Denver’s premier left field music festival spanning weirdo heavy music to ambient, noise rock to post-hardcore and avant-pop among others runs Thursday August 26, 2026 through Sunday August 30, 2026 in various venues. Below is a brief description of the artists with links. For more information and to buy tickets please visit: ghostcanyonfest.com.
Holy Sons in 2011, photo by Tom Murphy
Th 08.27 at HQ doors 7pm Wax Trax Music Panel: DIY In the Age of Slop: A Discussion Sponsored by Smashed Plastic: Local music heads discuss the perilous future in the age of tech bro oligarch vampires. 7pm
Ryan Wong & Sunswept:A fusion of improvisational impulses weave together guitar and cosmic flute soundscapes. 8:45pm
The Gotobeds: Like a 90s K Records band fueled by a punk interpretation of C86. 8:30pm
Steve Von Till:Apocalyptic drone psych Americana from one of the founders of Neurosis. 10:30pm
claire rousay, photo by Katherine Squier
S 08.29 Bug Theate doors 12:30pm doors Nora Mal: Pastoral shoegaze from Salt Lake City joined by Chaz Prymek of Lake Mary and Mike Fuchs of Passive Tourist. 1pm
Shane Parish Plays Autechre Guitar: Improvisational guitar wizard interprets the electronic music and tonal detail of Autechre for acoustic instrumentation. 1:45pm
Daniel Higgs: Poet, mystic, visual artist and legendary singer/lyricist for Lungfish. Keen crafter of transcendent ambient psychedelia. 2:45pm
claire rousay: Masterful musique concrète ambient collage pop. 3:45pm
Moor Mother, photo by Ebru Yildiz
S 08.29 Hi-Dive 6pm doors Watch Yourself Die: Borderline terrifying confrontational performance art post-punk prog. 7pm
Blacks’ Myths: Free-associating free jazz and drone collage commentary on cultural historical moments. 7:45pm
ABANDONS: The sound of civilization collapsing and evolving into more exciting forms. 8:30pm
Water Damage:Organic motorik Neu!-esque drone rock featuring noteworthy members of Austin’s experimental scene including Thor Harris. 9:15pm
Moor Mother:Avant-garde free jazz noise and the poetry of cultural heritage. 10pm
Su 08.30 Wax Trax Broadway Bazaar free in-store, show 1:15pm Burn Barrel: Kansas City-based crushing post-hardcore noise rock including members of Canyons. 1:30pm
Arson Charge: Thrashcore scorchings of the baked in abuse of human culture. 3pm
Dead Rider, photo from Bandcamp
Su 08.30 The Skylark Lounge 4pm doors Blööd Ôath:Demented and thrillingly abrasive metallic post-punk like a collision of Oblivians and The Cramps. 5pm
Infinite Ohm: Hypnotic drones and other mind-altering sounds courtesy Justin Lemons (and the name of his studio, label and this project). 5:45pm
Violenteer: Brooding, menacing and caustic industrialized noise rock for fans of Unsane and Shellac. 6:30pm
Great Falls: Relentless and unhinged mathcore. 7:15pm
Dead Rider: Left field noise rock and experimental electronic strangeness with connection to avant-guitar rock band U.S. Maple. 8pm
Midwife:Cathartically heartbreaking ambient folk heavenmetal. 9pm
Kathryn Mohr is a songwriter, composer and visual artist based in Oakland, California. She is a relative late-comer to making music first experimenting with drawing and painting. She acquired her first guitar at age 20. Sigur Ros was the band that got her into more experimental music in her teens and the first concert she witnessed at an Outside Lands festival appearance. Mohr became aware that a guitar could be used like a synthesizer when used unconventionally as she had heard in Sigur Ros and later in Grouper. In 2018/2019 Mohr started recording on her phone but in 2020 she felt the strong urge to make an album resulting in As If. That tape opened up opportunities for her in various ways including having label backing. Around the same time the songwriter got her first synth to help realize her sonic imagination. She didn’t play her first live show until 2022 playing a local Zen center before playing the DIY venues in Oakland. That same year Mohr got connected with Madeline Johnston aka Midwife through their mutual label The Flenser. Johnston engineered the then new album Holly. The record shared a similar gentle spirit and emotional depth and delicacy that one hears from a Midwife album and like a particularly sophisticated ambient folk tape one might find randomly at a consignment shelf at a DIY space and the music sticking with you.
For Mohr’s third album, 2025’s Waiting Room, she undertook an artist residency in a small town in Iceland where she wrote and recorded the music free from the distractions of a highly mediated modern world coaxing out authentic emotions and thoughts expressed in music that is at once highly personal and otherworldly, perhaps innerworldly, in tone and mood. It’s like a lo-fi folk album but blending the aesthetics of ambient music into the songwriting for an expression style uniquely Mohr’s own. A little over a year later Mohr issued her latest album Carve. Once again the artist took herself to an environment relatively lacking in regular contact with any kind of social media, advertising, popular culture or anything like that living for awhile in a single wide in the Mojave Desert. The album has a distinctly cinematic quality and capturing the alien tranquility of such an environment but this time some of the guitar songs are grittier at times reminiscent of early PJ Harvey but more informed by her own style of psychedelic, noisy folk bordering on a left field garage rock. The album references Wallace Stenger’s classic 1971 novel of the American West, Angle of Repose and a node to the influence of literature on Mohr’s music. The album’s contrasts are some of the widest of Mohr’s output and it is at turns and often at once pastoral and contemplative, menacing and caustic, delicately gentle and tense. The layers of field recordings, synth, processed vocals in parts of the record convey a deep sense of place, psychological and physical as there is a tactile aspect to Mohr’s songwriting in every song so the album comes across as something felt and experienced and not merely heard. Written over a period of five years and recorded in a few weeks it nonetheless feels of a piece like an expertly edited film. It is Mohr’s most creatively realized work.
Listen to our interview with Kathryn Mohr on Bandcamp and follow her music and performances at the links below. You can see Mohr perform the first night of Ghost Canyon Fest 2026 on Thursday, August 27.
Ghost Canyon Fest organizers Brian Dooley, Sean Dove, Jeremy Brashaw, photo by Tom Murphy
Ghost Canyon Fest presents its fourth edition in 2026 from Thursday, August 26, 2026 through Sunday, August 30, 2026. The festival has from the beginning has showcased some of the most fascinating bands and artists operating in the broad realm of left field rock and experimental music. Noise rock, art punk, ambient, avant-folk, post-metal, art pop, psychedelic folk and more. It has been an extremely well curated festival and on a scale that intentionally makes it easy to catch all of the acts for festival goers if they have the fortitude to make it to all the performances as it isn’t multi-venue at the same time and the final night doesn’t run too late for work the next day. As usual the festival is a mix of acclaimed national acts and some of the most creatively daring bands from Colorado in the realms of music that is at the core of the festival’s curation. This year you can see Holy Sons, Kathryn Mohr Ryan Wong & Sunswept, a Wax Trax Music Panel called DIY In the Age of Slop: A Discussion, Six Organs of Admittance, Prairiewolf, Steve Von Till, Silkworm, The Gotobeds, Dust Congress, Supreme Joy, claire rousay, Daniel Higgs, Shane Parish Plays Autechre Guitar, Nora Mal, Kowloon Walled City, Moor Mother, Water Damage, ABANDONS, Blacks’ Myths, Watch Yourself Die, Arson Charge, Circling Over, Burn Barrel, Midwife, Dead Rider, Great Falls, Violenteer, Infinite Ohm and Blööd Ôath. The festival takes place at HQ, Wax Trax Broadway Bazaar, Hi-Dive, The Bug Theatre and The Skylark Lounge. For more information and the full schedule please visit ghostcanyonfest.com.
Listen to our interview with Ghost Canyon Fest organizers Sean Dove, Brian Dooley and Jeremy Brashaw on Bandcamp.
Experimental music festival Ghost Canyon Fest returns August 27-30Pearl & The Oysters, image from Bandcamp
Saturday | 08.01 What:Pearl & The Oysters w/Green Typewriters and Pleasure Prince When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Pearl & The Oysters is based out of Los Angeles these days via the Gainesville, Florida scene but has its origins when the duo of Juliette Pearl Davis and Joachim Polack met in high school in Paris. Polack earned a master’s degree in muscology with a focus on Brazilian popular music. And you hear that flavor in this band’s output which sounds like a retrofuturist pop band with some jazz informing its compositions and Tropicália flavor but really its own thing with some obvious heavy influence by classic 60s and 70s pop and psychedelia. But its production is lush and from record to record it would be impossible to pigeonhole an exact style including its most recent record Monkey Mind (2026). So it’s only appropriate the art pop psychedelic prog weirdos Green Typewriters and virtuosos of soulful synth pop Pleasure Prince are sharing the bill and thus no downside.
babybaby4ever, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 08.01 What: babybaby4ever, Sonic Chick, Mon Cher and PEPPERSACK When: 7:30 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: babybaby4ever will bring her tonally immersive indie synth pop to places well beyond Denver following this tour kick-off show and win over audiences far and wide. For the occasion you’ll get to see lo-fi synth-infused dream pop project Mon Cher, darkwave dance duo PEPPERSACK and the lo-fi, Half-Japanese-esque emo band Sonic Chick—fans of K Records bands of the 90s will definitely find much to like about the latter and its new record All Star Hits.
Let the Dead Eat the Dead, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 08.01 What:Let the Dead Eat the Dead, Part Weapon and The Picture Tour When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Club Why: Let the Dead Eat the Dead is the new project that rose up from the remnants of Bad Luck City. Similar dark Americana and poetry with wit, intensity and an unpretentious earnestness that one would come to expect from the musicians involved including ex-members of Random Victim, Red Cloud, Slim Cessna’s Auto Club and Snake Rattle Rattle Snake. Part Weapon will being its fusion of noisy post-punk and industrial sounds and The Picture Tour will fill the room with deeply atmospheric, melancholic moods and late night drive intensity circa early Nicolas Winding Refn cinema.
TV Star, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 08.03 What: TV Star w/Angel Band, Pink Lady Monster and Pulse When: 7 Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: TV Star from Seattle recently released its new album Music For Heads which can have multiple meanings but for fans of the kind of crossover of shoegaze, C86 pop and pastoral Americana its exactly in your wheelhouse. Delicate and intricate guitar melodies and layered textural sounds with winsome vocals make the band’s new record and its Unrest-esque sound a repeat listen. Opening of course are purveyors of perfect indie pop Angel Band and Pink Lady Monster, the neo-No Wave art pop geniuses from Denver.
Cat Power, photo courtesy the artist
Monday | 08.03 What:Cat Power: Anniversary of The Greatest Tour When: 6:30 Where: Chautauqua Auditorium Why: Cat Power released her album The Greatest in 2006 to great acclaim. Recorded in Memphis, TN, the album included contributions from the late, great Mabon “Teenie” Hodges renowned for his contributions as guitarist and songwriter on several of Al Green’s hits as well as other notable artists in the realm of soul and R&B. And other greats of soul music including bassist Leroy Hodges. The record contains some of Chan Marshall’s most intimate songs in a career of intimate songwriting and there is a warmth and affection in much of the searching and heartbreak and at times resolution found across the album’s twelve tracks. This is a rare opportunity to catch these songs live in a venue as uniquely beautiful and rustic as the Chautauqua Auditorium.
Melvins, photo by Chris Casella
Friday | 08.07 What:Tomahawk w/Melvins When: 6:30 Where: Ogden Theatre Why: Tomahawk is the experimental metal band comprised of Mike Patton (Mr. Bungle, Faith No More etc), Duane Denison (The Jesus Lizard et. al.), John Stanier (Helmet) and Trevor Dunn (Mr. Bungle, Secret Chiefs among others). Considering the people in the band how metal is it and really more experimental, art rock noise rock with Patton’s versatile and powerful vocals. Opening is Melvins who reliably put on a powerful performance of heavy music of great nuance and imagination and with every tour they try to do something different and other than touring with Tomahawk in this format it would be worth showing up to find out what Melvins have in store.
The Jayhawks, photo by Steve Cohen
Saturday | 08.08 What: The Jayhawks When: 7 Where: Chautauqua Auditorium Why: The Jayhawks are unarguably one of the most influential Americana bands of the past four decades plus since forming in Minneapolis in 1984. They were early pioneers of what came to be called alternative country. Its 1992 album Hollywood Town Hall is a landmark record for the style and refreshingly out of step with the trendy sounds to emerge from early alternative rock. The group went on hiatus in 2005 while its members pursued other creative endeavors. Briefly reuniting again from 2009-2012 The Jayhawks have once again been an active band since 2014 with a new album Sanctuary Park due out August 28, 2026 with the eclectic yet coherent sound that has marked the best of The Jayhawks’ later work integrating some deeper atmospheric melodies and uplifting rhythms into the songwriting. Of all the venues along the front range Chautauqua was basically built for experiencing this kind of music.
Sugar, photo by Ryan Bakerink
Tuesday | 08.11 What:Sugar w/J. Robbins When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: After the collapse of punk legends Hüsker Dü, guitarist and singer Bob Mould released two acclaimed solo albums and came to recruit David Barbe (formerly of the great Athens, GA post-punk band Bar-B-Que Killers) and Malcolm Travis (who had been in early Boston New Wave band Human Sexual Response) to work with in the near future. The band they would dub Sugar became in its own right one of the more popular and influential of the early 90s alternativ rock bands. With a song pace that wasn’t as headlong as Mould’s previous band was known and more developed melodies the group’s debut album Copper Blue (1992) was instantly at hit with college and the nascent alternative rock radio. Mould had learned a lot from Nirvana who he influenced in terms of pop songcraft with spirited performances and he was finally able to somewhat capitalize on the sound his songwriting and guitar style had directly impacted. Sugar only released two albums and an EP before splitting in 1995 but all of those releases contain some of the finest music Mould has worked on to date. When the grop announced it was back together and playing live shows again it was arguably simultaneously one of the least expected and most anticipated reunions of recent years. And if you’ve seen Mould’s band recently you know it’s not going to be subpar.
Shonen Knife, phot by Kai Taylor
Tuesday | 08.11 What:Shonen Knife – Osaka Ramones Set & Shonen Knife Favorites Set w/Bricheros and Flight Kamikaze When: 7/7:30 Where: HQ Why: Shonen Knife is the Osaka, Japan punk band that has been running since 1981. An influence on people like Nirvana the group was invited into the international alternative music scene in an opening slot for Sonic Youth in Shonen Knife’s hometown in 1987 and then later for their first North American gig in Los Angeles shortly after. And in 1991 Shonen Knife was asked to open for Nirvana for the European leg of their tour before Nevermind signaled the commercial ascendance of alterntive rock. But all along Shonen Knife has perfected the art of blending punk spirit and power pop with infectiously catchy melodies and songs with themes of simple joys in life. In 2026 the trio re-recorded and released its 1992 classic Let’s Knife as Let’s Knife Re-Cut. For this tour the group will perform a set of its favorite Ramones songs as well as selections from its own prolific catalog of great punkified pop.
Widowspeak, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 08.12 What: Widowspeak and Dead Gowns When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Since 2010 Widowspeak has created music that weaves together countrified slowcore and intimate dream pop like they came up inspired equally by Luna and Mazzy Star. The group early on was a four-piece but is now the core duo of guitarist/vocalist Molly Hamilton and guitarist/multi-instrumentalist Robert Earl Thomas. The 2026 album Roses is about love in its various forms and often about the subtle kinds taken for granted and not pored over and examined and recognized as such.
Josaleigh Pollett, photo by PJ Guinto
Friday | August 14 What: Josaleigh Polett w/A Place For Owls, mlady and Vanna Blue When: 6pm Where: D3 Arts Why: Josaleigh Pollett is a singer-songwriter based out of Salt Lake City that has been developing an eclectic and inventive body of work since 2012 that could loosely be called indie pop. But from record to record, Pollett has experimented with production, songwriting and a blend of organic and electronic elements. The 2026 album If I Let It Quiet is a lushly produced, deeply evocative listen that guides the listener on an existential journey through modern anxieties and uncertainties with a gentle touch and expansive rhythms, cloaked in soothing atmospheric textures. Now available on vinyl via Audio Antihero. A Place For Owls might be described as a slowcore emo band and based in Denver. The band has previously collaborated with Pollett who also contributed to the band’s forthcoming album All Thieves Vol. 1 due out September 25, 2026.
Church Fire, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 08.15 What: Parlour Magic w/Church Fire and Cruel Mourning When: 7 Where: HQ Why: Parlour Magic is a synthpop project from New York City that recently released its latest, and third, album The Embassy. The music is in the vein of 1980s sophistipop with hints of R&B in the vocal delivery and layers of moody melody and cinematic production that captures a sense of isolation and yearning. Opening is industrial synthpop powerhouse now quartet Church Fire whose vibe will be much more confrontational yet inviting like they challenging the audience to join in raging against oppressive forces of the world. Denver’s Cruel Mourning recently released its new album Modern Tension that sounds like it is informed by 2010s synthwave with the pulsing rhythms but also the more synthpop end of darkwave.
Primitive Ring, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 08.15 What: Primitive Ring, Cherry Spit and Blööd Ôath When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Primitive Ring is a heavy psych band from Los Angeles that includes Charles Moothart who some may known for playing in various other bands including with Ty Segall, Moonhearts, Fuzz and Mikal Cronin. The group released its debut, self-titled full-length on May 15, 2026 and it sounds like a fine evolution beyond stoner rock and garage psych fusion but retaining the tonal richness and knack for a solid hook. Opening are two Denver bands that burst genres. Blööd Ôath is like an intentionally primitive noise rock post-punk thrash band with genuine grooves and a weirdness worthy of the Cramps. Cherry Spit is a ferocious amalgam of post-punk, post-hardcore and arty noise rock and defies easy comparisons.
zzzahara, photo by Lyndsey Byrnes
Saturday | 08.15 What:WILLIS w/zzzahara and The Flooks When: 7 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: WILLIS based out of Nashville, TN that recently released its latest EP Locals 5. Stylistically it’s reminiscent of surf-inflected indie psych from around a decade ago which means it’s probably going to have a nice summertime mood and nostalgic appeal to a lot of people evoking memories of the before times when things likely felt less complicated and at least seemingly less fraught with pressing and constant peril and chaos. We all need a break from that reality sometimes. One of the opening acts, zzzahara, put out their album Distant Lands in June 2026 and its layered, bedroom pop style truly sounds like a dream-journey of self-discovery and healing. Inspired by a dream in which the songwriter spoke to their departed brother the record is steeped in embracing authentic feelings that we often keep buried as we hurtle through our lives. It is an album about reconnecting and perhaps growing from that process. It could be described as dream pop, shoegaze, psych and all the other atmospheric guitar genre tags you want but it also sounds like it’s informed by the possibilities of production and in some ways is like a pop cognate of They Are Gutting a Body of Water.
Paul Riola and band, photo courtesy the artist
Thursday | 08.20 What: Shadow and Light When: 7/7:30 Where: The Fox Theater (Aurora) Why: Paul Riola is a saxophonist and composer who has long been a fixture of the Denver improvisational music and ambient scene. His prolific collaborations have graced various stages throughout the city and beyond and his command of cinematic soundscaping is honed from years of working within the realm of experimental music for over 30 years. He grew up in the Denver Metro area before moving to Portland, Oregon in the early 90s for around a decade where he came into contact with Nels Cline and recorded with him as well as Jeff Parker of Tortoise. If you’ve been to a sufficient number of improvisational music shows in the Denver underground in the past 20 years and more it seems unlikely that you haven’t had a chance to witness Riola’s skill in blending in with various other instruments and specific styles to create something that while improvisational always sounds composed to strike a deep mood. His latest project is Shadow and Light, an immersive collaboration that involves music, installation art and video collage. Taking place at the Fox Theater in Aurora, Colorado on August 20, 2026 the event brings together Riola with guitarist Colin Bricker, guitarist Emmanuel Alexander, drummer Sam Kok, visual collage artist and videography Elicia James, set designer Brandon Case, Olivia Kirkpatrick for live VJ performance and video sampling along with Wesley Schwarz also with live VJ and video sampling and lighting. The unique concert experience will blur the line between various disciplines of visual art, overlapping aesthetics and methods of sound and composition to evoke an emotional resonance with all involved.
