featuring touring underground bands and some of the best local acts. Carrallee is a darkwave synthpop artist from Madison. Wisconsin. Fainting Dreams is a Denver-based band with a sound like the cathartic manifestation of a folk horror film made into dark shoegaze and emotionally charged black metal. Baby Baby is an arty synth pop project. Tepid is the solo effort of Nick Salmon of industrial shoegaze band Voight.

Sunday | 11.03
What: Blood Cult Weekend Night 2: Ronnie Stone, Hex Cassette, Supreme Joy and I Luv Nandi
When: 8
Where: The Crypt
Why: Ronnie Stone is a synth pop artist from NYC whose songwriting and production bears a strong resemblance to a 1980s coming of teen drama that never happened. Hex Cassette is a humorously confrontational industrial darkwave one-man band and performance art cult. Supreme Joy is a noisy post-punk band from Denver with some sonic lineage to Jay Reatard’s early 2000s bands.

Sunday | 11.03
What: Claudio Simonetti’s Goblin
When: 7
Where: The Gothic Theatre
Why: Keyboardist Claudio Simonetti was one of the founders of progressive rock band Goblin. Before the band adopted the moniker it had already begun composing the score to Dario Argento’s 1975 horror film landmark Profondo rosso and its evocatively psychedelic prog creepiness. That quality the band developed even further for its soundtrack to Argento’s 1977 masterpiece Suspiria and on the director’s cut of George Romero’s Zombi aka Dawn of the Dead before the group split in 1978. Though the band’s members worked together in various configurations over the next two decades the band Goblin reconvened in 2000 and toured in a variety of manifestations including that for this tour as Claudio Simonetti’s Goblin which will bring to life some of the iconic music of the band’s respectable catalog.

Monday | 11.04
What: Washed Out w/After
When: 7
Where: The Ogden Theatre
Why: Ernest Greene as Washed Out may not have set out to be one of the most enduring and successful artists out of what came to be called chillwave in the late 2000s of which he is one of the pioneers. Before bedroom pop became a common quantity identified with a loose movement, Greene and other artists of early chillwave helped to establish the aesthetic characterized hazy, saturated, melancholic synthpop. But Greene has always infused his production with hip hop style arrangements and beatmaking paired with immersive melodies and a knack for tapping into that part of the brain triggering warm feelings of nostalgia. When combined with his reflective lyrics those sounds make bittersweet memories hit with a gentle catharsis. Greene’s song “Feel It All Around” from his 2009 EP Life of Leisure became the opening music for comedy series Portlandia and forever cemented the songwriter’s status as an architect of the sound of a time and place that is easy to look back on fondly even when those memories have a mixed if unforgettable place in your heart. The latest Washed Out record Notes From a Quiet Life seems to catalog an attempt to reconnect with a period in recent years when some people had the time to think about their lives as having more meaning and significance than the usual expectations and demands as they fit into cogs of capitalism. Greene zeros in on and mines that headspace for the kind of ideas and thinking that can hopefully sustain you into a regular life that grinds you down by creating a psychological space in your mind where there is time for sustained tranquility.

Tuesday | 11.05
What: The March Violets, Die So Fluid, Wingtips and Void + Veil DJs
When: 7
Where: HQ
Why: The March Violets were one of the early Goth bands of the first half of the 80s. Its 1983 single “Snake Dance” established the group as an influential and popular band in the realm of post-punk. As the decade went on the band shifted into a more pop sound but without losing the moody melodrama and atmospheric sound that initially caught the attention of fans. The group never released an official album during its initial 1981-1987 run, simply EPs and singles. But since reconvening in 2010 The March Violets have released three full length albums including 2024’s Crocodile Promises. Also on this tour are UK Goth hard rock band Die So Fluid and Chicago’s excellent darkwave/shoegaze duo Wingtips.

Space in Time circa 2016, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 11.08
What: Hi-Dive 21st Birthday Party: Space in Time, Moon Pussy, Church Fire, Quits and Debaser
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: For 21 years Denver’s Hi-Dive has been one of the go-to clubs to see up and coming bands and those that never attain a higher degree of fame and popularity but whose music shines brighter than a lot of what’s offered in the mainstream. For the occasion psychedelic doom band Space in Time performs a rare show. But also on the bill are heavy hitters like noise rock giants Moon Pussy and Quits, percussion punk auteur Debaser and Church Fire and their much needed industrial dance rock to immolate the authoritarian currents of our time.

Saturday | 11.09
What: Hi-Dive 21st Birthday Party: Pissed Jeans, Muscle Beach, Candy Apple, Cheap Perfume and Cherry Spit
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Pissed Jeans has been offering up its noisy, angular post-punk in the vein of DC post-hardcore blended with Killing Joke stripped of its haunted atmospheres. Its latest record Half Divorced is like a high speed journey through the American cultural landscape circa 2024. It’s nearly prophetic in its depiction of truncated hopes and dreams, the seeming inability of any of the powers that be to recognize that a flourishing society includes all and not just the people in America and other wealthy countries Its music’s invective is very choice and pairs well with Chat Pile’s Cool World. Fitting headliner for the second night of Hi-Dive’s birthday celebration and local stars of post-hardcore, political punk and noise rock.

Saturday | 11.09
What: Bear Hands w/Worry Club and Broken Record
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: Bear Hands emerged from the indie rock and post-punk milieu of mid-2000s Brookyn and rather than being fully lumped in with other bands of that time Bear Hands took a different kind of path and its dream pop guitar style and left field rhythmic structure garnered it a bit of a cult following over the years. It’s 2024 album The Key To What sounds like a record out of time. In its ebullient melodies and textures one hears echoes of a time when Animal Collective and MGMT would have been heard in public places regularly and its experiments in electronic composition more in the realm of modern indie pop dance flavor. Yet underpinning it all is Bear Hands’ knack for deconstruction rhythmic structure and rebuilding it with an ear for accessibility.

Saturday | 11.09
What: Dehd w/Gustaf
When: 7
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: Chicago’s Dehd has never fit neatly in a subgenre of rock but its foundation of lo-fi slacker rock and post-punk has resulted in a good deal of exuberant, cathartic, emotionally-charged pop. All of the band’s records focus on a different aspect of its creative leanings and its new record Poetry seems to embrace both the strands of pop punk influence and disaffected singer-songwriter balladry and all imbued with the band’s usual gift for creative rhythms.

Sunday | 11.10
What: Front 242 (final Denver show) w/Kontravoid
When: 7
Where: Reelworks
Why: Front 242 is one of the foundational bands of the EBM and electronic industrial sound hailing from Belgium circa 1981. Throughout the 80s the group developed a rhythm-driven songwriting in both electronic percussion and the layering of electronic melodies and textures that proved highly influential on later bands and were distinctive from peers like Skinny Puppy, DAF, Front Line Assembly, Ministry and Nitzer Ebb. This is purported to be part of the last shows the group will perform live and not only do you get to catch these tones in their rich glory for perhaps the final time but also an opening slot from Kontravoid whose own dense electronic industrial dance music is in a clear lineage from the Belgian legends.

Modest Mouse, photo courtesy the artists

Monday | 11.11
What: Modest Mouse w/The Black Heart Procession
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Modest Mouse was already a beloved alternative rock band in more underground circles by the turn of the twenty-first century and its 2000 major label debut The Moon & Antarctica and its arresting mix of harrowing and heartfelt emotions and engrossing soundscapes. The 2004 follow up Good News for People Who Love Bad News seemed to tap into a zeitgeist of the period that seemed challenging and hopeless for a lot of people in the midst of the George W. Bush era and an embrace of tenderness, vulnerability and imagination seemed like an antidote to despair and mere cope. It’s the kind of aesthetic that seems perhaps more relevant now with the album’s evocative pairing of melancholia and joy. This tour the band celebrates the 20 year anniversary of the album with the great baroque pop flavored indie rock band The Black Heart Procession.

Monday | 11.11
What: Duster w/Dirty Art Club
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theater
Why: Space rock/slowcore band Duster was only around for a handful of years from the mid-90s to the 2000s to relatively little fanfare but its glittery indie rock sound started to enjoy a sizable cult following after it reunited in 2018. In the 2020s the band’s songs started being featured on TikTok posts when shoegaze generally was enjoying a new level of cachet among younger music fans. Since its reunion Duster has released more albums than during its initial run including its 2024 album In Dreams and its refinement of the textural atmospheric flow and granular, tranquil melodies that has been a hallmark of the group’s sound since the beginning.

Monday | 11.11
What: Aimee Mann w/Jonathan Coulton
When: 7
Where: Boulder Theater
Why: Aimee Mann is one of the most celebrated of songwriters of the 90s and beyond with prominent placing of her music in cinema and radio airplay, perhaps most prominently in the 1999 film Magnolia. Mann’s sharp wit and nuanced takes of personal struggles in her lyrics and the emotional sweep of her music has resulted in a long career of rewarding listening that has aged remarkably well.

Tuesday | 11.12
What: TR/ST
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: TR/ST pre-dated the current darkwave movement when it began as Trust in 2010 and the project’s 2012 debut album TRST was lumped in with the more synth-driven end of indie rock in the beginning. But the aesthetics were much more in line with electronic post-punk and Robert Alfons’ unique vocals too versatile and at times too deep to be confused with even a the then popular chillwave movement. TR/ST began to be embraced by Goth night DJs around that time. As Alfons’ songwriting developed in the more than decade hence he has honed his creative tone sculpting and soundcapes so that it transcends even the limitations of being associated with darkwave and more like a dark electronic dance music perhaps best experienced in a venue with a robust sound system capable of replicating the rich tones and low end of his compositions in particular as embodied on the 2024 album Performance, the first for experimental/darkwave label Dais.

Tuesday | 11.12
What: The Milk Blossoms w/North By North and C!trus
When: 7
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: North By North is an indie rock band from Chicago whose blend of indie/power pop and garage rock hearkens back to a time two decades ago before all of that became too codified in the 2010s. Citrus from Denver is a fuzzy psychedelic pop band with a touch of gritty shoegaze edge. The Milk Blossoms are of course the avant-pop indie group form Denver whose heartfelt and poetic lyrics and imaginative arrangements and impassioned performance style makes it a memorable live band.

Tuesday | 11.12
What: Kris Baha, Void Palace, Combat Sport and Kill You Club DJs
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Kris Baha is an Australian producer now based in Berlin whose fusion of 90s trance and electronic industrial music has made him a bit of a crossover artist in the realms of darkwave and the rave scene. Along with the expertly crafted, distorted beats and streams and saturated tones, though, Baha injects a sensibility like he’s not a stranger to pop songcraft and even his most out there songs have an undeniable accessibility even for those who aren’t just heads for the aforementioned.

Thursday | 11.l4
What: System Exclusive w/Hex Cassette, Baby Baby and Candy Chic https://hi-dive.com/listing/system-exclusive-hex-cassette-baby-baby-candy-chic/
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Ari Blaisdel of System Exclusive sounds a bit like a fusion of Dale Bozzio of Missing Persons and Karen O. The band’s music though is like a retro-futurist synth pop New Wave band with textural guitar sounds and gorgeously icy synths. Hex Cassette is the one person industrial dance death cult, all in good fun, though, whose cajoling the audience is part of the enjoyment of the performance because let’s face it, audiences too often need to be pumped up for maximum enjoyment for all involved. Baby Baby is an experimental electronic pop act from Denver and Candy Chic a mix of prog pop and indie rock.

King Diamond, photo from kingdiamondcoven.com

Thursday | 11.14
What: King Diamond (guest vocals from Myrkur) w/Overkill and Night Demon
When: 6
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: King Diamond is the influential black metal artist who first made his mark outside his home country of Denmark with the legendary band Mercyful Fate where his wide-ranging vocals including his signature falsetto featured prominently. The singer’s theatrical stage presence with face make-up that would prove an enduring visual cue for many bands including the early Slayer and generations of black metal artists from the 1980s onward. There’s a lot of gimmickry with the visual presentation and the live show but the music itself has aged better than a lot of 1980s metal because other than the obvious influence of Judas Priest it was idiosyncratic and the whole Anton LeVey style Satanism wasn’t a pose though these days King Diamond doesn’t follow any religious persuasion. This tour includes vocal contributions from another Danish musician of note, Myrkur whose folk-inflected black metal and enchanting vocals has garnered her an international following in her own right. And of course thrash legends Overkill are included on the bill.

The Crooked Rugs in 2024, photo by Tom Murphy

Thursday | 11.14
What: The Crooked Rugs album release w/Honey Blazer and Tarantula Bill
When: 7
Where: HQ
Why: Fort Collins-based psychedelic prog indie band The Crooked Rugs are releasing their new album Hear & Now. The album’s countrified flavor gives it a different style than yet another cookie cutter psych band as were rampant in the 2010s and The Crooked Rugs as a live band have a spontaneous and contagious energy that elevates the music further than expected if you listen to the recordings alone. Honey Blazer’s own style of indie psych Americana sounds like something from another era when country rock bands were letting their freak flag fly a little after hanging out in Laurel Canyon for a summer.

Friday | 11.15
What: Caribou w/Joy Orbison and Yune Pinku
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: In writing his new album Honey, Dan Snaith aka Caribou the composer, mathematician and multi-instrumentalist wanted to make music accessible to a wide audience. So the record is much more directly dance oriented than most of his previous records which were dance-adjacent anyway but the beats are more explicit and the techno infrastructure of the songwriting impressive. Snaith engages in some sample massaging into the beat and the record feels like a DJ set more so than certainly his previous album, 2020’s melancholic Suddenly. But of course the live show with include live musicians and have a spontaneous energy that isn’t often as possible when one is operating from in the box.

Saturday | 01.16
What: Mumiy Troll
When: 7
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: Mumiy Troll has been described as the “U2 of Russia” because in its home country it is as popular as U2 has been internationally and playing to crowds of tens of thousands in Russia and Asia. Singer and songwriter Ilya Lagutenko has been the constant presence in the band from its founding in 1983 and he has appeared in the 2004 horror film Night Watch which garnered a bit of a cult following in the West. The band, though, didn’t make many forays into the Western music market until 2009 with the release of its excellent Comrade Ambassador album for which it toured small clubs and theaters in North America, a far cry from its usual reception back home. The music of the band since the 1990s has born the influence of Britpop from Lagutenko’s having spent time in the UK during that decade but of course it has a unique Russian flavor with arrangements that reflect a fusion of sensibilities. And yet Mumiy Troll is undeniably accessible even if you don’t speak Russian. And hey, the band risked its livelihood in condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 resulting in the cancellation of its concerts by Russian authorities.

Saturday | 11.16
What: Pink Fuzz, Forty Feet Tall and Headlight Rivals
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Pink Fuzz kind of came out of that classic rock sound revival of the 2010s and its embrace of the hard rock of 2000s stoner rock bands. But Pink Fuzz just sounds like it has a lot more life and bite to its music than a lot of that wave of music. Portland, Oregon’s Forty Feet Tall is a fascinating and visceral fusion of psychedelic garage rock and post-punk intensity and menace.

Sunday | 11.17
What: Gila Teen album release w/Horse Girl and Rabbit Fighter
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Gila Teen is releasing its new album at this show and if its Subtle Wizard EP is any indication the emotionally charged and arresting dream pop/post-punk band is leaning into the desperation underlying the times. It’s also incorporating the kinds of keyboards one more often hears on some 2000s DIY home recording indiepop group enhancing its already commanding immediacy. Horse Girl will do some weird performance art thing with music probably made just for the show and you’ll be better off having witnessed the strangeness. Rabbit Fighter might be a twee indie pop band but its earnest energy and vulnerably delivery can’t be dismissed or narrowed to such designations.

Janet Feder of cowhause, photo from Bandcamp

Sunday | 11.17
What: cowhause album release w/Hamster Theater
When: 7-10
Where: The Bug Theatre
Why: Two legends of local avant-garde music for this show. The first is a project between noted guitarist and academic Janet Feder whose imaginative and brilliantly virtuosic guitar playing has found its way into multiple records and in collaboration with multiple artists and Colin Bricker who has played with various bands over the years but is perhaps best known for his production company and studio Mighty Fine Audio. Their band cowhause is a brilliant blend of folk songcraft and ambient soundscaping. Hamster Theater is a long-running art rock band from Boulder whose membership has included members of Thinking Plague and Big Foot Torso. Though these days fairly obscure in the Denver and Boulder area the band has an international following for its wild sonic experimentation into realms of avant-garde jazz and 20th century classical deconstruction.

Wednesday | 11.20
What: Actors w/Occults and DJ Niq V
When: 7
Where: HQ
Why: Actors from Vancouver, BC has set itself apart from a lot of the modern darkwave and post-punk bands by having great pop songcraft instincts and rich synth composition alongside a lively stage show. Sure they look like Goths but there is a joyful energy to an Actors show like a New Wave synthpop band of old and a guitar sound that is more full than the spindly, guitar flavor favored by too many bands among the current swath of trendy post-punk.

Wednesday | 11.20
What: AJ Suede w/Ceschi & Factor Chandelier and Esh & The Isolations
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: AJ Suede may not identify as an alternative hip-hop artist as that’s a somewhat archaic term these days. But the experimental rhythms and left field sound choices in his beats point to roots in the kind of underground hip-hop that was becoming popular in the late 90s and 2000s and more recent collectives like Odd Future and A$AP Mob. His creative and imaginative lyrics also veer from the sensibilities of mainstream hip-hop. His latest record Voiceless (2024) is all instrumentals and should be available on tour. Ceschi has been a star of underground hip-hop for around 20 years with his brilliant fusion of folk punk, psychedelia and hip-hop. His two most recent albums Bring Us the Head of Francisco False Parts 1 and 2 (2024) are an epic journey through the creative legacy that produced Ceschi and the culture in which he’s been operating as well as commentary on the wider society which its had to navigate. The albums also represent the end of Ceschi’s career as a solo artist.

Friday | 11.22
What: Ms. Boan w/Jeff In Leather, Moon 17 and As In Heaven As In Hell
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Ms. Boan is Mariana Saldaña of the darkwave band BOAN who were a significant project of that great 2010s group of industrial and synthpop influenced bands that came to prominence in the underground. Ms. Boan has in recent years collaborated with Houses of Heaven and Boy Harsher and live is a commanding figure whose mystique adds to the sensual impact of the music. Jeff In Leather is a hard techno solo project from Omaha whose most recent release JiL includes production and mastering by industrial darkwave legend Street Fever, Moon 17 is an electro-industrial band from Kansas City whose sound appears to be a fusion of Front 242-esque EBM and melodic darkwave, As In Heaven As In Hell is the solo coldwave post-punk project of John Bueno who has been in punk bands in the past and a noteworthy comic artist but discovered a love of being able to produce music with few creative compromises.

Saturday | 11.23
What: Snakes final show w/Jenny Don’t and The Spurs and DBUK
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Snakes is playing its final show. The band fronted by George Cessna is like an unlikely fusion of psychedelic surf honky tonk band. Like the sort of group you’d hope to serendipitously run into on a road trip to an isolated town with a secret underbelly of Bohemian weirdos creating music for their own enjoyment and that of others with tastes in music that run astray of mainstream radio fare. Cessna can still be seen playing with Slim Cessna’s Auto Club and likely as a solo act with a catalog of his own that is worth exploring on its own. But Snakes’ gritty self-awareness is a rarity in the realm of Americana with an aesthetic that sounds like it came out of a place where the band hung out with The Velvet Underground and The Creation both and vibed off each before opening for Graham Parsons period The Byrds. Oh yes, Cessna’s dad Slim will be performing in the weirdo, folk infused post-punk opening band DBUK that includes members of the Auto Club. Jenny Don’t and the Spurs will be making a stop in from their base in Portland, Oregon with a glittery and melancholic take on modern outlaw country that fans of Green on Red and Dolly Parton will appreciate.

Saturday | November 30
What: Lyra Muse, Deth Rali and BLDDDLTTR
When: 7:30
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Lyra Muse is a pianist/violinist/vocalist from Santa Fe, New Mexico whose dream pop has an elemental quality reminiscent of The Knife and Jenny Hval. The orchestral sounds and ethereal expansiveness of the music conjures images of dream exploration of deeper personal issues and trauma. BLDDDLTTR is also from Santa Fe but its sound is like a great blend of darkwave post-punk and shoegaze with emotionally charged vocals. Deth Rali is hard to quantify but its recent album release show revealed the band to have fused the ideas and aesthetics of 70s glam rock, hypnogogic pop and prog art rock in both sound and visual presentation of the music.

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond October 2024

**Charli XCX performs at Ball Arena on October 11, photo by Harley Weir**

Fontaines D.C. photo courtesy the artists

Wednesday | 10.02
What: Fontaines D.C. w/Been Stellar
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Irish post-punk band Fontaines D.C. has always been a bit different from the current crop of shout-y punk bands yet sharing a sharply observed critique of contemporary society and politics with a literary sensibility. For its 2024 album Romance the group took a bit of a different turn in its sounds drawing inspiration from manga, horror and existential cinema, ambient post-rock, a post-ironic absorption of nu metal and trip-hop. It sounds almost entirely unlike their previous offerings while preserving the core of its irreverent spirit and poetic leanings and transforming the expression of both. Openers Been Stellar from NYC is almost an American cognate of the musical impulses and instincts one finds in Fontaines D.C.. Its own melodic yet brooding rock is also brimming with an energy that suggests a sober assessment of the world as it is and deciding to reject the temptation to dissociation and despair. The quintet’s new album Scream from New York, NY is noisy and atmospheric with shades of Washington, DC post-punk and NYC arty noise rock.

Wednesday | 10.02
What: Mint Field w/Wave Decay
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Mint Field is a shoegaze/krautrock band from Mexico City that has garnered a bit of a cult following the past several years. Its songs have the kind of entrancing melodies one would hope to hear out of a dream pop outfit but its arrangements wax into the realm of the avant-garde with the use of noise and recursive production and sound processing so that its music ripples in hypnotic if not always incredibly predictable directions. Its latest full length is 2023’s Aprender a Ser and its autumnal moods and atmospheric resolves are reminiscent of Blonde Redhead in a more gloomy mood. In 2024 the group released the songs that were cut from the previous year’s albums as a mini-LP called Aprender a Ser: Extended. Wave Decay is of course the Denver band whose music most directly sonically aligns with Mint Field’s unorthodox rhythms and otherworldly leanings.

High On Fire in 2010, photo by Tom Murphy

Wednesday | 10.02
What: High on Fire w/Weedeater and Cobranoid
When: 6
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: High on Fire is the band that Matt Pike started following the 1998 dissolution of foundational stoner rock band Sleep. High on Fire has been more hard edged even if the sludgy guitar sound is there. Depending on what record by the band you check out you’ll get a different flavor of heavy music. 2024’s Cometh the Storm is the first to feature Big Business and former Melvins drummer Coady Willis following the departure of Des Kensel. It’s vintage High on Fire but there is even more of a punk attitude in the energy behind the music’s rhythm.

Thurdsday | 10.03
What: Deicide w/Krisiun, Inferi and Cloak
When: 6
Where: Marquis Theater
Why: Death metal band Deicide hails from what many may consider the home of the genre in Tampa, Florida where legendary studio Morrisound Recording is located as well. The group has courted controversy from early on even before it changed its name from Carnage to Deicide in 1989 with wild theatrics and lyrics that were and have been gloriously, and colorfully anti-organized religion. But all of that wouldn’t amount to much if Deicide’s music was simply brutal guitar riffs and relentless rhythms with lead vocalist/bassist Glen Benton growling out scenes of horror and struggle. There is more creativity in what the group has done and while consistent in those regards its new album Banished by Sin reveals a good deal of evolution of style and experimenting with arrangements.

Thursday | 10.03
What: Luna Li w/John Roseboro
When: 7
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Luna Li came out of Hannah Kim’s garage rock band Veins. But people apparently showed up thinking they were going to be some kind of metal band or the like and the group switched its name to Luna Li in 2017. The COVID-19 pandemic gave Kim the opportunity to create videos of performances from her home with her playing various instruments that went viral and established the project as a noteworthy act out of the then nascent bedroom pop movement. With the release of 2024’s When a Thought Grows Wings, Luna Li has proven that its lo-fi aesthetic translates well to a more high end production with lush atmospheres paired well with Kim’s knack for the intimate quality of her songwriting. Think cosmic dream pop made for the late night roller skating rink.

Thursday | 10.03
What: Wardruna w/Chelsea Wolfe https://www.redrocksonline.com/events/wardruna-539577/
When: 6
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Wardruna won’t release its new album Birna until January 24, 2025 but you’ll probably get to hear a good deal of its orchestral, epic, ambient, Nordic folk majesty in one of the perfect settings for that music at Red Rocks. This is the band’s only North American show ahead of that album release but the group has demonstrated a desire for playing iconic, historical settings in the past and a fall show at the natural amphitheater will only add to the experience of the music in a one-of-a-kind way. Also on the bill is the dark, atmospheric, Gothic metal and experimental music artist Chelsea Wolfe who brings to her own shows a mystical quality that will bring to the show another expression of blurring the mythical with the aesthetics of the present. Wolfe and Wardruna composer Einar Selvik recently did an interview with Frank Godla or Metal Injection discussing the upcoming show and you can watch that below.

Friday | 10.04
What: Air play Moon Safari
When: 7
Where: Bellco Theatre
Why: Air’s 1998 album Moon Safari released in January of that year became something of an instant classic. It borrowed heavily from the aesthetics of library music, downtempo, abstract funk and psychedelic lounge music. But it was also an amalgamation of some of the musical impulses of the time in its retrofuturist compositions. Other bands in other styles of music were tapping heavily into 70s and 60s music that at that time might have been considered schlockily self-indulgent but recontextualized and recombined with innovative production techniques and modern sensibilities it was like an aural vacation to a more chill space than some of the conflict of the late 90s often forgotten in the current sweep of history in which horror seems to be piling on top of horror and every week and sometimes every day there’s something new that seems to take up the oxygen of existence. So maybe you’ll get to experience a temporary exit from all of that at this show marking a celebration of that singular record whose magic Air didn’t quite capture again even as it innovated further.

Friday | 10.04
What: Blonde Redhead w/Allison Lorenzen
When: 6
Where: Levitt Pavilion
Why: Blonde Redhead doesn’t often make an appearance in Denver more than once every two or three years but this is a chance to see the legendary dream pop/art rock band outdoors before the colder days of Fall descend. Opening is ambient indie folk luminary Allison Lorenzen whose delicate and emotionally rich soundscapes will fit in well with the music to follow.