Courtney Barnett, photo by Lyndsey Byrnes
Friday | 08.21 What: Courtney Barnett w/Zoh Amba When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Courtney Barnett is one of those most acclaimed songwriters of the past decade and a half with a rich and vibrant body of work including her fourth full length album Creature of Habit which dropped March 27, 2026. Written after Barnett relocated from her Melbourne, Australia to Los Angeles the record includes contributions from expert drummer and producer Stella Mozgawa who was part of Barnett’s previous two releases but also some vocals from Waxahatchee, bass from Flea and some synth from Floating Points. But the record is all Barnett’s signature clever and personally insightful lyrics and seemingly a record contemplating major changes in one’s life circumstances and reflecting on choices and embracing the change one has pursued in the end. The record feels a touch more introspective than prior albums but highlights Barnett’s ability to speak with sensitivity and poetic delicacy to the parts of our brains that are given to anxiety and insecurity and soothe that energy with emotional honesty.
Dillon Francis, photo by Broylen Bowers
Saturday | 08.22 What:Dillstradamus Tour: Dillon Francis and Flosstradamus When: 8 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Dillon Francis became one of the bigger names in 2010s EDM through not just his skill as a producer but also via his skillful use of social media and engaging with a fanbase in a way that has been entertaining for years. He has helped to popularize moombahton, the blend of house and reggaeton through high energy performances that has been part of keeping EDM a going concern in the live concert setting. For this tour Francis teams up with Flossatradamus, one of the pioneers of trap whose own career predates Francis’ by a few years. They 2010s massive heyday of EDM has died down some but Francis and Flosstradamus have been proving that the artform can still be valid and exciting in the large room format.
Only Echoes, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 08.22 What: Only Echoes album release w/Creek, Seed of the Sorcerer, Womb of the Witch and Lovesick for Mina When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Only Echoes is a heavy post-rock/instrumental metal band from Denver. For this show the quartet is releasing its latest, third, album of contemplative, existential journeys Born Adrift on CD, blue marble vinyl, cassette, digital download and streaming. Live the frequencies will get into your body and carry you along on the epic adventure of the music.
Her New Knife, image from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 08.26 What:Her New Knife, Blackberry Crush and The Red Scare When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Her New Knife blurs any boundaries between noise rock, shoegaze and electronic music in a way that is resonant with fellow Philadelphia band They Are Gutting a Body of Water and UK duo Jockstrap. Its 2024 album chrome is lullaby is haunted and gritty and in moments is reminiscent of Dry Cleaning. Blackberry Crush is a one of the best Denver-based shoegaze outfits who learned soundscaping beyond some bands that appear to have evolved one or two steps from garage psyche. The Red Scare from Fort Collins are like-minded in the milieu of noisy, post-punk-infused shoegaze.
Tune-Yards, photo by Shervin Lainez
Friday | 08.28 What: Tune-Yards When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex Why: Tune-Yards is the Oakland-based duo that has exerted a not often obvious influence on the indue underground for production and songwriting technique by making the most of loops early on and evolved on later releases. Like a mix of R&B, live beat-making, psychedelic folk and non-Western pop. The project’s most recent EP Tell The Future With Your Body hits like an indie Grace Jones record in some ways with Merrill Garbus’s powerful vocals the usual soul standout.
Th-Su | 08.27-08.30 What: Ghost Canyon Fest When: Varies Where: HQ, Hi-Dive, The Bug Theater, The Skylark Lounge, Why: Denver’s premiere experimental music fest returns with its fourth edition including some of the most riveting and innovative artists operating in the world today with four nights and three daytime showcases at multiple venues. See the schedule below. Our guide to the festival with brief descriptions of the artists coming soon.
Th 08.27 at HQ doors 7pm Holy Sons Kathryn Mohr Ryan Wong & Sunswept Wax Trax Music Panel: DIY In the Age of Slop: A Discussion Sponsored by Smashed Plastic
F 08.28 Free In Store at Wax Trax Broadway Bazaar 4pm Six Organs of Admittance Prairiewolf
F 08.28 Hi-Dive 7pm doors Steve Von Till Silkworm The Gotobeds Dust Congress Supreme Joy
S 08.29 Bug Theate doors 12:30pm doors claire rousay Daniel Higgs Shane Parish Plays Autechre Guitar Nora Mal
S 08.29 Hi-Dive 6:30pm doors Kowloon Walled City Moor Mother Water Damage ABANDONS Blacks’ Myths Watch Yourself Die
Su 08.30 Wax Trax Broadway Bazaar free in-store, show 1:30pm Arson Charge Circling Over Burn Barrel
Su 08.30 The Skylark Lounge 4pm Midwife Dead Rider Great Falls Violenteer Infinite Ohm Blööd Ôath
Tuesday | 06.02 What: Lip Critic, Flatwounds, Public Opinion and Bejalvin When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lip Critic is a digital hardcore/noise rock band from NYC that recently put out its new album Theft World. Its high energy, confrontational performance style and truly genre-bending music has already garnered it a bit of a cult following. Fans of Sleaford Mods, Gilla Band and Model/Actriz will appreciate the inventiveness, unusual and inspired sonic choices and overall energy of Lip Critic.
Ladytron, photo by Anna Levin
Wednesday | 06.03 What: Ladytron “Paradises” When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: UK experimental pop band Ladytron made a big splash early on helping to pioneer what came to be known as electroclash with inventive production incorporating retro sounds and aesthetics but with modern sensibilities and minimalism. As the band has evolved it is sometimes considered a shoegaze band for some of the guitar sounds it employed in the mid-to-late 2000s but all along the band had more in common with downtempo groups and dance music ideas. With its new album Paradises the group is well within more electronic dance territory but with rich, saturated synth tones and clear melodic lines and the usual, transporting, deeply atmospheric sounds. Like a science fiction soundtrack of a near future you’d want to live in rather than the dystopia we’re living with in the moment.
White Rose Motor Oil, photo courtesy the artists
Friday | 06.05 What: Graveyard Choir, The Milk Blossoms, White Rose Motor Oil When: 7 Where: The Skylark Lounge Why: Before retiring In the Whale in 2025, Nate Valdez was already using Graveyard Choir as an outlet for his more Americana songwriting. But as a full-fledged band with In the Whale drummer Eric Riley joining in the new project Graveyard Choir began after their former band folded. The two musicians had taken that project about as far as one can touring regularly and garnering a regional and even national fanbase fairly independently and by word of mouth. The new band isn’t like a garage rock Melvins, more like a bluesy alt-country band with an ear for mood and atmosphere. The Milk Blossoms are an experimental pop band that has recently expanded its own sounds to including more electronic elements and processed sounds but with Harmony Rose’s emotionally rich vocals and poetic storytelling at the center. White Rose Motor Oil is a very underrated band that plays regionally throughout the front range delivering its own vibrant brand of rockabilly-inflected Americana and a touch of punk spirit.
Yot Club, photo by Rachel Biggs
Saturday | 06.06 What:Yot Club w/Renny Conti When: 7 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: John Ryan Kaiser was perfecting his particular style of bedroom pop when he was writing music under the name Amateur Observer and releasing his songs via SoundCloud like many a truly underground songwriter of the 2010s (and even now). By 2019 he had taken on the moniker Yot Club perhaps as a play on the genre of yacht rock. His more recent music has the earnest charm and economic songwriting of the best bedroom pop but with higher end production so that his music has more tonal richness. His new album Simpleton (2026) is filled with song names as spare as the title track but each embodies a core concept of the confessional songwriting that runs through the record. Kaiser’s vocals are processed to the point of bordering on hyper pop but the production always feels just the right amount of mood and atmosphere so that Kaiser’s lyrics have maximum impact to offer catharsis for life’s melancholic moments and struggles. Opening the show is Renny Conti. The latter, according to a 2025 interview with WHUS, came up playing metalcore and punk as a teen but when he changed coasts for school from the Bay Area to New York his transformation as a musician was under way and his 2025 self-titled album sounded like he had spent more than a little time immersed in the likes of Elliott Smith, Nick Drake and maybe even the more folk end of Animal Collective. Fully blending organic folk pop with electronic production there is a pastoral gentleness to his music infused with a sense of wonder and emotional sensitivity and nuance that is sometimes reminiscent of a Phil Elverum project.
I’m A Boy, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 06.06 What:Red Tack, I’m a Band and Chef Andre When: 9/9:30 Where: Lion’s Lair Why: Red Tack is Ted Thacker who has been a prominent musician and songwriter in the Denver underground music scene first making waves perhaps as a member of experimental punk band Baldo Rex in the 90s. Also in the 90s through the 2000s he played as a member of power pop band Veronica. These days it’s more difficult to pin down any kind of style and that’s probably for the best because Thacker’s songwriting voice is unique. I’m a Band is the new incarnation of the band I’m a Boy with Jimmi Nasi as singer/guitarist. He appears to be inspired by the power of solid songwriting to inspire the musician and listener and though steeped in classic and alternative rock there is a fresh energy to Nasi’s performance and songwriting that has kept his projects worth witnessing and hearing. Chef Andre is a duo whose recent album Songs of Mehrhoff was inspired in part by the poetry of Charlie Merhoff but musically it’s more like a baroque pop and calypso fusion.
Carrellee, photo from Bandcamp
Sunday | 06.07 What:CD Ghost w/Carrellee and Hex Cassette When: 7 Where: HQ Why: CD Ghost is a dream pop band from Los Angeles whose forthcoming album When The Rain Stops has some of that chillwave flavor from a decade and a half ago. The title track is reminiscent of “Eyes Without a Face” by Billy Idol but with more delicate vocals yet a similar saturated atmospheric quality that renders both songs instantly relistenable. Hex Cassette from Denver will bring his own ear worm industrial dance music to the show with a live performance that is both confrontational and highly animated as well as wickedly charming. Carrellee is a darkwave artist from Madison, Wisconsin whose moody dream pop has an impressive depth of atmospheric emotional resonance. Her song “Stay” was a standout on the soundtrack to the quasi-found footage film Frogman (2023) and in some ways elevated the movie. Her 2022 album Scale of Dreams, from which the song was borrowed, is front to back a reflection on seeking clarity in one’s own mind adrift in mixed emotions. The 2025 self-titled album seems to have some more forward momentum in its rhythms but still reaching for meaning in a world that seems to be short on that for many if not most people. Fans of Madeline Goldstein need to check out Carrellee.
TsuShiMaMiRe, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 06.09 What:TsuShiMaMiRe, The Tammy Shine and Autumnal When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: TsuShiMaMiRe started up in 1999 in Chiba Prefecture in Japan and have been fairly prolific since with its most recent album Bando wa Mizumono which celebrated its 25 years as a and in 2024. Trying to pigeonhole the band wouldn’t do justice to how it has a real knack for pop songcraft while being very much a punk band without being pop punk. Its core sounds have been eclectic yet distinctive in its exuberant performance style that also weaves in some introspective melodies. Opening is the incomparable The Tammy shine whose debut solo album OK Shine OK released in February 2026. Tammy Ealom was perhaps best previously known and rightfully still so as the frontwoman of indie pop legends Dressy Bessy. The solo album is distinct from the Dressy Bessy material but still with the exuberant charm and thoughtful lyrics for which Ealom is known. The band autumnal from Fort Collins tends to have more pastoral sounds while being well within the realm of a kind of cosmic indie pop.
The Cab, photo by Juan Flores Mena
Tuesday | 06.09 What: The Cab w/Carr When: 6:30 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: The Cab from Las Vegas, Nevada came up during a big upsurge of emo and pop punk in the 2000s and enjoyed a good deal of cache from its first chapter 2004-2015 before going on hiatus for over a decade. The band always leaned more in the pop direction and since it has reunited the band has honed its instincts for crafting songs that are more in the realm of modern R&B and electronic pop but with some instrumental kick behind the music and its signature anthemic songwriting. The Cab finally released its new album Chasing Crowns in April 2026 and is now on its “Back From the Dead Tour” to showcase its new sound and more than likely perform more than a few fan favorites from its earlier years.
Worm, photo by Doomvana
Wednesday | June 10 What: Worm w/Arkwave and Chamber Mage When: 7/7:50 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: Worm released its most recent album Necropalace in February 2026. Funeral doom, black metal, death doom, whatever genre tags you want to use the record includes spooky synths that wouldn’t be out of place in either an old Vincent Price movie or a Charles Band production. The spectral and caustic guitar work and sepulchral vocals create a unique sense of death metal theater delivered by the band’s stage presence and visual sense like one of those occult Hammer House films and the later seasons of Dark Shadows. Fantastical but inspired and clearly the product of idiosyncratic creativity.
Claire Rosinkranz, photo courtesy the artist
Wednesday | 06.10 What:Claire Rosinkranz w/Stevie Bill When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Persplexiplex Why: Claire Rosinkranz started writing music from at a young age having helped her composer and mutli-instrumentalist father on songs he was writing for TV and advertisements. She had her breakthrough single of her own material with “Backyard Boy” in 2020 at age 16 which went viral through TikTok. Since then Rosinkranz has honed her songcraft and become a notable artist fusing pop, R&B and rock to give life to a body of work that tackles sometimes sensitive subject matter like chronic illness on her new record My Lover (2026). The songwriter’s melodiously expressive vocals and gift for perfectly blending her singing with vibrant arrangements that lend an orchestral quality to her economical compositions seem to make each song a unique and fresh listening experience without a wasted moment.
Kerosene Ensemble, photo courtesy the artists
Wednesday | 06.10 What:Kerosene Ensemble Plays the Music of John Zorn’s Masada When: 6/7 Where: Dazzle Why: Kerosene Ensemble is a Denver-based jazz quarter that began in 2001 including notable musicians David Thomas Bailey (guitar), Mike Brown (bass), Dean Hirschfield (drums) and Troy Thill (saxophone) who have made a name for themselves in the local avant-garde and experimental music scene. Masada is a band lead by John Zorn from the early 90s assembled to perform compositions by Zorn inspired by the Radical Jewish Culture scene in New York City. Mixing free jazz, punk and exploratory rock the music often sounds like something that could have come from the outer reaches of late 60s jazz with wild flourishes that push the boundaries of established forms of music. And this set of musicians with their collective skills and experiences seem like the only group in Denver capable of attempting to perform any of Zorn’s compositions in the group’s prolific releases.
Metric, photo courtesy the artists
Thursday | 06.11 What: Metric w/Broken Social Scene and Stars When: 5:30/6:30 Where: The Fillmore Auditorium Why: This All The Feelings Tour brings together three of Canada’s finest purveyors of experimental pop music whose projects have shared members over the years with Emily Haines of Metric having been a member of Broken Social Scene and Evan Cranley of Stars currently in that band (Amy Millan of Stars has been a contributor to the Scene as well). Metric released one of its best albums Romanticize the Dive in April with songs that seem to reflect on the early period of its existence. But it doesn’t feel nostalgic so much as tapping into some of the feelings and energy of being a band discovering its identity and striving for creative and professional fulfillment while holding onto personal and artistic integrity, a quality that can be lost or diluted once you’ve experienced any level of commercial success. It contains some of Haines’ most resonant vocal performances of the past several years as well as some of the band’s most focused songwriting. Broken Social Scene dropped its first record in some nine years with Remember the Humans reuniting the band with producer David Newfeld who worked on You Forgot It in People (2002) and Broken Social Scene (2005). The record feels like a deep and affectionate meditation on times past and its impact on one’s current life and the future. It revisits some of the energy of the band’s early records as well and uses that as a vehicle to help reinvent and recontextualize the band’s sound for the current era when things seem to be dissolving on the social and cultural level partly because people have forgotten about the things we took for granted for years and the album is a reminder of those personal and close connections that reverberate beyond.
Broken Social Scene, photo courtesy the artistsCephalic Carnage circa 2009, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday and Sunday | 06.13 and 06.14 What: Flatline Fest When: 5pm start each night Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Flatline Audio is the renowned recording and production studio based in Denver out of which many of the more acclaimed records in the realm of extreme metal have come over the past twenty plus years. This debut festival showcases several of the bands with whom recording engineer and musician Dave Otero who runs Flatline Audio has worked meaning two whole evenings of some of the better metal bands operating today including local skate punk legends Clusterfux, blackened death metal outfit Glacial Tomb, deathgrind giants Cattle Decapitation, technical death metal band Archspire, Fort Collins-based melodic death metal group Allagaeon, doom metal trio In the Company of Serpents, Death-doom outfit Necropanther and jazz-death-metal greats Cephalic Carnage. For full lineup by date please visit the Flatine Fest site.
Quintron and Miss Pussycat in 2015, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 06.17 What:Quintron and Miss Pussycat w/Pink Lady Monster When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: It would be a disservice to call Quintron and Miss Pussycat merely a kind of psychedelic rockabilly garage rock band. It’s a full multi-media show but with practical effects including puppets and a stage set as well as the high octane live musical performance with costumes. If there is some gimmick to the show the band backs it up with high entertainment value and actually worthwhile songs that are best experienced in person with the concentrated, inspired strangeness of the duo in their element. Opening the show is one of Denver’s best bands who have experimented with camp with aspects of the live show which is also highly energetic without a theatrical and dramatic flourish but also with songs that stand on their own in the realm of No Wave post-punk jazz funk.
Midwife in 2025, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 06.18 What:Midwife, Amulets and Devin Shaffer When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Three of the most important artists operating within the broad realm of ambient and existential folk music on one bill is a rare thing particularly when they’re based in disparate parts of the country. But Amulets has worked with Midwife and both have crossed paths with Devin Shaffer over the past several years. One thing all three have in common is the ability to channel emotional vulnerability and grace into songs of great delicacy and deep emotional resonance although each also has a different musical style. All have released transcendent records in the past year and a half and this is a rare opportunity to see them all together on the same bill.
Air Moons, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 06.20 What: Air Moons, Ripcords album release and Gila Teen When: 7pm doors, 8pm show, $10 Where: East Fax Tap Why: Air Moons is a psychedelic pop/indie rock quartet from Denver. Its membership includes current members of Salads and Sunbeams and A Strange Happening. The band hasn’t played many shows yet but the strong songwriting and performances including exquisite multi-part harmonies were there from the band’s first show last year. Gila Teen has long been one of the better bands from Denver with thoughtful and vulnerable lyrics deeply observant of personal psychology and social dynamics. Sort of a mix of dream pop, emo and post-punk with a charmingly raw quality that means the band avoids tropes ably. Ripcords are releasing their debut album You Should Not Continue In This Fashion in an official capacity with this release show. If you were fortunate enough to see recent shows you could pick up a CD as you’re likely able to for this performance. The trio is steeped in 90s grunge in a way that doesn’t feel like they borrowed some of the vibe. There is an intensity and a weaving in of thrash and heavy blues rock that gives one the impression of the same energy as early Alice in Chains but with more aggression.
Molly Tuttle, photo by Ebru Yildiz
Saturday | 06.20 What:Molly Tuttle w/Pixie & The Partygrass Boys and Mair When: 7:30 Where: Arvada Center Why: In a career that has yielded rightfully acclaimed albums in a bluegrass style, Molly Tuttle’s 2025 album So Long Little Miss Sunshine didn’t completely break with what has made Tuttle a notable artist but thoroughly leapt in new musical directions. Bits of country and pop sensibility were already part of Tuttles previous two records but the new album feels like something that doesn’t fit neatly into a box yet sounds like a natural next step forward as an artist. The title along is clever enough a nod to a shedding of a previous musical identity and the songs are like stories of that journey in short chapters as Tuttle delivers the sort of intimate yet lively songs that have garnered her an increasingly wider audience. There is even a contribution from Charli XCX on the song “I Love It” hinting at Tuttle’s embrace of pop songcraft beyond expected sources.
Sir Richard Bishop in 2013, photo by Tom Murphy
Monday | 06.22 What:Sir Richard Bishop w/Debaser, Eli Wendler and Flaming Tongues Above When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Sir Richard Bishop was a member of experimental rock band Sun City Girls from 1981-2026 and though part of the same punk scene that yielded Meat Puppets and JFA, brought together free improv, poetry, surf rock, tape collage and non-Western musical styles for a unique sound that has had an impact on American avant-garde underground music since. As a solo artist, Bishop has expanded upon that early foundation and threading together non-western folk styles with American primitive guitar aesthetics. He released the album Hillbilly Raga in 2025 and is on the verge of the more Middle Eastern sounding Hillbilly Erotica in 2026.
Squid Pisser, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 06.23 What:Squid Pisser w/Victim of Fire and Cop Killer When: 7 Where: Hi-Dice Why: Squid Pisser is a mutant synthesis of grindcore, noise rock and No Wave with a gross-out aesthetic fitting considering its members include Tommy Mehan of GWAR and Cancer Christ, Michael Armendariz from Duck Duck Goose and Melted Bodies and Seth Carolina of Starcrawler. Live, it’s definitely something different like a more commited to the costume Slipknot with generally more interesting and confrontational music and performance style. Victim of Fire is a Denver-based hardcore band who don’t bother to not lean into thrash, death metal and grind influences and with superb musicianship and incisive lyrics. Cop Killer has a name bound to get it in trouble but its own version of early-hardcore-inspired punk definitely delivers the goods with a performance style that is fiery and intense the way you’d hope to witness.
Family Worship Center, photo by Sequoia Woods
Wednesday | 06.24 What: Family Worship Center w/Smoker Dad and Jesus Christ Taxi Driver When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Family Worship Center recently released its new album Only Visiting on June 12, 2026. The record is a vibrant psychedelic pop offering with a back story of a claim that the songs were recorded in 1974-1975 and recently unearthed. To be fair the songwriting is vivid with a recording attention to detail worthy of the finest songwriting of that decade like something that might have been recorded at Muscle Shoals sound studio if some kind of cult with a collective coherence had a faith band that was worth listening to steeped in R&B, funk, country, psychedelia and classic pop. This is not like Ya Ho Wha 13, the house commune band of The Source Family. Whatever the exact origins and motivations the new record is one of the best albums of its kind since the 1970s. Live, it’s a 10-member band and seeing that happen will be an event in itself especially at the Hi-Dive that actually hosted Sloppy Jane’s sprawling live band in 2022.
Soy Celesté, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 06.26 What: Tiny Humans EP release w/Battle Pussy, Soy Celesté, Team Nonexistent When: 6pm doors, 7 show Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Tiny Humans is releasing its self-titled debut EP. The band is clearly coming from a place of the kind of punk that took the more punk end of 90s grunge more seriously in terms of its sound and spirit not to mention lyrics that don’t mince words about personal and social struggle. Battle Pussy is a politically-infused punk band that sounds like the next phase of what Riot Grrrl started with fiery vocals. Soy Celesté is similarly inspired by Riot Grrrl punk but weaves in Latin folk and a more expansive social critique with lyrics in Spanish as well as English paired with a spirited performance style from lead singer Celesté Martinez and back by Denver jazz and Latin music heavy hitters Joshua Trinidad (trumpet) and Yuzo Nieto (tenor saxophone, bass). And Team Nonexistent brings a queer punk sensibility to its own 90s-infused punk fury.
Low Cut Connie, photo by Danny Clinch
Friday and Saturday | 06.26 and 06.27 What: Low Cut Connie w/J. Roddy & The Automatic Band and The Patti Fiasco (06.26) and Queen Frog (06.27) When: 7pm both nights Where: The Aggie Theatre (06.26) and The Bluebird Theater (06.27) Why: Low Cut Connie counts among its fans the likes of Barack Obama, Elton John, Springsteen and Nick Hornby. But that distinction means little if the music itself isn’t worth the attention and in this case Low Cut Connie has been making vital, insightful, socially aware rock and roll since the group emerged out of the solo performances of songwriter and lead vocalist Adam Weiner. The band really got off the ground in Philadelphia but Weiner paid his dues playing piano in dive bars, gay bars, karaoke joints, restaurants and honky tonks. He has performed in anarchist collectives often to people who were overtly not into what he was doing. But that taught the artist to really deliver in an engaging way. The band’s debut album Get Out the Lotion (2011) was a surprise hit with critics and audiences and the group’s spirited, soulful garage rock was a standout from the then nascent modern attempt at a classic rock sound because the music stood on its own apart from obvious musical reference points. As the group’s songwriting and live shows evolved you could hear in the music a through line of compassion for regular human existence expressed with a passion, compassion and poetry that felt missing from a lot of the music of bands trying to be a new version of Led Zeppelin or evoking a Laurel Canyon vibe. From then to now the songwriting has captivated a wide audience from all walks of life. On February 13, 2025 Low Cut Connie was the first act to announce it would not perform at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts following President Trump’s takeover of the formerly non-partisan arts institution and, albeit temporarily as it turns out, adding his own name as well as politicizing its board of trustees and programming. In May 2025 Low Cut Connie released the single “Livin’ in the USA” which with a grace and intensity criticized the Trump administration’s immigration policies and the tactics employed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the CBP. The single garnered the band threats of violence and death threats. Coming from American fascists and their ilk the song, admittedly powerful, immediately became one of the most important protest songs of the current era and one of the most musically commanding. In 2026 Low Cut Connie releases the album from which the aforementioned became the title track and is currently touring ahead of that release. Go expecting the usual sense of rock theater and heartfelt performances.
Chroma Lips, photo courtesy the artists
Saturday | 06.27 What: Chroma Lips album release for chromaZone w/Wave Decay, Various Blonde and DJ Kleiman When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: For the past few years Chroma Lips have garnered a following locally for its signature fusion of krautrock, post-punk, shoegaze and garage rock. And for this show the band will release its debut full-length chromaZone which is five new songs and five reworked, remastered older songs for a coherent presentation of its catalog of songs up to now. The album has some trippy edge to its sonics yet undeniable pop hooks and vibrant synth work that mean it doesn’t get stuck in some psych jam or prog groove rut. The album released digitally on June 22 but should be available on vinyl for the show. Bonus, one of the opening bands is the fantastic krautrock shoegaze trio Wave Decay.
Entrancer, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 06.28 What: Blanket: Entrancer and Modern Devotion When: 1pm Where: City Park Why: The new season of the Blanket mini-concert series kicks off with the inspired techno/ambient/analog synth compositions/dance music concoctions of Entrancer and the gabber-infused industrial techno of Modern Devotion. This isn’t just some half-baked presentation of the music and the sound system brought for these shows is impressive in its richness and clarity of sound rare for an outdoors gig in general much less something as low key as these events.
Ak’Chamel: The Giver of Illness, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 06.30 What: Ak’Chamel: The Giver of Illness w/Munly & The Lupercalians When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Ak’Chamel: The Giver of Illness might perhaps be best described as a ritual folk psychedelic performance art group that puts on a show with maybe costumes isn’t the right word but garb intended to put the audience into a different headspace and something from another time, a mystical frame outside the norms of industrial civilization. The music is created from organic and often self-made instrumentation and the live show is not going to be much like anything else you’re going to see in Denver this year unless you see Quintron and Miss Pussycat except this will be radically different from that and yet resonates in that the presentation is executed with a similarly masterful expression of craft. Munly & The Lupercalians too will bring a ritualistic, occult element to its own performance of dark, avant-garde folk.
Monday | 03.02 What: Nuovo Testamento and Dark Chisme When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Nuovo Testamento is a Los Angeles-based band that has made a reputation for itself as crafters of fine synthpop songs with some dark Italodisco flavor. Charismatic singer Chelsey Crowley’s rich vocals are reminiscent of peak 1980s Madonna. Dark Chisme from Seattle is musically adjacent but its sound more in the vein of darkwave with a touch of house in the production.
Final Gasp, photo by Caleb Gowett
Wednesday | 03.04 What:Final Gasp w/Victim of Fire, Ukko’s Hammer and writheinfear When: 7 Where: Bar 404 Why: Boston’s Final Gasp released its new album New Day Symptoms on Relapse on February 27, 2026. The record continues the development of the band’s sound fusing death rock and metallic hardcore. Live the group comes across as something from another era when subgenres didn’t matter so much in navigating the appeal of the music and sounds like the missing link between Christian Death and American Nightmare. Opening are some of Denver’s great hardoce bands in Victim of Fire, Ukko’s Hammer and writheinfear.
American Culture, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.06 What: American Culture w/Candy Apple, Spin Move and Blackberry Crush When: 7/8 Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: American Culture kicks off its latest tour with this show of its own current fusion of shoegaze indie pop with punk attitude. The group’s most recent album, and arguably its best, Hey Brother, It’s Been a While, bears the hallmarks of the influence/impact of 90s Britpop psychedelia and its 2020’s echo in the modern underground/indie scene and electronic production. Opening are local shoegaze acts Spin Move and Blackberry Crush and atmospheric hardcore group Candy Apple.
Blackwater Holylight, photo by Magalena Wosinska
Friday and Saturday | 03.06 and 03.07 What: Blackwater Holylight w/Som and Dreadnought (03.06) and Cronos Compulsion (03.07) When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Blackwater Holylight released its new a.lbum Not Here Not Gone in January and its blend of doom and ethereal shoegaze this time out seems to chart the group’s relocation from Portland, Oregon to Los Angeles and embracing uncertainty and establishing new connections, roots and creative and personal evolution. Though heavy in a vein that fans of Slow Crush will appreciate there is a sensitive energy to the music that gives it an intimate feel throughout the album even as many of its songs soar into epic, exhilarating passages. Opening the tour is shoegaze-adjacent post-metal band Som and on the Friday show is Denver psychedelic doom group Dreadnought, on Saturday it’s experimental death metal band Cronos Compulsion.
Polly Urethane in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.07 What: The Liberation Series Presents: Polly Urethane, Melodies Never Lie, Entrancer and Luke Leavitt & Eden Figueroa When: 7/8 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: This is a show series where the proceeds go toward benefiting an organization or person currently being persecuted by corrupt American institutions and imperialism. This night you can see performance artist, songwriter and composer Polly Urethane whose shows are all different from one another but always impressive. Also ambient indie pop shoegaze solo act Melodies Never Lie, techno/ambient artist Entrancer and post-jazz/classical duo Luke Leavitt and Eden Figueroa.
Peaches, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 03.10 What: Peaches w/Cortisa Star When: 7 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: Peaches has been releasing provocative music that challenges norms of a sexually repressive and misogynistic societies and cultures since the turn of the century. Her production has been an influence on various artists over that time as well and sure overtly her songs trade in immediate terms that challenge the bases of norms of subject matter and creative use of language. She hadn’t released a record since 2015’s Rub until this year’s issuing of No Lube So Rude. Peaches’ production may have been updated to reflect the evolving nature of electronic music and methods of composition but her wonderfully vibrant and colorful use of words to challenge vested authority and power structures is still just as vital as ever.
Lala Lala, photo by Ariel Fish
Friday | 03.13 What: Lala Lala w/Lots of Hands When: 7/8 Where: Lost Lake Why: Lala Lala aka Lillie West was one of the leading lights of the Chicago indie rock scene in the late 2010s and with her 2021 album I Want the Door to Open she deconstructed her own sound palette and songwriting style to include more electronic aesthetics. Subsequently the musician/songwriter underwent a kind of personal journey to Taos, New Mexico where she more or less lived off the grid and drew inspiration from the pastoral beauty and unique energy of that town. Then she found her way to Iceland and a residency at LunGa school as well as some time in the capital city of Reykjavik. Out of that leg of her journey West crafted what is essentially an ambient/instrumental album including beautifully arranged field recordings called if i were a real man i would be able to break the neck of a suffering bird (as Lillie West). Lala Lala ultimately landed back in the USA in Los Angeles and on February 27, 2026 she released her new record Heaven 2 via Sub Pop. You can hear traces of West’s creative journey and development informing the record’s evocative soundscapes and existential sentiments. The almost sound design approach to the composition of the songs with West like a figure in her own cinematic creation draws the listener directly into the moments she builds as she catalogs life in the current era of being swarmed with distractions that inspire only overstimulation and yearning for nuggets of the authentic.
Tassles, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.13 What: Witch Cat Records Anniversary: Tassles, babybaby4ever, Watch Yourself Die, The Tammy Shine and Hotel WiFi When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Witch Cat Records is celebrating its five year anniversary with this show including artists both on the label and adjacent to its aesthetic embracing the uniquely creative and finely honed experimental music whether pop or otherwise. Tassles is a band that shows how lo-fi shoegaze can have a maximalist emotional resonance, babybaby4ever is like a rebirth of tonally rich synthpop in an inspired idiosyncratic vein, Watch Yourself Die is a confrontational performance art band, The Tammy Shine is the iconic lead singer of Dressy Bessy doing her own version of spirited punk-edged pop and Hotel WiFi somehow reconciles country, emo and lo-fi indie rock.
Moon Pussy, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.13 What: Moon Pussy, Cleaner and Team Nonexistent When: 7 Where: The Crypt Why: Moon Pussy makes the kind of noise rock that makes you wonder why other bands don’t adopt a fully eccentric approach to lyrics and performance because they’re so compelling and unique that it’s difficult to really compare them to anyone else except to clumsily slap a genre term on them. Team Nonexistent started out as more of a Riot Grrrl-esque grunge band but now is more a raw punk thing with stirring hooks and pointed lyrics. Cleaner is a punk band with some threads of fuzzy, psychedelic 2010s garage rock.
Jeff Tweedy and band, photo by Rachel Bartz
Friday | 03.13 What:Jeff Tweedy w/Liam Kazar When: 6:30 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: Jeff Tweedy released a thirty song opus of an album called Twilight Override in September 2025. The record showcases the songwriter’s typically thoughtful and personally insightful lyrics as well as his knack for writing paradoxically spare songs with orchestral arrangements. The gentle energy of the song reflects the guiding principle, as it were, of the release and that is how creativity is the antithesis of the pervasive destruction and darkness that is part of everyday life in America and so much of the world in this moment and if one is honest for years. The record is an attempt to stay above being overcoming by this tidal wave and show at least a little common human solidarity in songs that sound like an attempt to being drowned by personal anxieties and the ambient terribleness around us daily as they intermingle to reinforce each other in sinking every single one of us. Tweedy addresses all of this with warmth and humor and live he’ll likely have more than a handful of stories to enhance the intention of the album.
Bison Bone, photo courtesy the artists
Saturday | 03.14 What:Bison Bone and Chella Negro When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Why: Courtney Whitehead will be moving out of Denver soon and this is a farewell show for his long-running project Bison Bone. Whitehead’s style of Americana is deeply personal with vivid portraits of life that illuminate universal human experiences of working class life and its often undersung and undercelebrated joys that aren’t often the subject of the myths of the wealth-obsessed end of our culture. Joining Bison Bone for the bill is another of Denver’s Americana greats with folk-inflected, alternative country acts Chella Negro whose own lyrics aren’t short on deeply insightful and affectionate depictions of a life we all known and relate to directly but maybe don’t examine with as much clarity as Chella reveals in her lyrics.
Saturday | 03.14 What: Glueman, Rugburn and Fossil Blood When: 8 Where: Hi=Dive Why: Glueman is going on tour and taking its potent brand of classic hardcore-infused garage rock to various corners of the blighted American landscape. It’s most recent album III is a bit like an amalgam of 90s and 2000s Memphis garage rock and Black Flag. Rugburn is a psychedelic fuzzy punk band from Denver, not to be confused with with the funk band from elsewhere. Fossil Blood sounds like they grew up on all Black Sabbath all the time and then embraced what Ronnie James Dio did before joining that band including his time in Rainbow and his early solo career with the epic riffs and the fantastical imagery.
Max Styler, photo by Clay Westcott
Saturday | 03.14 What: Max Styler w/Discip B2B Roddy Lima, Dan Molinari and GS When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Max Styler got a boost up in his career when, at 18 years old, he was signed to Steve Aoki’s Dim Mak Records. Since then he’s had his music out via Mad Decent, Ultra Music and other prestigious imprints in the EDM universe. His blend of tech house, bass music, trap and dubstep often seems to land in a place of almost pop accessibility in the composition. Currently he is touring ahead of his headlining spot at Coachella on April 10, 2026 and this is a chance to catch him at a mid-sized venue with the best sound in Denver especially for this style of music.
George Cessna, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 03.15 What:Fire in the Mountains Pop-Up: George Cessna, SHADOWROUGHT, PROGMISTRESS and Corpsewhale When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Fire in the Mountains is a festival happening in East Glacier, MT from July 23-26 that includes some of the best bands in the broader heavy music world (an exclusive reunion of the great, cosmic, tribal doom band SubRosa is part of the proceedings) but this edition includes representation of artists out of the spectrum of Gothic Americana including the reunited Sixteen Horsepower, Tarantella, Midwife and El Welk. For this show you can see George Cessna of El Welk perform a solo set as well as PROGMISTRESS of Dreadnought who will perform at the event as well.
Advance Base in 2018, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 03.15 What:Advance Base w/Moontype and Pyramyd When: 7 Where: Glob Why: Owen Ashworth has for decades given us tender, heartfelt, emotionally unvarnished and honest pop songs in the lo-fi indie vein and his now long-running project Advance Base occasionally tours including this performance in Denver where he played in 2025. The authenticity and openness of Ashworth’s songs gives them an immediacy and relatability that is rare in a world that puts a premium on the flashy and overproduced.
Wednesday | 03.18 What:Testament w/Overkill and Destruction When: 6 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: Testament is one of the most influential and enduring of the Bay Area thrash bands from that second wave of the music. From early on the group’s storytelling and often socially aware lyrics set it apart from a lot of heavy metal of the day. While it didn’t become as famous as the likes of Metallica and Megadeth it has reliably put out worthwhile records including 2025’s Para Bellum which is the band’s first in five years. But apparently the members of Testament took it upon themselves to push their own songwriting boundaries as a band as well as that of thrash and metal generally with songs that fuse black metal, death metal, thrash and progressive chops. It’s one of their best records in a career not short on fine material. Also on the bill are thrash legends Overkill from New Jersey and German thrash luminaries Destruction.
Thursday | 03.19 What: An Evening with Bill Frisell When: 7 Where: The Federal Theatre Why: Bill Frisell is an influential guitarist mostly known for his contributions to jazz and new music. A graduate of Denver’s East High School, Frisell made a name for himself in the NYC Downtown Scene and has worked with the likes of John Zorn. Across his career his has contributed to albums by Ryuichi Sakamoto and Earth while living in Seattle. In his long career Frisell has collaborated with artists too numerous to cite here as a band leader, a curator and a creative co-conspirator and his work has been nominated for a Grammy. But his creative approach to technical music is what has set him apart from many of his peers and there is an accessibility to even his headiest music that has garnered him a cult following.
Jesus Christ Taxi Driver, photo by Hailey Jane
Thursday | 03.19 What:Jesus Christ Taxi Driver album release w/The Thing and Honey Blazer When: 7 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Jesus Christ Taxi Driver has been establishing itself as a kinetic live act from the Front Range of Colorado since founding in 2022. Plenty of acts have done the blues rock with power pop flair and punk energy but JCTD seems to be on a mission with ambitious songwriting to match its outsized stage presence. This year the group releases its new album, a follow up to 2023’s Like My Soul, titled Taxi the Rich. The record will see a vinyl release for this show a month ahead of its release on streaming platforms. If the previous album was an audacious and raucous affair the new record has a more focused clarity without losing the raw energy that has made the band so appealing like they’re channeling a bit of Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and Ty Segall simultaneously.
2charm, photo courtesy the artists
Thursday | 03.19 What:2charm w/Abrii and Vyblossom When: 7 Where: Larimer Lounge Why: Australian electronic duo 2charm has been on its debut headlining tour of the USA including stops at SXSW in support of its new album star scum city. The record is like a fusion of club style EDM, hyperpop and more mellow glitchcore. In many ways the mood of the music is reminiscent of a more dance music manifestation of chillwave that fans of Charli XCX and Sextile may appreciate for the tonal richness and playfulness of the music.
Sunswept, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.20 What: hlao, SixFM, Sun Swept and Polly Urethane When: 7 Where: Pablo’s East Colfax Why: A stacked lineup of local underground ambient and avant-garde electronic music including a more beat-based approach with hlao, progressive folk psychedelia ambient with Sun Swept and performance art/classical art pop/noise collage with Polly Urethane’s often confrontational performances.
The Playground Ensemble in 2019 performing Eight Songs For a Mad King, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.21 What:The Playground Ensemble at 20 When: 7am – 3am Where: Various (see program below) Why: The Playground Ensemble is celebrating its 20 years of existence with a series of events this day as outlined below. For more information click here to read our recent piece on the event and our interview with founder Conrad Kehn.
Spontaneous Team Composition Workshop (all ages and levels welcome) Metropolitan State University of Denver’s Kalamath Building 800 Kalamath St, Denver, CO 80204
Join Denver’s The Playground Ensemble as we celebrate our 20th season with a 20-hour MARATHON of new music.
The day opens at 7:00 AM with a yoga session and gong bath, followed by the Sound Bites breakfast meet-and-greet.
After breakfast, participants will be divided into small groups and given 90 minutes to collaboratively create a new work to be shared at the end of the session. Each group will be facilitated by Playground Ensemble teaching artists who will guide participants through the music creation process using hand gesture composition, graphic notation, structured improvisation, digital audio workstations, and musical story-telling to name a few.
Bring your own instrument and we will also provide a variety of electronic and found sound instruments to help ‘orchestrate’ and inspire creativity. The teaching artists will demonstrate how these approaches are adaptable to a wide range of educational contexts and are accessible to learners of all ability levels and musical backgrounds. The session will conclude with a performance of each group’s composition.
Afternoon at The Stanley Marketplace 2501 N. Dallas St. Aurora, Colorado 80010
Join Denver’s The Playground Ensemble as we partner with Friends of Chamber Music to celebrate our 20th season with an afternoon of music creation and community at The Stanley Marketplace. Each session highlights a different part of what makes Playground Ensemble the innovative organization that it is.