Faye Webster, photo by Michael Tyrone Delaney

Friday | 10.04
What: Faye Webster w/Miya Folick
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Faye Webster has established herself as skilled practitioner of delicately orchestrated melodies and deeply personal storytelling across her five albums. Her imaginative songwriting is delivered with a soulful accessibility so that Webster can indulge moments of musical whimsy and inventiveness that make for albums that have a paradoxical diversity and consistency that lend them a timeless quality. Live, the singer-songwriter also bucks expectation in not just embodying the vulnerability and sensitivity required to make the music she does with authenticity but taking chances with stage sets and costumes that can make you wonder if you’ve stepped into an alternate reality serving the worlds and stories Webster has on offer. The summer leg of the tour for her 2021 album I Know I’m Funny Haha included the stage being flanked by giant, mythical, mysterious beings like something out of a supernatural manga. So expect something theatrical and entrancing for the presentation of the 2024 record Undressed at the Symphony.

Blood Incantation, photo by Julian Weigand

Friday | 10.04
What: Blood Incantation – Absolute Everywhere album release w/Steve Roach
When: 8
Where: Boulder Theater
Why: This will be completely different kind of show with the headliners being Denver-based, psychedelic death metal band Blood Incantation celebrating the release of its new album Absolute Everywhere. But this year also marks the release of a documentary about the band’s time in Berlin called All Gates Open: In Search of Absolute Everywhere. The group’s 2022 all synth album Timewave Zero revealed explicitly the fact that the members of the band had an interest in sculpting atmospheres beyond what it had done on previous albums and the new set of songs fuses the two worlds in a seamless way and expanding in some ways what death metal can be. So who is opening this show but legendary ambient composer Steve Roach who would be worth making out to see all on his own.

Saturday | 10.05
What: The Milk Blossoms album release, Wheelchair Sports Camp and George Cessna
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: The Milk Blossoms are releasing their latest album Open Portal on vinyl this night. The record is a resonantly introspective dive into memory and how little details can spark and linger in your brain, shedding light on significant moments and details of experience that the conscious mind can pass over and miss their holistic connectedness when limited by linear thought. These songs break down that process and turn it into poetry and music that feels like a direct experience rather than mere snippets filtered by one’s own psychological conditioning. Because of this the band’s songs can feel like dreams rendered into melancholic yet emotionally vibrant bits of pop goodness. Wheelchair Sports Camp is an amalgamation of dirty rap, masterful production, jazz wizardry and sharply observed social commentary in a brilliant and playful performance style. George Cessna’s songwriting like that of the late Kris Kristofferson recognizes no boundary between pop, rock and Americana with lyrics that are poignantly observant of personal struggle and common human moments navigating the often emotionally perilous world.

Saturday | 10.05
What: Kate Bollinger
When: 7
Where: eTown Hall
Why: Kate Bollinger recently released her debut full-length album Songs from a Thousand Frames of Mind (2024) on the Ghostly International imprint, a label more known for experimental and otherwise left field music. Bollinger’s own indie folk songs is the kind of thing you’d hear on the local indie rock station but if you listen deeper and watch any of her music videos it becomes obvious the Bollinger is an artist that experiments in tone and tonality and unconventional arrangements that somehow come together sounding like something from another era, but a mythical version of that era and her mastery of atmospheric songwriting is reminiscent of the warmly spookier end of The Velvet Underground’s folkier, drifty songs. Maybe on another tour the songwriter would be playing a regular club but this time around you can catch her at eTown Hall in Boulder and its finely curated programming.

Saturday | 10.05
What: Ginger Root w/Pearl & The Oysters
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: With a name like Ginger Root and knowing nothing about the artist you might be expecting a jam band but no, the project led by singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Cameron Lew straddles the realms of soul, funk, jazz and pop in a seemingly self-aware style. Lew’s records unabashedly center the cheesier aspects of East Asian culture as a starting off point in writing with insight about the usual personal concerns while also commenting on society in a playful manner that at times can come across as surreal. His new album SHINBANGUMI is like a stroll through the kind of daytime television world that anyone that has spent time watching regular programming in Japan, Taiwan or Hong Kong will find familiar. That bizarre realm of crass commercialism, forced enthusiasm and manufactured positivity that serves as the backdrop of programming that isn’t necessarily advertising with often fantastic sound design is part of the aesthetic. But Lew turns the vibe on its ear while borrowing the chillout lounge energy to inform his own charming, psychedelic pop.

Saturday | 10.05
What: SynthBanger’s Fest: Arcade High, The Bad Dreamers, Master Boot Record, Starfarer, Watch Out For Snakes, The Runsaway Wild, Komonic, Bob Sync and Jacket
When: 3
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: DJ Tower presents the latest edition of his showcase of current Synthwave artists from Denver and beyond including Pittsburgh’s Arcade High, Los Angeles’ The Bad Dreamers and their late night crime drama pop and Master Boot Record from Rome, Italy and its orchestrated, energetic chiptune heaviness.

Saturday | 10.05
What: UPSAHL w/Conor Burns and Zoe Ko
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: UPSAHL came up as a trained multi-instrumentalist and singer but fortunately she channeled that knowledge into a skillset that has made her indie pop bangers have and uncommon musical depth and sophistication. Her early singles showcased her musicianship a little more but her newer work demonstrates that UPSAHL has a great command of production in crafting hooks for hedonistic dance club fare with interesting pop culture references like that to Jennifer’s Body in “Summer so hot.”

Descartes a Kant, photo courtesy the artists

Sunday | 10.06
What: Descartes a Kant
When: 7
Where: HQ
Why: Descartes a Kant from Mexico City sounds like its members came up listening to a combination of art rock and 90s alternative pop. Its 2023 album After Destruction is like the soundtrack to a pirate takeover of a television station including commercials and instructions on the use of technologies. All with a healthy, surreal and subversive sense of humor. The music is often a fusion of synth pop and punk for a sound somewhere between a Garfunkel and Oates song with a frenetic noise rock version of pop punk. Fans of Otoboke Beaver and Deerhoof may like this band’s strange sounds and undeniable flair for theater.

Sunday | 10.06
What: J.R.C.G. w/American Culture and Candy Apple
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Justin R. Cruz Gallegos’ second album Grim Iconic…(Sadistic Mantra) is a cathartic burst of hybrid musical ideas that bring together raw noise experiments, structured beats and a sound that has punk spirit but irreverent IDM sensibilities. It’s like a modern manifestation of the sort of thing Meat Beat Manifesto got up to in the early 90s and Trans Am’s more rock moments. But really it’s something different and more original than a lot of music with solid hooks and accessibility that came out in the past five years. Think something like if Fugazi and Sleaford Mods did a mashup project with a resurrected Macha producing. American Culture underwent a bit of a reboot of sound more in the direction of rediscovering and repurposing the melodic soundbending of Britpop groups and The Cure in a power pop mode without losing a raw human mode of expression in the past few years and is all the better for having pushed its boundaries past where it has been before. Candy Apple is what happens when hardcore kids realize the full noise potential of that music and stretch it into creative shapes outside the standard format.

Sunday | 10.06
What: Illuminati Hotties w/Daffo
When: 7
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Sarah Tudzin is known at least as much for her masterful work as a producer, mixer and audio engineer as she is for her music with her band Illuminati Hotties. The latter put out its latest album POWER in August 2024 with Tudzin as producer alongside another luminary in audio production John Congleton. Though the songs are spare in their arrangements they are imbued with an energy and a fuzzy edge reminiscent of 90s alternative pop with often surprisingly introspective melodic vocal hooks that pair well with those Tudzin crafted for guitar. The wryly observational lyrics and personal insight makes the record something with more depth than is obvious because the songs are so catchy. Opening the show is Portland-based indie folk artist Daffo. Growing up in Philadelphia, Daffo was involved in the DIY scenes of Philly and New Jersey where they developed some of their uncommonly sensitive songwriting and fluidly dynamic musicianship. Their song “Poor Madeline” is an affecting work that captures the wistfulness of looking back on a time of displacement and emotional turmoil in one’s life and specifically about the loss of the feeling of having a place one associates with home. It’s immediately relatable and Daffo’s arrangements reflect well the welling of emotions and the granular flow of them in your mind as you’re feeling them. This characteristic the songwriter brings to their other released material so far as collected on the album Pest/Crisis Kit released September 20, 2024.

Sunday | 10.06
What: Boris “Amplifier Worship Service” w/Starcrawler
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Few albums have been as singular in exemplifying an aesthetic as succinctly summed up by the title of an album as Boris’s epochal 1998 album Amplifier Worship. Boris didn’t invent doom metal or necessarily do it better than everyone else but that record is like a user’s manual for how to make heavy music that’s dense with atmosphere, not too polished to be interesting and thoroughly informed by a willingness to let the wildness and bleeding edges of the analog technology employed drift where it may while guiding it all to great heights of artistry and intensity. And for one night in Denver you can witness the Japanese heavy music greats deliver that album in its entirety.

Tuesday | 10.08
What: Pixel Grip w/Madeline Goldstein
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Pixel Grip is a Chicago-based band whose industrial dance club sound is steeped in EBM and techno. Its rhythms and tones have an angular quality but the band’s vocals are ethereally melodic. Live the band looks like they come straight from a Goth club that never existed in a cyberpunk manga but the music goes hard and has the kind of visceral impact one wants from a darkwave act with pretensions to dance music. Pixel Grip doesn’t pretend. Madeline Goldstein has been making a mark for herself as a producer of moody synth pop in the wonderfully gloomy post-punk vein. Her 2023 album Other World couches Goldstein’s melodiously, yes, otherworldly vocals reminiscent of Siouxsie Sioux in layers of entrancing tones and driving rhythms.

Shannon & The Clams, photo by Jim Herrington

Tuesday | 10.08
What: Shannon & The Clams w/The Deslondes
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Shannon & The Clams have been building a cult following for years since their 2007 inception. Lead vocalist Shannon Shaw was a startling presence with a powerhouse voice that made the band stand out when it was playing dive bars and the like a decade and more ago and the songwriting a mix of garage punk and the emotional delicacy and grit of 1960s girl groups has proven to be versatile and fruitful in exploring themes of love and heartache with creativity and passionate tunefulness. The outfit’s latest album The Moon is in the Wrong Place bears all the hallmarks of Shannon & The Clams’ blend of vital soulfulness and vulnerable introspection and waxes further into its psychedelic pop leanings.

Wednesday | 10.09
What: Crumb w/Vagabon
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Crumb’s foundation of jazz-inflected, psychedelic dream pop started garnering a bit of a following with its first two EPs Crumb (2016) and Locket (2017). It wasn’t the standard issue indie psych that had been flourishing often blandly in the middle of the 2010s. Crumb’s creative vision was more experimental and imaginative and its songwriting seemed to be informed by a deep listening of electronic music of the 90s and 2000s with rhythms that though often driven by live instruments flowed like something stemming from a production base. With its new album Amama, Crumb pushes its sounds further into colorful soundscaping with an aesthetic resonance comparable to the unique worlds of a Dash Shaw film and the wondrous imagery and sense of mysterious emotional familiarity.

Thursday | 10.10
What: Thou w/Slowhole, BleakHeart and The Flight of Sleipnir
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Thou may still be a cult band but its one that has garnered critical acclaim for its unique take on sludge and doom metal. Anyone that has seen the band live knows they don’t look like they’re about to get up and play the heaviest music of the night with a wild energy that stretches the music into interesting sonic and emotional shapes. They often look like you’re about to see some weird Americana. And in some ways that’s exactly what you get—a sonic portrait of aspects of the tortured American psyche. The group’s new album Umbilical is its most expansive and accessible yet without sacrificing the band’s rouch edges and idiosyncratic textures and tonal layers that make its songs such gloriously nightmarish passages of cathartic sound.

Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage, photo by Brent Cole

Thursday | 10.10
What: Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage w/The Grasping Straws and Gila Teen
When: 8
Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Club
Why: Jeffrey Lewis is a songwriter from New York City who is currently on tour with his band The Voltage. His rich and prolific body of work is a broadly diverse presentation of ideas and biographical/autobiograpical sketches that have a refreshingly and fascinating honesty and earnestness that fans of Half Japanese, Daniel Johnston, Camper Van Beethoven and Billy Bragg will find rewarding. It’s part punk, part folk, part Americana and all what might be described as captured, on recordings anyway, in brash burst of lo-fi vulnerability. Look for a new record from Lewis due out in March 2025 but for now take a visit to his Bandcamp page and really start anywhere.
https://jeffreylewis.bandcamp.com/

Friday | 10.11
What: Charli XCX w/Troye Sivan
When: 6:30
Where: Ball Arena
Why: Brat Summer just got extended into the Fall with Charli XCX’s latest tour in support of her 2024 album. The singer-songwriter-producer has long found ways of crafting enthralling modern pop music either largely on her own but often with various collaborators. Brat combines the brashness of Charli’s performance style and a radical vulnerability that has been an element of her lyrics for years. With Brat Charli and company tap into aspects of synth pop and transforms them into undeniable bangers with genuine emotional resonance. “360” became an obvious hit over the summer but “Apple” finds Charlotte Aitchison aka Charli XCX branching into new creative territory making the album one of the more innovative in mainstream popular music.

Little Fyodor and Babushka Band circa 2016, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 10.11
What: Franksgiving – in Memory of Frank Bell: Little Fyodor, Mr. Pacman and Sense From Nonsense
When: 9
Where: Lion’s Lair
Why: Franksgiving was a yearly fundraiser for colitis and Crohn’s Disease charities led by the late Frank Bell, DJ and purveyor of fine musical weirdness for years. The banner of that cause has been taken up by Little Fyodor who has shared Bell’s appreciation for the musically odd and a maker of plenty of that one his own whether with tape collage legends or his long running, bizarro punk band that is more punk than most bands calling themselves such. But then you also get costumed video game superhero glitchcore/synth pop legends Mr. Pacman and the ambient/soundtrack project of former Echo Beds drummer/programmer/vocalist Tom Nelsen.

Saturday | 10.12
What: Meet the Giant 15 Year Anniversary w/Church Fire and Jaguar Stevens
When: 8
Where: 1010 Workshop
Why: Meet the Giant is a post-punk band with a keen ear for electronic soundscapes resulting in a music that is visceral, emotionally rich and possessed of great sonic nuance. The band has two albums under its belt after a decade of incubating before playing its first shows and on the verge of releasing a third and you may get a chance to hear some of the new material at this show. Industrial dance synth pop firebrands Church Fire are releasing the vinyl version of their great 2022 album puppy god through Witch Cat Records at this show as well.

Sunday | 10.13
What: GEL w/MS Paint, Destiny Bond and The Mall
When: 6
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: GEL recently released its most recent collection of punchy and caustic hardcore in the album Persona. Hailing from New Jersey, the quartet started life as a powerviolence outfit called Sick Shit. But starting in 2018 the fledgling group leaned further into more pure hardcore but with more expansive rhythms and a layer of moodiness under the aggressive bluster. And this show features some of the most noteworthy acts out of the recent wave of American hardcore with Destiny Bond and its amped anthems of navigating ideas of identity, personal politics and a bursting of narrow definitions of how we have to be and a resistance to bland yet destructive conformity. MS Paint came out of the hardcore scene but its synth and drums-driven post-punk is like something new with resonances with the likes of The Screamers and The VSS. It’s also one of the most powerful live bands you’re likely to see this year.

Monday | 10.14
What: Unwound w/Quits
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Unwound was considered one of the premier noise rock bands of the 90s and early 2000s even though it mostly earned a cult following playing dive bars, DIY spaces, basements and in the end small theaters. Its raw and both controlled and unhinged post-hardcore style had an intense energy and dreamlike passages of a transcendent emotional headiness that implanted so many of the band’s songs in the psyches of fans. At one point a critic or two compared their style and influence to that of Sonic Youth, a band that likely had more than a passing influence on Unwound. Following the 2001 tour in support of its then and most recent studio album, the highly experimental and even avant-garde Leaves Turn Inside You, Unwound split in 2002 only to resurface in 2022 after the passing of bassist Vern Rumsey. For the recent spate of live shows Jared Warren of Big Business and formerly of KARP has taken up role as bassist as one of the only people who could really do it justice as he like Unwound was based out of Olympia, Washington in the 90s as well not to mention Rumsey worked on KARP records. Opening are Denver noise rock legends Quits whose emotionally charged songs may sound like jagged emotions and caustic pronouncements about humanity but are really sensitively rendered observations and fantasies about life in a world that can feel hostile to human frailty.

Monday | 10.14
What: Clairo w/Alice Phoebe Lou
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Bedroom pop artist Clairo in her relatively short career has created a body of work and musical style that has had reverberations for other songwriters in the past several years and garnered a cult following as well. Her melancholic and delicate vocals and inventive use of organic and electronic instruments have a timeless quality because Clairo has mastered mixing and blending the aesthetics of multiple eras into her own style so that even if there’s a nostalgic aspect to the song it has a paradoxical immediacy. Her new record Charm has some of Clario’s most accomplished production and songwriting so that so many of the compositions feel like indie instrumentation over beatmaking paired with the usual melodious and chill vocals and every so slightly psychedelic sensibilities.

Tuesday | 10.15
What: Iguana Death Cult w/Los Toms and Supreme Joy
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Iguana Death Cult from Rotterdam, Holland formed in 2015 when singer/guitarist Jeroen Reek brought together a group of friends who didn’t know each other but had his friendship in common. As they began to develop their music their sound absorbed the garage and surf rock influences of the 2010s and manifested those ideas in music that moved beyond trendy aesthetics and by the time of its 2023 album Echo Palace you might be excused for thinking they were influenced more by the likes of Parquet Courts, Gang of Four and The English Beat. Still fiery but angular, arty and more daring in its guitar work than most garage rock acts. Also on the bill is the ferocious, Denver post-punk band Supreme Joy whose own roots in garage rock adjacent-modes isn’t so obvious.

Tuesday | 10.15
What: Mr. Gnome w/Spyderland and Glass Human
When: 7
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Since its 2005 inception Mr. Gnome has cultivated an eclectic and evolving style of art rock that on its albums dives deep into concepts and aesthetics like they’re making a unique work with world building but not lacking in personal storytelling. Songs stand on their own yet fit into the mosaic of the work at hand. Its a level of creative songwriting that not many bands achieve without coming across as a little corny. Its latest offering is 2024’s synth-infused A Sliver of Space a seeming record about clinging to meaning as the world falls apart and resisting being washed away in the flood of world and life events.

Rootbeer Richie & The Reveille, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday and Saturday | 10.18 and 10.19
What: Rootbeer Richie & The Reveille album release w/Slow Caves, May Be Fern and Cactus Cat on 10.18 and w/Bubby Lucky, Jesus Christ Taxi Driver, Dayton Stone & The Undertones on 10.19
When: 7 both nights
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: The rock and soul review of Rootbeer Richie & The Reveille celebrates the release of its new album Never Needed Me with a weekend of shows including luminaries of the local rock and roll and indie rock scenes in Denver and Fort Collins.

Testament, photo by Stephanie Cabral and Mia Demonz

Tuesday | 10.22
What: Testament, Kreator and Possessed
When: 6
Where: The Fillmore Auditorium
Why: Testament is one the most important of the second wave of thrash metal bands out of the Bay Area in the second half of the 80s that helped to define the genre with its unique approach to the musicianship. It had the wild exuberance of thrash in its first few years but backed by a technical precision and creativity in its execution that set the band apart from some of its contemporaries. Like its contemporaries, Testament was able to weather the implosion of the popularity of metal in the early 90s because its music seemed rooted in something more durable than hedonistic rock and roll tropes with more to say and its songwriting more imaginative than what was on offer from glam metal. By the 21st century the style Testament cultivated was vindicated with a new wave of popularity and the reunion of its classic lineup with brilliant lead guitarist Alex Skolnick returning to the fold. But this show includes other giants of 80s metal with influential German thrash group Kreator and pioneering death metal act Possessed.

Wednesday | 10.23
What: Minami Deutsch w/Nightfishing
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Minami Deutsch is the minimal techno-inspired psychedelic prog band from Tokyo whose motorik beats and hypnotic minimalism is both consistent and ever evolving in its soundscapes. Its 2022 album Fortune Goodies is like a gentle version of Kosmische that some may find resonances with the more abstract end of Deerhunter.

Wednesday | 10.23
What: Marc Rebillet w/Flying Lotus and Reggie Watts
When: 5
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Marc Rebillet is an eclectic music and multi-media creator whose live performances and YouTube streams, Facebook/Instagram live feeds etc. blur the line between electronic music, funk, R&B, comedy, performance art and whatever else seems to strike his fancy in the moment as an artist who has found a way to use the format as the medium of his artistic expression. For this tour he is bringing along like-minded creatives like filmmaker, experimental hip-hop and avant-garde jazz composer Flying Lotus and comedian and multi-faceted post-punk R&B storyteller Reggie Watts.

Thursday | 10.24
What: David Liebe Hart w/Magic Cyclops and DJ Wayzout
When: 8
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: David Liebe Hart came to the attention of a wide audience for his appearances in the Adult Swim program Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! His surreal songs and puppet theater many probably assumed to be purely a character but there is an earnestness to Hart’s creative work that comes from a genuine place and his status an outsider artist is no pose. The music with his various collaborators has evolved to a truly unique kind of synth pop with themes of aliens, trains and the litany of tragedies of his love life. Magic Cyclops is not quite the Colorado (or is it Iowa, IYKYK) equivalent of Hart but his own take on surreal synth pop is driven by a concept of an egotistical people star whose personal is fueled by bombast and at times technical incompetence. His own songs, nevertheless, have their own charm and odd humor.

Friday |10.25
What: Photay w/M.Sage
When: 7
Where: Lost Lake
Why: For roughly the past decade Evan Shorntein has released experimental-leaning, electronic pop music as Photay. His latest offering is 2024’s Windswept which mixes minimal techno rhythms and structure with subtle textures and ethereal, sparkling melodies building to a playful mood. Opening the show is noted Colorado-based ambient artist, composer and curator M. Sage.

Trees Inside Out, photo courtesy Myshel Prasad

Friday | 10.25
What: Trees Inside Out (first show) w/Pleasure Prince and Extreme Sports Club
When: 7:30
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Trees Inside Out released its debut album IOVI on September 12, 2024. It’s a drifty bit of dream pop and space rock reminiscent of Low and Eleventh Dream Day. Its principle songwriters though are known figures in Denver’s shoegaze scene of the 90s and early 2000s with Roger Green (Idle Mind, The Czars) and Myshel Prasad (Space Team Electra) so really that alchemy of sounds extends from their own deeply creative songwriting and soundscaping and left field poetic sensibilities. Also on the record are Todd Ayers who was part of an early part of STE called Dive but later in Volplane and Sonnenblume; Sean Eden (Luna); Bill Kunkel (STE); Kit Peltzel (STE); John Rasmussen (among others, Pale Sun); and Lee Wall (Luna). That alone should be a reason to go to the show. Then Pleasure Prince is also on hand with their beautifully orchestrated, emotionally vibrant, experimental, electronic pop.

Saturday and Sunday | 10.26 and 10.27
What: The Magnetic Fields 69 Love Songs 25th Anniversary Tour
When: 7 both nights
Where: Boulder Theater
Why: Indie rock band The Magnetic Fields released 69 Love Songs in 1999 to great critical acclaim. Written as a concept for a music review by main songwriter Stephen Merritt that could have been 100 songs long but thought the shorter length more attainable and the math worked better for three sections of 23 songs apiece. The album is stylistically diverse and delivered with an almost nonchalant energy in the vocals and Merritt’s songs range in subject matter widely and depict relationships in a spectrum of sexual orientations. But mostly it’s an ambitious and sprawling collection of finely crafted pop songs that go well beyond the cliches and tropes of a subject that has been written about entirely too often without a fraction of the creativity.

Monday | 10.28
What: La Luz w/Tele Novella
When: 7
Where: Marquis Theater
Why: La Luz has evolved rapidly and in always interesting directions from its more surf rock-oriented sound when it began in 2012. But even then Shana Cleveland’s songwriting has set the band apart from presumed stylistic leanings. The band’s 2024 album News of the Universe is a futuristic, softly psychedelic set of songs that sound like the group has moved well into the richly atmospheric side of Krautrock and fused that perfectly with Cleveland’s expert pop songcraft and gift for intermingling classic songwriting and styles and sounds across decades and cultures into a coherent and entrancing whole.

What: The The
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: The The was both a critically acclaimed and commercially successful band throughout the 80s and 90s. Having come up from experimental music and post-punk roots, The The has always had a bit of an arty, left field edge even as many of its songs have enjoyed a bit of mainstream popularity like “Uncertain Smile” from its 1983 debut album Soul Mining, “Uncertain Smile” featuring Sinead O’Connor from the 1989 album Mind Bomb and “Dogs of Lust” from 1993’s Dusk. From 2003 through 2017 the project went on hold while main songwriter Matt Johnson focused on crafting music for soundtracks. In 2024 a new The The album emerged with Ensoulment a record of brooding, Americana flavored art rock noir songs about love, existential pondering and the band’s usual poignant social commentary.

Monday and Tuesday | 10.28 and 10.29
What: SHEROES Live with Carmel Holt
Where/When: The Colorado Sound 105.5 FM at 3PM on 10.28 and Indie 102.3 time TBA (10.29)
Why: The Road to Joni is a podcast that launched on September 6, 2024 hosted by SHEROES’ Camel Holt. The podcast honors the great folk rock/experimental pop legend Joni Mitchell. Guests have and will include the likes of St. Vincent, Brittany Howard, Hozier, Arooj Aftab and Bonnie Raitt. The first episode featured Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes, Lucius and Kathleen Edwards. Carmel taped episodes on her way across America from Kingston, NY to the “Joni Jam” at The Hollywood Bowl which occurred on October 19/20. She has also been making stops in various cities for on air visits and tapings at local NPR stations including The Colorado Sound in Fort Collins on October 28 and Indie 102.3 in Denver. Listen to the archived episodes here.

Tokyo Police Club, photo by Ross Macdonald

Wednesday | 10.30
What: Tokyo Police Club final tour
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: The members of Tokyo Police Club grew up and went to school together in their hometown of Newmarket, Ontario forming the band in 2004 when most of the group were still in high school. Unlike most bands formed in that way, TPC has stuck it out and its particular style of left field, guitar-driven post-punk went on to garner a sizable following and commercial success with songs imbued with great energy and immediacy alongside a spontaneous quality and willingness to go off standard melodic structures. The band has thus been able to consistently craft music that comes across authentic because a little rough around the edges. In January 2024 the quartet announced it was splitting up with a final tour concluding in Toronto on November 29.

Vince Staples in 2017, photo by Tom Murphy

Wednesday | 10.30
What: Vince Staples w/Baby Rose
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Vince Staples released his sixth album Dark Times in May 2024 and offered a more vulnerable set of songs than his already impressive catalog of songs of emotionally open and introspective storytelling. This time out the moods are more downcast in a way that feels cinematic like Staples has written an album like an anthology of vignettes best embodied as a series of short films that illuminate themes of acceptance and the kind of resistance that comes not from some hokey everything’s gonna be alright insipidity but a deep assessment of how things are and working to not be overwhelmed by the challenges of finding meaning in a society that makes a genuine effort at doing so challenging.