Family/Community Music-Making 1-2:30 PM: We invite families (grown-ups too!) to create their own instruments and compositions. Create your own compositions using colors and shapes and hear them played on the spot! Record your own beats at our electronic music station. Make tongue depressor kazoos, and play our collection of strange found sound instruments.
At 2 PM, Sing With Us! Meet us in the Stanley commons for a community singing of Pauline Oliveros’ Tuning Meditation. Using any vowel sound, sing a tone that you hear in your imagination. Listen for someone else’s tone and tune to its pitch as exactly as possible. Introduce new tones at will and tune to as many different voices as are present. Sing warmly.
String Quartet Concert 2:30 PM: In keeping with the spirit of Stanley Marketplace, the Playground String Quartet provides an eclectic sample of works by Latino, Indigenous, and women composers. Including works by Gabriela Ortiz, Raven Chacon, and Caroline Shaw, this program contains the breadth of both Playground’s style and their mission.
Playground at 20! MCA Denver at the Holiday Theater 2644 W 32nd Ave, Denver, CO 80211
Hosted by MCA Denver at the Holiday Theater, this series of concerts is the heart of MARATHON.
The evening starts with Shane Courville (trumpet, electronics, composer) and Nathan Hall (piano, electronics, composer) presenting solo, duo, and improvised works on themes of freedom: freedom of nations and sovereignty, freedom to express our own identities, and the freedom of creative collaboration.
Up next join Leah and Josh for a 30-minute program of (mostly) contemporary art songs that recall childhood and gently remind us never to stop playing, even amidst the gloom and doom of life today. When you look through the kaleidoscope of your childhood, what do you see? Do the bright spots of hope, nature, and laughter stand out, or does darkness prevail?
After these two duo sets we gather for a celebratory toast to all that has been accomplished in the previous two decades while looking forward to the future.
At 8PM is the main event, The Playground @ 20!
This chamber concert features the first work we ever played, a new commission by Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez for bass flute and ‘ghost’ string quartet, and a new work by Playground Director Conrad Kehn for the entire ensemble.
The evening will also feature the Colorado premiere of Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate’s Ithánali, about a Chickasaw woman astronaut who is designated to be the first human to set foot on Mars, aware of the irony of her own action – colonizing Mars – and how it compares/contrasts to the historic colonization of her own tribe.
We will also highlight one of our favorite works commissioned with I’m Waiting for Your Crip Cadence, a collaborative composition by Nathan Hall and performance artist MG Bernard that creates an auditory and visual experience of what it is like to exist in a chronically sick bodymind exploring ideas of the disabled experience of non-linear time, and the doctor-patient relationship through a visceral display of how she is bound to the medical industrial complex, dependent on uncomfortable relationships of care, and indentured to pain.
Late Night GLOB
Close out MARATHON at Denver’s DIY citadel, GLOB.
This underground atmosphere set will intersperse avant DJ sets by former Playground board member DJ i.lind before our Music of The Shining, a show based on music from the Stanley Kubrick (and Stephen King) classic.
At midnight Playground composer and board member Silen Wellington will lead us in Haunting, a ritual performance. This is followed by Loretta Notareschi performing How All’s to One Thing Wrought! an improvisational work for a custom-designed virtual instrument that uses the electronic transformation of a single cello low C to express the spiritual idea of an interdependent web of all existence. Luke Wachter will perform …and we are a collection of memory for solo vibraphone and still photography which juxtaposes the impermanence of improvisation with the immutability of static images, examining how identity is constructed in the mind by collecting and reinterpreting memories and shared experiences. Ryan Fiegl winds us down with an electronic music set with reactive video as his musical alter ego Severed Shadow.
The evening closes with an open invite community-improvised drone session carrying us into the early morning.
This program is supported by Denver Arts & Venues through the DENVER CREATES Fund.
Telescreens, photo by Sydney Lemons
Monday | 03.23 What:Quarters w/Porch Light and Telescreens When: 6 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Telescreens from New York occupies a musical territory balanced between early 2000s post-punk and power pop live energy and modern electronic production. You can hear roots in the music in 90s alternative rock and maybe a touch of Walkmen and The Strokes but Telescreens aren’t going for the image of either. Its new singles “Nothing” and “Preacher” are pure expressions of breaking out of self-imposed repression and the ambient despair that is the normal reaction to modern life. Headlining the show are fellow New York City alternative rock band Quarters whose own sound on its more recent music incorporates an R&B aesthetic into its rhythm and vocals.
mclusky, photo by RC Stills
Tuesday | 03.24 What:mclusky w/Cherry Spit When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: mclusky established itself as one of the more unhinged post-hardcore acts out of the UK in the 90s and early 2000s with records that were partly surreal humor and partly oblique social commentary often taking the piss out of more obvious sanctimonious approaches to having something to say. The band has album titles like The Difference Between Me and You is That I’m Not on Fire and Mclusky Do Dallas. The group split originally in 2005 and reunited in 2014 for a benefit show. But then did a 20-year anniversary tour for the underrated Mclusky Do Dallas delayed to 2024. Then the band released an EP in 2023 called Unpopular Parts of a Pig followed by a full length in 2025 titled The World Is Still Here and So Are We with a subsequent 2026 EP called I Sure Am Getting Sick of This Bowling Alley. With the dire absurdity of world events mclusky is a welcome presence in modern music. Opening the show is top tier Denver post-hardcore/noise rock quarter Cherry Spit who are a pure fusion of technical death metal, noise rock, post-hardcore and shoegaze.
Gov’t Mule, photo by Emily Butler
Friday | 03.27 What: Gov’t Mule at Mission Ballroom When: 6:30 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Warren Haynes paid his dues as a musician throughout the 70s, 80s and 90s with stints in David Allen Coe’s band, The Nighthawks and on and off with The Allman Brothers Band which he joined in 1989. But in 1994 he formed Gov’t Mule in 1994 with Allman Brothers bandmate Allen Woody which became their focus when their more well-known project went on hiatus. With the then new band Haynes was able to channel his honed guitar work and insight into songwriting into original material with a masterful command of live improvisation so that the band has never been limited to expectations and sure there is the blues and country foundation but also the psychedelic flourishes that informed Haynes’ early influences with Hendrix and Clapton. The most recent Gov’t Mule record Peace…Like a River continues the band’s fusion of styles and influences into a sound that blurs the line between genres and seems orchestrated like a jazz record with contributions from the likes of Billy Gibbons, Ivan Neville, Ruthie Foster and Billy Bob Thornton.
Banshee Tree, photo by Christian O’Rourke
Friday | 03.27 What: Banshee Tree album release for Bad Luck w/Riley J Band When: 7:30/8 Where: Fox Theatre Why: Boulder-based Banshee Tree will release its sophomore album Bad Luck on April 17, 2026 but playing a hometown show ahead of the release likely featuring live versions of the songs from the forthcoming record. Banshee Tree’s eclectic mix of jazz inflected chamber pop and psychedelic folk pop is an apt vehicle for the eight songs on the record that have a gentle and contemplative quality like songs crafted late nights and honed in sessions around a campfire meant to be shared with friends. Despite this intimate aspect of the music each of the songs has an almost orchestral and expansive arrangement that flow into one another as though thematically Bad Luck is a concept album capturing a mood and state of mind wherein one examines wht to let go and what to hold onto going into a new chapter of life.
Pearly Drops, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 03.28 What:Pearly Drops When: 7 Where: Lost Lake Why: Finish dream pop band Pearly Drops released its latest album The Voices Are Coming Back to great acclaim in 2025. The record showcases the group’s gift for freely blending elements of hyperpop, glitch and what might be described as electronic dance shoegaze. Its gauzy and luminous atmospheres and entrancing, processed vocals sound like music from an as yet unrealized, existential indie science fiction film. It is an album that is its own world and one worth getting lost within and one you’ll get to experience a bit of live.
Ashnikko, photo by Vasso Vu
Saturday | 03.28 What: Ashnikko w/Princess Nokia When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Ashnikko established herself as one of the stars of hyperpop in the 2020s with her eclectic sound and look inspired in part by Tokyo street fashion (think Harajuku). Her particular blend of styles including rap, electropop and glitch sounds like music for a dance club in a cosmopolitan post-oligarchic collapse near future tourist destination city. The artist’s sophomore album Smoochies (2025) free associates sounds and cultural references and phenomena past and present including a mention of Strawberry Switchblade in the song “Chichinya” perhaps invoking that band’s own unique style and place in popular music history. Live expect set and costume changes and plenty of theater worth showing up to catch for the sheer spectacle.
Sextile, photo by Sarah Pardini
Monday | 03.30 What:Machine Girl w/Sextile and LustSickPuppy When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: Until a handful of years ago Machine Girl was an underground phenomenon with its borderline unhinged style of breakcore. Its music is an often disorienting mashup of frenetic grindcore, drum and bass and glitch that might be compared musically favorably with Lightning Bolt with whom the now trio has toured. In that Lightning Bolt is in the vein of punk but taking that spirit and making a different kind of music than expected and delivering ferocious live performances. Sextile started out in a more shoegaze/post-punk style but in the past few years have switched more fully into a sound akin to 90s big beat with modern production methods and sensibilities while maintaining a deeply atmospheric and richly moody aspect that has emphasized more its experimental electronic inspirations.
Westerman, photo by Eric Scaggiante
Monday | 03.30 What:Westerman w/Otto Benson When: 8 Where: Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox Why: Westerman’s ambitious 2025 album A Jackal’s Wedding was written in Athens and recorded on the island of Hydra and perhaps reflects the mythological and cultural resonances of one of the birthplaces of Western culture. More minimal and dark, yet also perhaps more minimal, than previous offerings from the songwriter the new record is also more piano and synth forward than earlier more guitar heavy albums and the effect is reminiscent of mid-90s Magnetic Fields or the more lush post-punk period of Arthur Russell. It is an album that explores becoming comfortable with uncertainty and embracing how that mindset can ease one better into an everchanging world. In surrounding himself with an unfamiliar environment in the writing and recording process it seems as though Westerman has crafted a record that makes that navigation an easier indirect experience for the listener as the album is not a departure from style so much as an adaptation and evolution.
Ulrika Spacek, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 03.30 What:Ulrika Spacek w/Barbara and Prairie When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Ulrika Spacek was already a noteworthy, arty post-punk band in the early 2020s but with the release of its 2026 album EXPO offers a view into its more avant-garde leanings with compositions that are nearly modern classical fused with baroque pop others a kind of breakbeat post-punk yet others a processional downtempo dream pop IDM. Its simply a rich record in terms of sound and creative ambition and seeing that kind of varied experimentalism in a small room is the way to witness it.
The Belair Lip Bombs, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 03.31 What:The Belair Lip Bombs, Dust and Laveda When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: The Belair Lip Bombs are an Australian power pop/garage rock band that was the first Australian band to sign to Third Man Records. Its spirited energy and gift for earnest melodies garnered it early praise for 2023 debut album Lush Life. For 2025’s Again, the group sounds slightly more introspective without losing its ability to put some urgent energy behind its performances. Opening the show is dream pop group Laveda from New York whose own 2025 album Love, Darla revealed its own songwriting and style leaning into a more experimental and gritty direction more akin to NYC post-punk and No Wave.
Monday | 02.02 What: Worst Night of the Year Fest II: Clementine Was Right, Caspar Milquetoast, Al Ameda and Small Houses When: 7/7:30 Where: Hi-Dive Why: At least this is in February and not January so the name of the event is by circumstance a bit of a joke this year. And given world and national events it seems unlikely as well. But music, yes, Clementine Was Right is the band that combines vivid and heartfelt poetry with emo-flavored country and atmospheric rock and live the band is truly exuberant. Caspar Milquetoast is a band that sounds like what a lot of bands were trying to do mixing psychedelia and folk rock but opting more for an indie pop sound than Laurel Canyon retro and that has meant more original songwriting.
Hobbyist, photo courtesy the artists
Tuesday | 02.03 What: Hobbyist, Pet Traits and Reposer When: 7:30 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Chicago-based Hobbyist like many bands from the Windy City is coming at music from a different angle. This one is noise rock adjacent in terms of sensibility and yes there is guitar and bass but electronic beats and a fusion of downtempo and punk attitude. At times the band dips into a mutant kind of blues rock but its 2024 album People, Like Used CD’s sounds like edgy art pop. Think post-punk made by former theater kids who are writing music to have an emotional resonance and appeal beyond narrow genre categories. Fans of Two Ton Boa and Mecca Normal will probably find something to like here.
Buñuel, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 02.05 What: Buñuel w/Squid Pisser, Spiritual Poison and Almanac Man When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Buñuel is the San Francisco-based avant-garde noise rock/No Wave band. Fronted by Eugene S. Robinson formerly of experimental rock legends Oxbow. This newer band has a similarly menacing and intense sound that is part experiments in arrangement and rhythm that sometimes hits the ear as some kind of industrial noise rock like a sister band to Swans, Live Skull or The Jesus Lizard whose Duane Denison contributes guitar to the group’s most recent album Mansuetude. Squid Pisser is glitchy, demented grindcore from Tommy Meehand (GWAR), Michael Armendariz (Duck Duck Goose) and Seth Carolina (Starcrawler). Spiritual Poison is the “ambient” project of Primitive Man’s Ethan McCarthy and some of the best music he is making. Almanac Man are an angular noise rock band whose style of post-hardcore is rooted in both DC and West Coast punk.
Weakened Friends, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 02.06 What:Weakened Friends w/Team Nonexistent and Queen Frog When: 8/9 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Portland, Maine’s Weakened Friends released its third album Feels Like Hell in October 2025 through Don Giovanni. The trio tapped into that 90s grunge pop sound and the loud-quiet-loud sort of sound structure early on but by now has refined it into something with more nuanced emotional range. The new record seems to be informed by the existential exhaustion, exacerbated by the current social and economic climate, of feeling like maybe your closest relationship has run out of steam yet you’re not ready to let it go while taking an assessment of every aspect of it and realizing in the end that a lot of those feelings are projection and you’re really tired of yourself and how you are and the ways in which you self-sabotage. And how that reflection allows you to grow and be present for the people you care most about but maybe allowed yourself to forget along the way. Team Nonexistent is in a similar lane of music but from Denver and with a little more edge in the presentation.
Judge Roughneck, Hi-Def Photography
Friday | 02.06 What: Judge Roughneck’s 30th Anniversary Party w/Reptiles & Samurai When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Judge Roughneck’s history reaches back to 1995 when ska was entering into its ascendance in American mainstream music but instead of being the kind that plagued the airwaves for a time with a watered down version of the music, Judge Roughneck seemed to have some authenticity and musical chops. The band’s fusion of reggae and ska with soul set it apart from many of its peers and thirty years later and with the recent tragic passing of former trombone player/back vocalist David Dinsmore, the group is still fronted by lead singer and multi-instrumentalist Byron Shaw. This show celebrates its legacy of excellence that transcended genre.
Patrick Dethlefs, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 02.06 What: Patrick Dethlefs and The Still Tide When: 7 Where: Swallow Hill Why: Patrick Dethlefs has been one of the more gifted songwriters out of Colorado for more than a decade and his style of folk Americana is poetic and emotionally vibrant. In 2025 he released his latest record Patty, a collection of songs that told stories of life and made sage observations about the human psyche and society that felt both like something from another, better, era and a commentary about the present times without some kind of didactic statement or grandstanding. All of which is easy and understandable to do but the lack of which lends Dethlef’s record an unspoken elegance of expression. The Still Tide might be described as a dream pop band but one that rocks a little more at times and singer/guitarist Anna Morsett is a bit of a prodigy player with songwriting that doesn’t make that obvious because it is all folded into how captivating the songs so often are.
babybaby4ever, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.07 What:babybaby4ever album release for 4ever is a long time w/Pleasure Prince, Xenon Thief and WNGDU DJ When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Over the last handful of years discerning fans of synth pop in Denver that have been fortunate enough to witness a babybaby4ever show have an artist worthy of her influences. Lily Conrad grew up in Golden, Colorado and started playing music at a young age getting into playing guitar and then cello by her middle school and teen years. In 2016 in college Conrad started making music and performed her first show as babybaby but in the past couple of years she changed the project name so that it was more findable via internet search engines. Early on playing out in and around Denver Conrad was part of the local DIY scene playing house shows and underground venues like the now defunct Posh House. Around that time she started playing keyboards in the live version of psychedelic garage rock band Rose Variety with her friend Becc Perez. The pandemic era stretched time in weird directions but since the world opened up again Conrad started playing around more often in her solo project at venues that could better represent her developing sound and its highly developed, rich synth tone and production. The show now includes props and aspects of performance art from Conrad making a babybaby4ever show memorable both visually as well as for the finely crafted songs that have the spontaneity and vulnerability of classic indiepop and the robust and enveloping melodic tonality of 80s New Wave. In 2026 babybaby4ever releases the new album 4ever is a long time via Denver-based imprint Witchcat Records. The nine songs are loosely a kind of breakup album as breakthrough. The lyrics and moods honor the heartache and the will to move forward by embracing vital experiences and the roots of who were are and what makes our lives feel vibrant.
Midwife, photo by Alana Wool
Tuesday | 02.10 What: Midwife and Amulets w/Sunswept When: 7:30/8 Where: Chautauqua Community House 900 Baseline Why: Midwife brings her emotionally vibrant, ambient folk soundscapes to a rare appearance in Boulder. Opening is Amulets, the solo project of Randall Taylor who has collaborated with Midwife on both his records and her own and his compositions that combine pastoral drones and tape collage is definitely spiritual kin to Midwife’s own songwriting. Sunswept is a flute and synth-driven ambient project from Denver comprised of local improve and experimental music scene star Sarah Christensen.
Sudan Arhcives, photo by Obidi Nzeribe
Tuesday | 02.10 What: Sudan Archives w/Suhreetah When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Sudan Archives came up playing violin and while studying ethnomusicoloy at Pasadena City College she attended the legendary club night Low End Theory and wrote her own music and did some deep diving into violin players across cultures and by 2017 released her self-titled debut EP. Since then, Sudan Archives has made a name for herself a talented composer, songwriter and performer blurring the lines between R&B, classical music, experimental electronic composition and dance music. Her latest album is the sprawling and entrancing The BPM (2025).
Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy, photo by Christy Bush
Wednesday | 02.11 What:Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy and Friends Play R.E.M. w/Bob Goldthwait When: 7 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: For the past dozen years acclaimed actor Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy (Bob Mould Band, Superchunk, Sunny Day Real Estate) have been working together to play albums live by mutually loved artists like The Modern Lovers, The Smiths ad Neil Young. But the past two years the focus has been performing classic albums by college rock/early alternative rock band R.E.M.. Last year the duo performed Fables of the Reconstruction with four original members of R.E.M. joining them on stage for their two shows in Athens, Georgia, the hometown of the group. For this tour Shannon and Narducy will by joined by Jon Wurster, John Stirrat, Dag Juhlin and Vijay Tellis-Nayak in celebrating the 40th anniversary of the album Life’s Rich Pageant and of course the show will include some choice cuts from across R.E.M.’s catalog.
Palehorse/Palerider in 2017, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 02.12 What: Palehorse/Palerider w/Glass Human and BleakHeart When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: This will be a front to back show of heavier Denver bands that don’t fit comfortably in the realm of metal though they might each be considered within that lane of music. Palehorse/Palerider combines desert rock, shoegaze and tribal/pastoral rhythms and soundscapes in its evocation of emotional weight. Glass Human is able to navigate being an art rock band and heavy shoegaze with pop songcraft with surprising mastery. BleakHeart is like if a doom band discarded those trappings in favor of more existential, dark and heavy post-punk.
Plastik Mystik, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 02.13 What:Plastik Mystik album release w/Cherry Spit, Pale Sun and Soneffs When: 7/8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Plastik Mystik is refreshingly difficult to pigeonhole because its sound hits the ears as some kind of amalgam of punk fury, dark post-punk sophistication and mutant garage rock left of center fractured song structures. After a handful of singles the past couple of years the group is finally releasing its debut album. The rest of the bill is filled out with some of Denver’s finest. Cherry Spit is a ferocious noise rock/post-hardcore quintet whose sound fuses angular, caustic sounds and impassioned vocals with a mathematical precision that breaks enough with being more calculated to be interesting. Pale Sun is arguably Denver metro’s greatest shoegaze band with former members of Bright Channel, Pinkku and Space Team Electra. Soneffs make music at the intersection of indie rock songcraft, psychedelia and shoegaze.
Salads & Sunbeams, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.14 What: The Cowboy Confessional: Sea of Heartbreak – Real Stories, Fake Cowboys w/Christie Buchule, Erin Christian, Susan Earley, Sarah Chase Fountain and musical guests Salads & Sunbeams When: 2 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: This will be an afternoon of confessional storytelling in the spirit of the subversion of the Valentine’s Day holiday. With musical guests, masterful pop band Salads & Sunbeams and their layering of poetry, 60s psychedelia and 90s indiepop.
Gentleman Deluxe, Way High album cover
Saturday | 02.14 What:Heartbreak Holiday: Gentleman Deluxe, The Schofields, Scooter James, Micah and the Mirrors & Silver West When: 6 Where: The Federal Theatre Why: Gentleman Deluxe is the solo Americana project of Aaron Howell, the charismatic frontman of MF Ruckus, White Fudge and various other bands over the years. This effort showcases Howell’s ability to write stripped down songs without losing the emotional sensitivity he can bring to a song that perhaps isn’t as obvious from his more bombastic bands but the sensibilities of which can be heard in his other songwriting. Also on the bill is former Tin Horn Prayer and Pinhead Circus member Scooter James with his own solo work and cosmic country artist Silver West.
DeVotchKa, photo by Jen Rosenstein
Saturday | 02.14 What:DeVotchKa A Tribute to the Music of Little Miss Sunshine When: 7 Where: The Boulder Theater Why: DeVotchKa was already a bigger band in Denver metro around the turn of the century that worked hard to hone and refine its masterful songwriting and sound that got pigeonholed as “gypsy punk” and Americana. But the affecting lyrics and the sophistication of its songwriting with elements of jazz composition and classic pop songcraft and a little luck landed the group’s music on the soundtrack for the 2006 film Little Miss Sunshine which adapted songs from the group’s albums How It Ends (2004) and Una Volta (2003). This is a rare chance to witness a great deal of that music live.
Weval, photo from kompakt.fm
Monday | 02.16 What:Weval – Chlorophobia album tour w/CERVAL When: 8 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Weval is an electronic duo from Amsterdam that for nearly a decade and a half have produced some of the more sonically rich dance and pop crossover music of recent years. Its fusion of deep house, techno and the kind of low end heavy electronic pop that fans of Big Black Delta, Sextile and Moderat would fully appreciate with songs that seem to fit both the dance club and indie radio formats.
Ron Funches, photo from ronfunches.com
Thursday-Saturday | 2.19-2.21 What: Ron Funches When: Varies by date Where: Comedy Works (downtown) Why: Ron Funches launched his comedy career while working various jobs in Portland, Oregon in 2006. Since then he has been on numerous television shows including a memorable but short bit in Portlandia in 2011. His surreal and sharply observed material exposes aspects of American culture and the collective psyche with great wit and insight. His unique vocal style and renders his inspired storytelling into bypassing expectations and giving a new perspective on what you may think is already familiar. Fans of Mitch Hedberg will definitely be into what Funches has to offer.
Rowboat, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 02.20 What:Rowboat, Loose Charm and Owosso When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Rowboat is a band whose music has some roots in folk but Sam McNitt has refined those influences into something more moody and literary with fine sonic textures and an intense delivery that creates a fascinating contrast with the sensitivity and delicacy of the songwriting. Owosso is a band that seems to draw inspirations from angular, DC post-punk, 90s emo and noisy shoegaze. Loose Charm makes music out of another era when alt-country wasn’t watered down into indie Americana, when it had more slivers of punk and early 90s alternative rock in its spine.
Atmosphere, photo by Samantha Martucci
Friday | 02.20 What: Atmosphere w/Sage Francis, R.A. the Rugged Man, Kool Keith and DJ Mr. Dibbs When: 6 Where: Boulder Theater Why: From humble origins as an alternative hip-hop group forming in 1996, Atmosphere has become one of the most popular acts out of that musical milieu. Celebrating its 30 year anniversary for this tour including a club show at Boulder Theater, Slug and Ant bring their hyper verbal, emotionally vibrant and imaginative hip-hop as well as legends of the art form including innovators like Sage Francis and Kool Keith who have both pushed the boundaries of hip-hop with experimentation in sound delivery of subject matter. Mr. Dibbs maybe became more well known in the 2000s but he was honing his skills at turntablism actively as an artist since the early 90s and has worked with Atmosphere and El-P as well as Doseone and numerous other noteworthy artist of hip-hop.
Taraneh, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 02.20 What:Taraneh w/Tassles and Warper When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: New York’s Taraneh sounds like it draws equally from more avant-metal, post-punk, noise rock and shoegaze to make its own sound that is deeply atmospheric and edgy with soulfully delivered vocals. While sounding nothing like Kylesa and Slow Crush, fans of those bands will find something to appreciate about the way Taraneh combines heaviness, electronic music and psychedelic flourishes. Warper recently put out a new album that showcased its complete absorption of heavy 90s emo and shoegaze and fused it into its own flavor. Tassles started out as sort of a bedroom shoegaze band but as the live project has evolved into more of a band its robust guitar sound backed by live bass and the in person experience expands upon the strong songwriting of the project’s recorded releases with robust sound that doesn’t take away from songs that are like the next evolution or two beyond chillwave with meditations on life and how you have to fantasize about something that engages the mind and otherwise dissociate to get through the nightmare of life under late capitalism and how it manifests in your personal existence.
Dressy Bessy, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.21 What:Dressy Bessy & The Tammy Shine Album Release w/Hotel Wifi and Cribbo When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Dressy Bessy doesn’t play live in its hometown in Denver often and it has become a bit of a tradition to play the Hi-Dive in February. The indiepop band includes Apples in Stereo guitarist John Hill and fronted by the charismatic Tammy Ealom who super old school Denver people may know from The 40th Day or Sissy Fuzz. But obviously Dressy Bessy eclipsed all of that with national and international fame of the kind that doesn’t fill stadiums but does allow one to have opportunities most smaller bands can only dream of. This show celebrates the release of Ealom’s debut solo album as Tammy Shine called Ok Shine Ok on Happy Happy Birthday To Me Records with a special lathe cut of edition of songs from the album available from local imprint Witchcat Records. Of course the record has the charm and spirited energy that Ealom brings to Dressy Bessy if the songwriting is a little different and more spare but doesn’t spare the energy and attitude that is the singer and songwriter’s signature style. Plus, Ealom produced the album herself and it fully reflects her unique creative vision.
clipping., photo by Daniel Topete
Sunday | 02.22 What: clipping. w/Open Mike Eagle and Cool Prongs When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: From its inception clipping. was a band that had experimental leanings baked into its beats and aesthetic. But its latest record Dead Channel Sky is the fullest development of its albums as works of science fiction as much as music but not the kind that’s instantly corny and heavy-handed. Sure the title seems like a nod from the opening lines of William Gibson’s 1984 cyberpunk landmark Neuromancer. But the relentless yet sparely executed beats and flow of words is like hearing something like Busdriver working with The Prodigy. But more stark and reflecting the dystopian mood of the world today. At times it feels like it makes statements on the unsustainability of striving culture and and a world seemingly on fast forward driven by the demands of late capitalism but which does nothing but wear out mere humans.
MDC, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 02.26 What:MDC w/The Elected Officials, Poison Tribe and Shit Drugs When: 7 Where: The Federal Theatre Why: MDC just had a provocative name with radical left perspectives in its lyrics being against racism, homophobia, the perils of imperialistic capitalism (as if there’s any other kind) and fascism. All that at time when mainstream culture seemed to reflect the insipid “Morning in America” nonsense promoted by the Ronald Reagan administration which also funded death squads in Latin America and interfered with American elections in 1984 in a way that is still buried for fear of general public upset. Fast forward some forty years and things are somehow even worse so MDC (Millions of Dead Cops or Multi Death Corporations or whatever darkly funny and irreverent name the band chooses to adopt at any given time) is more relevant than ever.
Gogol Bordello, photo courtesy the artists
Friday | 02.27 What: Gogol Bordello w/Puzzled Panther and Boris and the Joy When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: Gogol Bordello spawned in 1999 in New York City named in part from 19th century Ukrainian writer Nikolai Gogol. Frontman Eugene Hütz, also from Ukraine, started playing in bands in the country of his birth with an appreciation for strong lyrics and thus another reason for the literary connection. The singer/musician spent a good deal of his youth in various parts of Eastern Europe, Austria and Italy including refugee camps in the wake of the Chernobyl meltdown ultimately landing in Vermont prior to his migrating to New York where he met the future members of his band. Fortuitously, Gogol Bordello came together when NYC was experiencing an upswing in underground rock with bands of disparate styles starting in the late 90s and 2000s. With a sound that has been perhaps self-described as “gypsy punk” perhaps as a way to capitalize on Hütz’s Romani background and incorporation of Romani musical ideas into rock as well as Ukrainian and Russian punk which has its own rich history and unique development. The band’s impassioned performances and unique sound distinct from other bands from New York of the time has since garnered Gogol Bordello a bit of a cult following across the past three decades as it successfully evades easy categorization except its own style. On February 13, 2026 the band released its new album We Mean It, Man!, potentially a reference to the Sex Pistols song “God Save the Queen” as well as a statement of intent. It has all the hallmarks of the band’s infectious energy and fusion of punk, glam rock, Eastern European folk and orchestral flourishes.
Cluxterfux in 2019, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 02.27 What: Clusterfux w/Prescription and Arson Charge When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Clusterfux has been around for more than 30 years as a staple of the local scene with its amalgam of skate punk and crossover. Brothers Josh and Justin Lent have been longtime supporters of local community including with their shop Chain Reaction Records. Their irreverent and intense records hasn’t exactly lost its edge and intent as evidenced by December 2025 single “American Gestapo.” Arson Charge also makes no bones with its own brand of hardcore taking aim at the dark corners of one’s psyche and American culture. Prescription is one of the old school hardcore bands from Denver’s 90s punk scene that came across as being humorous and pointedly political back then and now with its new album Lab Rats.
Hex Cassette in 2021, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.28 What: Hex Cassette, “Horse Girl,” Brock “‘”the Brick” Bronson and aithworker When: 8 Where: The Crypt Why: Hex Cassette is Denver’s premiere industrial dance/darkwave performance art act. Zachary Graves is a commanding and hyperkinetic figure whose music is well-crafted and compelling on its own but his stage banter in which he cajoles the audience in hilarious heel fashion is second to none. “Horse Girl” is not the Chicago band. It is the performance troupe/experimental pop band from Denver whose shows are all fairly unique and often involving a concept and musical elements can be drastically different from the previous show but always wortth seeing.
Brotherhood of Machines in 2016, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 02.28 What: 4digit, Virga Delta, Brotherhood of Machines (album release) and Sell Farm When: 8/8:30 Where: DMV Why: Brotherhood of Machines is set to release his new album for this show. The project is a unique layering of ambient methodology, environmental industrial, techno noise and cassette collage music. Virga Delta is industrial ambient glitch. Sell Farm is a ferocious amalgam of industrial rock and noise akin to Nine Inch Nails.
Wednesday | 10.01 What: Modest Mouse w/Built to Spill When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Coming off the heels of a summer co-headlining tour with The Flaming Lips, alternative rock icons Modest Mouse is now touring with fellow Pacific Northwestern alt-rock legends Built to Spill. Modest Mouse’s idiosyncratic melodies and emotionally charged vocals that range freely from the vulnerable to the nearly unhinged and cathartic has made the group a cult band from its early underground days to international stardom. Built To Spill came out of the psychedelic post-punk band Tree People to carve out a legacy of being steeped in both punk and psychedelic improvisation. The group’s coherent yet eclectic style has been considered shoegaze by some or more deconstructed, slackery power pop by others but all held together by singer and guitarist Doug Martsch’s introspective poetry and colorful songwriting imagination informed by the broad swath of human experience layering melancholia with joy. Both bands started in 1992 and have managed to release vibrant later career material unlike many bands over thirty years into their existence.
Patriarchy in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 10.01 What: Patriarchy w/Spiritual Poison and Kill You Club DJs When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Patriarchy is the Los Angeles-based electro death rock band whose edgy lyrics and just as edgy stage appearance and performance art style has garnered it a wide underground following. Fortunately the band’s songs are more than the bombastic live show with commanding vocals and refraining from the usual tropes of modern darkwave and leaning into rich tones and embracing the industrial underbelly of the music as well as glitchy witch house and ambient washes of foggy harmonic gloom. Currently on tour in support of the new album Manual For Dying.
Malena Cadiz, photo by Mikael Kenedy
Thursday | 10.02 What: Malena Cadiz and Anna Ash When: 7 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Malena Cadiz’s 2023 album Hellbent & Moonbound seems to be inspired by snapshots of experiences of life during an average week in Los Angeles and walking the neighborhood and imagining the lives of strangers based on intuitive observations and mixed with more than a touch of autobiography to breathe life into the storytelling. The songs are in the realm of Americana pop but with vibrant electronic touches that combine with spangled guitar flourishes that anchor the songwriter’s words in your mind. She is touring with Anna Ash who like Cadiz was born in Michigan but now calls the City of Angels home. Her own style seems more stepped in country but the kind that emerged from the folk pop and rock that spawned the likes of Phoebe Bridgers. Meaning some luminous moods, strong cadence and expressive vocals and stories that sound like they came out of astutely collecting anecdotes while working in the service industry and thus imbued with an undeniable authenticity.
Anna Ash, photo courtesy the artistFlutter, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 10.04 What: Flutter and The CDs When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Flutter is a Denver-based power pop band whose 2025 EP When You Love Somebody hearkens back to late 70s power pop. Its earnest lyrics about the nuances of love and relationships and how one’s emotions can be so strong but feel so complicated paired with sparkling, jangle-y guitar melodies render the band’s songs memorable beyond any tinges of nostalgic tone. Live the group has a surprisingly passionate performance style that elevates the music even further.
Die Spitz, photo by Pooneh Ghana
Sunday | 10.05 What: Die Spitz w/Flowers For the Dead When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: Austin-based Die Spitz taps into the more melodic end of 90s grunge but clearly with a foundation in pop punk energy and knack for melodic hooks. Its 2025 album Something to Consume is moody and smoldering in tone and often reminiscent of early 2000s post-hardcore emo with some edge and vulnerability mixed in with the bombast. Some nice atmospheric layers and for the song “Throw Yourself to the Sword” an obvious taste for thrash metal somewhere in the band’s DNA makes Die Spitz a band that isn’t beholden to a narrow musical traditions.
Riki, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 10.06 What: French Police w/Riki When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex Why: French Police is a Chicago-based post-punk band with a bit of a cult following for its melodic coldwave style with subdued moods and narrowly atmospheric melodies. Riki is an enigmatic synth pop artist from Los Angeles who has a bit of a following of her own among connoisseurs of darkwave for her dance music adjacent beats, vivid washes of synth and commanding vocals reminiscent of 1980s New Wave acts. With only two full length albums under her belt for the Dais imprint out in 2020 and 2021 respectively, Riki recently released a two song EP Pulser (2025) that hints at further newly developed material that may be experienced at this performance.
Dark Angel, photo from Facebook
Monday | 10.06 What:Dark Angel w/Sacred Reich, Vio-Lence, Midnight and Interceptor When: 5 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Dark Angel formed in the early days of Bay Area thrash and its early music was understandably compared to Slayer with the wild and menacing guitar pyrotechnics and urgent rhythms that broke and changed direction in an instant to switch up the tone of the song. Its most coherent early statement of style was the caustic and thrilling 1986 album Darkness Descends. It was the first to feature legendary drummer Gene Hoglan whose contribution to the sound and style of the better heavy metal of the era and since is undeniable as a pioneer of thrash and death metal. The group’s final album before splitting for the first time in 1992 Time Does Not Heal was primarily written by Hoglan and instead of occult themes it delved into issues mental health issues and the impact of culture, religion and failed political policy (including a complete lack thereof) on the individual and thus society generally. It was ahead of its time as a kind of masterpiece of progressive thrash. The band would not release another record until 2025’s Extinction Level Event, the first album following the death of founding guitarist Jim Durkin in 2023 to whom the record is dedicated. Also on this bill are other luminaries of 80s thrash like Sacred Reich and Vio-Lence.
Patrick Shiroishi, photo courtesy the artist
Wednesday | 10.08 What: Patrick Shiroishi: Forgetting is Violent Tour w/M. Sage https://hi-dive.com/listing/patrick-shiroishi-forgetting-is-violent-tour/ When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Patrick Shiroishi is a multi-instrumentalist composer based in Los Angeles who is most known for his imaginative and explorative saxophone work as a solo artist and as an inspired collaborator with projects like Fuubutsushi, We Bow to No Masters, Upsilon Acrux. This year he released his latest record Forgetting is Violent, a masterclass in using the idiom of music as abstract free jazz, field recordings and ambient composition to express ideas about colonialism and racism and its legacy for today and how both threaten human existence and yet both of which need not lead to dire inevitabilities when acknowledged and confronted with honesty and integrity. M. Sage is Matt Sage who was a pillar of the DIY music world on the front range when he was based in Fort Collins in the 2000s and 2010s before relocating to the Midwest for a spell and there further putting out cutting edge ambient and pastoral folk records on his Patient Sounds imprint. Lately, Sage has expanded his musical range further into the realm of avant-garde improvisational and electronic music.
Oliver Hazard, photo by Ross Bustin
Wednesday | 10.08 What:Oliver Hazard & The Last Revel: Head West When: 6 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Oliver Hazard is an indie folk band from Waterville, Ohio that recently released its latest album Raindrop River on Nettwerk. The band started prior to the 2020 pandemic and thus earned its audience the hard way through extensive touring in livingrooms and small venues and now headining theaters like The Gothic. The band’s delicate melodies and uplifting, bright energy ads a lift to songs that seem honest about everyday life struggles and simple joys, about tough choices and heartache and affection and a broad spectrum of human experience.
Shonen Knife, photo by Tomoko Ota
Thursday | 10.09 What:Shonen Knife w/The Pack A.D. When: 7 Where: HQ Why: Shonen Knife is a pioneering Japanese punk band that started out in Osaka in 1981 inspired by the kind of music that influenced the Ramones like 60s girl groups and by the Ramones themselves. The trio were a rarity in Japan in the early days as an all-female group and its lyrics about food, animals and pop culture paired with infectiously upbeat melodies were all but a precursor to pop-punk and a focus on everyday joys over the horrible things we often face in the world we experience. After all, if you only focus on the negative it’s harder to get through tough times. Shonen Knife embraced by American artists and labels like K Records in Olympia, Washington and Sub Pop out of Seattle and Sonic Youth, Red Kross and Nirvana who were instrumental in getting the band a record deal with Capitol Records in 1992 for the release of its 1993 album Let’s Knife. Shonen Knife has remained a bit of a cult band since and its reliably fun music and charming and energetic live shows has justified its legendary status. The outfit’s latest album Our Best Place got a 2025 vinyl reissue available on the tour and afterward through the Good Charamel website. The album is vintage Shonen Knife with fun and sometimes surreal songs about good times, beloved food and personal empowerment.
The Chameleons, photo by Mick Peek
Thursday | 10.09 What: The Chameleons w/The Veldt When: 7 Where: The Marquis Theater Why: The Chameleons are the legendary post-punk band that innovated a type of atmospheric and emotionally charged sound with two guitars playing off each other almost as one instrument. The effect and aesthetic is a sound that seems to have heavily influenced the shoegaze bands of the late 80s and early 90s by showing how effected guitars layered with synth could be a unified element in songwriting. Add Mark Burgess’ socially conscious yet deeply personal lyrics and commanding voice and you have a body of work that has aged well from the 80s and a clear inspiration for modern darkwave whether those bands know it or not. The band hadn’t released a new album since 2001 until this year with Arctic Moon, the first since the return of original guitarist Reg Smithies. The record’s songwriting reconciles the more acoustic rooted songwriting of the group’s later albums and the ambient moods of its classic 80s material for a surprisingly effective late era effort from one of the greats of 80s. Get there early to see The Veldt, one of the great, lost shoegaze and psychedelic post-punk bands of the 90s through today with a sound like a mix of R&B and dream pop.
Martin Rev, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 10.10 What: Martin Rev (and VJ Divine Enfent) w/Loveshadow (SF), Fergus Jones (DJ-Denmark,Scotland) and Kill You Club DJs When: 7 Where: The Aztlan Theatre Why: Martin Rev is one half of pioneering punk/post-punk/electronic band Suicide. The latter pre-dated the classic CBGB’s scene while also part of that. Its confrontational/borderline dangerous early live shows are remembered vividly by those who were there with former lead singer Alan Vega alternatively swinging a motorcycle chain during the performance to crawling over broken glass into the crowd and other refinements. Rev’s more modern solo music is an adventurous foray into noise, playful soundscapes, abstract industrial and what might be described as harsh ambient.