Wednesday and Thursday | 10.30 and 10.31
What: T-Pain w/Akon (10.30) and Lil Jon (10.31)
When: 5:30 (10.30) and 6:30 (10.31)
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: T-Pain is most often associated with the popularization of Auto-Tune in popular music of the past twenty years and more. But for the artist it’s more than just a gimmick and he’s used it creative to give his vocals another dimension of expression beyond their normal range. And beyond the vocal treatment, T-Pain is a songwriter who has consistently tried to push the boundaries of hip-hop with his songwriting and production. In 2023 he released a record of eclectic covers called On Top of the Covers that includes “War Pigs” for which Ozzy Osbourne and Geezer Butler have expressed great appreciation. Other than the selections the album showcased the singer’s prowess as a vocalist without Auto-Tune. So for this show you’ll probably get to witness T-Pain at the peak of his abilities thus far. The first night of this two night run includes a performance from Akon who early in T-Pain’s career helped to give that artist a leg up into the music industry through his record label Konvict Muzik. But Akon’s own pop-inflected hip-hop and world music infused R&B has garnered himself no small following as well. The second night you will get to see Lil Jon who was pivotal in developing crunk and that EDM (particularly bass music) and Southern hip-hop crossover as embodied prominently by his hit 2013 single “Turn Down For What” which he performed at the 2024 DNC.

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond August 2024

**Bikini Kill performs at Mission Ballroom on August 27, photo by Debi Del Grande**

Brotherhood of Machines in 2016, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 08.02
What: Brotherhood of Machines (album release), Seance, Snowswept and Aloe Static
When: 8/8:30
Where: Glob
Why: Brotherhood of Machines is the project of Tyler Knapp who has been crafting haunted experimental electronic music for years in Denver alone. You wouldn’t call his music ambient though adjacent, not beat driven dance music though those influences are present and not noise though aspects of his compositions incorporate what often sound like field or otherwise repurposed recordings. In July 2024 he released two albums Loops From Temple Familiarity and Unknown Set and is releasing one or both at this show. Also on the bill are the ethereal melodies and ambient soundscapes of Snowswept and Aloe Staic’s more glitch and texture post-IDM environmental moods.

Friday | 08.02
What: SUMAC w/Portrayal of Guilt and Trigger Object
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: In June SUMAC released its latest set of moody, evocative and crawling, post-metal improv The Healer. The trio channels intense passages of rhythm and sound into expressive bursts that sound like a death metal band discovered doom and utilized those musical modes to make a heavy post-hardcore designed to embody the deconstruction of the world and shedding of old ways and habits in favor of those more nurturing and open. Even more psychedelic than previous records, The Healer finds SUMAC charting new territories of of how heavy music can seem more immersive than merely monolithic. Portrayal of Guilt is the kind of hardcore band that enjoys drenching its aggressive sounds in caustic moods like it explored to the roots of he music that built where it had been and found the connections with the likes of St. Vitus, Celtic Frost and Possessed.

Saturday | 08.03
What: Alejandro Escovedo w/James Mastro
When: doors/dinner 6, show 9
Where: Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox
Why: Although Alejandro Escovedo is now rightly known as one of the great artists in modern roots rock and alt-country, he cut his teeth as a member of pioneering punk band The Nuns who were one of the two bands (including The Avengers) that opened for the Sex Pistols at the final live performance at Winterland in San Francisco in January 1978. In subsequent decades and in various bands and under his own name Escovedo has maintained more than a bit of that spirited, early punk and counterculture attitude including on his 2024 record Echo Dancing. Opener James Mastro also his his own unique place in punk and Americana as a member of The Richard Lloyd Group in his teens and later with a variety of music activities including in bands like The Health & Happiness Show. Mastro has been a staple of the rich NYC and Hoboken, NJ scenes and for this show he will be playing double bass in Escovedo’s band but prior to that he will perform liberally from his own 2024 record Dawn of a New Error with graced by the singer/songwriter’s warmly husky voice, expansive spirit and bright and vivid production courtesy engineer and mixer James Frazee and mastering by Greg Calbi.

Saturday | 08.03
What: Listening Lawn IV: Cholla, Blood Out w/Silt, Glissline, Combat Sport & DJ Ursa, Yonbre Netz and Sunswept
When: 5-8 pm
Where: Carpio Sanquinette Park
Why: These events happen in a semi-hidden pocket in Denver at a public park with a setting like ruins of an older Denver long neglected. The perfect setting to witness innovative electronic music in the realms of techno, ambient, IDM and free jazz.

“Horsegirl” in 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Saturday | 08.03
What: A Rally For Worker’s Rights: Vegan Gore, F1sh1fty, “Horsegirl,” and Clayton Kenney
When: 6-10 pm
Where: Cheeseman Park Pavilion
Why: This is an event to draw attention to collective efforts at promoting the interests of workers in one of the more expensive cities in America with the sprawl of that income inequality spreading everywhere. The musical portion of the gathering includes performances by techno/glitch/IDM artist Vegan Gore and weirdo performance art dream pop band “Horsegirl.”

Wednesday | 08.07
What: Nox Novacula w/Church Fire and Weathered Statues
When: 7
Where: HQ
Why: Seattle deathrock band Nox Novacular is touring in support of its newly released latest album Feed the Fire. Its brooding atmospheres and impassioned performances have made the quartet a band of choice for discerning fans of post-punk like a commanding mix of Xmal Deutchland and the spookier end of The Cramps. Weathered Status from Denver is cut from a similar cloth with clear roots in punk with standout basslines and haunted synths. Church Fire while not a post-punk band plays its electronic darkwave with an electrifying conviction.

Thursday | 08.08
What: Orville Peck w/Jaime Wyatt and Gold Star
When: 6
Where: The Fillmore Auditorium
Why: Orville Peck performs his 70s cowboy country style music masked like a nod to The Lone Ranger. His songs about love and heartbreak are well within the storytelling tradition of classic country but with Peck infusing the songwriting with a queer perspective his songs have another dimension of potential resonance with fans. His latest album Stampede finds Peck collaborating with the likes of Willie Nelson, Beck and Nathaniel Rateliff among others.

Thursday | 08.08
What: Urban Heat w/Gvllow and Delores Galore
When: 7
Where: HQ
Why: Austin’s Urban Heat makes an appearance in Denver just over a week before the release of its latest album The Tower. The darkwave trio has mastered a reinvention of 80s moody synthpop into expansive darkwave with commanding and soulful vocals. The group’s 2023 cover of Q. Lazzarus’ classic single “Goodbye Horses” brought to the song a tonal richness and expressed the fiery intensity underneath the surface of the original. Urban Heat’s earlier releases showcased the band’s gift for EBM beatmaking akin to what TR/ST and Kontravoid have been doing by fusing techno sensibilities with emotionally-charged pop songcraft. The singles from The Tower thus far have revealed the band has been evolving its use of space to great evocative effect.

Friday | 08.09
What: Keytar Fest: The Jinjas and Claudzilla
When: 8pm doors/9pm show
Where: 715 Club
Why: Claudzilla returns for the most recent edition of Keytar Fest, an event that showcases artists that make use of that most visually iconic of 1980s synthesizer technology. Claudzilla is a little like a lo-fi weirdo outsider avant-pop performance artist that is part personae part a manifestation of inner space. Like if Klaus Nomi made indie pop. The Jinjas are a synth and drums-driven rock band that use bass synth and keytar to build a sound like a retro synth pop band with a songwriting style that’s more modern and akin to something like The Blow and Trans Am gone more pop.

Friday | 08.09
What: Magic Sword w/ESSENGER and Church Fire https://tickets.meowwolf.com/events/denver/magic-sword/
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: Magic Sword is the costumed space night synthwave band from Boise, Idaho who sure do have a gimmick but its music speaks for itself with its saturated tones and science fiction epic themes like if Giorgio Moroder had been convinced to score the music for The Terminator, Children of Men or the latest Dune movies. Fresh off opening for Nox Novacula, Church Fire will be in good company here too with their own epic, emotionally vibrant, electronic dance ragers.

Plack Blague in 2023, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 08.09
What: Plack Blague w/God Save the Queens and Hex Cassette
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Plack Blague is the by now legendary industrial techno and performance artist whose on stage personal is like a leather daddy delivering queer themed bangers in a darkwave mode. Reliably entertaining and charismatic. So it’s only appropriate that God Dave the Queens is part of this show as a drag show with Noveli, Heavenly Powers, Neurotika Killz and Belle Fegore. Opening is the one man, occult EBM freakout and heavy darkwave dance music Hex Cassette who excels at provoking the audience with good-natured ribbing.

Sunday | 08.11
What: Sluice w/Fust and The Milk Blossoms
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Sluice aka Justin Edward Morris is an indie folk artist from Winston-Salem, North Carolina whose songs have a textured moodiness and freshness to them that gives the songwriter’s more pastoral musical impulses a tangible presence. His 2023 album Radial Gate is a deeply reflective set of seemingly autobiographical vignettes like a kinder, gentler Bill Callahan. Also on the bill is Durham, NC’s Fust whose music is similarly-minded in the mining personal history for creative illumination of everyday human experiences but in a more country rock mode. Opening the show are The Milk Blossoms whose tenderly rendered indie pop songs have some roots in folk but whose songs and performances have both a raw vulnerability and emotional intensity that powerfully manifest the group’s creatively poetic lyrics.

Monday | 08.12
What: Brijean w/Colloboh
When: 7
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Brijean Murphy is known for her time serving as a percussionist for Mitski, Poolside and Toro Y Moi but this project with multi-instrumentalist producer Doug Stuart has resulted in entrancing, dance-music adjacent art pop. The saturated synths, ethereal vocals and layers of textured polyrhythms sound like something from a retrofuturist disco if the music being played dipped liberally into 70s disco and 2010s deep house. The duo’s new album Macro introduces even more organic percussion and bass to great effect marking the record as one of the most fascinating electronic pop releases of the year alongside that of Mount Kimbie’s The Sunset Violent.

Thursday | 08.15
What: Mac Sabbath w/Tejon Street Corner Thieves
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Mac Sabbath is celebrating 10 years of its absurd concept of doing parody covers of Black Sabbath songs with fast food-themed lyrics and fully committed stage costumes of characters not unlike some of the most well-known of McDonald’s characters. It’s a gimmick that the band has been able to sustain for a decade without admitting to being people other than the stage personae which is an accomplishment in itself in the modern era.

Friday | 08.16
What: Atmosphere w/Method Man & Redman, Deltron 3030, NOFUN! and Skratch Basitd
When: 5:30
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Atmosphere is of course the hip-hop duo from Minneapolis that were foundational figures in early alternative hip-hop and advocates for other underground artists in that style. Its eclectic and atmospheric beats and introspective lyrics are a consistently effective counterpoint to the group’s energetic and extroverted stage performances and Slug’s crowd interaction. The subject matter of the lyrics from Atmosphere have evolved in content and nuance over the years but always informed by a reflective and empathic sensibility paired with a sense of personal exploration of psychological and social issues. All along Slug and Ant have created a body of work with music that speaks to the artists’ innate curiosity and willingness to expand beyond where they’ve already been.

The Green Typewriters, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 08.16
What: The Green Typewriters, A Strange Happening and Van Death
When: 8
Where: Goosetown Tavern
Why: The Green Typewriters have become a bit of a psychedelic glam rock/indiepop mutant with their music but all for the better. The songwriting is as accessible and its sounds comforting yet mysterious and its live show colorful and friendly. A Strange Happening has always been a high concept indie rock band but its music has more of a raw and ragged Neil Young flavor recently.

Sunny Day Real Estate, photo from Subpop.com

Saturday | 08.17
What: Sunny Day Real Estate – Diary 30 year anniversary w/Kevin Devine
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Sunny Day Real Estate’s 1994 debut album Diary is one of the blueprints of the Midwest emo sound with its post-hardcore grit, raw emotional vocal style, quiet-loud dynamics and gritty melodies. Though from Seattle the band’s sound then and now was out of step with the grunge bands its label Sub Pop was known for championing. But the live band and its earnest and intense performances resonated with that realm of music and has had a lasting impact on pretty much all emo since as well as modern sheogaze and a whole swath of punk adjacent music in a way that is obvious from the moment you play a song from that first record and this show will celebrate what SDRE accomplished on Diary.

Saturday | 08.17
What: King Dunn (King Buzzo & Trevor Dunn) w/JD Pinkus
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: For this show King Dunn will perform the solo work of Buzz Osborne, the renowned guitarist and singer of Melvins with Trevor Dunn of Mr. Bungle fame on hand to provide bass duties as he did when Melvins toured as Melvins Lite a handful of years back. It’s the kind of left field move that Osborne seems to favor with Melvins always trying to do their tours a little differently and pushing into new territory in performance and songwriting. Osborne didn’t get to tour behind his 2020 solo album Gift of Sacrifice and there’s a good chance a lot of people haven’t seen the music from 2014’s This Machine Kills Artists live and the more acoustic guitar-driven songwriting from an artist perhaps most well known for some of the heaviest guitar rock in the modern era.

Barns Courtney, photo courtesy the artist

Tuesday | 08.20
What: The Struts w/Barns Courtney
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: The Struts are a band from the UK that rode that wave of retro glam rock revival that began in the early 2010s and garnered hit singles along the way. Luke Spiller early on having done his level best to tap into that Freddy Mercury sound. More recently the band has pivoted in a more pop-oriented style of songwriting channeled through the lens of 80s glam metal. Barns Courtney started his career in bands SleeperCell and more professionally with Dive Bella Dive until that band was hamstrung by label contracts. But those didn’t limit Courtney as a solo artist whose early singles caught the attention of audiences and garnered a recording contract. Fast forward to 2024, Courtney released his third full length Supernatural on July 19 for a record that showcases the songwriter’s commanding vocals and knack for crafting sonically rich rock songs of broad stylistic touchstones fusing acoustic and electric sounds. There is the sort of blues rock foundation there but Courtney injects the classic sounds with modern pop song sensibilities.

Tuesday | 08.20
What: Sheppard w/Seth Beamer
When: 7
Where: Moon Room at Summit Music Hall
Why: Sheppard is an indie pop trio from Brisbane, Australia that formed as a duo of siblings George and Amy Sheppard in 2009 but expanded to a six-piece by 2012 including their sister Emma on bass. In 2014 the group released its debut full-length Bombs Away and the record’s second single “Geronimo” became something of an international hit for its undeniably uplifting melodies and the kinds of song elements that invite participation among listeners including choruses pretty much anyone can sing and clap along rhythms, a hallmark of Sheppard’s songwriting in general. In 2023 the group relocated to Nashville and a year later issued its latest record Zora named for the now trio’s grandmother. It’s sounds are more atmospheric but the album is the kind of life-affirming/celebrating work that could be cloying but the songwriting finds Sheppard growing beyond where it has been before and its melodies undeniably infectious.

Wednesday | 08.21
What: Roselit Bone w/George Cessna and Fly Janet
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Portland, Oregon’s Roselit Bone writes darkly dramatic songs like a noir version of country music with deep mood and a touch of psychedelia. So it’s a good pairing to have George Cessna on the bill with his own thought-provoking, dusky country in its own existential and cosmic mode. Denver’s Fly Janet will bring the spooky surf-spaghetti Western Americana.

Thursday | 08.22
What: Car Microwave, The Milk Blossoms and mLady
When: 8
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Kansas City-based indie folk band Car Microwave released its latest record Photo Album in 2023. Its delicately rendered musicianship and vulnerable vocals have an underlying emotional strength that gives the music a charmingly earnest quality reminiscent somehow of both 10,000 Maniacs and one of Mary Timony’s bands or even in moments of Throwing Muses. One might be tempted to call The Milk Blossoms and indie folk band but with it too there is a poetry to the lyrics that more than hint at a more experimental creativity and there is a passionate delivery of the music that imbues even its most beautifully fragile moments with a vibrant emotionality.

Friday | 08.23
What: Acidbat album release w/Lanx Borealis and Church Fire at Glob
When: 8
Where: Glob
Why: Acidbat aka Seth Ogden celebrates the release of his latest album Empty Vial (out on Witchcat records) at this show feature other Denver luminaries of electronic and dance music. The new record is a further evolution of Ogden’s sonically rich and playful, psychedelic techno and ambient compositions using almost if not entirely analog synth sources. Lanx Borealis creates what might be described as ambient pop at least as far as her 2024 EP Released It seems to reveal. But think something darker with more grit but imbued with a sense of the fanciful. Church Fire is the now legendary industrial dance band with strong political content that while polemical doesn’t lack for creativity and a healthy sense of fun and humor. It is cathartic music that doesn’t skimp on the intellectual and socially critical element either.

Friday | 08.23
What: Ghost Canyon Fest Night 1: Noun, Lung, BleakHeart, Ex Everything and Cherry Spit
When: 6
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Every night of Ghost Canyon Fest features some of the best weird and experimental rock and not-rock bands/artists operating today. This night kicks off with post-hardcore, thorny shoegaze locals Cherry Spit. Ex Everything will provide scathing and thrilling critiques of the prevailing order of things with its angular noise rock. BleakHeart’s dark, epic dream pop will provide the paradoxical chill and vibrant emotional expressions for the night. Lung’s fusion of punk, blues and classical sensibilities delivered with its raw energy will be a good pairing to come on the stage before Noun closes the night as the vehicle for former Screaming Females frontwoman Marissa Paternoster’s solo songwriting. The project dates to before Screaming Females formed in 2005 and over the years the songwriter has released Noun albums including the gritty and entrancing dream pop of the 2021 album Peace Meter.

Saturday | 08.24
What: Ghost Canyon Fest Matinee Show: Flaming Tongues Above, Lake Mary and Matt Talbot
When: 1
Where: Mutiny Information Cafe
Why: Flaming Tongues Above is the solo project of Amos Helvey who has been in various local bands over the years including American Culture, Destiny Bond and Angel Band. This is more a kind of cosmic bluegrass thing with exquisitely intricate musicianship. Lake Mary is the long-running project of Chaz Prymek whose compositions solo or with various collaborators is an embodiment of the spirit of improvisation and the pastoral sides of the American landscape and consciousness. Matt Talbot’s introspective, ambient slowcore minimalism is elegantly composed slices of tranquility in practice. Some may know him better as the lead singer and guitarist of Hum.

Saturday | 08.24
What: Ghost Canon Fest: Replica City, Stress Palace, Nightosphere, Ghostlike, Aseethe, Jaye Jayle, Wolf Eyes
When: 6
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Replica City is an angular post-punk band from Denver whose atmospheric shimmer contains as much urgency and menace. Stress Palace is a noise rock band from Kansas City, the kind with caustic and desperate vocals and seething, suspended guitar when it’s not gouging the air alongside pummeling percussion. Nightosphere also from KC is a darkly slowcore project that some may be tempted to call dream pop but it’s a little too gloomy and noisy for that and more for fans of the likes of Flooding and Unwound’s more atmospheric moments. Ghostlike hails from Lincoln, Nebraska and its dense drifts of tone are in the region of shoegaze but more slow-moving like a post-metal band with unconventional melodies. Aseethe’s brooding, crushing doom metal sounds like colossal weather patterns struggling with each other until the vocals come in and then it’s like a possessed person for an effect akin to Neurosis gone more grindcore. Its 2024 album The Cost is brimming with the purge of negative emotions transformed into transcendent heaviness. Jaye Jayle is the solo project of Young Widows’ Evan Patterson who brings to this project a sensibility of mystical, experimental, tribal folk. Wolf Eyes is of course the legendary noise improv band from Detroit who have been prolifically exploring the possibilities of the use of sound since 1996. Now a duo of Nate Young and John Olson Wolf Eyes has always bucked the perception of noise being just harsh noise and mere chaos for the sake of putting off normies. There is an odd accessibility to the work of Wolf Eyes that is more like an unpretentious art that live has always been compelling and unlike anything much else even of previous performances and thus more in the vein of early Cabaret Voltaire and Throbbing Gristle.

Saturday | 08.24
What: Alvvays w/The Beths
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Something about Canadian pop band Alvvays has always set it apart from being just an indie pop band or shoegaze or psychedelic. Its melodies drift and warp in sometimes unpredictable directions off so that Alvvays consistently has a quality of unpredictability and inspired imperfection though its tone is coherent and entrancing. Out the gates with its self-titled debut the band started garnering a bit of a cult following for its emotionally rich vocals and layered, atmospheric guitar and poetic and sharply observed lyrics. The most recent Alvvays album Blue Rev proved that the quartet is as capable of captivating twee sounds as robust guitar rock and live something about the band seems to exude a kind of mystique most bands can’t muster.

Saturday | 08.24
What: Dad Bod w/Oruã and Totem Pocket
When: 5
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Dad Bod is a psychedelic pop band from Salt Lake City that seems steeped on folk rock of the 70s. Oruã is like if a great modern jazz band decided to start doing a garage rock version of krautrock and came off a little like a bedroom version of a psychedelic rock band from Texas but just a little weirder. Totem Pocket rides the line well between 2010’s psych rock and shoegaze.

Nina Nastasia, photo courtesy the artist

Sunday | 08.25
What: Ghost Canyon Fest: Animal Bite, Fainting Dreams, Bear Claw, Missouri Executive Order 44, Nina Nastasia and Young Widows
When: 6
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: The final night of Ghost Canyon Fest begins with a set from Casper, Wyoming’s mutant, heavy, psychedelic noise rock quartet Animal Bite. Fainting Dreams is now like the opposite image of its more dream pop beginnings, more thorny, more sonically pointed yet also moody and an intense release of tangled emotions. Bear Claw is a two bass and one drum set outfit from Chicago whose jagged and clipped dynamics range widely and akin to the likes of Mclusky and yet one gets the impression that at least one person in the band is into Failure. Missouri Executive Order 44 may or may not be based out of the Missouri side of Kansas City. But its post-hardcore, math-y riffs and mischievously surreal song titles suggest metalcore roots before the members discovered the Butthole Surfers.

Nina Nastasia is the critically acclaimed songwriter currently based in Seattle who grew up in Hollywood but moved to New York before making a name for herself as a gifted musical artist who worked throughout much of her career recording with Steve Albini. Due to years of abuse by her then partner, Nastasia left music in 2010 before returning to writing and releasing songs Her return to releasing music was the 2022 album Riderless Horse, an album or tender sounds and textures but whose subjects are a rich tapestry of the evocation of love, despair, loss, and finding moments of joy and humor in the great sprawl of life especially when you’ve been suppressing your creative gifts and now finding your vehicle of expression once again free of former limitations. The album charts the aftermath of the death of Nastasia’s former partner in 2020 and her own rediscovery of being able to write music with integrity after around a decade of finding herself unable to do so. It’s a record of rare beauty and deep personal insight that while bearing the hallmarks of going through periods of personal darkness ends up being an uplifting record and a declaration of self-empowerment. While writing and recording that record, Nastasia was simultaneously crafting the songs that would comprise the 2023 self-titled debut album by Jolie Laide, a duo with Nastasia and Jeff MacLeod. Both records have a noir quality in the nuance of emotional expression and entrancing moods that have a cinematic quality that one might compare favorably to Lana Del Rey and Cat Power.

Young Widows from Louisville, Kentucky formed following the dissolution of influential post-hardcore band Breather Resist. Young Widows’ own music was in a post-hardcore vein with roaring guitar sounds and crushing rhythms. But its musical ideas stretch out the sounds into unpredictable shapes a little more and its lyrics often depict the world as we know it, not inaccurately, as a place of great perils and challenges.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday | 08.26, 08.27 and 08.28
What: Khruangbin
When: 7 (each night)
Where: Mission Ballroom (08.26) and Red Rocks (08.27 and 08.28)
Why: Houston’s Khruangbin is a trio that may have absorbed the surf and garage psych influences that were shaping a good swath of rock music in the 2010s but all along the group also employed non-standard rhythms and elements of dub, funk and non-western musical forms into its sound. Its latest album A La Sala (2024) is more mellow than one might have expected and yet it’s perfectly in line with the energy Khruangbin has tapping into for years with the mood of a chill disco lounge in a retrofuturist cosmopolitan city near the beach.

Monday | 08.26
What: HIDE w/Mirrored Fatality, Bent and aeonexit
When: 7
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: HIDE is the industrial noise punk duo from Chicago that has been releasing some of the most pointed and cathartic music of the past several years critical of the worst aspects of our culture and civilization. Its live performances are confrontational and not for the faint of heart or the easily spooked. And just from the raw intensity of the the band especially vocalist Heather Gabel’s seeming embodiment of the collective outrage of the oppressed and of the abused world challenging the foundations of power. Bent is an industrial noise project from Colorado Springs with a similar aesthetic and ethos. Mirrored Fatality is a brilliant, darkwave industrial hyperpop duo that produces scathing yet danceable critiques of late capitalism and its corrosive effects on us all. And aeonexit has long been producing experimental electronic music in forms that are as cohesive as they are eclectic, as structured and as coherent as they are intuitive and amorphous. Its in the realm of noisy ambient but even at its most darkly menacing has a gentleness that renders the music inviting rather than forbidding.

Bikini Kill circa 1995-1996, photo by Lisa Darms

Tuesday | 08.27
What: Bikini Kill w/Sweeping Promises
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Bikini Kill is the legendary feminist punk band originally from Olympia, Washington that in part inspired the riot grrrl movement and a branch of third wave feminism. The group was part of a community of like-minded artists of various types and not just musical and often lost in the projected hype is how Bikini Kill’s music while a vehicle for an important perspective was also thrilling and exciting with performances that helped show other women how you could be a member of a powerful band or something else cool and important and reclaim and own your power regardless of your role in life without having it be contingent upon what a man would have to say or the conventional social mores of mainstream society with its baked in misogyny. That was an important message and example to set even when the band split in 1998 but oddly just as relevant when the band reconvened in 2019 at a time when the then president’s influence on society seemed to expose deep currents of American racism, misogyny and xenophobia. Bikini Kill had to cancel its 2020 tour for obvious reasons but making up for it at a time that feels like yet another too soon cultural crossroads for the USA.

Thursday | 08.29
What: Lamb of God & Mastodon w/Kerry King and Malevolence
When: 7
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Lamb of God formed in 1994 and Mastodon in 2000 in Richmond, Virginia and Atlanta, Georgia respectively. That was a time when metal other than Metallica and “nü metal” was largely relegated to the underground. But both groups evolved and built up a strong following that has all but broken into the mainstream. Lamb of God has generally written music in a groove metal vein but its 2022 album Omens leans into the harder-edged and at times sounds like its members have been influenced by crossover thrash with lyrics reflecting the state of the world seemingly on the edge of environmental collapse and the rise of global authoritarianism. The band has teased the release of a new album and you may hear some of the new material at this show. Mastodon tends to be more psychedelic and melodic in its sound with progressive rock structures and diversity in rhythms. Its own most recent album Hushed and Grim is like a anthology of haunted and spooky stories utilized to discuss personal struggle in a way accessible and more creative than something more straightforward. Kerry King is one of the former guitarists of Slayer who released his debut solo album From Hell I Rise in 2024.

Friday | 08.30
What: Alternative TentaclesFEST hosted by Jello Biafra: Tsunami Bomb, Kultur Shock, Wheelchair Sports Camp and Dead Pioneers
When: 6
Where: Levitt Pavilion
Why: Legendary record label Alternative Tentacles headed by former Dead Kennedys frontman Jello Biafra is having a festival in Colorado featuring various acts on the label. Tsunami Bomb from Petaluma, California is a pop punk band with keyboards so it’s sound is decidedly different from other bands in that vein. Seattle’s Kultur Shock is a self-styled gypsy punk band that sounds more like Grazhdanskaya Oborona and its eclectic and experimental leanings than Gogol Bordello. Wheelchair Sports Camp is the great hip-hop group from Denver with the charismatic Kalyn Heffernan as the MC and contributors who are most often musicians with serious jazz chops. Dead Pioneers is a heavily political punk band from Denver but with a wry sense of humor that keeps the music from feeling didactic.

Friday | 08.30
What: Daniel Rachel Appearance Promoting Too Much Too Young: The 2Tone Records Story
When: 6 (start time)
Where: Tattered Cover (Colfax)
Why: Acclaimed and prolific writer and journalist Daniel Rachel saw the 2024 US publication of his 2023 book Too Much Too Young: The 2Tone Records Story, a non-fiction history of the influential but relatively short lived record label that helped launch modern ska into international consciousness and the careers of the likes of founders The Specials as well as The Selecter, Madness, The Beat and others. It is part oral history and part narrative and a compelling read particularly since Rachel was able to interview or find quotes from almost all of the major figures in the history of that music and movement. This event will be hosted by Queen City Sounds and Art writer and editor Tom Murphy whose own work has appeared in publications such as Westword, The Onion A.V. Club, Dagger Zine, Birdy, Denverse and Tidal HIFI.

Daniel Rachel, photo courtesy the author

Friday | 08.30
What: X
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Influential Los Angeles punk band X is doing one final tour in conjunction with the release of one final album so if you’ve ever wanted to see the pioneering poetry, punk and Americana band definitely make it to this show. They may swing back through before retiring the band but maybe not.

Friday | 08.30
What: Isadora Eden, Pill Joy and May Be Fern
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Dark dream pop band Isadora Eden has a rare headlining show at the Hi-Dive ahead of taking some time off to work on its next record. Also on the bill are all non-male funk band May Be Fern and the excellent slacker pop shoegaze group Pill Joy.

Pleasure Prince, photo courtesy the artists

Saturday | 8.31
What: Pleasure Prince w/Sunstoney, DeEt ta Jain
When: 8
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Pleasure Prince is releasing its new album General Pallor at this show. The project is the duo of Lilly Scott and William Duncan whose eclectic background and musical chops prior to this project has yielded a strong body of creative work that blurs the line between avant-garde electronic music and ambient, techno, hip-hop, jazz, downtempo and dream pop. The new record further reveals the band’s knack for innovative songwriting with hazy atmospheres layered with those more vivid. As vocalists both Scott and Duncan complement each other well in delivering thoughtful lyrics and a deep sense of tranquility. The songs from the new album is like a fusion of neo soul and krautrock-flavored chillwave and a welcome respite from living in interesting times.

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond May 2024

**IDLES perform at Mission Ballroom on May 18, 2024, photo by Tom Ham**

Wednesday | 05.01
What: Slowdive w/Drab Majesty
When: 6
Where: Levitt Pavilion
Why: Slowdive was one of the original shoegaze bands of the late 80s and early 90s and it was more on the more sonically delicate and ambient end of the real of music. So much so that it’s then 1995 final album Pygmalion was not rock so much as avant-garde experiments in melodic atmospheres and abstract pop. It reflected its members immersion in electronic music and left field sounds in the world of dance music. Then the band split for nearly a decade while a few members went on to the more desert rock and Americana-esque Mojave 3. Another continued with Monster Movie and yet another played in Lowgold for a stretch. But 2014 brought the classic lineup of Slowdive back together and that reunion tour revealed a band that was surprisingly forceful in its gossamer webs of tone and melody and emotionally charged in its expansive atmospherics. But was the reunion a fluke? The 2017 self-titled album proved otherwise and was easily on par with its earlier catalog yet a clear demonstration of creative growth. The group’s complete embrace of electronic sounds and vulnerable guitar composition has meant its older music has aged well and its newer material clearly informed with an ear for the present and future. Opener Drab Majesty was one of the newer artists whose own fusion of electronics and melancholic guitar atmospherics seemed to look back at predecessors like Slowdive, Love and Rockets, Red Lorry Yellow Lorry and Cocteau Twins while establishing a sound very much its own imbued with dark moods and futuristic glam imagery.

Wednesday | 05.02
What: Brainstory
When: 7
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Brainstory just released its latest album Sounds Good. Its fusion of jazz, psychedelia and R&B has a sound resonant with some of what Todd Rundgren was doing in the 70s but rougher edged like these guys spent some time playing in garage rock bands that played covers to earn their keep and took that discipline to make music with tangibly lush moods, a touch of that deceptively soft Steely Dan thing including the strong musicianship and while sounding like musicians from another era are clearly informed by the modern lens of that reinterpretation because the production style has a modern sensibility of intentional high contrast sounds and a real depth of sonic field.

Thursday | 05.02
What: Sanguisugabogg and Jesus Piece w/Gag and Peeling Flesh https://www.gothictheatre.com/events/detail/?event_id=526035
When: 6
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: This is the kind of heavy music show that will offer a lot of aggressive sounds but sensitive sensibilities cloaked in brutal sounds and subject matter. Sanguisugabogg is a death metal band from Columbus, Ohio with extreme song titles like “Face Ripped Off” but whose music video is like an inversion of being tough and hard edged. Gag is a hardcore band from Olympia, Washington whose contorted sounds reveal eclectic roots and a surreal, absurd and sometimes dark sense of humor. Jesus Piece is the renowned metalcore act from Philadelphia that set out to be a death metal band but evolved into something its own. Yes, the aggressive vocals and rapidly bludgeoning riffs but with a rhythmic structure that has meant Jesus Piece doesn’t hit as just another death metal or hardcore band as its music has passages where it breathes rather than pummels, and the defiant energy of the music challenges the audience to join in its raw vitality.

Drew Holcomb & The Neighbors, photo courtesy the artists

Friday | 05.03
What: Drew Holcomb & The Neighbors w/Donovan Woods
When: 7
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: For a little over two decades Drew Holcomb has been developing his songwriting in the public eye first as a solo act and since 2005 as Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors. His contemplative and observant lyrics have an intimate quality suggest roots in folk while the pastoral atmospheric features of his sound hearken to more than a passing familiarity with the cosmic end of country. The band’s most recent album is 2023’s Strangers No More the title of which seems to be a calling card for the songwriter whose music connects on a direct human level as an attempt to build an informal community or at least encourage those impulses in particular the song “Find Your People.” Opening the evening is Donovan Woods who is touring ahead of the July 12 release of his new record Things Were Never Good If They’re Not Good Now. The Canadian singer-songwriter’s material is poetically vivid its imagery and lush yet minimal in the way the songs are arranged like cinematic, miniature orchestral pieces the frame Donovan’s delicate yet passionate vocals.

Friday | 05.03
What: Cherubs w/Moon Pussy, Quits and Cherry Spit
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Austin’s Cherubs have been unleashing an unhinged noise rock that sounded like they were falling apart and clashing into each other constantly and there is a certain cathartic appeal to that sound. And from 1991-1994 the group would have been peers of other rock and roll weirdos like The Jesus Lizard and Butthole Surfers whose King Coffeey signed the band to his own Trance Syndicate imprint. Then the band went inactive only to suddenly reappear in 2014 seemingly undiminished in its ability to deliver relentlessly rhythm-driven sonic bursts of ruptured and noisy psychedelia. 2023 saw the remastered reissue of the band’s colossal 1992 debut Icing. Maybe Moon Pussy and Quits aren’t ripping off Cherubs but they are both surely direct descendants of the kind of sound Cherbus helped to pioneer. Moon Pussy this night is also releasing its beautifully disjointed and inspired new album Death is Coming.

Friday | 05.03
What: LEAF: Laraaji visuals by L’Astra Cosmo w/Lisa Bella Donna and visuals by Christopher Robin Short at The Arts HUB sold out
When: 6:30
Where: The Arts HUB
Why: LEAF concludes the live music performance segment of the festival with a performance by ambient and new age legend Laraaji on his birthday no less. The multi-instrumentalist began working on music in the 70s when he bought a zither and then converted it into an electronic instrument and later in the decade began busking in New York. This is where Brian Eno encountered him and the two collaborated on Laraaji’s brilliant 1980 album Ambient 3: Day of Radiance on which the composer used various acoustic instruments and a hammered dulcimer to craft unique soundscapes the likes of which haven’t been heard or seen much since. Since that time Laraaji has delved into various forms of music and performance as well as presenting his Laughter Meditation Workshops. 2023 saw the 4LP reissue of Segue To Infinity, a collection of Laraaji’s early works from his 1978 debut album Celestial Vibration and six longer pieces recorded around that same time.

Mannquin Pussy, photo by Millicent Hailes

Saturday | 05.04
What: Mannequin Pussy w/Soul Glo
When: 8
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Mannequin Pussy has come a long way since beginning in Philadelphia in 201 when Marisa Dabice and Athanasios Paul formed the group as a duo inspired in part by experimental garage punk band Lust-Cats of the Gutters from Denver. One thing that has remained intact is Dabice’s ferocious and confrontational vocal delivery and incisive lyrics. Its most recent album I Got Heaven (2024) finds the group exploring themes of yearning but written in explorative fashion across styles and often threading punk boldness with emotional delicacy for a mixture that is undeniably compelling and refreshingly vital in its creativity and sonic nuance. For this tour Mannequin Pussy brings along Philly hardcore band Soul Glo whose sound of course in true tradition of music from its hometown strays widely from any formula. Its feral vocals often wax snotty but the music has so much momentum and the lyrics imbued with so much fire that you forget what it is you think you’re supposed to be hearing and get swept up in the moment. A perfect pairing.

Saturday | 05.04
What: Alana Mars EP release w/Tireshoe, The Salesmen and Sk8rade
When: 7
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Denver-based pop/rock artist Alana Mars celebrates the release of her latest EP The Prologue at this show. The six songs comprising the EP showcase the singer-songwriter’s gift for introspective and vulnerable lyrics and lushly atmospheric compositions. Live Mars isn’t short on personality, presence and humor. Also on the bill is the supercharged post-punk band The Salesmen and their unabashedly polemical yet creatively fun deconstruction and dismantling of social ills and injustices.

Saturday | 05.04
What: Jade Bird w/Emelise and Kayla Katz
When: 7
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Something must be said in favor of Jade Bird’s moxie in releasing the 2024 EP Burn the Hard Drive. It’s about her split from her fiancée and former guitarist Luke Prosser who has writing credits on 2/3 of the songs. The EP also demonstrates Bird’s growth as an artist and while there are aspects of her more Americana and indie folk sound the most interesting songs including the title track are more electronic and informed by funk and neo soul sounds and psychedelia. They also feel the most cathartic even as the more guitar-driven songs are imbued with the emotional vulnerability that has been the artist’s hallmark from the beginning. It’s a pivotal release for Bird, though, and this might be a good time to catch her as she breaks more out of expectations built around her past work.

Young Rising Sons, photo courtesy the artists

Sunday | 05.05
What: Young Rising Sons w/Diva Bleach
When: 6:30
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Young Rising Sons are an alternative pop band that formed in Brooklyn in 2010. Bassist Julian Dimagiba and drummer Steve Patrick grew up in Red Bank, New Jersey playing music and caught singer Andy Tongren performing an acoustic set at a New York Cit bar and struck by his skills talked with him later about joining their fledgling band. The new group spent a few years with different names while writing songs and settling on the name Young Rising Sons. In 2013 the group signed with Dirty Canvas Music and their 2014 debut single “High” became a bit of a global viral hit leading to the band signing with Interscope that same year. For the following two years the quartet toured opening for the likes of Halsey, Weezer, The 1975 and The Neighbourhood. Although Young Rising Sons delivered three EPs with Interscope as with many other worthy artists that didn’t translate to the commercial performance expected by a major label. In 2017 the band parted ways with Interscope and a year later announced a hiatus that lasted a couple of years. Since reconvening the outfit has been regularly releasing singles and in 2022 it dropped its debut full length Still Point In a Turning World. Tongren’s soulful and passionate vocals and the tight pop songcraft of the band has remained intact. Its body of work including its new single “(Un)Happy Hour” reveals a sensitivity to the complexity and fragility of human life and the importance of accepting the high points and the low to experience to make it through an oftentimes challenging existence with dignity and a sense of fulfillment. Listen to our interview with Andy Tongren here.

Tuesday | 05.07
What: Swans w/Kristoff Hahn
When: 7
Where: The Gothic Theatre
Why: Swans are the influential, experimental rock band formed in New York City in 1982 as one of the standout acts of the no wave scene. Fronted by singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Michael Gira, the group’s ever-evolving lineup and sound has helped pioneer and in many ways define aspects of noise rock, industrial music, post-punk and in later eras of the band post-rock. Its earliest records were brutal affairs of a stark beauty and unsettling intensity. By the last half of the 80s singer and keyboardist Jarboe had joined the band and its music began to increasingly incorporate a musical intricacy, melodic ambiance and emotionally nuanced delicacy that became a regular feature of the songwriting. And for years the constant members of the band were Gira, Jarboe, and longtime guitarist Norman Westberg. Swans might have come to an end on a high note following the tour for the sprawling epic of the masterful 1996 album Soundtracks For the Blind. But in 2010 Swans reconvened and began another great arc of songwriting with songs that had an even more orchestral aesthetic than in the past and a series of albums that have delved into themes of existential terror, mortality, death and the search for meaning later in life in a world seemingly on the brink of unraveling. The latest Swans record, 2023’s The Beggar, finds Gira and his collaborators manifesting some of the songwriter’s most personal statements in songs that experiment even more deeply into modes of expression that disregard conventional notions of song structure and length in favor of experiential truth. Read our interview with Gira here.

Friday | 05.10
What: Water From Your Eyes w/Friko and Red Scare
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Water From Your Eyes is the innovative and deeply imaginative art pop band from Brooklyn, New York. Its music is steeped in hip-hop style production with some free association sampling and live instrumentation mixed together for music that often seems reminiscent of an update of 90s IDM which itself had a leg in similar pools of inspiration. Live the duo is somehow both like an alternative hip-hop project and infused with punk spirit. Chicago’s Friko released its debut full-length Where we’ve been, Where we go from here on February 16, 2024 delivering on the promise of its early singles. Niko Kapetan’s captivating vocals have a rawness and vulnerability that is reminiscent of early Bright Eyes and the music is a thrilling fusion of post-punk angularity, orchestral arrangements and classic power pop with moments of noise rock fury.

Belle and Sebastian in 2015, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 05.10
What: Belle and Sebastian w/The Weather Station
When: 7
Where: Fillmore Auditorium
Why: Belle & Sebastian is the highly influential indie pop band from Glagow, Scotland. Its emotionally rich delicately crafted songs not short on literary quality are some of the foundations of modern indie rock and yet the band has continued to offer fine records including its 2023 record Late Developers for which the band is conducting a rare live tour. As a live band the group has a sprightly charm with shows that can feel a bit like you’ve been invited to someone’s living room to be in on something that is otherwise intimate and private but friendly.

Friday | 05.10
What: Panchiko w/Wisp and Weatherday
When: 7
Where: The Summit Music Hall
Why: Panchiko is a bit of a cult indie rock band that was originally around in the late 90s through 2001 when it split leaving behind few recordings but D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L its 2000 EP got a bit of a new life in the mid-2010s when a CD was found in an Oxfam charity shop and was very much an enigma. Fast forward to 2020 and the EP gets a deluxe reissue and in 2023 the group released its beautifully bizarre shoegaze/IDM/glitch pop record Failed at Math(s).

Friday | 05.10
What: Guided By Voices w/Undersale
When: 7
Where: The Marquis Theater
Why: Guided By Voices has been putting out a steady stream of unique garage rock albums of varying levels of inventiveness and quality since and yet it seems like band leader Bob Pollard has a seemingly endless supply of great riffs and something insightful to say about the human condition. Currently the group is touring in support of its 2024 album Strut of Kings.

Members of Teacup Gorilla from Grapefuit Lab’s Whiskey from Strangers

F-S | 05.10-06.01
What: Grapefruit Lab Presents Whiskey From Strangers
When: See Schedule Below
Where: Buntport Theater
Why: Queer theater group Grapefruit Lab launches its new show Whiskey from Strangers. The production weaves personal narrative and Denver mythology into a live concept album that runs weekends from Friday, May 10 through Saturday June 1. In collaboration with local indie rock band Teacup Gorilla the show will be part theater and part live musical performance. The show is imbued with a nostalgia for “Old Denver” in its mythic dimensions and adding new lore to the story. It is part album release as the live band draws stories from songwriter and musician Miriam Suzanne’s novel Riding SideSaddle for nine songs that explore themes of friendship, loss, identity and memory with the Mile High City as almost another character the way New York City and Los Angeles often are in movies set in those cities. The previous Grapefruit Lab shows have all been brilliant and poignant commentaries on American culture and how we all find ourselves navigating life with that legacy but through a queer lens that resonates beyond the specificity of identity. The final night of the run will include a performance by psychedelic indiepop phenoms The Green Typewriters. For tickets click on the link above and for the schedule of the run of the show see the dates and times below.

Friday, May 10th, 7:30PM
Saturday, May 11th, 7:30PM
Friday, May 17th, 7:30PM
Saturday, May 18th, 7:30PM
Sunday, May 19th, 2:00PM
Friday, May 24th, 7:30PM
Saturday, May 25th, 7:30PM
Sunday, May 26th, 2:00PM
Friday, May 31st, 7:30PM
Saturday, June 1st, 7:30PM

Saturday | 05.11
What: CSS
When: 7
Where: The Marquis Theater
Why: CSS is the renowned dance punk band from São Paulo, Brazil. The group made a name for itself in the US with the release of its 2006 album Cansei de Ser Sexy (“[Got] tired of being sexy”) and its first single “Let’s Make Love and Listen to Death From Above.” It’s playful and smooth sound was at times reminiscent of Tom Tom Club and a funkier version of its electroclash contemporaries like Ladytron with whom it toured the same year as the release of the album. In 2013 the group split but reunited in 2019 for what was planned to be a one-off show in their hometown but now currently touring in celebration of the 20 year anniversary of their coming together.

Saturday | 05.11
What: Dustin Kensrue w/The Brevet and brother bird
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Dustin Kensrue is perhaps better known for being the lead singer and guitarist with influential post-hardcore band Thrice. His solo songwriting is decidedly different in style and mood and really more a solid Americana and country flavor. The Brevet is a rock band in the more gritty end of pop Americana with anthemic choruses and earnest and uplifting melodies. Now brother bird, the project of one Caroline Glaser, may have similar roots as the other two bands on the bill in country, folk and Americana. But her 2024 album another year has an delicacy of feeling and emotional strength at the core of the songwriting that is immediately accessible. The songs hit like songs from direct, actual experiences channeled through a creative interpretive lens without losing the essential truths of the real life stories. Glaser’s arrangements are simultaneously intimate and orchestral and in moments may be reminiscent for some of the early Rilo Kiley records.

Saturday | 05.11
What: Pond w/26FIX
When: 8
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: Pond from Perth, Australia has been developing its sound since forming in 2008 and though it shares membership with Tame Impala, Pond’s music has charted a musically divergent course. Its latest album Stung! (due out June 21, 2024) makes more obvious the influence of R&B and neo soul on its songwriting. Which is a contrasting departure from the more krautrock and electro-soul sounds of the 2021 album 9. But whatever flavor Pond is swimming in at the moment its live shows have a lushly transporting quality like the modern equivalent of a 1970s psychedelic space rock band circa late 70s Hawkwind with the mystical space vagabond trappings discarded in favor of glam rock.

Tuesday | 05.14
What: X Ambassarors w/New West and Rowan Drake
When: 6:30
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: X Ambassadors released its latest album Townies in April 2024 and the record feels like particularly vivid portraits of life in the kind of town that exists all across America where there’s a nearby college and an industrial town that partly caters to the needs of the school while having a social world not dependent on the academic institution while its native residents are often looked down upon by students as yokels. The songs are a warm depiction of life in these towns and the inherent dignity of people whose dreams and aspirations are, frankly, no less worthwhile or hopeful than those of their more well-heeled peers and whose stories have a unique poetic resonance. The songs for the band this time out are a little moodier, more atmospheric and introspective and with lyrics that shine a light on everyday life in all its vibrant and recognizable detail whether the details of which are harrowing, heartwarming or heartbreaking.

Wednesday | 05.15
What: Amenra w/Primitive Man and Slow Crush
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Amenra is a Belgian post-metal band whose deeply atmospheric heavy compositions wed a cinematic aesthetic with a seemingly orchestral approach to its performances and arrangements. The names of its albums are reminiscent of classical suites but the music though steeped in exquisitely performed feats of technical prowess are cathartic and emotionally charged. Primitive Man is the by now legendary doom trio form Denver whose songs are an exorcism of the destructive nihilism of modern human civilization and its negative effects on all our lives as not prosperity but repression and internalized violence trickles down from the power elite. Slow Crush is one of the heaviest shoegaze bands on earth but whose music nevertheless has an ethereal grace that elevates its crushing songs into otherworldly realms of transcendent melodicism.

Friday | 05.17
What: Moon Pussy, Church Fire, The Kronk Men and CNTS
When: 7
Where: Squirm Gallery
Why: CNTS are a band from L.A. whose sound seems to draw from hardcore and noise rock in equal measure with a caustic irreverence and hostility toward faux feel-good sentiments and empty gesture sloganeering. Clear roots in The Jesus Lizard and maybe Unsane. The Kronk Men from Bend, Oregon are somehow a post-hardcore surf rock band with a touch of dark psychedelia. Church Fire is of course the industrial dance trio from Denver who turn a maelstrom of pain, sadness, outrage and righteous anger into incredibly heartfelt music. Moon Pussy obliterates the line between great noise rock band, inspired awkward comedy and electrifying live performance art.

Friday and Saturday | 05.17 and 05.18
What: Medium Build w/Rosie Rush
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Nicholas Carpenter played music for a handful of years in Little Moses while an intern at Disney Publishing. But moved to Alaska after that internship was over and started his current project Medium Build. Maybe getting away from his upbringing and roots and the American South was what Carpenter needed to spark his current prolific arc of songwriting but his lyrics are informed by working class sensibilities and cultural references that tell vivid tales of life’s all too at hand and intense struggles and joys. His new album, Country, released April 5, 2024 and its raw and vulnerable compositions are poignantly introspective like Carpenter took a deep dive into the fractured places in his own psyche in search of a personal reconciliation and finding that healing the bruised and broken places in your mind require more patience and grace than many of us are afforded. He’ll be haring his emotional discoveries across two nights a The Bluebird and throughout the tour.

Saturday | 05.18
What: IDLES w/Ganser
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: IDLES took a decidedly different musical turn with the release of its fifth album Tangk in February 2024. Singer and frontman Joe Talbot has said in interviews and press releases that the songs are about love and an attempt to get people hearing the music to dance and not overthink but to feel genuinely. It probably shocked and maybe even disappointed people who got into the band for its early, angular and ferocious post-punk. But the spirited energy is still there, it’s just swimming in moody atmospheric layers at times and others the aggression that has made earlier music from the band so engaging and exciting is delivered with more sonic creativity. The first half of the album almost sounds like a different band with experimental soundscapes and tonal textures worthy of early Liars. And in the lyrics the vulnerable sentiments are preserved and curiously and refreshingly exposed. How this will translate to the live show will have to be witnessed and certainly IDLES won’t disappoint. Also on the bill is the great darkwave post-punk art rock band Ganser from Chicago.

Red Rum Club, photo courtesy the artists

Saturday | 05.18
What: Red Rum Club w/High Street Joggers Club and Card Catalog
When: 7
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Liverpool’s Red Rum Club released its latest album Western Approaches in February 2024. The album is just under 32 minutes at eleven songs and is a fine example song by song of economical songwriting without sound like the band is skimping on rich melodies and storytelling. The group’s eclectic style straddles power pop and blue eyed soul with a standout brass section and infuses it with an infectious energy.

Sunday | 05.19
What: BleakHeart w/Palehorse/Palerider and George Cessna
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Denver-based, dark shoegaze band BleakHeart celebrates the release of its second album Silver Pulse with a performance this night sharing the stage with friends the likeminded post-rock/tribal shoegaze act Palehorse/Palerider and singer-songwriter George Cessna whose work traverses realms of moody and existential Americana. The new BleakHeart album leans into the group’s more orchestral impulses with vocalists Kiki GaNun and Kelly Schilling interweaving their vocal talents further to create moving choruses, perfectly accenting each other’s voices.

Judah & The Lion, photo courtesy the artists

Sunday | 05.19
What: NEEDTOBREATHE w/Judah & The Lion
When: 6
Where: Red Rocks
Why: NEEDTOBREATHE is the Southern rock/Americana band from Seneca, South Carolina that has been building its audience since its 2001 inception. In 2023 it released its latest album Caves. On the track “Dreams” the group brought in Nashville-based electro folk and pop duo Judah & The Lion to bring in its own delicate and intricate touches to the song. Judah & The Lion released its new album The Process on May 10, 2024 establishing the band as masters of pastoral soundscapes and fusing the aesthetics of electronic pop and more traditional songwriting and musicianship. The album’s songs are simultaneously otherworldly and warm with an emotional immediacy.

Tuesday | 05.21
What: Sculpture Club w/Lesser Care, Baby Baby and Kill You Club DJs
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Sculpture Club is a synthpop-inflected post-punk band from Dallas that is touring ahead of the release of its self-titled album due out June 14 and sharing the stage tonight with the great shoegaze/post-punk trio Lesser Care from El Paso which released its latest record HEEL TURN in March 2024. Also on the bill is avant-pop group Baby Baby from Denver.

Tuesday | 05.21
What: Mount Kimbie w/Chanel Beads
When: 8
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: Mount Kimbie has been charting a left field musical path since its 2008 inception. It began by innovating in the UK dubstep scene and has generally traveled in the circles of innovative and avant-garde electronic music and rightfully so. Utilizing field recordings, live instrumentation, programming and samples Mount Kimbie has blurred the boundaries between musique concrète, abstract hip-hop, IDM, ambient, dubstep and indie rock. Its latest record The Sunset Violent in particular pushes those boundaries with songs that are as accessible as they are challenging with a tranquil yet expansive mood that runs throughout the album’s runtime. Opening act Chanel Beads is a producer and expert soundscaper in his own right from New York. His debut album Your Day Will Come dropped on April 19, 2024 and its heavily-percussion and bass driven music is imbued with reflective, melancholic moods reminiscent of Safe in the Hands of Love-period Yves Tumor but more informed by hypnogogic pop and chillwave.