The Milk Blossoms, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday and Saturday | 10.10 and 10.11 What:Aurora Borealis Festival When: 4:30 Where: High Prairie Park at Painted Prairie Why: This event promises an array of vendors and food and live music set to unique visuals inspired by the Northern Lights and taking place in the furtherst northeast reaches of Aurora, Colorado probably the final weekend of the year when it may not be too cold to hold an outdoor event. The first night of the festival is headlined by R&B pop and soul artist Kayla Marque whose songs stretch beyond the preconceived boundaries of genre with a commanding voice and charismatic stage presence. Also on that night are Destiny Shynelle, Kalpulli Mikakuikatl, Jade Oracle and DJ Polyphoni. The second night of the festival will be headlined by experimental dream pop quartet The Milk Blossoms who have been writing new music that expands what pop music can sound like with deeply poetic lyrics that invite you to feel your own emotional turmoil fully as a vehicle for personal transcendence through immersion in creative work. Earlier on that evening you can also witness Miss Flowers, Kalama Polynesian Dancers, Eye Yoob and DJ Rewild.
Bambara, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 10.11 What:Bambara w/Midwife When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Brooklyn-based post-punk band Bambara released its new album Birthmarks in March and built further its reputation for transporting and moody deathrock with bluesy vocals. The combination hearkens back some of the 80s bands that combined soul and R&B with dark, experimental rock. Live the band has a bit more grit than one would expect from the the records. Midwife is the internationally renowned underground artists whose pastoral, ambient, “heaven metal” has crossed from the indie and experimental/ambient realms of music into the heavy music world for the weightiness of her lyrics and the quiet intensity of her performances. The music frankly packs an emotional gutpunch more than virtually all metal bands and that makes a massive difference.
PUP + JEFF ROSENSTOCK, photo by Nestor Chumak
Saturday | 10.11 What:PUP & Jeff Rosenstock and Ekko Astral When: 6:30 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: When PUP from Toronto, Canada started out in 2010 it was part of a wave of underground bands that came up in punk, perhaps even 2000s hardcore, that seemed to figure out they could find a way to make fun, catchy songs in a pop punk vein with some integrity that realm of music had lost like its connections to punk spirit and ethos were more or less gone. So PUP and bands across North America in pockets seemed to come up with a similar idea around the same time without necessarily knowing about each other. And PUP absolutely tapped into that sound and that anthemic and heartfelt pop-punk and even emo aesthetic with lyrics that truly captured working class struggles, everyday challenges that anyone with any heart could relate to and the attainable triumphs that can sometimes seem so elusive. In 2025 PUP released its new album Who Will Look After the Dogs? On that record the group worked with Jeff Rosenstock who is co-headlining this “PUP + JEFF ROSENSTOCK PRESENT: A CATACLYSMIC RAPTURE OF FRIENDSHIPNESS” tour and of course they’ll play some or all of their collaborative material together with separate sets. Rosenstock has been in bands since the 1990s like The Arrogant Sons of Bitches and Bomb the Music Industry but he has rightfully earned his plaudits for his solo albums with his incredibly catch songs with scrappy energy and tenderness and an acute awareness of the things that make life challenging for everyone.
eHpH, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 10.12 What: Laether Strip w/Cervello Elettronico and eHpH When: 7 Where: HQ Why: Leæther Strip is the well-known electro-industrial/EBM band from Denmark that was part of the second wave of that music in the late 80s but which didn’t succumb to the temptation of the bland future pop trend of the late 90s and 2000s. The latest release from the project is Æppreciation VIII, a tribute album that includes versions of songs originally written by the likes of Garbage, Boy Harsher, Yaz, Robin, Ladytron and Madonna. Local opener eHpH has been on a bit of a mini-hiatus for a couple of years but has always been an example of how a project can draw from EBM and electronic-industrial and not be caught up in the tired tropes of that style of music. The band’s lyrics are often a poignant and sharply observed social commentary and the production more layered and deeply creative than that of many of their peers in the broader realm of modern industrial music.
The Mayday Parade, photo courtesy the artists
Sunday | 11.12 What: All Time Low w/Mayday Parade, The Cab and The Paradox When: 6 Where: Red Rocks Amphitheater Why: Mayday Parade is in the middle of releasing a three part album in 2025 to commemorate 20 years as a band. Sweet released in April and the second installment Sad dropped October 3. The group formed in 2005 around the time when the pop punk and emo scenes nationally were basically floundering but Mayday Parade came as a result of two other bands in Tallahassee, Florida coming together. The 2007 full length A Lesson in Romantics and its mix of earnest songwriting and humor won over detractors of the band’s early efforts as the group has set itself apart from late era pop punk. Since then the group has refined its sound while maintaining a knack for tapping into the sensitive emotional core that is at the heart of its stylistic roots and finding new ways of writing about experiences that people go through no matter what age. Headlining is All Time Low who slightly predate Mayday Parade but have been in a similar musical lane in anthemic power pop and emo. In one of the opening slots is The Cab who also came up in the mid-2000s pop punk milieu and were signed to the Fueled By Ramen imprint along with All Time Low. But The Cab’s sound seemed to be more informed by 90s R&B and mainstream pop and its electronic production than most of the band’s pop punk peers and because of that its music is decidedly different from any standard issue punk.
Superchunk, photo by Alex Cox
Monday | 10.13 What:Superchunk w/Case Oats When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Superchunk is one of the most well=known of the alternative rock bands of the 90s who helped ot not just define a sound with its upbeat, melodic punk at a time when punk had become mostly an underground scene. The group also helped to push other left field rock bands well past the 90s with its Merge imprint and though its own music is respectable and easily worth a listen for the wit and expert songcraft that larger effort of creating an environment in the culture for its own type of music thrive and be accepted is a massive legacy. Superchunk is now touring in support of its 2025 album Songs in the Key of Yikes, a record that not only has some of the group’s finest songwriting of recent years but a title and content that is very much a poignant summation of this moment in history and of the culmination of recent years to boot. Not enough bands have done so with such hummable conciseness. Case Oats is an Americana band based in Chicago fronted by Casey Gomez Walker that put out its debut album on August 22, 2025. Titled Last Missouri Exit it’s a reference to a sign near the Illinois border. Walker’s vocals are earnest and have enough raw vulnerability to give her performances an authenticity that lend her tales of growing up and growing beyond one’s place of upbringing a poignancy that is reminiscent of Rilo Kiley with a similar deftness in crafting turns of phrase that hit like sparks of the truth that can warm and sting at once.
Case Oats, photo by Braeden LongAcid Mothers Temple perform at Larimer Lounge on April 8. Photo by Tom Murphy
Monday | 10.13 What:Acid Mothers Temple w/The Macks and Los Toms When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: You don’t go to an Acid Mothers Temple show to see the legendary, Japanese psychedelic rock expecting they’ll play your favorite song from their copious recorded catalog. You go because it’s going to be pure musical weirdness and an experience to take you out of mundane reality for several moments and right now that kind of musico-psychological transmogrification is a welcome respite from a world in unfortunate historical times. Fans of space rock, shoegaze, heavy psychedelia, freak folk, ambient and noise generally will get something positive about witnessing this band’s wild live performances.
Bitchin Bajas, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 10.13 What: Bitchin Bajas w/Prairiewolf When: 7 Where: Glob Why: Bitchin Bajas is a Chicago-based psychedelic ambient and experimental synth band and a side project of Cooper Crain of Krautrock/post-rock group CAVE. This is much more chill than CAVE but the gentle, hypnotic qualities of the music is more in line with an experimental electronic band even though aspects are generated by live instruments like sax and keyboards. The new album Inland See is like a cosmic New Age jazz with pop leanings like something composed on a paradisiacal island in a more pastoral future where everyone’s basics are covered and we can all live out extended lives indulging our passions and even our whims, perchance exploring creative ideas that benefit all.
Goya, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 10.14 What: Goya w/In the Company of Serpents and Church Fire When: 7 Where: The Crypt Why: Goya from Phoenix, Arizona is a fusion of doom blues and heavy psychedelia and its 2025 album In the Dawn of November was engineered by legendary grunge scene producer Jack Endino. So the crushing hits land perfectly and so do the warping melodic passages and the songs have both a bite and some swing to them that a lot of heavy bands don’t. Think equal parts TAD and Sleep. In the Company of Serpents these days has evolved well beyond the devastating heaviness of its early records into its own psychedelic, Western doom. Its new album A Crack in Everything is the band’s most personal statement yet on issues of addiction and identity with burnished guitar work and elegant yet weighty rhythms. Church Fire may seem like an odd choice for this show but its own music has a heavy impact in terms of the intensity of the music and its emotional heft. Also the band has been known on at least one occasion to play a show as a cosmic black metal band. But this night it’ll probably “just” be the politically charged, industrial synth pop that has turned the group into a bit of a cult band.
Shiner, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 10.15 What:Shiner w/No Fauna and Brass Tags When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Shiner was a respected band in the post-hardcore lane but the type that really crossed over into realms of experimental, atmospheric rock bordering on shoegaze/space rock before splitting in 2003. It was inspired by noisier shoegaze bands as well as the major noise rock bands of the 90s and space rock/hard rock crossover act Failure. The outfit is currently touring in support of its new record BELIEVEYOUME, which definitely showcases its gift for drawing upon disparate influences to produce something almost orchestral in its use mastery of evocative noise.
I’m With Here, photo by Alysse Gafkjen
Wednesday | 10.15 What: I’m With Her w/Jon Muq When: 7:30 Where: The Paramount Theatre Why: I’m With Her is an Americana and bluegrass supergroup comprised of Sarah Watkins (Nickel Creek), Sarah Jarosz and Aoife O’Donovan (Crooked Still) . Each of the singers and musicians has a renowned solo career as well as their work in their respective bands. All grew up playing music and Jarosz met Watkins when the former was a kid and came to the attention of O’Donovan as a teen. This group came together in 2014 at a workshop during the Telluride Bluegrass Festival, and thus a somewhat local connection. The group has thus far only had two albums, other obligations clearly demanding of their time, including its new album Wild and Clear and Blue (2025) for which the trio is touring. The new album has a sense of wonder and seems imbued with an inner light that informs songs about reconciling the lessons of one’s past to help in getting through the tumultuous times and not losing sight of there being goals to reach for that matter even with clear and present dangers and challenges to navigate.
Ches Smith’s Clone Row, photo courtesy the artists
Wednesday | 10.15 What:Ches Smith’s Clone Row When: 7 Where: The Federal Theater Why: Ches Smith is a drummer, percussionist and composer originally from California and now based out of New York. His career as a musician has been varied and acclaimed including playing on albums with and playing with the likes of John Zorn, Mr. Bungle, Xiu Xiu, Fred Frith, Pauline Oliveros Terry Riley, Marc Ribot (as a member of Ceramic Dog), Secret Chiefs 3, Nels Cline and Dave Holland. Smith’s mastery of technique is not divorced from a creativity in crafting rhythms to whatever musical style and mode or mood he finds himself contributing to or writing himself with his various collaborators. In 2025 Ches Smith offered his latest opus, Clone Row which includes performances from avant-garde guitar legend Mary Halvorson, jazz luminary Liberty Ellman and multidisciplinary sound artist Nick Dunston. It’s an album of music that moves with imaginative flow of layered rhythms and tones like if one of those more gifted 2000s math rock bands like Hella and Battles were more into fusion and free jazz. Although instrumental the songs speak musically with a cinematic quality.
Matt Maltese, photo by V Petersen
Wednesday | 10.15 What: Matt Maltese w/Cornelia Murr When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: For his sixth album Hers, UK singer-songwriter Matt Maltese sounds like he immersed himself in the film and music of the late 60s and through the mid-70s. Perhaps especially the albums of Jacques Brel and Scott Walker and the cinema of Jean-Luc Godard. There is a vivid yet hazy tone to his songs that suggest an introspective and reflective spirit and a timeless, classical sensibility that the aforementioned seem to exude as well. A fortunate pairing of an opener in Cornelia Murr is in store for anyone catching the show when it starts at 8. Murr’s 2025 album Run to the Center builds out her lush, experimental dream pop sound into the realms of songwriting sophistication one would expect of a creative visionary like Aldous Harding. Murr’s orchestral arrangements and literary storytelling is instantly captivating and her otherworldly energy and charisma as a live performer are undeniable.
Goon, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 10.16 What: Goon w/beaming and The Milk Blossoms When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Goon is a dream pop band from Los Angeles that over the summer released its third album aptly titled Dream 3. The songs on the record have a quality like short films based on the memories of dreams in which the strong emotions and experiences of your waking life haunt the subconscious and filter back through as strong but hazy emotional resonances. Often the songs are gorgeously ethereal and in others noisy and tense and overall the record is like a psychedelic pop affair that fans of Black Moth Super Rainbow and Spirit of the Beehive might like. Indie pop project beaming is a collaboration built around making playful and explorative pop songs with creative production choices lending the songs a unique flavor if the elements might seem familiar. The Milk Blossoms are the experimental indie rock band from Denver whose literary sensibilities and emotionally vibrant songs seem like a vivid sonic experience of stories based in memories and the feelings those memories elicit. Listening to a song by the band is akin to reading a short story so poignant and poetic it sticks with you as a true thing because they elicit such deep responses if you’re open to having them.
Patrick Wolf, photo courtesy the artist
Sunday | 10.19 What:Patrick Wolf When: 7:30 Where: Bluebird Theater Why: Patrick Wolf is a singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from the UK whose musical style is refreshingly challenging to pigeonhole. He combines electronic pop with more classical sensibilities for a sound that is like an experimental, even conceptual, folk especially on his new album Crying the Neck the lyrics for which seem to tap into the lore of his home region of East Kent. Prior to the album and the 2023 EP The Night Safari, Wolf had taken a decade plus hiatus from music during which he dealt with personal misfortunes and tragedies including the death of his mother. The new album is a meditation on processing losses personal, cultural and collective socially through the use of the imagery and references of his immediate environment rich in its own traditions and unique spirit.
Gina Birch by Dean Chalkley
Monday | 10.20 What: Miki Berenyi Trio and Gina Birch & The Unreasonables When: 7 Where: Larimer Lounge Why: Miki Berenyi is of course the charismatic and ironic co-singer and co-guitarist of pioneering shoegaze band Lush. The latter even in its time was innovative in its incorporation of electronic musical elements into the songwriting and sound, especially on its later records. The trio got off to what might be seen as a fragile start when KJ “Moose” McKillop was unable to do the early touring but this time around he will be able to and the trio’s new album Tripla picks up where Lush’s mid-90s dream pop leanings left off with an even more robust electronic production undergirding the expansive melodies and Berenyi’s soulfully ethereal vocals. But of equal interest is Gina Birch & The Unreasonables. Which is the latest band from Gina Birch, former bassist of legendary and influential post-punk group The Raincoats. The latter opened up what post-punk could sound like and essentially paved the way for left field rock and pop being an inspiration for the likes of Half Japanese, Beat Happening, Nirvana and Hole. In 2023 Birch released her acclaimed debut solo album I Play My Bass Loud and proved herself once again an artist with deep creative vision and a strong experimental streak utilizing dub techniques in the production and wide-ranging sonics. The 2025 album Trouble continues with boundary pushing songwriting and politically-charged lyrics.
Conan Neutron & The Secret Friends
Monday | 10.20 What: Conan Neutron & the Secret Friends w/Plastik Mystik and The Better Selfs When: 7 Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: Conan Neutron and his various bands have been a wonderfully eclectic yet coherent example of doing whatever kind of music an artist might want to do whether that’s weird noise rock post-punk, mutant Americana or whatever it is The Way of the Neutron album (2025) might be dubbed with contributions from members of Melvins, Coliseum, Replicator and Trophy Wives. It sounds like a groove-driven sludge rock band with a knack for the psychedelic in a vein that doesn’t sound like the sort that got popularized in the 2010s. The Better Selfs is what happens when you collage heartfelt, Neil Young-esque Americana with equally emotionally vulnerable emo that isn’t afraid to spill over the edges with its sound and feelings in the performance of the music. Plastik Mystik is technically a garage psych band but only if that band leaned more into Kiwi Rock weirdness and the haunted dead end town desperation and edge of Wipers.
Purity Ring, photo by yuniVERSE
Tuesday | 10.21 What: Purity Ring w/Washed Out (DJ Set) and yuniVERSE When: 8 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Purity Ring’s innovative approach to production and songwriting was evident with its 2012 debut album Shrines paired with an idiosyncratic live show that included unique controllers and multi-media elements. A lot of artists that use side-chaining really waste our time by merely making bad hip-hop and pop. Purity Ring uses that technique to create mind-expanding rhythms and tonal colorings. It’s difficult to know how to sum up the band’s sound because it does sound like it’s coming to us from a realm of human existence that is separate from mundane reality. Fitting for the duo’s 2025 self-titled record which is a concept album intended as a soundtrack to a fictional fantasy video game with a similar emotional and creative resonance and expansive sense of wonder. At times the album is reminiscent of the kind of glitch pop we heard from early 2010s Crystal Castles with the expert pitch shifting and rhythm splicing but pushed to another realm of production expertise.
Wednesday, photo by Graham Tolbert
Thursday | 10.23 What: Wednesday w/Friendship When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Wednesday has been one of the bands of choice among aficionados of boundary pushing and blurring guitar rock. Its early output combined shoegaze atmospherics and tonal bending, emo-inflected math rock and arty post-punk but with a knack for memorable hooks and melodies. With 2023’s Rat Saw God the band was exploring deep into songcraft with some countrified tunes that also didn’t skimp on mood and a bit of an edge in the guitar sounds. The record also continued startlingly vulnerable lyrics and astute observations of social and interpersonal dynamics. The 2025 record Bleeds builds upon the tense but cathartic energy that made its predecessor so arresting and risks even more in the emotional openness of the songwriting. Live the band has been glorious exuberant and charming with a raw quality that invites the audience in for the collective catharsis.
Peel Dream Magazine, photo by Matthew Schmohl
Friday | 10.24 What: Peel Dream Magazine w/Wave Decay and Bellhoss When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Peel Dream Magazine is currently touring in the wake of the release of its 2025 mini album Taurus which dropped October 1. The record continues in the experimental vein of its predecessor with deep, gossamer atmospheres and left field pop songcraft with no allegiance to established styles or tradition making the album refreshingly out of frame with prevailing musical trends. Denver Krautrock-inflected shoegazers Wave Decay are also on the bill with its massive sounds and electrifying tone. Bellhoss will bring its own masterful songwriting and willingness to go off the rails sonically and emotionally in its particular style mashup of indiepop, shoegaze and emo.
Entrancer, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 10.24 What: DJ Earl w/Entrancer and Sinistarr When: 8 Where: Glob Why: DJ Earl is a Chicago based house and footwork producer whose work shows how there’s really no difference between Chicago house and hip-hop production. Eclectic beats and bright electronic melodic and rhythmic layers and a sense of play that one heard in the work of J. Dilla. Entrancer is a Denver-based techno/ambient artist whose compositions for synth have been informed by 90s hip-hop and his time in Chicago experiencing that city’s electronic music firsthand as well as the experimental electronic, pop music and noise he came up with in Denver. His recent work is emotionally stirring and expertly references the sounds, emotions and spirit of his whole career as an artist at once.
Between the Buried and Me, photo by Randy Edwards
Friday | 10.24 What: Between the Buried and Me at w/Hail the Sun and Delta Sleep When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: Progressive metal band Between the Buried and Me were trying to figure out its place in the world of music on its 2021 album Colors II. With the 2025 album The Blue Nowhere it appears that some decisions or conclusions were made or an embrace of notions with the music seemed clear. Not that the group hasn’t incorporated elements of pop songwriting and hooks into its sound but the new album other than the masterful musicianship in a clearly progressive rock mode is basically a pop record but one that hits as introspective and expansive, one that sounds like it came out of spending time taking stock and considering what one’s life is really, deeply about and not ignoring the feelings that might crash in on you in middle age, but feeling them and giving them voice in the music.
Hayden Pedigo, photo by Jackie Lee Young
Friday | 10.24 What:Hayden Pedigo w/Jens Kuross When: 7 Where: Swallow Hill Daniel’s Hall Why: Fingerstyle guitarist and left-field songwriter Hayden Pedigo is having quite a year with his new album I’ll Be Waving as You Drive Away coming out on June 6. The record is a fascinating set of songs that come across as gently psychedelic and pastoral Americana folk at once and consistently too weird to fit into a narrow box of music. The textures and informal rhythms he employs in creating his melodies stands out as decidedly different but soothing to the mind. He also worked on a collaborative album In the Earth Again with fellow Oklahoma City residents, sludge metal, political doom band Chat Pile with both sets of artists fusing their aesthetics for a heavy record imbued with otherworldly elegance.