Wednesday | 05.22
What: Guitar Wolf w/Hans Condor
When: 7
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Tokyo’s Guitar Wolf is the kind of mutant garage punk/noise rock that is easy to understand and difficult to explain. It’s raw exuberance as a live band is incredibly infectious and makes the madness and malestrom of its sound and live performance something to get swept up within. Listen to any of its records and it can be a blunt, fractured, hyperkinetic rock and roll that sounds like it’s deconstructing and imploding while you’re listening to it yet there is a primal charm to what this bands does on recordings and at its shows. It must simply be experienced at least once by anyone even pretending to be into rock music.

Thursday | 05.23
What: Optic Sink w/Voight and Pill Joy
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Optic Sink is a project of Natalie Hoffman of art punk outfit NOTS from Memphis, Tennessee. She spent some time as the bassist of Ex Cult as well. This band is synth driven, minimalist post-punk seemingly inspired in part by early synth bands like The Normal and Fad Gadget. But on the band’s 2023 album Glass Blocks it also covered Liliput’s “A Silver Key Can Open An Iron Lock, Somewhere” for an effect not unlike Young Marble Giants with synths or extra stripped down Suburban Lawns or Roxy Music. Opening is shoegaze-post-punk duo Voight from Denver whose music is informed by and includes synth composition and aesthetics. But all undergirded by an emotional intensity that warps its purely musical aspects into interesting sonic shapes.

Thursday | 05.23
What: Waxahatchee w/Good Morning
When: 7
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Waxahatchee is touring in support of its new record Tigers Blood. The previous record Saint Cloud felt like a shift in a new direction in singer Katie Crutchfield’s songwriting and this new record feels even more like Crutchfield has stripped the elements to the essentials. Part of that sound suits well the desire the songwriter has expressed in rediscovering the appealing essence of an already existing relationship, relationships and life situations. A re-orienting, a grounding and coming back from a vital place with which to imbue the performances and sentiments with fresh conviction. It’s not a radically different sound from the commanding indie folk and Americana flavor that has established Waxahatchee as a band to watch but after four years and the prolonged period of the early pandemic it sounds like Crutchfield reconnected with something in heart mind and heart that might have fallen out of sync as it did with everyone the past handful of years.

Friday | 05.24
What: Trauma Ray w/Downward, World’s Worst and Cherished
When: 8
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Trauma Ray is the shoegaze doom band from Fort Worth, Texas whose sound and energy comes off like the people in the band came out of the that city’s local punk scene. Presumably Downward is the emo-inflected post-rock band from Tulsa, Oklahoma. World’s Worst from Salt Lake City blurs that emo and shoegaze line perfectly with delicate melodies and raw emotions as manifested most accessibly on its 2023 self-titled album. Cherish is of course the dream pop turned shoegaze band from Denver whose roots come from various places including the local hardcore scene. When the band started out it was called Lowfaith and had more of a death rock sound but over time its music evolved into emotionally charged shoegaze with a real ear for vulnerable moods and intricate yet evocative melodies.

Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, photo from Bandcamp

Saturday | 05.25
What: Wicca Phase Springs Eternal w/Midwife
When: 7
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: Wicca Phase Springs Eternal released its self-titled album in 2023 and showcased how one can tap into darkwave moodiness and hip-hop production methods to create something uniquely compelling that doesn’t seem too beholden to the aforementioned styles of music. Opening is Midwife whose heartbreaking, ambient indie folk which she self-styles as “heaven metal” and whose songwriting engages deeply with its radical vulnerability with all pretense of performative toughness that is very much baked into the American psyche dispensed with. The result is instantly relatable music that shows how it’s possible to experience personal loss and feel that so deeply and still find a way to survive without the baggage of needing to “getting over” it.

Saturday | 05.25
What: Allison Lorenzen w/Oldest Sea and Calamity
When: 7
Where: Squirm Gallery
Why: All solo sets from cosmic indie folk artists from Colorado and elsewhere. Allison Lorenzen fuses ambient compositional elements with experimental folk forms for warmly ethereal songs. Lorenzen is undertaking a short tour through the American southwest with Oldest Sea, an artist from New Jersey whose music some might call “funeral doom” because it is heavy, it has grittiness and exudes a densely atmospheric sound that fans of Lingua Ignota and SubRosa might fully appreciate. Calamity for this show will be a solo set from Kate Hannington so the core of her economic songwriting will shine on its own separate from the context of the full band and its more full-fledged shoegaze-adjacent style.

Sunday | 05.26
What: Mind’s Eye w/Friko
When: 7
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Mind’s Eye is a psychedelic, indie garage rock band from Los Angeles whose 2023 album Long Nights and Wasted Affairs that sounds like a blend of early 2010’s post-punk and current shoegaze-y indie rock. Opening the show is Friko from Chicago’s who have been on tour with Water From Your Eyes and whose debut full-length Where we’ve been, Where we go from here dropped in February. The songwriting has the emotional rawness and vulnerability that fans of Bright Eyes and Microphones will appreciate for its orchestral arrangements and noisy power pop sensibilities.

Monday | 05.27
What: Facet, Church Fire and Probes
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Facet is an angular noise-rock/post-hardcore band from Oakland whose 2023 self-titled album is filled with urgent, caustic, cathartic sounds and sentiments. Think the modern equivalent of a Gravity Records band and if you enjoy that flavor of thrillingly abrasive music and/or Unwound Facet is for you. Church Fire will match the intensity and energy but with beginning to end industrial dance pop. On its Bandcamp page Probes from Denver says it’s “Bleak as fuck.” And it’s doomy sludge rock is heavy and stark like if guys who maybe got started in stoner rock bands discovered Shellac and Unsane.

Monday | 05.27
What: Melt Banana w/babybaby_explores and Tomato Flower
When: 6:30
Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station
Why: Melt Banana is the legendary noise rock/grindcore/electro pop duo from Tokyo whose 32 year career has revealed a knack for making sounds that get under your skin and electrify in the live setting. Witnessing a Melt Banana show is like being grabbed in the embrace of hyperkinetic energy and riding out a barrage of sounds that shift constantly with rapidly evolving rhythms in a train of jump cuts. Absolutely one of a kind and kind of an odd show to have happen at Meow Wolf rather than one of the dive bars the group usually plays in Denver. Melt Banana will soon release its new album 3 + 5.

Monday and Tuesday | 05.27 and 05.28
What: Maggie Rogers w/The Japanese House
When: 6:30 (both nights)
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Maggie Rogers apparently transcribed hundreds of hours of interviews for Lizzy Goodman that the latter put into her 2017 epochal book about 2000s New York rock music Meet Me in the Bathroom when she started at NYU thinking about a career in music journalism. But she she caught the songwriting bug and worked her way through an early band and experiments in style when in 2016 she wrote her breakout single “Alaska” Since then the singer-songwriter-producer has established herself as one of the more well known pop artists in the indie realm who is now touring in support of her 2024 album Don’t Forget Me. Opening the show is an artist who has been on the rise as well the past handful of years. Amber Mary Bain is a year younger than Maggie Rogers but has garnered a bit of critical acclaim and built an increasingly wider audience beyond her home country of the UK. Her own brand of indie pop weaves together electronic aesthetics and production so that even her more folk-inflected material has an otherworldly yet warm aspect that lends her songs a unique sense of intimacy.

Tuesday | 05.28
What: Wednesday w/Draag
When: 7
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Wednesday is a a band from Asheville, North Carolina whose sound seems to effortlessly shift from noisy shoegaze to alt-country with a curiously coherent ease across an album and sometimes within the same song. Its 2023 album Rat Saw God made that range clear and touring in support of the album the group performed that music with a joyful exuberance that turned the heartbreaking songs into catharsis. Opening the show is Los Angeles-based experimental shoegaze group Draag. Its sound brings together beat-making expertise with ambient soundscaping and abstract dream pop melodies. Its hazy layers of hypnotic sound make a listen to its 2024 album Actually, the quiet is nice like walking into a luminous fog that stimulates your mind and senses in unexpected ways. In moments its reminiscent of Loveless in its tonal drift and creative use of iterative repetition and live it promises an engulfing and transporting effect.

Thursday | 05.30
What: Ladytron w/boyhollow
When: 7
Where: Reelworks
Why: Ladytron is an electronic pop band from Liverpool, England that started in 1999 in a more minimalistic mode that got the group lumped in with the then nascent electroclash movement but its own sound wasn’t too in line with the aesthetics of other artists associated with that style. And almost immediately Ladytron moved on to other production styles, methods and sounds so that by the time of the mid-2000s some people were calling them a shoegaze band but there is nothing guitar-driven in the band’s music though its rich tones and saturated melodies seemed to have a resonance with the way many shoegaze bands reflected the influence of electronic sounds on their own musical expression. In much of the Ladytron sound one hears the influence of the likes of Giorgio Moroder and ABBA. After what seemed like a lengthy hiatus in studio output Ladytron in the last handful of years has released new albums including 2023’s Time’s Arrow. Boyhollow is Michael Trundle the legendary DJ who currently helms the long-running now monthly DJ night Lipgloss at Ophelia’s.

Slim Cessna’s Auto Club, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 05.31
What: Slim Cessna’s Auto Club album release w/Little Fyodor & Babushka Band, Mr. Pacman and MC’d by John Rumley
When: 7
Where: The Oriental Theater
Why: Slim Cessna’s Auto Club is a Denver institution of the Mile High City’s branch of Gothic Americana. But in recent years the group’s albums have showcased the exuberant joy of its live performances as well as the literary underpinnings of the band’s songwriting which has been an often underrated aspect of its music from the beginning. This show occasion’s the release of its latest album Kinnery of Lupercalia; Buell Legion which has some of the most attentive production to the placement of sound in the mix of its albums to date. Opening the show are art punk legends Little Fyodor & Babushka Band and weirdo new wave synth punk giants Mr. Pacman. John Rumley has also been a fixture in Denver music including stints in bands like Urban Leash and The Buckingham Squares. An entire show of bands that have helped make Denver a place where unique music has been emerging for decades.

Friday | 05.31
What: Whores w/Native Daughters and Suicide Cages
When: 7
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Fresh off its performance at the Caterwaul festival in Minneapolis, Atlanta-based noise rock juggernauts are making a stop in Denver. The group recently released its caustic and driving new album WAR. and its tales of inner turmoil and struggles with self-loathing and transcendence from personal darkness. Local support comes from doomy instrumental post-rock band Native Daughters and brutally noisy post-hardcore quartet Suicide Cages.

Friday | 05.31
What: Alexander Stewart w/Emmy Meli
When: 7
Where: The Marquis Theater
Why: Alexander Stewart is a pop artist originally from Toronto but now based out of Los Angeles who has enjoyed a bit of viral success with over a billion streams of his music to date. His emotive vocal style suits well his heart-on-sleeve lyrics and fusion of auto-tune inflected hip-hop, reggaeton and indie pop. Opening artist Emmy Meli recently released her Hello Stranger EP but made waves with early single “I Am Woman” which she initially posted to TikTok in 2021 where it became a sensation for her soulful and commanding vocals and the song became the theme song to Megan Markle’s podcast Archetypes. Meli is clearly steeped in the tradition of soul and R&B in a fashion that has garnered her some comparisons to Amy Winehouse. Her EP demonstrates that such accolades are very much deserved.

Best Shows in Denver and Beyond July 2022

Primitive Man performs at Bluebird Theater on July 15, 2022

Aldous Harding at UMS 2017, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 07.01
What: Aldous Harding w/H. Hawkline
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Ever since the release of her 2014 self-titled debut album Aldous Harding has been crafting some of the most unique songs in the realm of indie folk of the past few decades. With each album Harding offers songs that seem like a blend of the deeply personal, the mythical and the conceptual. Her song titles suggest a surreal aesthetic that lends itself to her imaginative story telling and a willingness to seek beyond tropes and clichés for ways of signing about relationships, identity, aspirations and dreams and commenting on society. 2017’s Party and her subsequent North American tour revealed Harding to be a truly and fascinatingly idiosyncratic artist whose emotionally powerful and riveting performances were reminiscent of Joni Mitchell with a touch of Kate Bush. Her latest album Warm Chris (2022) puts the focus on fusing the jazz elements of her songwriting with the avant-garde pop for a set of songs that sound like lounge music from a parallel universe where creative weirdos are in charge and creativity is more valued than affirming popular trends.

Reverb and The Verse, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 07.01
What: Yonbre Netz w/Reverb and The Verse
When: 9 p.m.
Where: Broadway Roxy
Why: Yonbre Netz is a Boulder-based hip-hop and experimental electronic artist whose varied collaborations can be heard on his Spotify account where his keen ear for colorful, percussive melodies can be heard. But this is also a rare chance to catch Reverb and The Verse who recently put out their tenth and supposed final album BLACKWALL under this project name. Shane Etter and Jahi Simbai have been at it since the late 90s making hip-hop that has always been rich with creative soundscaping and truly clever wordplay informed by incisive commentary on society and the travails of everyday life. Seemingly never content to repeat the same musical ideas album to album the duo’s catalog of material is a great trail of creative evolution and experimentation. BLACKWALL is a little like if Public Enemy collaborated with Nine Inch Nails with the gift for emotionally charged and politically and poetically astute as that comparison might imply. You may not get many chances to catch those guys in action and the Broadway Roxy would be a great room to make that the opportunity to witness one of the finest hip-hop acts Denver has to offer.

Friday | 07.01
What: Vmthanaachth w/Church Fire, Sell Farm, Ray Diess (album release) and Coma Roulette
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Glob
Why: Vmthanaachth from Dallas, Texas combines ambient music and industrial with classical avant-garde in a way that fans of Pedestrian Deposit will appreciate. Church Fire has been really upping their game with making irresistible bangers that also dismantle status quo sentiments and ways of being. For those not in the know Church Fire is something like an alchemical mixture of synth pop, industrial dance music, confrontational feminist punk and one of the best bands out of Denver or anywhere of the past decade. Ray Diess is releasing his latest album the hyperpop inflected and rawly honest It’ll Always Ache. It sounds like something that might have come out of Manchester in the late 80s or early 90s but with musical references and more obvious inspirations of a couple of decades later. There is some fine shade and ascerbic wit across the album but in the end it’s about seeking the authentic in experiences and embracing one’s own feelings as valid and does so with passion and playfulness.

Friday | 07.01
What: Spyderland video/EP release w/Machu Linea and Random Temple
When: 8 p.m.
Where: The Skylark Lounge/Bobcat Room
Why: Spyderland is an electro pop duo comprised of Marie Litton and Drew McClellan. The two have been veterans of the Denver underground scene for years and to their credit this project is really unlike anything else they’ve done. Rather, they’ve taken their strengths as artists and applied then to crafting a different style of music meaning an experimental form of pop that can at times be a bit downtempo but with a spirited sense of play running through how they spark off each other as performers. It comes off as a bit of a musical dialogue which lends itself to a body of imaginative and fresh songwriting. For this show Spyderland is releasing a new animated video and its new EP. Machu Linea is a likeminded artist who can often be seen DJing around town but it turns out Armando Garibay has a gift for assembling beats and sounds that transform popular styles into something far more inventive. The 2020 album HeXotica showcased Garibay’s range as an artist and collaborator with some of the most talented artists in the local hip-hop and electronic music scenes. Random Temple has been in various types of bands over the years but under this moniker his ambient and IDM music freely weaves together textures, tones and even musical structures as a way to deconstruct conventions of genre.

sleepdial in June 2022, photo by Tom Murphy

Monday | 07.04
What: Zach Rowden, Terravault Network, Tripp Nasty and sleepdial
When: 9 p.m.
Where: Glob
Why: Zach Rowden is a member of collaborative improvisational project Crazy Doberman that began life as a series of collaborations with John Olson of Wolf Eyes fame. But since its inception in the late 2010s Crazy Doberman has had a prolific output of recordings. Under his own name or with Tongue Depressor Rowden has been running experiments in texture and environmental sounds as they intersect with a hypnotic, almost ritualistic form of ambient. Terravault Network is Eli Windler (Spectral Voice, City Hunter, No Thought and others) and Kevin Wesley (Hot White) making industrial ambient soundscapes that sound like abstracted and processed environmental field recordings at a distance from an active factory late night near the train tracks and processed to preserve rhythms and an enigmatic mood. Tripp Nasty has had quite the eclectic run of music experiments over the years from modern classical music to performance art, weirdo punk and now an almost academic analog/modular synth composition project that he recently displayed opening for legendary avant-garde musician William Basinski. Sleepdial is Luke Thinnes’ musical alter ego to French Kettle Station. Whereas the latter pushes the boundaries of electronic dance music and new age pop, the former is Tim Hecker-esque textured ambient music that layers subtle running pulses and flowing drifts of white noise and purely abstract melody that conveys a sense of endless space and wonder.

Tuesday | 07.05
What: Darkest Hour w/Toxic Holocaust and Necropanther
When: 7 p.m.
Where: The Marquis Theater
Why: Darkest Hour from Washington D.C. has been evolving its particular flavor of melodic death metal mixed with post-hardcore since its inception in 1995. Its epic guitar progressions and apocalyptic visual style makes the band sound and look like something from the near future after the fallout of the collapse of worldwide civilization as we know it has been sorted out. This tour represents the group’s first with new lead guitarist Nico Santora and Darkest Hour will perform its 2007 album Deliver Us in its entirety and subsequent to the tour the group will return to the studio to record its tenth album. Opening the show is blackened death thrash mutants Necropanther from Denver as well as veteran thrash band Toxic Holocaust from Portland, Oregon whose own music has more than a leg in hardcore and grind as evidenced by its blast beats fused with acidic, Venom-esque menace.

Grief Ritual October 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Tuesday | 07.05
What: Under the Pier, The God Awful Truth, Vexing and Grief Ritual
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Under the Pier is a math-y post-hardcore outfit from Baltimore whose songs feel chaotic even as they are guided by a bizarre precision of execution. Vexing from Denver is difficult to pin down even though it clearly has roots in extreme metal and post-hardcore mainly because it also comes off like a grindcore band that’s dialing back the onslaught a little to let sounds hang in the air and hit you differently than a persistent force. Makes its gruff vocals and mathematically precise accents in a riff seem more nuanced and creative. Grief Ritual is going through some transitions since long time guitarist Mykel Monroe is departing but this may be a last chance to check out his guitar wizardry with Grief Ritual. Its own hardcore stylings have a brutal elegance from guitar pyrotechnics, to finely executed, cathartic vocals to surprisingly spare yet interlocking rhythms that allow for the songs to switch moods and focus of forcefulness with great flexibility. Its most recent album The Gallows Laugh may be more in the realm of metallic hardcore but has the beautifully confrontational and caustic quality of a melodic black metal record.

Wednesday | 07.06
What: Puscifer w/Moodie Black
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Puscifer is Maynard James Keenan’s vehicle for a plethora of creative musical ideas that don’t really fit in with the art prog of his more famous band Tool. So he’s been able to infuse it with some of his more innovative experiments in sound and theatrical performance. The group hasn’t toured the U.S.A. since 2016 and reports of shows and footage that has made it onto the internet reveals what you might hope for and expect with elaborate sets and Maynard performing almost like a cosmic variety show host and his cohort of weirdos. The most recent Puscifer album Existential Reckoning (2020) must have been a head scratcher for anyone expecting industrial rock or hard rock in general. Its extensive and evocative use of synths and other keyboards as the drivers of melody and dramatic vocals is tempting to compare to something Peter Gabriel might be doing now but also not unlike something Gary Numan might do and really one of the most sonically fascinating records of Keenan’s career thus far.

Thursday | 07.07
What: The Pine Hill Haints w/Glueman and George Cessna
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: The Pine Hill Haints from Auburn, Alabama perform fairly traditional bluegrass and folky country with great the intensity and energy. Fans of rockabilly will probably appreciate what the Haints have to offer but its music also seems just slightly out of frame of normalcy to be interesting. Opening the show is George Cessna whose 2021 album Lucky Rider is a beautifully and paradoxically warmly haunting piece of work that transcends “alt-country” into the realm of slowcore and pastoral, Lanois-esque Americana that feels like reading an idiosyncratic noir novel comprised of impressionistic vignettes about navigating a culture and society in decline and trying to do something worthwhile with integrity in spite of one’s personal limitations and the weight of one’s history and attachment to tradition and sentimental notions.

Friday – Sunday | 07.08 – 07.10
What: Compost Heap Music Festival V
When: 3-11 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: Can’t sum up why better than the verbiage from the FB event below which includes set times and other information.

“It’s happening again! July 8th, 9th, and 10th! One of the biggest temporary DIY music festivals you’ll ever see! Three days of great music from underground bands from across the nation and local support that you may have never heard of but you will definitely love!

ACCESSIBILITY INFO: This event will be wheelchair accessible. ADA portapotty onsite. Proof of vaccination is required. Masks are strongly encouraged. Denver will be hot and dry, dress in breathable and moisture wicking clothing and avoid dark colors. There will be shade provided and cooling misting fans throughout the day. This event will be live-streamed.
We created this festival with a goal, it’s organized to center and amplify the music and art of marginalized folks, and to celebrate radical perspectives and ideologies in general. It’s focus is to try and raise awareness about oppressive institutions that stunt our ability to flourish as individuals and communities, and to come together to resist against them for our collective liberation, express solidarity and make some new friends.

FRIDAY, JULY 8TH
4:00-4:25 Team Nonexistent
4:35-5:00 Mx Wander (PA)
5:10-5:35 Old Scratch & The Holy Mess (AZ)
5:45-6:10 Bird Teeth (WA)
6:20-6:45 Chatterbox and the Latter Day Satanists
6:55-7:20 Endless, Nameless
7:30-7:55 Gutter Town (AZ)
8:05-8:30 Fables of the Fall
8:40-9:05 Shooting Tsars (TX)
9:15-9:45 RAT BATH (WI)
10:00-10:30 Ceschi Ramos (CT)
10:45-11:15 Crow Cavalier

SATURDAY, JULY 9TH
3:00-4:00 OPEN MIC
4:00-4:25 Marissa.
4:35-5:00 Loud in the Morning (WA)
5:10-5:35 Sunnnner
5:45-6:10 HappyHappy (IN)
6:20-6:45 Fruiting Body of the Larger
6:55-7:20 Straight Line Arrival (ND)
7:30-7:55 Gila Teen
8:05-8:30 Danbert Nobacon (WA) (x Chumbawamba)
8:40-9:05 Ludlow (OR)
9:15-9:45 Self Neglect (NM)
10:00-10:30 Lo Cash Ninjas (NN)
10:45-11:15 Doom Scroll

SUNDAY, JULY 10TH
3:00-4:00 OPEN MIC
4:00-4:25 The Michael Character (MA)
4:35-5:00 Rumbletramp (NC)
5:10-5:35 Hello the Camp (ID)
5:45-6:10 Helga Pataki
6:20-6:45 Gone Full Heathen
6:55-7:20 The Ragetones
7:30-7:55 Mr. Atomic
8:05-8:30 Dana Skully and the Tiger Sharks (IN)
8:40-9:05 Caustic Soda
9:15-9:45 Noogy (TX)
10:00-10:30 Plasma Canvas
10:45-11:15 Anxiety Cat (LA) (x Taxpayers)

Compost Heap music festival is a not-for-profit event. All festival revenue will be used to pay touring bands, or donated to the Harm Reduction Action Center in honor of Marci, a dear friend who is no longer with us. Thank you for your support.

$45-75 suggested donation for a weekend (3 day) pass

$20-25 suggested donation for a day pass

+$5 SEVENTH CIRCLE MEMBERSHIP FEE (if you don’t have one already): In order to attend any event at the venue you must posses a membership card. This helps 7C stay afloat and protects them from getting shut down, help keep DIY alive in Denver!

If you would like to pre-order your weekend pass, please email us @ compostheap2022@gmail.com (please put “Compost Heap 2022 pass” in the subject line) You should get an immediate response, but if for some reason you don’t, please email wormfooddiy@gmail.com instead.”

Saturday | 07.09
What: Derek Monypeny w/New Standards Men, Sex Funeral and Pythian Whispers
When: 2 p.m.
Where: Mutiny Information Café
Why: Derek Monypeny is coming from communing with the Methuselah tree to bring his accumulated musical wisdom fostered while living in Joshua Tree. Think drone and “free jazz” if you were hanging with Alejandro Jodorowsky and Werner Herzog. Sex Funeral brings their celebration of the transmogrification of tantric rites through the necromantic meditation practices cultivated in secret sites in southern Iowa. The manifestation of these mystical energies will emerge as improvisational ritual drone for guitar and electronics. New Standards Men are fresh off a sabbatical merging analog synth and guitar as synth alchemy as structured exercises based on the deep secret knowledge shared by Robert Moog, Don Buchla and Morton Subotnick as conducted by Terry Riley. And probably opening this afternoon of high psychedelic frequency modulation is Pythian Whispers. Lore has it the three early members of the band that wrote and performed the album The Dark Edge of Hippie Life met on a mountaintop, perhaps at Machu Picchu, perhaps at Alamut Castle, perhaps in the secret chamber below the skeletons of ancient trees at the top of Mount Evans. Whatever the truth might be and whatever arcane secrets of improvisational music learned it will be unleashed in short form by those ragged vagabonds of psych prog ambient. So what do you have to lose and trust me everything of something to gain? Probably donation based. We’ll see if Jodorowsky can come from Paris to do tarot readings for the event but no promises. Tamam shud.

Sunday | 07.10
What: Skeleton and Hulder
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Austin’s Skeleton started out as a hardcore band but has since its 2014 inception morphed into something that has clear sonic roots in thrash and black metal. Its 2020 self-titled album is too slow to be some kind of crossover thing but not slow enough to be some kind of doom project. Its blunt yet jagged riffs are reminiscent of early thrash but without be defined by that aesthetic. Also on the bill is HULDER whose own black metal style weaves together an elegant classical music sensibility with a refined black metal onslaught that reaches epic peaks of evocative and gritty atmospheres like the elevated subjects of her songs. The new album The Eternal Fanfare finds HULDER expanding her sonic palette so that melody and texture seem to work in perfect tandem to cinematic effect like scoring the saga of an ancient heroic journey to the underworld and back.

duck turnstone, December 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Monday | 07.11
What: TV Star w/Broken Record, Flor De La Luna and Duck Turnstone
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: TV Star from Seattle apparently aimed at being somewhere between the sound of dysfunctional era The Brian Jonestown Massacre and the more dream pop period of The Jesus and Mary Chain. But it ended up more in the realm of late period Sarah Records jangle pop with delicate melodies and warm vocals. Denver’s “Flora de la Luna” talks about being a “tough guy boy band” but really sounds more like an angsty power pop band with really tight songwriting and enough sneer to keep it from being safe. Maybe that’s what they meant by the whole “tough guy” thing that one presumes was a more humorous and ironic thing you write about your band as an inside joke. Broken Record also from Denver is like if an emo band discovered Dinosaur Jr and didn’t shed some of its roots including drawing some slight inspiration from Rainer Maria. duck turnstone is the band fronted by Melissa K. Jones who moved to Denver in 2018 with her then partner, apparently had an ugly break-up, and then shortly thereafter the pandemic happened and she had the opportunity to pour some of her heartbreak into writing music that in 2021 she was able to turn into a full band shortly after she released the album Howling & Crying under her own name. The album is a collection of vivid and delicate portraits of human vulnerability and exploring the nuances of rebuilding your life on your own terms. The live band is more in the power/indie pop vein.

Tuesday | 07.12
What: Kill You Club Presents: Haunt Me w/Weathered Statues, S!ntax and Precious Blood
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Glob
Why: Haunt Me is a post-punk/darkwave band from Austin whose 2021 album This Sadness Never Ends had some familiar hallmarks of the genre with the spidery guitar melodies and Paul Banks-esque vocals. But Haunt Me tends to switch up the rhythms and dynamics in unexpected ways and never full stays the same vibe for the whole song thus setting itself apart from many of its peers. Weathered Statues is a post-punk band from Denver with roots in the local punk scene. S!ntax is an industrial noise project with some grounding in confrontational performance art.

Tuesday and Wednesday | 07.12 and 07.13
What: The Airborne Toxic Event w/Mondo Cozmo
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Ogden Theatre
Why: [Rescheduled from April 2022] Joshua Ostrander aka Mondo Cozmo made a name for himself as the frontman for Laguardia in the the first half of the 2000s and then for a decade as the lead singer for Eastern Conference Champions. But since 2015 he has been recording and performing under the Mondo Cozmo moniker and crafting heartfelt and genre eclectic music. His new album, 2022’s This Is For The Barbarians takes Ostrander deep into his roots in rebellious folk artists like Bob Dylan and his more experimental electronic interests at the same time. The album is like a Radiohead album but more informed by folk and more overtly pop but with the appropriately rough around the edges quality to suit the times that surrounded the process of writing the songs with Ostrander commenting on the highs and very low depths of the world in the past half decade and his insight into personal psychology and the American zeitgeist is as cathartic as it is inspirational. And yes, opening for Toxic Airborne Event whose own long career of luminously gritty alternative rock has garnered a bit of a cult following. Its 2020 album Hollywood Park, sharing the title with singer Mikel Jollett’s memoir of the same name from the same year, was unsurprisingly as literarily as musically as poignant album as any in the group’s career to date and certainly seemingly its most personal.

Wednesday | 07.13
What: The Black Keys w/Band of Horses and Ceramic Animal
When: 6 p.m.
Where: Red Rocks
Why: When The Black Keys started out of Akron, Ohio in 2001 it seemed very much like a niche, blues rock outfit like the lesser cousin of The White Stripes. When the duo first rolled through Denver it played small venues like Lion’s Lair where it opened for Reverend Dead Eye. But Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney stuck it out and developed their sound and songwriting and transformed what was likely a stripped down initial configuration into something more akin to a minimalist funk phenomenon as embodied well by its 2022 album Dropout Boogie. With the expansion of sounds and textures for the album the touring line-up of the band is also much more expansive than the core of Auerbach and Carney that will showcase how The Black Keys are a bit like a blues based rock version of ELO which is no bad thing. Opening is the well-known indie rock power pop group Band of Horses whose expansive songwriting is irresistibly uplifting especially its 2006 hit “The Funeral.” The proceedings will begin with a set from Ceramic Animal whose Dan Auerbach produced new album Sweet Unknown is brimming with warmly melancholic songs informed by a poignantly tangible sense of loss and reconciliation with emotional devastation and the inadequacy with which life and culture prepares one for the loss of the most significant people in your life.

Ceramic Animal, photo by Up in Smoke Photo

Elizabeth Colour Wheel in 2019, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 07.15
What: Primitive Man w/INDIAN, Jarhead Fertilizer, Body Void, Spirit Possession and Elizabeth Colour Wheel
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: Primitive Man assembled one of the most interesting lineups of heavy music you’re likely to see in Denver all year in celebration of its 10 year anniversary as a band. The death-grind trio has long created some of the most brutal, crushing and exciting music of the past decade obliterating the line between noise, extreme metal and doom while making commentary on a world all but ruined by international corruption and collusion in diminishing the lives of everyone below the 1% of the 1% of the economic and political power scale in ways deranged and in the end self-destructive. It’s cathartic stuff and in its sharp edges and raw ugliness holds a mirror up to the world we all feel hitting us but may not see or hear concentrated so powerfully in one place. It will also be one of the few times to see the band locally for a good deal of time to come. Chicago’s INDIAN has for nearly 20 years crafted a sound that wouldn’t be out of step with what one hears out of a band on Amphetamine Reptile or Touch and Go but with more sludge rock flavor and songs that go in for a more fluid and wide ranging dynamism than most bands that get lumped in with the canon of doom. Elizabeth Colour Wheel is a startlingly energetic fusion of a noisy shoegaze band and a grindcore outfit as unlikely as that combination sounds. Body Void’s ominous, clashing guitar and drum interplay has a somehow both feral and elegant quality that lends the desperate, distorted vocals an elevated outrage and pain like a harsh noise duo using more standard instrumentation to deliver a dense, caustic and textural soundscape.

Knuckle Pups in October 2021, photo by Tom Murphy

Friday | 07.15
What: Knuckle Pups “TV Ready” album release w/Jeff Cormack of South of France and Earth to Luna
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Mercury Café
Why: Knuckle Pups is an indie pop band that has been around for a few years but which is finally putting out its debut album TV Ready. Oliver Holloway was once a member of the great folk punk band The Fainting Fansies that used to hold shows at a place where some or all of the band members lived back when people could rent out a house in neglected or underutilized houses or buildings in Denver. That time in deep, DIY “Old Denver” days has stuck with Holloway and Knuckle Pups isn’t a band short on charmingly earnest expressions of joy helped by the fact that the group’s multiple singers harmonize extraordinarily well.

Saturday | 07.16
What: The Velveteers w/Sky Creature and Holographic American
When: 2 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: This is probably the smallest venue you’re going to see The Velveteers play for some time. The band that has taken a foundation of a modern interpretation of classic blues rock and infused it with sharply observed lyrics, imagination and youthful energy has been and will go to keep touring with Greta Van Fleet and playing big cities and the hinterland to large crowds. And that will be quite a contrast with Queens, NY-based experimental pop band Sky Creature whose new album Bear Mountain is exuberant and ethereal and by all indications mostly electronic. Majel Connery has a voice that is both intense and fey which suits being paired with music that sounds like something you’d want to hear if you could travel to a museum of snow globes and spend time in each exploring the worlds of which each gives you a surface level taste. It’s otherworldly stuff and has a cool energy that will be welcome on what is likely to be a hot day in Denver. Holographic American is a trio consisting of guitarist Caleb Tardio formerly of math rock wizard weirdos I Sank Molly Brown and currently of doom metal greats NightWraith and drummer Matt Grizzell who some may know for his time with prog indie band Alan Alda and indie rockers Instant Empire along with bassist Owen Pearson. So of course it’s a little different with some of that math rock vibe in its songs thus far released in demo form but moody and delicately and intricately yet not busily melodic.

Green Typewriters in 2011, photo by Tom Murphy

Saturday | 07.16
What: Green Typewriters album release w/Falcon’s Eye
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Enigma Bazaar
Why: After fifteen years the psychedelic indiepop band Green Typerwriters are finally releasing its debut EP The Solar Anus which brings together musical ideas across its entire existence for a beautifully coherent and moving experimental pop album with as much wisdom as whimsy. Engineered and produced by Zach Bauer, one of Denver’s secret, genius pop songwriters and recordists, who most that know who he is know for having been a member of avant noise punks Zombie Zombie, stoner doom trio The Outer Neon, psychedelic post-punk art rock band Wicked Phoenix and Can tribute band Future Days. Among others. So you know the album is going to sound good and for the show the band is bringing in guests and making it the kind of show that you’re not going to get to see every day. Look out for the Queen City Sounds Podcast episode featuring Gioja and Jared Lacy from the band.

Saturday | 07.16
What: Emerald Siam, Cyclo Sonic and Bridey Murphy
When: 8 p.m.
Where: 1010 Workshop
Why: Denver is fortunate that some of its elder statesmen and stateswomen are still out there making valid, interesting and imaginative music. So Emerald Siam and its flood of brooding atmospherics and rich emotional colorings help to turn finely honed songwriting into something that seems larger than life and will seem like you’re getting to see something mythical outside at 1010 Workshop. The band’s blend of post-punk darkness and the way The Church took that framework into a more psychedelic and expansive realm of music as a platform for telling meaningful stories with arrestingly poetic lyrics. Cyclo Sonic may be basically a garage rock punk band but when it’s Matt Bischoff formerly of The Fluid and Arnie Beckman formerly of Choosey Mothers and other luminaries of the local punk scene the songwriting just hits as stronger and the precision of rhythm pushed forward and working in tandem with a ferocious energy it makes a lot of other operating in a similar realm of music seem quaint. Bridey Murphy includes Jay Tonne (Black Forest Fire), John Call (Baldo Rex, Veronica), Rich Groskopf (Boss 302, The Black Smiths, The New Idols etc.), Collette St. Clair and Dave Harrison so it’s going to not be short on rock theater and surprisingly fun songs in the garage rock and soul vein.

Saturday | 07.16
What: Cola w/Voight and Gazes
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Cola consists of Tim Darcy and Ben Stidworthy formerly of great now defunct Canadian post-punk band Ought along with Evan Cartwright. When Ought split in 2021 ending a decade-long run as one of the more interesting and inventive guitar rock bands of recent years Cola came along shortly after and its 2022 debut album Deep In View (Fire Talk) with its offbeat song structures and hypnotic rhythms will appeal to fans of Ought for sure but also anyone who appreciates the art rock proclivities of a band like Pile. Voight may still be a guitar band at this point and not yet committed to being a full-on dark techno and power electronics project so you’ll get to see the post-punk/darkwave band scorch the rafters with its own intense and emotionally charged music. This is the first Gazes show and it features former Tyto Alba members Melanie Steinway and Andrew Bair along with former Male Blonding vocalist/guitarist Noah Simons. It’s a curse to call a band a supergroup but considering the membership of Gazes expect great things in a vein that will fit in with this bill overall.

Saturday | 07.16
What: Itchy-O’s Tetrapolar Purification Ceremony w/BleakHeart
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Fillmore Auditorium
Why: Itchy-O has seemingly found ways to imbue its few shows on the large scale with an aspect of the mystical and tie it to a new dimension of the band’s sound and performance. This time the Tetrapolar Purification Ceremony will signal the debut of the SÖM SÄPTÄLAHN, a massive instrument inspired by the gamelan assembled from over six hundred pounds of cynbals and gongs donated from local percussionists and crafted in collaboration with the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, a prestigious academic institution that specializes in geology and engineering. The show will include an audience participation aspect involving three elemental themes of Fire, Air and Water. Perhaps the fourth in the “tetrapolar” theme of earth is the SÖM SÄPTÄLAHN itself. For Patreon supporters of the band there will be a ticket giveaway to an “augmented reality scavenger hunt.” It’s always an extravaganza of sights and sounds and with the addition of the new instrument it’s going to be a new era for the band that has consistently found ways to augment already familiar elements in new ways with new ritualistic creativity.

Wednesday | 07.20
What: Steve Von Till and Helen Money
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Globe Hall
Why: Steve Von Till is the charismatic singer and guitarist from influential post-metal band Neurosis. Anyone familiar with the long arc of stylistic experiments in that band will probably appreciate what Von Till has done as a solo artist. His raspy vocals often sound like they’re harboring haunted memories and a flood of emotion that he has released in focused, cathartic bursts. His most recent albums No Wilderness Deep Enough (2020) and A Deep Voiceless Wilderness showcase the songwriter’s ear for organic song structure like his instrumentation is a direct reflection of the moods and feelings as weather patterns that swirl around you when you take a long period to reflect deeply on life and the often hidden wells of emotions you neglect as you spiral through life in a cultural hellscape that does little to nurture our humanity. Alison Chesley as Helen Money has contributed imaginative and evocative cello work for the likes of Bob Mould, Mono, Russian Circles, Broken Social Scene, Chris Connelly and Thalia Zedek. But her own arresting compositions have a stark yet maximalist beauty. With her cello, a spare chain of effects and a looping pedal, Chesley creates an orchestra of one that is both surprisingly heavy and elegantly ethereal, imbued with the compositional architecture of classical music. Her most recent album Atomic (Thrill Jockey, 2020) likely didn’t get the proper presentation as Von Till’s own most recent records didn’t and the sets of both artists seem like the perfect complement to each other’s.

Wednesday | 07.20
What: French Police w/Wisteria and Julian St. Nightmare
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: French Police from Chicago have a brooding and delicate, darkly melodic sound like they dug deep into Italian and Russian post-punk of the 80s and wrote a set of songs in a cold apartment and had to do so through headphones so as not to get a noise complaint from a neighbor. That’s probably not how the music came about but it has that intimate and mildly claustrophobic quality that is also part of its downtempo charm. Wisteria from Los Angeles seems to have come out of a similar process of crafting the darkwave equivalent of bedroom pop with a thin synth sound that is somehow also evocative in a tender way that is a bit like one imagines what would have happened had New Order had to construct its music given similar limitations on writing the music. Julian St. Nightmare is a great example of when people discover an eclectic musical palette at a young age and find a way to integrate it all into a coherent and vibrant sound so you hear in its songs the influence of surf rock, Molchat Doma and The Cure—all performed with a for now self-effacing confidence and charm.

Friday | 07.22
What: CXCXCX w/Occidental, Perdi La Luz, K129, Organ and DJ Precious Blood
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: This is a Plains Archaic showcase featuring artists affiliated with the Denver-based experimental music label. CXCXCX seamlessly blends noise, techno and power electronics for a sound like dance music for a crumbling civilization. Occidental was once and may still be affiliated with the electronic music collective Deep Club that used to hold some of the most interesting and well curated underground techno and deep house and other forward thinking electronic music events in Denver for a few years. His own sound is more like a fusion of deep house and trance. Perdi La Luz is reminiscent of the kind of fluid and psychedelic techno one heard on some edges of what Underworld and Future Sound of London were doing in the late 90s. K129 plugs some well processed organic percussive sounds into a beat heavy techno mix. Organ is a collaboration between glitch techno noise artist Cremedelacrvvp and industrial glitchcore ambient artist Kid Mask. DJ Precious Blood recently did a solid post-punk set at a Kill You Club event for the Haunt You show but for this event we may hear some deep recent techno and IDM cuts.

Friday | 07.22
What: Vinny Golia w/SeFaLoCo
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Atlas Theater (709 16th St. Greeley)
Why: Vinny Golia is a prolific and respected multi-instrumentalist and composer whose career has fused world music, modern classical music and avant-garde jazz. A specialist in woodwinds Golia’s work has been featured in performance with the likes of Anthony Braxton, John Zorn, Patti Smith, Eugene Chadbourne, Lydia Lunch and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. He has led ensembles as small as the trio that will perform a series of three shows in eastern Colorado (this date in Greeley and others listed below) to the 50-piece Vinny Golia Large Ensemble. His music in both the small and larger format are vehicles for his imaginative musicianship with musical ideas that span more broadly and deeply than most musicians will ever attempt. Even in his 70s Golia has been an innovator in the use of texture and atmosphere and his 2020 album Music for Gongs, Singing Bowls and other Metallaphones is like the lost soundtrack for an elevated horror masterpiece (there’s even a song called “King of the Spanish Horror Movies”) while also sounding like a nod to Alex North’s score for 2001: A Space Odyssey and Penderecki. Not many free jazz masters of Golia’s stature roll through Colorado and this series of intimate shows might be a good time to catch him live.

Polly Urethane in May 2022, photo by Tom Murphy

Saturday | 07.23
What: Multidim Records Presents Listening Lawn II: DJ Ilind, Polly Urethane, Deb the Demo, Luke Leavitt, H-Lite and Entrancer
When: 5-8 p.m.
Where: Carpio Sanguinette Park
Why: Multidim has been releasing some of the most forward thinking electronic music of the past few years and this showcase held at the Carpio Sanguinette Park includes a DJ set from avant-garde noise and techo artist Isaac Linder as Ilind, a purportedly more mellow performance from Polly Urethane whose recent live sets have been a bravura display of the blending of contemporary classical, industrial noise and the avant-garde, Deb the Demo’s tracks capture the mood of the modern media environment with both playful and urgent pieces of techno house that really push the brain beyond preconceptions of the genre and the methods of emotional expression, Luke Leavitt is always doing something different and even though many may know him for the expanded Afrobeat No Wave of his time as Cop Circles there will be a conceptual aspect to his performance with an intentional discipline behind the making of sounds, H-Lite has made some bright and upbeat electronic downtempo glitchcore bangers but his own sonic palette is also so broad and imaginative he’ll bring surprises too and of course Entrancer has been steadily refining and expanding his own craft of techno utilizing analog synths and a visionary challenging of where he’s already been as an artist.

Saturday | 07.23
What: Dust City Opera
When: 9 p.m.
Where: Broadway Roxy
Why: Albuquerque’s Dust City Opera recently released its latest album Alien Summer and perhaps fortuitously making a stop during an unusual summer in Denver and elsewhere with heat waves and social turmoil brewing. So the band’s theatrical performance of songs that sound like a colorful manifestation of years spent taking in campy science fiction and horror cinema and taking away from it all the inspiration to craft songs that don’t fit neatly into a trendy genre. The songs on the album is like a collection of poignant and poetic stories of human life even when the setting is a zombie apocalypse or an encounter with aliens. The pure amalgamation of chamber pop, indie folk and a hard rock edge in the guitar convey a cinematic feel that draws you in for the duration. Intimate and epic the miniature grunge and indiepop orchestra of Dust City Opera is something unique in an era of too much bland imitation.

Saturday | 07.23
What: Vinny Golia w/SeFaLoCo
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Muse Performance Space (Lafayette)
Why: See above for more on Vinny Golia.

Sunday | 07.24
What: Vinny Golia Trio
When: 2 p.m.
Where: Art Lab (Fort Collins)
Why: See above for more on Vinny Golia.

Goo Goo Dolls, photo by Claire Marie Vogel

Wednesday | 07.27
What: Goo Goo Dolls w/Blue October
Where: Red Rocks
Why: Goo Goo Dolls became a bit of a household name in the 90s due to hit songs like “Name” (1995) and of course “Iris” (1998). But the band originally from Buffalo, New York garnered a bit of a cult following during its early punk and then more power pop years for its potent blend of tunefulness, grit and raw emotional honesty. The group lead by singers John Rzeznik and Robby Takac has made a career of writing evocative songs about relationships, life and finding essential meanings in all of it so that even its ballads, love them or not, are not generally trite or without insightful commentary. The group’s latest album Chaos in Bloom, the first produced by Rzeznik, is definitely more in the realm of modern pop but if you watch the video for “Yeah, I Like You” you can hear more than a touch of that early punk rock verve and sharply observed social and personal commentary that sets it apart from a lot modern pop rock with undeniable instrumental hooks to pair with energetic vocal harmonies. But if you go it seems like there’s a better than average chance the Goo Goo Dolls will dip into its back catalog and not just the biggest hits.

Roselit Bone, photo from roselitbone.com

Wednesday | 07.27
What: Roselit Bone w/Snakes and No Gossip In Braille
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Portland, Oregon-based Roselit Bone fronted by trans singer Charlotte McCaslin is somehow a rockabilly band, dark Americana, Mexican ranchera and whatever one might call the likes of Gun Club, The Blasters and Lone Justice. It’s a really different take on genre bending so that it can seem like some countrified folk but with the intensity of punk without the sonic trappings. Its most recent album Crisis Actor is a little more gentle in tenor but not in attitude and its songs of daily struggle and working class politics are poignant and powerful. Snakes similarly has the kind of frayed musical roots that bring together a variety of musical instincts in forming its own dark Americana informed by nuanced thinking on the ways one has conversations with oneself in an ongoing process of sorting out the oftentimes perverse misfortunes and charmed moments in life. It’s lively music but more philosophical than expected from music that has a similar flavor. No Gossip in Braille is decidedly not Americana but its ethereal post-punk comes from a similar emotional place in exploring and making meaning of experiences that hit us as vital whatever their essential and specific impact on our lives.

Thursday | 07.28
What: Black Star w/Dead Prez, Pharoahe Monch and TH1RT3EN
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: Yasin Bey and Talib Kweli were already stars of hip-hop in their own right when they formed Black Star in 1997 named after a shipping company founded by Pan-Africanist political activist Marcus Garvey. The project’s debut album Mos Def & Talib Kweli Are Black Star (1998) was pretty much an instant classic with thoughtful explorations of black culture with beats more in line with late-80s and early 90s hip-hop with a creative and vivid use of jazz and funk samples as well as more unique sounds that framed the powerful lyrics well in establishing a mood with cinematic resonance. Afterward the duo released a single here and there while focusing on other musical and creative endeavors. But in 2022 Black Star released its most recent record No Fear of Time. The almost existentialist bent of the lyrics remained but seemingly more direct and with music more stark yet no less imaginative and immersive. Black Star has toured in the last 25 years but not often and somehow its music seems even more relevant in subject matter today.

Thursday | 07.28
What: Lost Network, Blackcell and DJ Mudwulf
When: 9 p.m.
Where: Mercury Café
Why: Lost Network might be considered an industrial rock band but more on the industrial side and plenty of its output is more in the realm of darkly ambient soundscapes. Though its guitar sound is more cutting and its sound often more jagged, fans of The Tea Party may find what this veteran band out of the Denver scene has been doing for years. Also on the bill is long-running, legendary EBM band Blackcell whose sharp social commentary and personal songwriting blurs the line between ambient music and classic EBM the first wave of which it emerged out of the tail end. Of course DJ Mudwulf will bring a set of songs that are well curated and also not 100% predictable. A lot of music out of the Goth-industrial world can be corny but that won’t be on display at this show.

Saturday | 07.30
What: TRAITRS w/Radio Scarlet and Wingtips and DJ Luci Ghost
When: 8 p.m.
Where: Mercury Café
Why: Canadian post-punk band TRAITRS on its 2021 album Horses in the Abattoir separated itself from many bands out of that vein of music with creative vocals that don’t sound like a cut-rate imitation of any obvious influences. And its synth work and songwriting has an orchestral aesthetic that establishes a truly enveloping and haunting sound that isn’t driven by the wheedly guitar sound that is the hallmark of too much darkwave now. TRAITRS’ sound is rich and expansive and though melancholic isn’t a downer. Chicago’s Wingtips is more electronic and one hears in its music including 2021’s excellent Cutting Room Floor a touch of influence from Vince Clarke-period Depeche Mode. Its moody songs have strong dance beats and the vocals widely expressive also distinguishing the group from some of its peers that intentionally sing in ways murky and obscure. There is something effusive in Wingtips’ songs that are immediately striking. Radio Scalet is a death rock band from Denver. The title of its 2017 album Too Goth for Punk, Too Punk for Goth sums up its aesthetic well and sure these people look the part but there is a joyful element to its performances that prevents it from slipping into the wrong end of dour. DJ Luci Ghost is a long time DJ in the local Goth-industrial scene but fortunately for anyone that is around for one of her sets her taste is much more eclectic and expansive beyond narrow conceptions of expected music.

Best Shows in Denver 12/26/19 – 12/31/19

Thursday | December 26

Sliver_Mar31_2019_TomMurphy — Sliver, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Sliver w/Sad Bug, The Slacks, Forla De La Luna, Black & White Motion Picture
When: Thursday, 12.26, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Lately Sliver frontperson Chris Mercer has been taking vocal lessons from Ed Sheerhan so that they could stop “sounding like I’m totally ripping off Eddie Vedder.” While their songwriting reveals a deep affection for the Everclear catalog the band tries to steer Mercer away from their dreams of having “basically a Silverchair tribute band.” See for yourself if any of this is true tonight.

What: Nektromantic w/Juliet Mission and Plague Garden
When: Thursday, 12.26, 9 p.m.
Where: Shag Lounge
Why: Nekromantic is the bi-monthly post-punk and darkwave night at the Shag Lounge but in the new year those nights will be the second and third Thursday and another night at the Skylark to be announced soon. This evening’s schedule includes a rare live band showcase with Juliet Mission, a post-punk band with roots in the late 80s and early 90s Denver underground scene as all three members were in an early line-up of jazz-inflected shoegaze band Sympathy F. Plague Garden is the post-punk side project of the members of eHpH and Paul Baker of Red Wing Black Bird.

What: Homegrown
When: Thursday, 12.26, 8 p.m.
Where: Grafenberg Sketch Comedy And Improv Theater
Why: This is a live performance from Homegrown, a comedy troupe consisting of contributors of some of the best current comedy television series running with Anne Lane (Rick and Morty), Betsy Sodaro (Disjoined and Bob’s Burgers) and Haley Mancini (Shameless and Powerpuff Girls). Opening the night are Justin Franzen, Nick Ross and Max Schwarz opening

What: Slynger w/Vic N’ The Narwhals and George Cessna
When: Thursday, 12.26,7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge

Friday | December 27

GreenDruid_Jul21_2018_TomMurphy — Green Druid (older), photo by Tom Murphy

What: Green Druid w/Scepter of Eligos and Tricoma
When: Friday, 12.27, 8 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Sludge metal night at Lost Lake. Green Druid is more on the psych end of doom and Tricoma on the black metal end of the same.

Saturday | December 28

DeVotchKa_2_by_Jen_Rosenstein — DeVotchKa, photo by Jen Rosenstein

What: DeVotchKa w/The Copper Children
When: Saturday, 12.28, 7 p.m.
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: First of two year end shows for Denver-based, dark cabaret band DeVotchKa who have recently come back from a several years of hiatus in releasing new music with 2018’s excellent This Night Falls Forever. The band has been through several permutations of its development as a creative group from the “gypsy punk” phase early on to its now more orchestral, grand melodrama and broad emotional expression.

What: Velnias w/Gruesome Relics, Fell Harvest
When: Saturday, 12.28, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

What: The Born Readies, Elektric Animals and The Ghoulies
When: Saturday, 12.28, 8 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake

Monday | December 30

KidCongoPowersAndPinkMonkeyBirds_Feb3_2014_TomMurphy — Kid Congo Powers & Pink Monkey Birds circa 2014, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Slim Cessna’s Auto Club w/Kid Congo & The Pink Monkey Birds and Hang Rounders
When: Monday, 12.30, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Slim Cessna’s Auto Club is continuing its tradition of New Year’s Eve shows across two nights starting on this date with the same bill both nights. The Denver-based band is part Vaudeville act and dramatic, countrified post-punk with its stylized and compelling live show. Also on the bill is Kid Congo Powers’ classic Chicano rock band. Powers was once a member of Gun Club, The Cramps and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds but with the Pink Monkey Birds he’s able to shape that into his own musical vision steeped in the aforementioned and glam rock. Hang Rounders is an unabashedly classic country band with a modern flavor.