Friday – Sunday | 10.24-10.26 What: Denver Noise Fest 2025 When: F 10.24 7pm, S 10.25 12p.m and 8 p.m., Su 10.26 11 am Where: The DMV (10.24, 10.25 8pm and 10.26) and The Aztlan Theatre (10.25 12 p.m. Why: Denver Noise Fest returns in full with three days of boundary pushing noise art. Friday’s showcase includes Now That We’re Alone, Animal / Object, Phil Stearns, Eric Drasin, Carl Ritger, Eliza Miller and Bl_ank. Saturday afternoon’s event at the Aztlan will feature ETAM, Bat Mob, EM.BALM, Dream Cheese, Andrew Weathers and Cantare Montibus. Saturday night’s proceedings will include performances by Her Mortal Form, Many Blessings, EXREMADURA, Sick Tisk, Novasak, Page 27 and PCRV. The Sunday morning/afternoon concluding happenings is what’s called Harsh Toast that is sort of a potluck and improv noise sets. For tickets and more information please visit denvernoisefest.com.
Molly Tuttle, photo by Ebru Yildiz
Saturday | 10.25 What: Molly Tuttle w/Joshua Ray Walker and Cecilia Castleman When: 7 Where: The Ogden Theatre Why: Molly Tuttle’s 2025 album So Long Little Miss Sunshine has been described by critics as essentially her swing to pop country. But of course the bluegrass leanings in the guitar lines keep the music from losing the essence of Tuttle’s appeal as an artist who writes with an intimate feel and a facility with portraits of everyday experiences with subtly deft turns of phrase. The new record has some exquisite moments of personal insight commenting on one’s inner life and relationships. Also the concluding track “Story of My So-Called Life” is a nice title nod to the classic TV series while embodying the overall mood and story of the show as something that resonates with one’s adult self.
The Wombats, photo by Julia Godfrey
Saturday | 10.25 What: The Wombats w/Only The Poets and Red Rum Club When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: The Wombats are a band that hasn’t limited itself to a popular trend in style and sound from early on. Not choosing to be a pop band over being an art band that engages in sometimes dark and self-deprecating humor and eccentric songwriting. Its new album Oh! The Ocean is no exception and you have to appreciate a band that is willing to have a video like the one for “Can’t Say No” in which a man in his morning robes is chased down the street by his own car guiding itself by the rear camera with the parking sight lines in plain view. The record itself is brimming with the exuberance and expertly crafted moods and the kind of commentary on the wild, dystopian and tragically historical times we’re going through in this moment of human history.
Tuesday | 10.28 What: Viagra Boys w/Black Lips When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Viagra Boys have been the post-punk band of choice for nearly a decade with its driving, commanding and raw musical performances and lyrics that are at once smart, poetic, wickedly humorous and vulnerable. The latter one might not expect from the same band that writes pointed songs about authoritarian culture and human folly generally but on the new album Viagr Aboys (2025), with hints on earlier records, the tender side of the band is at this point undeniable. But don’t worry, Viagr Aboys is still imbued with the high concept art punk that has fueled its songwriting and performances up to now. Black Lips pre-dated Viagra Boys with their own spirited garage rock-inflected punk and were critical darlings for years with their own incorporation of experimental art concepts into its songwriting and performance style.
The Legendary Pink Dots in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday and Saturday | 10.31 and 11.01 What: The Legendary Pink Dots w/Orbit Service, Dead Voices On Air and DJ Mudwulf (10.31), on 11.01 also Edward Ka-Spel solo set When: 7 Where: HQ Why: The Legendary Pink Dots is a psychedelic rock/folk/electronic band that formed in 1980 and influenced generations of more left field, experimental bands of various stripes including the likes of Skinny Puppy, MGMT and Dresden Dolls, at least according the band’s Wikipedia article. But you really only have to listen to those bands after taking a sampling of the Dots’ extensive output to recognize that it’s likely true. Singer/keyboard player Edward Ka-Spel’s existential poetry and psychological/social analysis delves deep into our personal narratives and those which touch upon and are touched by others and the collective stories that course through our civilization. But Ka-Spel isn’t a mere, disinterested observer and commentator upon human doings, he comes from a place of someone who is living it and affected by things and processing his own psychological reactions to it all as well as his own place in it. The band’s records blend folk songcraft (and that music’s own spooky and atmospheric possiblities), ambient soundscapes, psychedelic rock and electro-industrial aesthetics with a keen ear for sound design. The latest album So Lonely In Heaven explores the current and future state of the panopticon of late capitalism and how it has infiltrated the most intimate spaces of our lives and consciousness and how we may not be able to disentangle ourselves from the techbro oligarchy without transforming the very nature of our socio-economic-psycho-spiritual existence. Orbit Service is Denver’s premiere ambient industrial duo which includes Randall Frazier whose music is clearly touched by the influence of the Dots but whose sound is also directly tied to noise, the broad spectrum of psychedelic rock and downtempo aesthetics. Also not short on incisive social commentary and a deep evocation of the struggle of existing as a human in a world challenging to the very notion of living a dignified life. Dead Voices On Air is the project of Mark Spybey who some may know for his pioneering work in Zoviet France. DVOA is even more abstract yet possibly even more human in the emotional resonance of the finely crafted sonics and cinematic sound design. For this show and other performances he will be joined by Nathan Jamiel of The Drood.
Thursday | 07.03 What:Planning For Burial w/Volunteer Coroner, Verhoffst and Patience, Ophelia When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: It’s Closeness, It’s Easy, the latest transmission of deep, troubling thoughts as slow and unsettling, yet beautifully rendered, musical exorcism from Planning For Burial is the kind of record any of us with life experience need in this moment. The grinding light of its most headlong moments of gritty black metal-shoegaze alchemy burns off a touch of the middle age angst and despair at discovering you are well into and halfway through adulthood and a lot of what you were told mattered, or worse the things you told yourself mattered, don’t amount to much. And living with friends passing away in seemingly rapid succession and the lives of those around you crumbling in this sick excuse of a fake advanced industrialized country hollowed out by the savage neglect of late capitalism with no end in sight. But the album is also about finding the flickering of meaning and significance and emotional resonance among those ruins and scraps and holding on to what and who moves you the most with a tightness that you might not have understood without having gone through all the things that don’t affirm your dreams and fantasies but instead attempt to chisel them into nothing yet failing just a little. It’s also just a gorgeously heavy, atmospheric work of borderline lo-fi, scuzzy shoegaze with heartfelt lyrics and an irresistible uplift. Opening are harsh noise soundscape sculptor Volunteer Coroner, power electronics ambient composer Verhoffst and ambient bedroom pop band Patience, Ophelia which includes Samuel Rupsa and Madeline Johnston (Midwife).
Meet the Giant in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 07.03 What:The Frickashinas w/The Born Readies and Meet the Giant When: 7 Where: Lost Lake Why: The Frickishinas are a melodic skate punk type of band from Denver in that sort of melodic hardcore borderline emo vein. The Born Readies are a kind of hybrid of hard glam and garage rock band also from the Mile High City. Meet the Giant, though they rock hard enough, are more of an alternative rock band steeped in electronic music aesthetics and deep mood atmospheric music so they might be considered a shoegaze outfit by some or leaning post-punk and even downtempo by others, there is an intensity and emotional depth to the music that reaches further than most more straight forward rock and roll.
The Milk Blossoms, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 07.08 What: Jackson & The Janks w/El Welk and The Milk Blossoms When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Jackson & The Janks is one of those retro old timey rock and roll and R&B bands with some garage rock spirit and gospel sensibility in its sound from New York City. El Welk is the new band from George Cessna who many may know from being a member of his father’s band Slim Cessna’s Auto Club or his former Americana outfit Snakes. But his solo albums have long been worthwhile for having existential lyrics and a spare and economic style. The Milk Blossoms is one of the best indiepop bands in the land at the moment with ear worm melodies and lyrics of uncanny poetic insight and imagination.
TopHouse, photo by Electric Peak Creative
Tuesday | 07.08 What:Fruition and TopHouse When: 6:30 Where: Denver Botanic Gardens Why: TopHouse is a Montana-based band whose roots in indie Americana and its bluegrass influences have been fully integrated into its heartfelt songwriting. In 2025 the band released two EPs: Theory in May and the newly released Practice. Obviously there is conceptual wit behind naming the two sets of songs but with the earlier EP was more upbeat and summery, the latest delves into struggle and self-re-discovery. The band’s masterful musicianship combines a sense of orchestral arrangements with emotional intimacy.
Howling Giant, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 07.10 What: Howling Giant, Abrams, Voidlung When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Stoner rock went out of style more or less around the turn of the 2010s but was replaced by its modern equivalent, psychedelic doom metal. But Howling Giant skipped the trend morphing and offered the kind of heavy music that is melodic yet hard hitting and and imbued with a sinuous rhythm style that gives the music a bit of sway. Denver’s Abrams clearly has similar musical inspirations as the headliner but with more than a touch of post-hardcore and post-rock.
Salads and Sunbeams, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 07.12 What: Salads and Sunbeams w/Air Moons (first show) When: 3 Where: Mutiny Information Cafe Why: Salads and Sunbeams is a psychedelic indiepop band whose gorgeously lush songs and literate lyrics sound like something from another era when creative songwriting was at a premium. Yet it’s sound isn’t stuck in the past even if you hear the songs and they have the strong production and ear for impeccable melodies that you’d expect on a Harry Nilsson or Apples in Stereo record. It’s new album Into the Starless Night is front to back a masterpiece of modern pop songcraft imbued with psychological insight and delivered with fantastic vocals both lead and in harmony.
Moon Pussy, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 07.12 What: Lost Relics w/Moon Pussy and No Comma When: 8 Where: The Crypt Why: Lost Relics’ juggernaut fusion of Unsane-esque noise rock and post-metal circa Neurosis will headline this show which includes the mutant noise rock tricksters Moon Pussy who absolutely blur the line between Butthole Surfers, Big Black and Shellac in style, methodology and substance. All the bands are from Denver and No Comma doesn’t play often but it will bring a blunt and clipped hardcore and noise punk aesthetic to the proceedings.
Lyle Lovett, photo by Michael WIlson
Sunday | 07.13 What:Lyle Lovett w/The Five Blind Boys of Alabama When: 7 Where: Fiddler’s Green Why: Lyle Lovett is one of the most popular artists in modern country whose career spans over four decades. He first burst into popular consciousness with his 1986 self-titled debut and his hit song “Cowboy Man.” In an era when pop country lacked a certain authenticity of expression Lovett distinguished himself with a style that’s eclectic and drew on swing, jazz, folk, gospel and blues but with his lyrics somehow tied it all together to be more authentically country than a lot of what else was going on as true to form for a genre that itself was made up of a rich tapestry of influences. This time out Lovett is touring with his Large Band so you’ll get to see those classic songs and newer favorites writ large.
J. Carmone, photo courtesy the artist
Saturday | 07.19 What: J. Carmone, Paranoid Image and Cosmic Smoke Wagon When: 5/5:30 Where: Larimer Lounge Why: The recent J. Carmone stuff sounds like a one-man psychedelic garage rock blues thing. Fuzzy melodies and simple chord and rhythm structure that’s broadly expressive even within that narrow range of elements. But in the songwriter’s bag of tricks are power pop hooks and a touch of indie jangle. Paranoid Image is an alternative rock band rooted in acoustic sounds and almost world music melodic structures. Cosmic Smoke Wagon as perhaps the name suggests is sort of a heavier blues rock quartet.
Arrows in Action, photo by Rachel Dwyer
Saturday | 07.19 What:Rain City Drive, Arrows in Action, Charlotte Sands, Taylor Acorn, Beauty School Dropout, If Not For Me When: 4 Where: The Fillmore Auditorium Why: The Summer School Tour lands at the Fillmore showcasing some prominent bands in the realm of modern alternative rock informed by pop punk and melodic post-hardcore. Rain City Drive fronted by The Voice runner-up Matt McAndrew though from Palm Coast, Florida derived its name from the city where they all met for the first time, Manchester UK. Arrows in Action from Nashville is touring ahead of the release of its new album I Think I’ve Been Here Before out soon on Nettwerk Music Group. The new, third, record is brimming with summery energy and songs informed by youthful exuberance and a spirit of rediscovering one’s joy of life. It’s a complete fusion of electronic pop and the kind of eclectic alternative rock from the late 90s that embraced production elements in the songwriting. Charlotte Sands blends glitchy alt-pop and emo for a sound that fans of Charli XCX may enjoy. Taylor Acorn seemingly takes the structure and sound of pop country and infuses it with the kind of alternative pop exemplified by Echosmith. Beauty School Dropouts do look like if Ratt reincarnated as later era scene kids. And its music is rooted in that kind of emo but one that also recognizes that processing vocals and other instrumentation can make more straight ahead songwriting sound more interesting.
Lyra Muse, photo by Adam Debary @mr.debary
Sunday | 07.20 What: Lyra Muse w/BabyBaby and Dandelioness When: 7:30/8 Where: The Crypt Why: Lyra Muse is a dream pop artist from Santa Fe, New Mexico whose command of production, layered atmospheres and vocal processing is thoroughly entrancing. Like a downtempo act that learned a bit from maybe listening to a bit of early 80s Brian Eno, Nicolas Jaar and The Knife. The music’s organic flow and intimate tones are a little like New Age darkwave. On tour with Lyra Muse is Danelioness from Taos whose music is superficially the opposite from Lyra Muse with sounds you might expect more out of an indie folk act including clear and evocative singing but the production on the recorded music suggests something that was influenced by experimental 1980s pop like Kate Bush or Marianne Faithful’s synth-infused period. And from Denver BabyBaby will thrill your ears with exquisitely crafted synth pop and enhanced by charming and idiosyncratic stage antics.
This Will Destroy You on the original Young Mountain tour in 2006, photo by Tom Murphy
Sunday | 07.20 What: This Will Destroy You w/Jesse Beaman When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Perplexiplex Why: This Will Destroy You will be performing its 2006 debut album Young Mountain and likely highlights from its album since then. This Will Destroy You from early on set itself apart from the glut of post-rock by making truly cinematic and expressive guitar compositions with emotional heft and dynamism that didn’t sound just like guys jamming out on a theme. The album has gone on to be a classic of the genre and nearly 20 years later its essential appeal as a set of music that stirs the imagination is intact.
Supreme Joy, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 07.24 What:Supreme Joy and Flutter dual album release show w/Team Nonexistent and Sun Swept When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: There’s probably a numerological significance to the title of Supreme Joy’s new album 410,757,864,530 Dead Carps or it’s just a surreal semiotic exercise in the absurdity of naming an album brimming with themes of “everchanging American identity, class warfare and Debord’s spectacle.” It’s an overwhelming number which may by part of the point but the psychedelic garage rock post-punk is a sprawling and shimmering collection of sharp observations and an attempt to make sense of so much nonsense in the context of one’s own living of life which can be perilous at best but that doesn’t mean there can’t be plenty of play to be had while figuring it all out and that’s what the record sounds like in all its sonically kaleidoscopic glory. Also releasing an album this night is the great Denver power pop band Flutter and its refreshingly earnest and romantic When You Love Somebody and its full arc exploration of the course of love—the insecurities, the infatuation, the travails of being in love with a human rather than one’s image of one and coming to terms with the highs and lows. It has the exuberance of a record informed by adolescent spirit but the nuance of someone with a bit more emotional maturity making it more relevant for someone that wants to love someone for real and being willing to deal with everything that comes with it.
Wheelchair Sports Camp, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 07.25 What: Wheelchair Sports Camp, Jello Biafra and Alice Wong When: 6-10 Where: Denver Art Museum Why: Wheelchair Sports camp takes over the Denver Art Museum for an evening of performances and an interactive element in celebration of Disability Pride Month and the 35th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act. It’s a way to flip the usual narrative in which disabled folks serve as entertainment for society and instead own the spectacle rather than merely be it for the amusement of others. It’s activism as art and engagement as an act of transforming the usual dialogues and contexts. As part of the proceedings you’ll see Jello Biafra who will have some choice words and long-time disability rights activist Alice Wong, founder and Project Coordinator of Disability Visibility Project which collects oral histories of people with disabilities in the USA.
of Montreal, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 07.26 What:of Montreal – The Sunlandic Twins 20th anniversary tour When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Long-running indie pop group of Montreal is celebrating the 20 year anniversary of its 2005 album The Sunlandic Twins. The album is a bit of a fusion of the group’s signature, psychedelic pop and early Brian Eno solo album strangeness for an effect that is like listening to something just out of the frame of usual reality which is what you want from an of Montreal album. And per usual there will probably be a unique stage presentation of the music including sets and costumes to enhance the sense of being witness to something fantastical.
Whitney, photo by Alexa Viscius
Saturday | 07.26 What:Caamp w/Whitney When: 7 Where: Fiddler’s Green Why: Caamp had modest beginnings when Taylor Meier and Evan Westfall met at, yes, summer camp in middle school and then formed the band after high school while students at Ohio University. It’s upbeat indie folk apparently struck a chord with its simple but appealing melodies and intimate presentation. Its latest album is the summery Copper Changes Color. Opening is Chicago’s Whitney which came out of the now defunct psych rock band Smith Westerns when Max Kakacek and Julien Ehrlich formed the project when their old band split in 2014. What they’ve done as the band has evolved and taken on new members is write orchestral pop songs in the vein of Laurel Canyon circa 1972 psychedelic folk rock but with a modern sense of exuberance and tapping into that time’s exquisite use of tonal arrangements. The band released a new single “Darling” so maybe it’s safe to say to expect a new album in the none-too-distant future.
Sculpture Club, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 07.29 What: Sculpture Club, Flesh Tape and French Kettle Station When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Sculpture Club is a post-punk band from Dallas that sounds like it took more inspiration from the more pop inflected end of that music like some of the upbeat Smiths-esque guitar melodies were a direct influence. Its 2024 self-titled album is reminiscent of The Prids with that neo-New Wave flavor and breezy dynamics and upbeat yet moody music. Flesh Tape is a vital hybrid of noise rock grit, emo vulnerability and shoegaze soundscape songwriting style. French Kettle Station could be any incarnation of his music of the moment from New Age glitch ambient or emotionally vibrant experimental pop. You’ll just have to go and see.
Fitz and the Tantrums, photo by Matty Vogel
Tuesday | 07.29 What:Fitz and the Tantrums When: 6:30 Where: Denver Botanic Gardens Why: Fitz and the Tantrums from Los Angeles have had a successful career with its brand of fusing indie pop and neo soul and ably tapping into uplifting melodic hooks and bringing to them great mood and emotional range. Sure its songs tend to be the kind built for parties and summertime fun but there is something that seems to bridge the style and sound of decades for something that sounds like something for today in the songwriting. The group is currently touring in support of its new album Man On The Moon and its outer space imagery as a vehicle for injecting the music with some hope and romance.
Tripp Nasty, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 07.30 What: Tripp Nasty, Debaser, Sense From Nonsense and Pythian Whispers When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Full disclosure, the writer of this piece is in Pythian Whispers. But really this show includes some old school Denver DIY scene artists from the 2000s through the 2020s era. Tripp Nasty these days has brought to bear his skills as a composer and technician of electronic music to produce vibrant and imaginative analog synth music that is both avant-garde and accessible. Debaser is the drums and bass guitar solo project of Monkey Mania founder Josh Taylor. It’s like the joyous noise rock with pop exuberance that is an analog to what he brought to the original Friends Forever. Sense From Nonsense is the solo project of former Echo Beds drummer/vocalist/synth composer Tom Nelsen. Sense From Nonsense has gone through various iterations but the current version has been a vehicle for doing live versions of the music from his short films and performance art like an outsider live juke box that irreverently deconstructs unexpected hits. Pythian Whispers for over a decade has included former Tornado Alley and 900 Ancestors guitarist Tom Murphy, former Odam Fei Mud percussionist and current Animal / object multi-instrumentalist David Britton and former Great Atomic Motor and Sense From Nonsense bassist Harmony Fredere. As this band it’s left field ambient and abstract progressive rock with elements of the band members’ various influences blended and layered into dense and dynamic soundscapes.
Midwife, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 07.31 What:Midwife w/Jenny Haniver and Fainting Dreams When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Midwife is of course Madeline Johnston whose ethereal guitar work and live production transforms a core of deeply emotional and melancholic songwriting into something that feels like experiencing a dream in real time. Her records are a catalog of giving honor to the pain and loss one must bear across a lifetime as well as the more understated joys that sustain us in unexpected moments when we need them most. Jenny Haniver is a post-hardcore industrial post-punk band from Portland. Fainting Dreams might be described as a transcendent black metal band that channels the trauma and emotional catharsis of surviving the degradations and limitations imposed on us by late capitalism.