What: Fuzzy J w/Chris Shrift and Kali Krone
When: Monday, 12.30, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake

Tuesday | December 31

ChimneyChoir_030219-139 — Chimney Choir, photo courtesy the artists

What: Chimney Choir (light shadow) album release party
When: Tuesday, 12.31, 9 p.m.
Where: Mercury Café
Why: Avant-garde pop group Chimney Choir is releasing its latest album (light shadow) tonight and as per usual, you’re in for the kind of show that pretty much no one else is doing and which will involve multi-media, physical props, costumes and more than likely some inspired audience participation aspect just for this show, probably never to be repeated again.

What: Slim Cessna’s Auto Club w/Kid Congo & The Pink Monkey Birds and Hang Rounders
When: Tuesday, 12.31, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

What: Devotchka w/Banshee Tree and Kiltro
When: Saturday, 12.28, 7 p.m.
Where: Bluebird Theater

Best Shows in Denver 11/14/19 – 11/20/19

NoSwoon_JackieWolf — **No Swoon performs at Rhinoceropolis on Novembe 16**

Thursday | November 14

ChurchFire_Dec29_2019_TomMurphy — Church Fire, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Church Fire
When: Thursday, 11.14, 6:30 p.m.
Where: Ross-Broadway Library
Why: Denver-based synth-noise-pop doom darlings Church Fire are playing this event sponsored by Titwrench as part of its Surfacing series highlighting female and LGBTQ underground and experimental artists. It’s after hours at the library in the Baker District and free.

What: Roller Disco 3
When: Thursday, 11.14, 9 p.m. – 2 a.m.
Where: Roller City

What: JP Harris w/Bison Bone, White Rose Motor Oil
When: Thursday, 11.14, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

Friday | November 15

Whippoorwill_photo5byGlennRoss — Whipporwill, photo by Glenn Ross

What: Whipporwill w/Courtney Hartman
When: Friday, 11.15, 6 p.m.
Where: Washington’s (Fort Collins)
Why: Fort Collins based alternative folk band Whippoorwill distilled its past few years of experiencing the turmoil of the land and the culture into its new album The Nature of Storms. On its 2017 tour the band experienced tornadoes, floods, forest fires, blizzards and the destructive nature of the Trump presidency itself and the polarized social and political climate surrounding it. With the personal lives of its members in disarray as well the trio pulled together and crafted one of the most affecting releases of the year that exceeds expectations for terms like “alternative folk” as the band seems to be channeling the pain and agony of the times into songs that if not exactly exorcising those emotions, brings a compassionate energy to the proceedings. This show celebrates the release of that record and hopefully soon the band will play regional shows in support followed by a tour soon enough.

What: Entrancer LP release Downgrade, Lone Dancer, Techno Allah, Felix Fast4ward, DJ ilind
When: Friday, 11.15, 9:30 p.m.
Where: Rhinoceropolis
Why: It’s been a couple of years or since Denver-based analog synth/techno composer Entrancer has released an album but his latest release on Multidim Records, Downgrade, shows where deep house could go if it followed a more conceptual pathway with a spirit of playfulness.

What: Noise Vs. Doom IV
When: Friday, 11.15, 7 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: This is the fourth edition of the Noise Vs. Doom event featuring bands that fall loosely into either category. Tonight’s lineup includes Denver noise legends Page 27, doom collective Ice Troll and avant-garde composer Victoria Lundy. Schedule below.

Clark Nova 6-615
Ice Troll 6:30 -6:50
minus X 7:00 – 7:20
Prayer Hands 7:30 -7:50
Haunted Sound Lab 8pm -8:20
Distance Research 8:30-9:00pm
9:15-9:45 Victoria Lundy
10-10:20 Page 27
10:30-11pm Deer Creek

DJ sets PterrorFranklin Soundsystem
(Frank Bell / James Jewkes )

What: Specific Ocean, Panther Martin, Amazing Adventures
When: Friday, 11.15, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake

What: The Kinky Fingers, Serpentfoot, TOOMUCHBLOND and Funk Hunk
When: Friday, 11.15, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

What: Kiltro w/Spirettes and Turvy Organ
When: Friday, 11.15, 8:30 p.m.
Where: Broadway Roxy

What: Pink Fuzz EP release w/21 Taras and Star Garbage
When: Friday, 11.15, 8 p.m.
Where: Silo Sound Recording Studio

Saturday | November 16

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA — Action Friend circa August 2006, photo by Tom Murphy

What: No Swoon, Kissing Party and Voight
When: Saturday, 11.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Rhinoceropolis
Why: No Swoon’s recently released self-titled full length is an example of how 2010s darkwave as evolved beyond the obvious classic reference points into the realm of sophisticated pop songcraft. Its vibrant tones and sense of sonic space is reminiscent of Chromatics but not tapping into feelings of nostalgia as much as a reflective yearning and introspection. Kissing Party is an indie pop band from Denver that has reliably been releasing quality material since the mid-2000s seeming to perpetually be able to draw on a sense of youthful romance and ideal love. Voight has been performing its brand of industrial post-punk noise-gaze since 2015 and is in the process of completing its new album due out in 2020.

What: GYES: Lady Gang, Preparation and Gothsta
When: Saturday, 11.16, 8 p.m.
Where: The People’s Building
Why: The final Get Your Ears Swoll at the People’s Building in Aurora featuring experimental loop and psychedelic folk artist/one-woman band Lady Gang and Gothsta who plays truly unusual covers in a playful style that lives up to the name. The latter is organizer Claudia Woodman who will rename the event for the same location on a different day of the month in 2020.

What: Hi-Dive 16th (and 7th) anniversary w/Wobbles, Rattlesnake Milk, Zebroids, George Cessna, Permanent Boner and DJ Marika
When: Saturday, 11.16, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Hard to believe the H-Dive has been around for sixteen years at this point but it remains a place to see some of Denver’s best underground bands and up and coming artists from around the world. This show brings together stalwarts of the club including Zebroids who are more an obnoxious collective of yobs than strictly a ridiculous but oddly good punk band and George Cessna whose sonically inventive songwriting blows expectations of the son of Slim Cessna in a great way.

What: Noise vs. Doom IV
When: Saturday, 11.16, 8 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: Second night of Noise Vs. Doom with performances from vinyl-collage sound processor Atari, ambient noise sculptor Blank Human and experimental noise rock prog punk band Action Friend from Los Angeles, formerly from Denver. This evening’s schedule below.

6pm-6:20 Jochanaan
6:30 -6:50 Mismo
7-7:30 Mautam
7:45 -8:05 Atari
8:15- 8:35 Flood Ov Blood
8:45 -8:55 – DJ Yeldarb Franklin
9-9:20 Clutch Plague
9:30-9:50 Voideater
10-10:20 Blank Human
10:30 -10:50 Cosmic Abyss
11pm Action Friend (Los Angeles CA)
DJ sets Mudwulf + Dj Zombie

What: DBUK
When: Saturday, 11.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Tuft Theater at Swallow Hill

Sunday | November 17

Vetiver_01_Alissa-Anderson — Vetiver, photo by Alissa Anderson

What: Vetiver w/Joe Sampson
When: Saturday, 11.16, 8 p.m.
Where: Ophelia’s Electric Soap Box
Why: Before it became very much a part of the current stream of “indie” music, Andy Cabic was crafting exquisite psych folk songs that incorporated electronic elements in a fully integrated way. His 2019 album Up On High is a fairly stripped down affair but the delicately intricate rhythms and textures with Cabic’s expressive vocals are still there creating an unconventionally atmospheric quality akin to something one might have heard on a Byrds or early Dead record. Maybe something Mitch Easter would have produced in the 80s. But the sensibility is very modern and its emotional immediacy is immediately compelling. Opening the show is Joe Sampson, one of Denver’s most gifted songwriters who some may remember from his days in A Dog Paloma but in the last decade plus he’s been woodshedding his own material while also having played in Bad Weather California.

What: An Evening With Bruce Cockburn
When: Saturday, 11.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Boulder Theater

What: Gort Vs. Goom, Toxi Wife, Trip Lip and Blacker Face (Chicago)
When: Saturday, 11.16, 8 p.m.
Where: Lion’s Lair

Monday | November 18

ASAPFerg_2018_TomMurphy — A$AP Ferg circa 2018, photo by Tom Murphy

What: A$AP Ferg and Ski Mask the Slump God w/Murda Beatz, MadeinTYO, Pouya, Danny Towers, DJ Scheme
When: Monday, 11.18, 6 p.m.
Where: Mission Ballroom
Why: A$AP Ferg is one of the most influential and creative artists in the world of trap and Ski Mask the Slump God is one of the great innovators in that genre but one who incorporates even more elements of punk and metal into his animated material and performances. Sometimes live rap shows are disappointing but this should very much be an exception.

Tuesday | November 19

Nots_Jun5_2015_TomMurphy — Nots circa 2015, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Nots, Slugger and Dearborn
When: Tuesday, 11.19, 8 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Nots is the noise punk band from Memphis, Tennessee that is currently touring in support of its new album 3 out on Goner Records. Guitarist and singer Natalie Hoffman was once the bass player of Ex-Cult where she stood out as a charismatic performer with wiry energy in a band not short on those qualities.

What: Wilco w/Tuomo and Markus
When: Tuesday, 11.19, 6:30 p.m.
Where: Mission Ballroom

Wednesday | November 20

Helmet_pictures_copyright earMUSIC_credit Jacob Blickenstaff — Helmet, photo by Jacob Blickenstaff, copyright earMUSIC

What: An Evening With Helmet
When: Wednesday, 11.20, 7 p.m.
Where: Summit Music Hall
Why: Helmet is the legendary noise rock/posthardcore band from New York whose 1992 album Meantime yielded a hit single “Unsung” during that period when anything a little different stood a chance of making it to the radio. The group’s blunt and angular riffs and aggressive groove has proven influential on a certain segment of heavy music since.

What: Slayer w/Ministry and Phil Anselmo and the Illegals
When: Wednesday, 11.20, 8 p.m.
Where: Broadmoor World Arena

Best Shows in Denver 10/10/19 – 10/16/19

Sleater-Kinney_NikkoLaMere — **Sleater-Kinney performs Sunday 10/13 at The Ogden Theatre. Photo by Nikko LaMere**

Thursday | October 10

JoshuaTrinidad_Jun29_2019_TomMurphy — Joshua Trinidad, photo by Tom Murphy

What: The Comet is Coming w/Joshua Trinidad
When: Thursday, 10.10, 7 p.m.
Where: Globe Hall
Why: The Comet is Coming is a London-based trio whose synthesis of jazz, Afrobeat and electronic music is true improvisational kosmische for the modern era. Its two 2019 albums Trust In the Lifeforce of the Deep Mystery and The Afterlife take you on a journey to the outer edges of inner space with soundscapes that wouldn’t be out of place on the long running NPR ambient program Hearts of Space or in a musical realm of the 1970s where Tangerine Dream, Fela Kuti and Gong played the same circuit and mutually influenced each other. So who from Denver could open for this outfit? Only one name really comes to mind and that’s jazz scientist improviser supreme, Joshua Trinidad and his own daring displays of mind-altering sonic experimentalism within an expanded realm of jazz.

What: Cécile McLorin Savant
When: Thursday, 10.10, 6:30-10 p.m.
Where: Dazzle
Why: Cécile McLorin Savant brings major late night vibes to this other great jazz show in Denver tonight. She takes feelings and stretches them out into a form more easily comprehended than the sometimes gnarled shapes they can take in our hearts. She gives them an air of elegance and soulful comprehension they deserve and interprets them back in her soaring, sonorous voice.

What: Vic N’ The Narwhals w/Claire Morales, Easy Lovin’, The Rewind and 21 Taras
When: Thursday, 10.10, 7 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

Friday | October 11

AdiaVictoria_2019_ShervinLainez — Adia Victoria, photo courtesy the artist

What: Tank & The Bangas w/Adia Victoria
When: Friday, 10.11, 7 p.m.
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Adia Victoria’s 2016 album Beyond the Bloodhounds introduced the world to the songwriter’s brooding, expressive, bluesy songwriting. Her 2019 album Silences finds Victoria expanding her sound, now operating in a realm somewhere between Rubblebucket’s soulful pop and Nick Cave’s smoldering intensity. Tank and The Bangas’ hybrid of hip-hop, jazz and R&B is deeply eclectic, lively, layered and uplifting in a way that feels sincere and wholesome without being hokey or self-righteous.

What: Cadaver Dog Japan tour kickoff w/Nekrofilth, Videodrome, Chair of Torture and Pontius Pilate
When: Friday, 10.11, 7 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective

What: ’68 w/The Inspector Cluzo, The Messenger Birds, Plastic Daggers
When: Friday, 10.11, 7 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

What: Gun Street Ghost, Ryann Lee, George Cessna
When: Friday, 10.11, 7 p.m.
Where: 3 Kings Tavern

Saturday | October 12

MuscleBeach_Oct4_2018_TomMurphy — Muscle Beach, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Muscle Beach w/Palehorse/Palerider, Church Fire and Simulators
When: Saturday, 10.12, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: It’s been a few years since the release of Muscle Beach’s self-titled album. But that time has seemingly been spent honing its sharp edges and wiry and explosive dynamics. Now we have Charms, the new full-length being released at this show. Each track has the irreverently humorous and surreal titles you’d hope a band that sounds like a barely controlled psychotic break with every track would have to let you know that this music is an outlet for the kind of frustration and outrage that is part of everyday life these days. “Ballistic Medicine,” “Rage Charles,” “Swim Team Six,” “When Horns Grow Teeth”? Crazy stuff and the sort of precise yet unhinged post-hardcore that is easy to get wrong. The band’s shows are supercharged and dynamic minus any of the machismo the genre can indulge in too often. But Muscle Beach has never fit neatly into a genre and in its clashing crashing sound there is mood and moments of introspection spliced together with angst blown out into shards of pure catharsis. And the bill is fortunately not a lot of music like that. Palehorse/Palerider is like a doom band gone into some pagan tribal version of industrial space rock. Church Fire is purging ritual, politically incendiary, darkwave dance pop. Simulators is thorny, angular, ebullient post-punk. Easily the local line-up of the week to catch a nice representative slice of Denver underground.

What: Cherubs w/Moon Pussy and Quits
When: Saturday, 10.12, 8 p.m.
Where: Moe’s Original BBQ
Why: Cherubs formed in 1991 in Austin, Texas and were plugged into the milieu of noisy, weirdo post-punk that one might have associated with the Amphetamine Reptile record label. Except that Cherubs were signed to Trance Syndicate, the label owned by Butthole Surfers’ drummer King Coffey. Think something like Jesus Lizard, Unsane and a doomier Failure. The band broke up in 1994 but came back together twenty years later and have been back to making heavy psychedelic music not much like anything else that overtly claims to mix either. Its new record, 2019’s Immaculada High, is a colossal slab of disorienting riffs and surreal imagery. Opening are two of Denver’s own finest noise rock outfits. Moon Pussy is a trio who improbably combine fluid dynamics with sharp edged soundscaping and emotionally exorcistic vocals. Quits includes current and former members of Denver noise rock legends Git Some, Hot White and Sparkles.

What: Stiff Little Fingers w/The Avengers
When: Saturday, 10.12, 7 p.m.
Where: Gothic Theatre
Why: Stiff Little Fingers from Belfast, Ireland and The Avengers from San Francisco, USA formed the same year, 1977. The Avengers even opened for the Sex Pistols at their final show at Winterland in 1978. Both bands had significant releases in 1979 and Stiff Little Fingers’ Inflammable Material took the subject of the “Troubles” in Northern Ireland at the time as a through line for the songs and their stark depiction of life in their hometown and the violence and political oppression then hitting hard. The Avengers’ self-titled EP minced no words on critiquing American culture and racism. Seems the subject matter of their songs are all too relevant again so this tour together is timely.

What: Zizia, Ryan Mcryhew and Ryan Seward
When: Saturday, 10.12, 7:30-10 p.m.
Where: Glitter City Nights
Why: Zizia is Amber Wolfe and Jarrod Fowler who perform a kind of environmental audio experience. Like ambient but it brings in field recordings that bring a sense of place with more traditional instruments and sound-making objects for a unique listening experience. Ryan Mcryhew has performed as Entrancer making forward thinking electronic dance music with modular synths and he is currently expanding his methods to explore the possibilities of those methods in expressing ideas and concepts beyond the purely artistic. Ryan Seward is an avant-garde, improvisational percussionist who for this show will perform Michael Pisaro’s 2011 composition, “A drum acted upon by friction, gravity and electricity.”

Starcrawler_Autumn_de_Wilde — Starcrawler, photo by Autumn de Wilde

What: Starcrawler w/Poppy Jean Crawford and Pink Fuzz
When: Saturday, 10.12, 8 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: On the Starcrawler’s latest album Devour You, the band’s fetchingly fuzzy punk reaches new heights as the group expands its song dynamics and refining its fiery delivery and mixture of distorted and clean sounds across the board. The crashing atonality the group is willing to entertain in the new batch of songs delivers on the promise of its earlier efforts as it moves beyond the sort of sludgy post-grunge doom pop that rightfully garnered it attention as a band to watch with a charismatic frontwoman in Arrow de Wilde.

What: Tank & The Bangas w/Adia Victoria
When: Saturday, 10.12, 7 p.m.
Where: Fox Theatre

What: Digable Planets w/5ve and GaDJet
When: Saturday, 10.12, 8:30 p.m.
Where: Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox

What: The Heroine, Tokyo Rodeo, Lost Relics and Stone Deaf
When: Saturday, 10.12, 8 p.m.
Where: 3 Kings Tavern

What: Heavy Shit at Streets: Messiahvore, Never Kenezzard, Sounds Like Words, Audio Dream Sister
When: Saturday, 10.12, 8 p.m.
Where: Streets Denver

Sunday | October 13

ron_pope_the_nighthawks3_NicoleMago2 — Ron Pope, photo by Nicole Mago

What: Sleater-Kinney w/Joseph Keckler
When: Sunday, 10.13, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: In the mid-90s Sleater-Kinney brought some raw emotional power and intellect to its wiry post-punk and spent the next twenty plus years or so refining that vision and making poignant and inspiring social commentary about what you can aspire to and achieve as a woman in a culture hostile to your dreams. The trio touring for the first time without long time drummer Janet Weiss, and with new drummer Angie Boylan, is taking the music of it’s latest album, the St. Vincent produced The Center Won’t Hold.

What: Ron Pope
When: Sunday, 10.13, 6 p.m.
Where: eTown Hall
Why: Ron Pope is a prolific songwriter from Marietta, Georgia who now calls Nashville home. In a city with numerous singer-songwriters, Pope has stood out with his keen ear for hearing and articulating the thoughts and feelings of the most lonesome times in your life when you’re in your own head sorting through and processing the feelings you don’t often get to when you’re meeting the demand on your psyche of everyday life. His introspective lens and ability to communicate that interiority in a relatable way can be heard across his catalog of spare yet evocative songwriting.

What: Preening, Horse Girl, Harms, Fragrant Mummery
When: Sunday, 10.13, 9 p.m.
Where: Rhinoceropolis

What: Jeremy Porter and the Tucos, The Born Readies, Television Generation
When: Sunday, 10.13, 9 p.m.
Where: 3 Kings Tavern

Tuesday | October 15

ChameleonsVox_Sep13_2017_TomMurphy — Chameleons Vox circa 2017, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Chameleons Vox and Theatre of Hate and Jay Aston
When: Tuesday, 10.15, 7 p.m.
Where: Herman’s Hideaway
Why: Chameleons Vox is Mark Burgess, iconic vocalist of Manchester-based post-punk band The Chameleons (in the USA often as The Chameleons UK) who started up in 1981 and whose deeply atmospheric and emotionally raw songs were a major influence on most of the shoegaze bands of the late 80s and beyond with echoes of influence reverberating throughout the post-punk revival of the 1990s and early 2000s to the darkwave of the past decade. Socially critical and thought-provoking, The Chameleons’ body of work had plenty of style but as a kind of compelling delivery system for psychically nourishing content.

What: The Rifle, Pure Weed, Jess Parsons and Bellhoss
When: Tuesday, 10.15, 9 p.m.
Where: Rhinoceropolis

What: Too Many Zooz w/Thumpasaurus
When: Tuesday, 10.15, 7 p.m.
Where: The Bluebird Theater

Wednesday | October 16

NashvillePussy_Sep23_2011_TomMurphy — Nashville Pussy circa 2011, photo by Tom Murphy

What: Big K.R.I.T. W/Rapsody and Domani Harris
When: Wednesday, 10.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Cervantes’ Masterpiece Ballroom

What: Nashville Pussy w/Wild Call and Last Rhino
When: Wednesday, 10.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake

Best Shows in Denver 4/11/19 – 4/17/19

EarlSweatshirt_Steven Traylor — **Earl Sweatshirt at Cervantes’ Masterpiece Ballroom on April 11, photo by Steven Traylor**

Thursday | April 11

BrotherSaturn_Feb25_2018_TomMurphy — Brother Saturn, photo by Tom Murphy

Who: Earl Sweatshirt & Friends w/Bbymutha and Liv.e
When: Thursday, 04.11, 8 p.m.
Where: Cervantes’ Masterpiece Ballroom
Why: Earl Sweatshirt released his first mixtape, Kitchen Cutlery, under the name Sly Tendencies in 2008 when he was just fourteen years old. Within a year he was contacted by Tyler, the Creator, who was a fan and changed his performance/musical moniker to what it is now. Born Thebe Neruda Kgositsile, the son of an American law professor and a South African poet and political activist, Sweatshirt has created some of the most sonically inventive and thought-provoking hip-hop of the past decade. He got a bump up early on due to his association and work with Odd Future but his solo albums from 2013’s Doris onward revealed an artist in touch with and non-judgmental toward the deeper regions of his psyche and whose imagination and musical instincts have never been narrowed down to how ideas and sounds fit into established channels of expression. The 2015 album I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside lives up to the suggestion of the title and probably won’t be played at many parties. But it’s a record that dives deep with an uncompromising search for something real and something that can cut through the haze of our world overstimulated by blandness broadcasted as exciting. 2018’s Some Rap Songs has brighter atmospheres but the words manage to plumb personal darkness further. The production, though, is reminiscent of Black Moth Super Rainbow in its sampling of sounds and music in a highly refined collage of feelings and imagery that fizz and fade out in perfect orchestration with the complimentary layers of rhythm and poetry.

Who: Life After Earth and Brother Saturn
When: Thursday, 04.11, 6:30 p.m.
Where: Hooked On Colfax
Why: Guess this edition of the Speakeasy Series hosted by Glasss Records could be called An Evening With Drew Miller. Life After Earth is Miller’s darker electro ambient project while Brother Saturn’s gorgeously gauzy, guitar-driven, ambient post-rock is decidedly brighter and more uplifting.

Who: Slow Magic w/Covex
When: Thursday, 04.11, 8:30 p.m.
Where: Fox Theatre

Who: Dead Characters, Obtuse, Bernie & The Wolf Rita Rita, Fragile Fires
When: Thursday, 04.11, 7 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective

Who: Great Falls w/False Cathedrals, Muscle Beach, Fathers
When: Thursday, 04.11, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive

Who: Blacc Rabbit w/Shark Dreams and Jeff Cormack
When: Thursday, 04.11, 7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge

Friday | April 12

lusine_sarah_m_686x320 — Lusine, photo by Sarah M

What: Double-Ply Translucent Caterpillar #5
When: Friday, 04.12, 8 p.m.
Where: Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox
Why: The free jazz improv prog fusion all-star extravaganza is back (sans the late, great, Ikey Owens who was a regular back in the day) but rather than at DIY space Unit E, at Ophelia’s. Includes members of Rubedo, Holophrase, déCollage, Wheelchair Sports Camp, Kendrick Lamar’s band and The Other Black.

Who: Lusine w/Milky.wav and Snubluck
When: Friday, 04.12, 8 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Jeff McIlwain has produced a consistently interesting, evolving body of work as Lusine for twenty years. Combining samples that contain elements of physical sound (chains, chimes, bells, other objects truck for textural qualities) into his beats and soundscaping, McIlwain’s songs truly transport the listener to a place that is both unknown and yet ineffably tangible.

Who: Memorybell, Sine Mountain, Mosh
When: Friday, 04.12, 9 p.m.
Where: Tandem Bar
Why: With Memorybell, Grant Outerbridge is able to use his mastery of piano beyond his classical training to craft evocative, minimalist compositions that suggest an intimate familiarity with doubt, unease and the overwhelming demands of modern life and how to untangle that with songs that transcend such contexts by subtly coaxing you lateral thinking and feeling.

Saturday | April 13

JaneSiberry-courtesyArtist — Jane Siberry, photo courtesy the artist

Who: DBUK and Norman Westberg w/George Cessna
When: Saturday, 04.13, 8 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Denver Broncos UK is basically the alter ego of Slim Cessna’s Auto Club but one that is moodier, less upbeat and post-punk in the sense as, say, Shriekback, Crime and the City Solution and New Model Army, all of whom incorporated elements of folk, a sense of brooding introspection and a broad array of musical ideas to tell stories that many of their contemporaries weren’t. In 2019 DBUK released Songs Nine Through Sixteen, the follow up to its fantastic 2015 album titled, what else, Songs One Through Eight. For this show the band is joined by Slim’s talented son and experimental singer-songwriter George Cessna as well as Norman Westberg, the legendary SWANS guitarist whose solo output while not sprawling is always worth a listen and where he is able to demonstrate his interest in crafting unique atmospheres with guitar, banjo and drum machine. It might be described as ambient but the kind one might have to compare to the likes of Marisa Anderson or Helen Money.

Who: Get Your Ears Swoll 5: Meet the Giant, Gata Negra, The Jinjas
When: Saturday, 04.13, 7:30 p.m.
Where: People’s Building
Why: Everyone should get to experience Meet the Giant’s powerfully evocative dream pop. Maybe “pop” isn’t the word for it as its music borders on hard rock but informed by the aesthetics of electronic music and post-punk. And the raw emotional honesty of Mic Naranjo’s vocals transcends genre. Gata Negra is probably an anomaly now in Denver in that its blues-tinged music would have been considered alternative rock in the early 90s because it’s using that musical vocabulary in offbeat ways that allow for nuanced and poetic expressions of inner space.

Who: Jane Siberry w/Antonio Lopez
When: Saturday, 04.13, 7 p.m.
Where: Swallow Hill/Quinlan Cafe
Why: Jane Siberry is a Toronto-based singer-songwriter whose prolific career should be more well-known in America outside college radio in the 80s and 90s. Her lilting and melodious vocals and use of space and dynamics give her sometimes minimal elements an unconventional versatility and inventiveness. She has worked with Michael Brook, Brian Eno and Peter Gabriel. Her song “It Can’t Rain All the Time” was featured prominently in the film The Crow and other songs have been part of the soundtracks of the Wim Wenders films Until the End of the World and Faraway, So Close. Though typically conceptual in nature, both musically and in terms of her subject matter, Siberry’s songs are accessible and relatable in a way music that is more obviously experimental isn’t.

Who: Shana Cleveland (La Luz guitarist/singer) w/Down Time and Ryan Wong
When: Saturday, 04.13, 8 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Shana Cleveland’s sparkling and lush guitar work in La Luz is one of the reasons that band has never been stuck in some kind of throwback surf guitar thing. That and her introspective vocals that imbue her songs with an enviable mystique in modern music. Her debut solo album, 2019’s Worm Moon, is more ethereal than the music of La Luz but has the same entrancingly dusky quality that band exudes. Worm Moon may be more stripped down than what we’re used to hearing from Cleveland but it feels like we’re hearing her plumbing another layer of emotional depth in an already respectable musical career to date.

Who: Street Tombs (Santa Fe), Zygrot, Blood Loss and Secticide
When: Saturday, 04.13, 6 p.m.
Where: Chain Reaction Records
Why: It’s record store day and Chain Reaction Records, in Lakewood, is worth the trip particularly to get to see some of the best local and regional hardcore bands.

Sunday | April 14

Swervedriver_SteveGullick — Swervedriver, photo by Steve Gullick

Who: Swervedriver and Failure w/No Win
When: Sunday, 04.14, 6 p.m.
Where: Oriental Theater
Why: Before the word “alternative” was a clumsily and ubiquitously applied term for a broad swath of music that emerged out into mass public consciousness in the early 90s, a generation of bands inspired in part by underground music were already embodying music that seemed like a paradigm shift into something different from what was then most “commercially viable.” Swervedriver rumbled to life in Oxford, England in 1989 when sole original member and vocalist/guitarist Adam Franklin and some friends laid down the roots of the band based on songs Franklin had written after his former band Shake Appeal (a nod to the influence of the Stooges) disbanded. Perhaps the right place at the right time, the nascent Swervedriver knew Mark Gardner of Ride, also from Oxford, who gave their demo to Creation Records head Alan McGee who signed the group. Creation would become all but synonymous with “shoegaze.”

All the bands on Creation, pretty much, were sonically massive and shared similar influences but unlike brilliant, ethereal soundcapers Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine, Swervedriver had more traditionally hard rock underpinning to the songwriting and its sound seemed more gritty and distorted like some of its American counterparts in the USA who were already poised to turn the music industry on its head while cultural commentators and journalists struggled with an overarching term for that phenomenon. Swervedriver didn’t become a household name like Nirvana or Pearl Jam but its records have remained revered and influential. The group split in 1998 but reunited in 2008 and has since released two noteworthy records since in 2015 with I Wasn’t Born to Lose You and 2019’s Future Ruins. Like former labelmates Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine, Swervedriver wasn’t inclined to release a record that wasn’t worthy of its legacy.

Failure_PriscillaCScott — Failure, photo by Priscilla C Scott

In Los Angeles, Failure formed a year after Swervedriver in 1990 at the peak of the popularity of glam metal. Drummer Kellii Scott had grown up a fan of Rush and Iron Maiden and had been an avid live music fan in Los Angeles’ diverse musical world including taking in the sorts of shows at Gazzari’s and The Troubadour as one might have seen in Penelope Spheeris’ 1988 documentary The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years. But Scott’s eclectic musical tastes meant he was open to whatever seemed interesting or exciting. He was once the drummer of alternative funk band Liquid Jesus whose cover of “Stand” by Sly & The Family Stone appeared on the soundtrack to the 1990 film Pump Up the Volume and through that band and other projects Scott established himself as a talented drummer in town. He was alerted to auditions for a little known group called Failure which was in the process of recording what would be its 1994 album Magnified. When he heard the demos future bandmates Ken Andrews and Greg Edwards had recorded and was immediately struck by the songwriting and how fresh and different its approach to making the music seemed that he wanted to be part of the band.

Failure’s 1992 debut Comfort as well as early Sunny Day Real Estate songs seem obvious influences on midwest emo and post-hardcore by mixing strong melodies with noisy, urgent songwriting and nuanced emotional colorings in the lyrics and Andrews’ vocal delivery. But Magnified put bass at the center of the the instrumentation allowing for guitar to gyre out out in plasmic bursts as the drums kept the dynamics corralled even as each song threatened to careen off into chaos. The new style gave the music a cinematic quality that the band expanded upon greatly with its 1996 then swan song Fantastic Planet. On the latter, Failure prominently introduced piano and acoustic guitar to give its urgent juggernaut of sound another layer of detail, giving the songs some space, no joke intended for a space rock record, to come down from the emotional heights and extremes present across the thrilling but sometimes harrowing record.

Even with a few critically acclaimed albums under its belt and having played on the 1997 Lollapalooza tour, Failure split in 1997 citing personal differences. Which is perhaps inevitable given the time, the pressure, knowing that you made some of the cooler records of the era but without that propelling one into the mainstream. After the break-up all the members of the band went on to different projects that helped each develop new musical skills and cultivate creative interests that would go on to help make Failure an even better band when it reunited in 2013. Edwards formed the fantastic, experimental post-punk band Autolux. Guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen (who had joined after Fantastic Planet was in the can) went on to play in A Perfect Circle and now plays in Queens of the Stone Age (and hasn’t returned to Failure). Scott played in various bands including Blinker the Star, Veruca Salt and Enemy but also did studio sessions for Linda Perry including performances on tracks by Christina Aguilera and Courtney Love. He also did work on a recent Dr. Dre album. Andrews has becoming an in-demand producer and engineer whose work can be heard on songs and albums by Paramore, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and Chris Cornell.

After announcing a reunion with the classic lineup of Edwards, Andrews and Scott in late 2013, Failure played its first show in nearly 17 years in February 2014. Later that year Failure would tour the US including dates as part of Riot Fest. Fairly early on in that cycle of rehearsals and performances Failure wrote new material and released the Tree of Stars EP in May 2014 which included live tracks and the new song “Come Crashing.” But it wasn’t long before the band was preparing material for a new full-length, 2015’s sprawling The Heart is a Monster. The album demonstrated how far the band members had come individually as well as its chemistry as a collective. Arranged, produced and sequenced in an almost narrative fashion the albums songs work individually but taken as a whole like a collection of musical vignettes. While critical reception of the new Failure album was mixed it was obvious that there was still something there.

2018’s In the Future Your Body Will be The Furthest Thing From Your Mind was conceived and recorded in phases with three EPs released separately throughout that year and the complete album including the fourth EP released in November. Scott feels it’s the group’s best album and in terms of focus, utilizing the group’s complete skill set, sound palette and bringing to bear a mature, creative sensibility it’s hard to disagree unless one is burdened with the misguided, though often justified, conceit that a band does its best work on its first few albums. The new Failure album sounds like a band that has already been through the stage of discovering what it wants to be and rediscovered what it can be.

What: Kalyn4Mayor Battle of the Bands: Pay2Play Politics: Venus Cruz, Felix Ayodele, Church Fire, R A R E B Y R D $, Tammy Shine, Bolonium, Josh Blue, Chris Fonseca and Christine Buchele
When: Sunday, 04.14, 6 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Kalyn Heffernan is running to be mayor of Denver. As a producer and hip-hop MC with her band Wheelchair Sports Camp, Heffernan has demonstrated her imagination, talent and managerial skills. As an advocate for people with disabilities and queer youth, she has shown her ability to both reach out to and critique vested authority in a productive manner while not compromising her righteous mission. As mayor of Denver Heffernan will bring a much needed helping of good sense, pragmatism (you can’t navigate the world when you’re disabled without this quality), compassion, a knack for productive engagement, a knowledge of issues facing not just struggling populations and gentrification but the city as a whole as well as a love of the city and the people that make Denver a world class city. For this event Heffernan has brought together some friends to raise awareness of her candidacy and to raise funds for her campaign. All the bands are some of the most interesting acts in the Mile High City and the comedians among the town’s most talented.

Monday | April 15

exhex_michaellavine3 — Ex Hex, photo by Michael Lavine

Who: Ex Hex w/Moaning
When: Monday, 04.15, 7 p.m.
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: Ex Hex was probably not the kind of band anyone would have expected from Mary Timony. The wiry, noise post-punk of Autoclave, Helium’s evolving experiments in tone and concept, Timony’s widely different albums under her own name exposing different aspects of her talent as a musician and songwriter. Inventively angular, often utilizing lo-fi aesthetics to create a quality of mystery, Timony is one of the most interesting musicians of the past three decades. So with the second Ex Hex album, 2019’s It’s Real, Timony, Betsy Wright and Laura Harris have written songs that sound like they could have come out of a weird nexus of early 80s power pop, garage rock, new wave and hard rock. Huge, brash, riffs. Unabashedly bombastic hooks. Plenty of bands have drawn on that earlier era of rock for inspiration but too often it comes with embracing the regressive topics and sensibilities of that time as well. Not the case here. And none of the cheesy production. Just the unabashed joy but paired with a futuristic vision untethered from old school rock and roll cultural baggage. Also on the bill is Los Angeles-based noise rock band Moaning who sound, in the best way, like You’re Living All Over Me period Dinosaur Jr after immersing themselves in the Siltbreeze catalog. Meaning understated, emotionally demolished vocals and urgent, gritty melodies and an energetic live show.

Tuesday | April 16

Buke-and-Gase-self-portrait1 — Buke & Gase, self-portrait

Who: Yob w/Amenra and In the Company of Serpents
When: Tuesday, 04.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Marquis Theater
Why: Amenra is a Belgian metal band that has in its twenty year history helped to redefine what metal can be and sound like and embody the concept of heavy not just sonically but emotionally. Its blend of doom and ambient post-rock is well suited the dark, majestic outbursts threaded together with ethereal introductions, builds and interludes. Its full-length albums are titled Mass followed by a Roman Numeral indicating its sequence in the band’s catalog but also serves as a nod to chapters in the canonical works of a mystical sect. In The Company of Serpents recently overhauled its sound and while still well within the realm of extreme metal and doom, the songwriting bears some comparisons to artists that tap into a dark, forbidding blues. Like maybe Grant Netzorg listens to a bit of Nick Cave or later era Swans. Yob is the influential psych doom band from Eugene, Oregon. Influenced by, of course, Black Sabbath and imaginative art rock bands like King Crimson and Pink Floyd, Yob’s music is incredibly heavy but there’s a fluidity and playfulness to its songwriting and presentation that ultimately transforms that heaviness into something uplifting, like a purge of the detritus that plagues the mind due to the build-up of the unreasonable demands of everyday life in late capitalism America.

Who: Buke & Gase w/Like A Villain and Holophrase
When: Tuesday, 04.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Buke & Gase has always pushed boundaries in its exquisite use of unusual rhythms and otherworldly melodies. Its new album Scholars has the band absorbing mainstream and synth pop and transforming it to suit the group’s own sensibilities as only it can. And this whole bill is filled with vocalists who use their powerful voices as instuments in themselves. Holland Andrews of Like a Villain creates sound environments that recall the soundtracks to Michael Powell films or Diamanda Galas and Björk collaborating on music to accompany a Stanislaw Lem adaptation. Holophrase’s Malgorzata Stacha channels moods and modes seemingly directly from the unconscious and makes it work in the context of experimental downtempo music.

Who: Show Me The Body w/Euth, Law of the Night and TARGETS
When: Tuesday, 04.16, 7 p.m.
Where: Hi-Dive
Why: Show Me the Body from New York is technically a hardcore band but the vocal delivery sounds as much like what you’d expect as something from a weird hip-hop band. Fans of Sleaford Mods and IDLES will probably find a lot to like here though Show Me the Body is a bit darker than the aforementioned. The group recently released its 2019 sophomore album Dog Whistle.

Wednesday | April 17

HEALTH-credit-FaithCrawford-hires — HEALTH, photo by Faith Crawford

What: HEALTH w/Youth Code and French Kettle Station
When: Wednesday, 04.17, 7 p.m.
Where: Bluebird Theater
Why: With the 2019 release of Vol. 4 :: Slaves of Fear, its first since the departure of guitarist Jupiter Keyes, proves that the remaining trio still absorbs new musical ideas and applies them creatively in its sonic palette while experimenting with its own production and sound processing as it has since its inception. This time the 8-bit crushing, driving-yet-fluid noise rock and ghostly, pitch-shifted/autotuned vocals give the impression of being layers in a dance track. It’s even difficult to tell whether the drums are analog or not and if so processed or submixed to EQ in unconventional ways. Honestly, knowing either way is irrelevant to anyone but purists of any stripe and HEALTH is a band that ditched notions of purity in music as boring and perhaps quaint long ago. The element that separates this new album and its music from 2015’s Death Magic is an element of industrial beat making. Sure the group worked with French industrial synth phenom Perturbator but if that was an influence it’s been wholly absorbed and incorporated.

Considering HEALTH’s new sound it’s only fitting that it’s touring with Youth Code. Both from Los Angeles, Youth Code was one of the major bands that was part of the recent darkwave revival of the past decade. Its confrontational EBM had the sharp edges of a hardcore band but its emotional resonance has been much broader.

Opening the show is Denver’s French Kettle Station. Always an incredibly energetic and dynamic performer, some might think there’s something of an act to it all beyond it being a compelling element to a live show. But Luke Thinnes’ enthusiasm is sincere and his mixture of 80s adult contemporary, Talk Talk and Arthur Russell. Speaking of 80s adult contemporary, FKS has been on a bit of a Phil Collins kick of late and even sometimes covers one of his iconic songs live.

Best Shows in Denver 1/24/19 – 1/30/19

hackdepicciotto_sylviasteinhäuser — **hackedepicciotto performs January 30 with DBUK at Lost Lake. Photo by Sylvia Steinhäuser**

Thursday | January 24, 2019

meetthegiant3_may15_2018_tommurphy — Meet the Giant, photo by Tom Murphy

Who: Meet the Giant w/Dead Pay Rent, Mr. Atomic
When: Thursday, 01.24, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Meet the Giant, perhaps unintentionally, perhaps subconsciously, perhaps entirely by plan, has drawn on both 80s and 90s sounds at a time when the various aesthetics of those decades are firmly back in vogue. Downtempo, brooding post-punk, the rhythms of sample-driven composition and emotionally rich vocals make for a band that sounds instantly like something beyond having an appeal to nostalgia while drawing on a hint of that. The group spent nearly a decade honing its songcraft and chemistry as a unit and more than a small amount of the intimacy that comes out of such extended wood shedding comes through in the music like you’re getting to experience that connection that friends have who can share much with each other and be real. Many bands put on some kind of ego-driven facade fueled by a kind of borrowed rock and roll myth bravado. Meet the Giant comes about its rock and roll power honestly and with tender emotions laid bare, which is always more compelling than tough guy strutting any day of the week. Do yourself a favor and see them or at least check out their remarkable 2018 self-titled debut.

Who: DSTR, eHpH, Cutworm
When: Thursday, 01.24, 8 p.m.
Where: 3 Kings Tavern
Why: DSTR is Destroid, a project of Daniel Meyer who some may know more for his work as half of influential EBM band Haujobb. Distorted vocals, imaginative soundscaping, strong, pulsing beats and menacing, glitch-hazed atmospherics. Denver’s eHpH has been making an interesting hybrid of industrial rock and dark EBM of their own but refreshingly unlike any of their peers in the Mile High City. Cutworm is a bit of a left field choice for a bill like this if its 2018 Swallow EP is any indication with its sound being unfruitful in placing in a particular genre box. Its sounds range from modern downtempo darkwave to especially beautifully moody IDM. Live, though, Cutworm definitely brings the industrial edge into the production.

Friday | January 25, 2019

klausdafoe_nov10_2018_tommurphy — Klaus Dafoe, photo by Tom Murphy

Who: Red Tack, George Cessna and Blindrunner
When: Friday, 01.25, 9 p.m.
Where: Lion’s Lair
Why: Red Tack is the solo, somewhat weirdo singer-songwriter project of Ted Thacker who should be remembered widely for being in 90s alternative rock band Baldo Rex and later as a member of indiepop band Veronica. Whatever his pedigree, Thacker has remained one of Denver’s most interesting songwriters and personalities. George Cessna is the son of Slim Cessna of Auto Club fame. The younger Cessna’s own work is both not too surprising considering his father’s legendary musical legacy but he is far from a carbon copy and his use of raw sound and atmosphere in his recordings and his wide ranging musical style in a broader realm of Americana and weirdo folk is noteworthy on its own merits.

Who: faim (record release), Line Brawl, Euth, Moral Law and Targets
When: Friday, 01.25, 7 p.m.
Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective
Why: Hardcore band faim is releasing its latest seven inch through Convulse Records and celebrating the occasion with a few of Denver’s and Wyoming’s best hardcore acts.

Who: Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1 and 2
When: Friday, 01.25, 9:30 p.m.
Where: Sie Film Center
Why: Tobe Hooper passed away in 2017 leaving behind a legacy of unusual and influential films beginning, in terms of impact, with 1974’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre, a movie so graphically violent and darkly disturbing for the time, because it felt more like a documentary than the mostly tame horror cinema up to its release. In 1986 he released the sequel as a horrifying kind of parody. Between that, the 1982 Poltergeist film, 1985’s space vampire spectacle Lifeforce and numerous other films, Hooper’s unique cinematic vision will be celebrated for years to come including this month-long or so series hosted by Theresa Mercado kicking off this night on the director’s birthday.

Who: Flaural, Panther Martin and The Eye & The Arrow
When: Friday, 01.25, 8 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: The kind of line up you want to see more often in the realm of indie rock with Flaurel’s psychedelic pop, Panther Martin’s visionary lo-fi rock and The Eye & The Arrow’s re-working of Americana into something we’re not hearing ad infinitum on playlists and radio stations with a fairly vanilla stream of content.

Who: Klaus Dafoe, New Standards Men and Simulators
When: Friday, 01.25, 9 p.m.
Where: The Skylark Lounge
Why: Klaus Dafoe seems to be a sort of instrumental rebirth of late 90s to mid-2000s indie math rock but deconstructed to be more fractured and potentially more interesting than some of the bands mining that neo-mathcore/emo sound of late. Simulators are the kind of post-punk that carves out the overtly atmospheric quality for stark contrasts of tone and angular rhythms that somehow still flow without getting splintery and yet, despite that intentional minimalism, bursting with Bryon Parker’s raw emotional vocals.

Saturday | January 26, 2019

hippocampus-creditpoonehghana — Hippo Campus, photo by Pooneh Ghana

Who: Hippo Campus w/Now Now
When: Saturday, 01.26, 9 p.m.
Where: The Ogden
Why: Hippo Campus has been writing finely crafted pop songs since its early days and challenging itself to make each record reflect not just personal and creative growth, qualities you’d want in any band worth your continued attention, but an evolving approach to larger cultural narratives. The group’s 2018 album Bambi offers no pat answers or platitudes. It is a record brimming with questions instead of the instant opinion/instant expert tendency that permeates our culture from the way people interact and present themselves on social media and how one must conduct oneself in various contexts lest one be thought indecisive rather than recognizing and learning to identify nuance—not in a way to placate all sides but in order to avoid the hubris of being unaware of one’s own limitations of knowledge and comprehension. It can be enjoyed as just a solid pop album but there’s a great deal of dimensionality and content for anyone wanting to listen deeper.

Who: A Celebration of 1/26 with Weird Al Qaida, Gregory Ego and Mermalair
When: Saturday, 01.26, 7 p.m.
Where: Mutiny Information Café
Why: Weird Al Quaida is an avant-garde punk/noise/psychedelic band from Denver that doesn’t perform often. Definitely for fans of the more rock end of Sun City Girls.

Who: Space Jail, Snaggletoothe and Claudzilla
When: Saturday, 01.26, 7:30 p.m.
Where: The People’s Building
Why: Space Jail might be described as a psychedelic synth band. Snaggletoothe as psych prog. Claudzilla as a one-person keytar rock weirdo extravaganza. All in likely the only venue in Aurora where you might see music anywhere within he realm of these bands.

Who: Soulless Maneater, Sliver, Endless Nameless, Fox Moses, Equine
When: Saturday, 01.26, 9 p.m.
Where: 3 Kings Tavern
Why: Soulless Maneater is somewhere between the best death rock band in Denver and a moodily creepy doom band. Sliver is “Diet Nirvana.” Fox Moses sounds like a gloomier neo-grunge band and all the better for that. Endless Nameless sounds like a hybrid of math rock, shoegaze and post-rock—not that those are mutually exclusive concepts. Equine is the avant-guitar and synth solo project of former Epileptinomicon and Moth Eater guitarist Kevin Richards.

Sunday | January 27, 2019

sumac_annegodoneo — Sumac, photo by Anne Godoneo

Who: Sumac, Divide and Dissolve, Tashi Dorij
When: Sunday, 01.27, 7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Aaron Turner’s guitar work and songwriting in partnership with fellow musicians has helped to define some of the boundaries of the more experimental, heavy music. As the leader of Hydra Head Records he also encouraged the development of that music throughout the 90s and 2000s. As a member of Isis, Old Man Gloom and Mamiffer, to name a few projects, Turner has crafted consistently interesting material that is undeniably within the realm of metal but with an ear for abstracting sounds into noise and then back together into coherent expressions of emotion outside the realm of standard songwriting in the genre. With Sumac this may be especially so in particular the band’s 2018 album Love In Shadow where the trio takes the concept of love at its most primordial level pre-marketing device, pre-narrowing the concept down to a relatively trite, or at least limited, word casually thrown around. Also on this tour is Bhutanese guitarist Tashi Dorij whose noisescapes could be considered loosely as avant-garde but also seem to contain a kind of personal ritualistic expression. See his own 2018 album gàng lu khau chap ‘mi gera gi she an example of the sorts of music you’re in for during his set. Since Dorij and Turner have collaborated on at least one record maybe you’ll get to see some of that this night as well.

Tuesday | January 29, 2019

themaykit_jul25_2015_tommurphy — The Maykit circa 2015, photo by Tom Murphy

Who: Nadia Bolz-Weber – The Shameless Book Tour
When: Tuesday, 01.29, 7:30 p.m.
Where: Tattered Cover — Colfax
Why: Nadia Bolz-Weber is the activist and Lutheran pastor whose 2014 memoir Pastrix: the cranky, beautiful faith of a sinner & saint traced her personal growth from a kind of bohemian comedian to sober theology student and pastor. The book, brimming with irreverent humor and sarcasm as well as plenty of illuminating insights into human psychology, whether you’re Christian or not, struck a chord with a fairly sizable audience. In humanizing challenges many people face, Bolz-Weber made a good case for how we can embrace an expanded sense of our own best selves. In July 2018 left her pastoship of House for All Sinners and Saints in Denver, Colorado. Now she is releasing her new book Shameless: A Sexual Reformation. As a candid reexamination of “patriarchy, sex, and power” (from the Tattered Cover website), Bolz-Weber will likely further cement her reputation as something of a refreshingly maverick religious thinker and writer.

Who: Big Paleo album release w/Places Back Home, The Maykit and Quentin
When: Tuesday, 01.29, 7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: Denver-based math rock Big Paleo is releasing its, presumably, debut album. One of the opening bands, The Maykit, may not be math rock but its intricate musicianship and songwriting and Max Winne’s indisputably sincere vocal delivery will be a standout of the evening.

Wednesday | January 30, 2019

mallrat_photocredit_ michelle pitris — Mallrat, photo by Michelle Pitris

Who: Gnash w/Mallrat and Guardin
When: Wednesday, 01.30, 7 p.m.
Where: The Bluebird Theater
Why: Mallrat is Grace Shaw from Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. Since high school, Shaw has been writing sophisticated pop songs that bring together elements of electronic dance production, hip-hop style beats and the informal structure of modern indie rock—really an ideal synthesis and vehicle for expressing one’s ideas with nuance but a direct emotional quality. Her 2018 EP In The Sky is an interesting blend of contrasts: dusky atmospherics speckled with bright highlights, onomatopoeic cadences and vivid lyrics and soaring, saturated melodies dissolving into introspective minimalism. Headlining the show is Gnash, aka Garrett Nash, who released his debut full-length We on January 11, 2019. Nash made waves with his early breakup EPs and his far better than average beat-driven R&B.

Who: Hackedepicciotto w/DBUK
When: Wednesday, 01.30, 7 p.m.
Where: Lost Lake
Why: Hackedepicciotto is a multi-media, experimental music duo comprised of Danielle de Picciotto and Alexander Hacke. De Picciotto was one of the founders of the long-running electronic music festival The Love Parade in Berlin. The festival was initiated as celebration of innovative electronic music but also as a subversive kind of demonstration for peace through love and music. Hacke is the bassist for influential industrial band Einstürzende Neubauten. The aforementioned couldn’t completely encompass either artist’s work, output and collaborations and it would be worthwhile to explore their work in depth. But with this project the two bring together a set of skills in composition, performance, film making and storytelling. The word “immersive” gets thrown around a lot these days but it definitely applies to a Hackedepicciotto show. It isn’t just that the sound design and visuals and songwriting are striking, they are, it’s also because before it quite became a widely articulated phenomenon, de Picciotto, in her 2013/2015 graphic novel We Are Gypsies now vividly and powerfully captured what it’s like to be noteworthy, internationally renowned artists have to uproot from one’s home and home city of decades due to gentrification. Then, as explored in further detail on the 2016 album Perserverantia and 2017’s Menetekel how the way the world economy functions now globally has not only all but dismantled the way independent artists and not-so-independent artists can live, function and thrive. The albums alone are worthwhile experiences in the listening but the live show is where you truly get to experience a deep emotional manifestation of faith and hope nearly crushed by despair at the state of things supported by a drive to seek what must be better over the horizon. There is no naivete to the work, de Picciotto and Hacke both know they can never really regain what they once had, but a reminder that one’s compulsion to pursue one’s life work can be a beacon through difficult times. The duo’s latest release is the 2018 meditation soundtrack Joy.

Who: The Pink Spiders w/Television Generation and Smile Victoria
When: Wednesday, 01.30, 7 p.m.
Where: Larimer Lounge
Why: The Pink Spiders are a power pop band from Nashville who had a minor hit in 2006 with “Little Razorblade” from their Ric Ocasek-produced album Teenage Graffiti. Smile Victoria sounds like it’s still wearing its Pixies and others 90s alternative music fairly freshly. But not in the neo-grunge kind of way as the trio has more atmosphere and melody than some of its peers tapping into the same era. Television Generation somehow perfectly blends grunge with power pop without sounding like Nirvana or like Cheap Trick gone metal. Is there a bit of sonic DNA in there out of Love Battery and Buzzcocks? Probably but live the band has plenty of grit and emotional darkness to keep it from ever feeling derivative.