Ozomatli, photo by Piero F. Giunti
Thursday | 07.31 What: Ozomatli w/Las Cafeteras When: 7:30 Where: Arvada Center Amphitheater Why: Ozomatli kind of got dubbed a party band in the 1990s because its music was popular at celebrations of all kinds. But the members of the band met when trying to form a workers union in Los Angeles. The band’s seamless integration of elements of hip-hop, funk, Chicano rock and various cultural music from around the world has mean its sound has been evolving from the beginning and with an appeal that transcends genre boundaries. All along the band has lived its social convictions and supported farm-workers’ rights and immigration issues and decidedly anti-war in the 2000s when it seemed like Americans were encouraged to be rah rah for expanding the empire. To the band’s credit its politics have become even more relevant as has its ability to bring joy and celebratory energy to its famously exuberant live shows.
Saturday | 03.01 What: Munly & The Lupercalians, Rowboat at Redwing Blackbird When: 7:30 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Club Why: Jay Munly has been making music with his Munly & The Luperclians project since the mid-2000s when not focusing on Slim Cessna’s Auto Club and Denver Broncos UK. It’s more dark folk, more Goth than the other configurations of music for which he’s known down to the more ritualistic stage garb. But the level of songcraft and sonic details we have come to expect from Munly as well as the richness of storytelling infuses this band as well. In a completely different style but equally steeped in literature and emotionally charged indie rock is Rowboat fronted by Sam McNitt. Some may know him from his time in the great shoegaze band Blue Million Miles but with Rowboat McNitt seems to have found his most fruitful lane for songwriting with high concept albums and insightful lyrics backed by finely sculpted songs that often soar into passionate passages that bring the listener along for the catharsis. Redwing Blackbird is a fusion of Cure-esque post-punk and synth-driven darkwave with creative flair and more than a touch of grit.
Glixen, photo by Jocelyn Pacheco
Wednesday | 03.05 What:Glixen, She’s Green and After When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Glixen is a shoegaze band from Phoenix that formed in 2025 and in 2024 could be seen touring with DIIV. This year the group released its latest EP Quiet Pleasures. Though citing influences as disparate as Godflesh, t.A.T.u, Hum and Björk the band’s output thus far seems most obviously inspired by My Bloody Valentine with the warping yet dense guitar atmospheres and paradoxically low key but loud and present production. Like floating through a storm of sounds and emotion with the band into transcendent spaces. She’s Green from Minneapolis is likeminded though more in the realm of indiepop but not short on the granular Slowdive-esque beauty in its melody crafting.
Finom, photo by Ash Dye
Wednesday | 03.05 What:Finom w/Brother Bird When: 7 Where: Lost Lake Why: Finom is the experimental pop duo from Chicago formerly known as OHMME. Its 2024 album Not God was produced by Jeff Tweedy and sounds like some kind of lost avant-garde New Wave from the 80s and benefiting from the excellent dual vocals the band has made a feature of its songwriting all along. It sounds like music for a stage play or other theatrical performance that has yet to manifest in the physical world outside the band’s typically engaging live performances.
Chat Pile, photo by Matthew Zagorski
Thursday | 03.06 What:Chat Pile w.Gouge Away and Nightosphere When: 6:30 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Chat Pile delivered yet another scathing and electrifying set of songs with its 2024 album Cool World. There is more experimentation with the atmospheric backdop of the songs but don’t worry its delivered with the blunt and caustic fervor that has rendered the band one of the most exciting in the world of modern heavy music and noise rock. Somehow the band manages to skewer the worst aspects of culture and civilization while demonstrating a vulnerability and compassion for the less fortunate and oppressed in its pointed lyrics. Live the group also injects the performances with a sense of humor without downplaying the moment we’re all in given political and environmental reality. Gouge Away has been in a similar lane with its own lyrics but the Florida hardcore/noise rock band has a more angular flow to its rhythms that perfectly accent the ferocious vocals that fans of DC post-hardcore will fully appreciate. Nightosphere is a shoegaze-inflected post-hardcore outfit from Kansas City, Missouri who expertly navigate dreamlike reverie and scorching intensity and emotional heft. When the group played at Ghost Canyon Fest in 2024 in Denver it was a clear standout among standouts.
Palomino Blond, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 03.06 What: Palomino Blond w/High., Moonpool and Blackberry Crush When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Palomino Blond released its latest album You Feel It Too last October confirming its mastery of blending a kind of pop-inflected shoegaze and grungy emo. High. from Boonton, New Jersey issued its new album Come Back Down on January 24, 2025 as an excellent set of glittery and fuzzy slowcore songs. Moonpool used to be called Sickly Hecks and put out some worthwhile indie rock in the more shoegaze vein but with the new name the outfit has traveled further in that direction including increased use of synth to craft its evocative soundscapes. Rounding out the evening of modern shoegaze is Denver’s Blackberry Crush whose inspirations from 90s grunge is really only apparent in its deft use of distortion and crunchy riffs in its more recent songwriting.
Cathedral Bells, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 03.07 What: Mind’s Eye w/Cathedral Bells and Bruha When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Mind’s Eye has been mining the territory between dream pop, early 2010s indie rock, 2020s bedroom pop and post-punk for the past few years with vulnerable songs of yearning and heartache. Catch the group ahead of its March 21, 2025 release of the new album If she looks like heaven… Orlando, Florida’s Cathedral Bells has been one of the bands of choice for those with a taste for ethereal, synth infused, shoegaze-y chillwave. The recordings have a kind of lo-fi charm that the band is somehow able to translate well to the live setting even with the more present, richer tones, just the intimacy and immediacy of the performances intact.
Almanac Man, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.08 What: Almanac Man, Only Echoes, Burning Sister, Shewolf When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Almanac Man are a noise rock trio from Denver whose sound seems rooted in early 90s post-hardcore and the angular, math-y rhythms of DC post-hardcore and maybe they came together as appreciators of the likes of mclusky and Unsane. Its lyrics take a more creative approach to commenting on social issues and the state of the world as it has been for decades clearly informed by literature as much as music. Only Echoes is an instrumental, post-metal band with a knack for crafting epic melodies and equally grand, crushing riffs with a gift for dynamic arrangements that lend its songs a cinematic quality worthy of poetic song titles like “Locus Mons” and “Truth Unveiled By Time.” Burning Sister’s psychedelic stoner rock sounds like a better version of what some of the 2000s stoner rock bands were doing partly because this trio though clearly touched by the foundational mutations of Sleep and Black Sabbath appear to have gotten into Loop, Mudhoney and the heavier end of Krautrock. Shewolf, the Denver artist, is in a similar vein to the other acts on the bill but his sounds seem more influenced by shoegaze and he even has an ambient album but this show will probably be the heavier rock but it would be cooler if it was a full on ambient set instead to break up the evening a little.
Crush of Souls, photo from Bandcamp
Monday | 03.10 What:Crush of Souls, Weathered Statues, Plague Garden and Kill You Club DJs When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Crush of Souls is a coldwave/post-punk band from Paris, France that sounds like he absorbed the great, percussive synth work of the better EBM bands, the mix of acoustic and electronic blend of Clan of Xymox and a touch of the enigmatic flair of Legendary Pink Dots. Opening are two of Denver’s, and America’s, best deathrock/post-punk acts. Plague Garden’s rhythm-driven songs and cinematic arrangements lend its songs a depth to match the emotionally-charged vocals. Weathered Statues is a band that came out of the local punk scene and that spirit is infused into its songs so that even as they are on the melancholic side they have an arresting exuberance, especially live. And like Plague Garden its electronic side of the music is imaginative and brings to the songwriting an early 80s New Wave sensibility that transcends time.
Lime Cordiale, photo courtesy the artists
Monday | 03.10 What: Lime Cordiale w/The Orphan and The Poet When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Australian pop group Lime Cordiale formed in 2009 and spent some years developing from the founding duo of brothers Louis and Oliver Leimbach. Icehouse frontman and songwriter Iva Davies saw the brothers perform at a type of band competition and took them under his wing inviting the fledgling band on the 2011 Icehouse tour. After a string of EPs Lime Cordiale finally released its debut album Permanent Vacation (2017, no relation of or nod to a comeback record by some other band released thirty years prior). By that point the group obviously had a gift for crafting songs with a wide open feel, lush arrangements and the ability to take on heady themes without a heavy hand. 2024 saw the release of Enough of the Sweet Talk. This time out the band chart the course of a relationship from early idealizing of one’s beloved to that period when people understand one another and accept each other as they think they are and to the end when they don’t feel like they ever really knew each other. It is in a way the opposite of the usual pop album about how great love is, rather something more realistic about how many relationships progress yet without dishonoring the feelings of the best of that arc of human experience. And all graced with the band’s elegantly crafted melodies and vocals imbued with a sensitivity and warmth.
Soccer Mommy, photo by Anna Pollack
Monday | 03.10 What: Soccer Mommy w/Hana Vu When: 7 Where: Ogden Theatre Why: Sophie Allison’s gift for vulnerably introspective songwriting and imaginative songwriting and masterful guitar work has been on fully display since her earliest releases. And the 2024 Soccer Mommy album Evergreen with its embrace of a more intimate and organic sensibility dives fully into sounds that reflect an immediacy and tenderness that is palpable. Like hearing an indie pop reincarnation of the more cinematic end of Sparklehorse. There’s something so compellingly fragile about the songwriting that its easy to get caught up in its gentle energies even when Allison kicks up the grit a little on, say, “Drive.” Live Soccer Mommy seems to effortlessly prove she’s one of modern indie rock’s most interesting musicians and with flourishes of her prowess on guitar without undercutting the elegance of her entrancing songs.
Ripley Johnson of Rose City Band, photo by Sanae Yamada
Thursday | 03.13 What: Rose City Band w/Tan Cologne When: 7 Where: Globe Hall Why: Ripley Johnson is perhaps more widely known by many for his membership in influential psychedelic space rock band Wooden Shjips and the experimental psych rock outfit Moon Duo. Rose City Band delves into another corner of the psych universe as what might be described in short as a cosmic country band in the classic vein. With transporting pedal steel courtesy Barry Walker Jr. and Ripley’s seemingly effortless countrified riffs like a band playing in a backyard with a carefree spirit. The result is something that fans of early 70s Grateful Dead and Gram Parsons would appreciate and with an easy pace that is as calming as it is transporting. The songs get into your head the way and uplift the way a patch of nice weather will lift your spirits. The group’s fifth album Sol Y Sombra dropped on January 24, 2025 via Thrill Jockey and available on vinyl and for digital download and streaming.
The Space Lady in 2021, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.14 What: The Space Lady w/Golden Brown, snowswept and RAREBYRD$ When: 7-12 Where: The Aztlan Theater Why: Susan Dietrich grew up in the rural environs of Las Animas, Colorado before trying college in Boulder and being disillusioned with academia made her way to San Francisco and became involved with the hippie movement. For years she and her then husband survived off their art and landing in Boston following the development of a fledgling synth and guitar band that morphed into a solo project for Dietrich. Starting what became The Space Lady with a winged helmet Dietrich evolved from performing with an accordion to a Casiotone MT-40 keyboard with vocals done through a delay pedal becoming a fixture of the San Francisco underground, street performer scene upon returning to the city in the mid-80s. Performing some originals and uniquely rendered covers of classic rock, synth pop and country Dietrich has become a legend of outsider music even after “retiring” in 2000 to return to Colorado to care for her parents. These days The Space Lady performs now and again in Colorado and beyond and this is a rare chance to see her at one of Denver’s classic, independently-owned venues with experimental artists no strangers to expanding the limits of conventional musical expressions.
The Tammy Shine in 2024, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.14 What: Witch Cat Records Presents: Tammy Shine, Baby Baby, Debaser, Head Slug When: 7 Where: Squirm Gallery Why: Witch Cat Records is celebrating its founding with this showcase of artists that reflect the eclectic yet well curated roster of the imprint. Tammy Shine is the charismatic frontwoman of Dressy Bessy and this solo project is no less spirited and raw but the songwriting is a little more stripped down without losing the emotional impact. Baby Baby is the art pop solo project of Lily Conrad. The 2023 album BabyBabyForever is like some kind of unlikely No Wave synth pop record that reflects the performance art aspect of Conrad’s live show. It is collection of melancholic dreamlike singles imbued with an entrance, ethereal appeal and richness of feeling that really sweep you into their spell. Debaser is the drum and bass project of Josh Taylor who some may know for his various projects over the years including Friends Forever and this particular effort dates back to that time as well and splices what might be described as outsider garage rock and jazz and punk. Head Slug, recorded anyway, sounds like the kind of haunted, lo-fi slowcore that you would hope to hear in some DIY art film.
Lazarus Horse circa 2017, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.15 What: Gold Glue w/Zoya When: 7 Where: Leon Gallery Why: Gold Glue is the latest band from Eddie Durkin of Lazarus Horse and Sparkler Bombs so it’ll probably be heavy on well crafted pop songs with earnest poetry deep personal insight.
Lesser Care in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.15 What:Lesser Care w/Candy Apple When: 8 Where: The Crypt Why: El Paso post-punkers Lesser Care are currently producing one of the most potent blends of shoegaze atmospherics and vulnerable post-punk melancholy played live with a forceful energy suggestive of a youth spent playing in punk and metal bands. Their 2024 album Heel Turn is like that sound but album-wise informed by great hip-hop records of the late 80s with an intro and nice interludes that connect a kind of narrative of survival and reinvention.
flipturn, photo by AJPG Photo
Saturday | 03.15 What:flipturn w.Krooked Kings When: 7 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: flipturn from Fernandina Beach in Northeastern Florida released its sophomore album Burnout Days in January 2025. The album seems informed by loving reflection on times in one’s life that felt like they lasted forever filled with a kind of vitality even if you spent that time spending one’s moments with a careless abandon as if one’s health and free time wouldn’t ever really run out. But the band doesn’t seem to bemoan this so much as try to reconnect with what made that time special. It’s a record of glimmering atmospheres and a wistful yet exuberant energy that illuminates its raw portraits of everyday life like the musical equivalent Polaroids that take you back to the exact moment and context depicted.
Evan Honer, photo by Harrison Hargrave
Saturday | 03.15 What:Evan Honer w/Leon Majcen When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Evan Honer is a singer-songwriter whose eclectic style includes bits of acoustic folk, Americana and indie pop in the mix. He got a big boost when his cover, with Julia DiGrazia, of “Jersey Giant” by Tyler Childers went viral after its 2022 release to day garnering over 120 million streams on Spotify. Two years later Honer released his sophomore album Fighting For independently recording in unconventional spaces with friends. The album has a homespun minimalism that puts Honer’s emotionally vibrant vocals in the center with the spare instrumentation sharing space in the mix for a set of songs that feel intimate and worthy of Honer’s poignantly insightful portraits of everyday life and his own confessional explorations of personal struggles and working through the painful moments we all often have to deal with in isolation.
Rachel Platten, photo by Jess Lynn Hess
Monday | 03.17 What: Rachel Platten w/Ben Abraham When: 7 Where: The Gothic Theatre Why: Prior to the 2024 release of her latest album I Am Rachel Platten the singer/songwriter hadn’t offered a new album of material since 2017’s Waves. Platten has said that the new album came out of a time experiencing mental health struggles like anxiety, postpartum depression, deep self doubt, the vagaries of having a public presence and the turmoil of leaving one’s major label. The resulting music are the cathartic and vulnerable songs one would hope from an artist who isn’t simply patting herself on the back for having the inner strength to get through those struggles, rather Platten’s songs are filled with a knowing that you don’t conclusively overcome some issues forever because life has a way of challenging you in different ways. Platten shows that one can have some grace and dignity even in the darkest of moments. Her live shows are where Platten shines with an uplifting and at times exultant energy and she delivers her songs real emotional force.
Poppy, photo by Sam Cannon
Monday | 03.17 What:Poppy w/kumo 99 When: 7 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: Poppy has been defying easy categorization since early in here career seeming to free associate between metalcore, synth pop and industrial rock and whatever other strands of style help to realize her musical leanings. Her latest album Negative Space sometimes hits as screamo but equally hyperpop and progressive metal. It is paradoxically eclectic and cohesive like if the members of Garbage had been born roughly 30 years later and absorbed then developing musical styles. Sometimes when a band tries to combine too many different musical ideas it’s a mess or it doesn’t work yet Poppy somehow orchestrates it all into a surprisingly effective synthesis especially live where the singer seems to channel that energy into a focused and theatrical performance like an updated version of something from the 90s and more than a cut above a lot of artists drawing upon similar inspirations.
Pelican, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 03.19 What:Russian Circles w/Pelican When: 7 Where: Gothic Theatre Why: Russian Circles is the Chicago-based post-metal trio that has garnered a bit of a cult following over the past twenty plus years that it’s been crafting its sound and songwriting concepts. Its most recent album was 2022’s Gnosis on which the group experimented with Celtic music tunings and the inclusion of a Moog Taurus synth to enhance the low end. The album while not hailed as among the band’s best nevertheless represents the band coming more fully into its cinematic musical ambitions. Also on the bill is another Chicago band that has made a name for itself with its heavy soundscapes and creative use of repetition, Pelican. The latter is on the verge of releasing its new album Flickering Resonance (out May 16, 2025) so you may get to hear where the group has gone since its excellent 2019 album Nighttime Stories. Earlier in its career the band wrote the early forms of its songs mostly on acoustic guitar to work out the chords and dynamics but since the 2019 record the group has gone for the louder foundation with electric instruments resulting in songs that take even more immediate advantage of the ways those sounds intersect to create unique resonances.
Vyva Melinkolya, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 03.20 What:Midwife and Vyva Melinkolya perform Orbweaving w/BleakHeart and Volunteer Coroner When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Midwife and Vyva Melinkolya released the collaborative album Orbweaving in 2023, the product of becoming friends in 2020 and meeting in person in 2021 for a recording residency. The album is a hazy, gauzy set of songs that are about dreams, personal myths, the beauty and horror of the world and getting through a time of extended grief and perilous uncertainty that seems to still be running through the world with no end in sight. The delicacy and vulnerability heard in its songs though is the ability to hang on in spite of these challenges and to navigate it with creative acts and being willing to feel those emotions that threaten to engulf you. The night begins with the ambient/analog synth sounds of Volunteer Coroner and the deep moods and engrossingly gorgeous harmonies of doomy, post-rock dream pop band BleakHeart.
Los Mocochetes, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 03.22 What:Los Mocochetes, My Blue Heart and The Milk Blossoms When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Why: Los Mocochetes is releasing its new 7” record “Huaraches”/”Sun Will Shine” via Unit E records and celebrating the occasion with this performance. The Chicano/funk band from Denver has been performing uplifting music aimed at turning the social and cultural power structure on its head since the 2010s. My Blue Heart might be described loosely as an art pop band in that its eclectic style is theatrical in presentation and in the way the music is performed but includes elements of blues, funk, jazz, prog and psychedelic rock. The Milk Blossoms is a band that seems to gather day dreams and poignant observations about the peaks and valleys of human emotional experience and crafts them into exquisite and finely honed pop songs that maintain more than a bit of the edges and unravellings that make for music that actually moves you.
Bluebook, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.22 What:Bluebook w/Body and Pleasure Prince When: 7 Where: Meow Wolf Convergence Station Why: Bluebook is a brooding yet electrifying dark, art folk band that has changed musical shape and membership for the past 20 years into its current form that comes across like a progressive art rock band with emotionally vibrant vocals and a riveting intensity. Body is a darkwave disco band that sounds like the trio spent a lot of time just listening to a bunch of mid-80s synthpop but updated by late 2000s indie rock. That the band includes Edmund Garthe and Stuart Confer formerly of Ned Garthe Explosion tells you there is a lot of creativity and imagination behind the music but then there’s also Roni Beer who brings her own left field pop energy into the mix. And to round out a fantastic bill is Pleasure Prince who seem to have mastered the art of pop songwriting utilizing real music chops in the vocals and percussion as well as a deep infusion of experimental edge.
Pom Poko, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 03.25 What: Pom Poko w/Fake Dad and May Be Fern When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Pom Poko from Oslo, Norway released the bright yet introspective album Champion in 2024. Across its eleven songs the band showed the missing links between indiepop, post-punk and Kiwi rock resulting in a unique sound. The way Orions Belte, another Oslo band, seems to have fused jazz, psychedelia, world folk and pop without quite sounding like anyone else either.
Alex Wilcox (left), image courtesy the artist
Thursday | 03.27 What: Alex Wilcox, Vegan Gore & Vicky Burp, Church Fire and Sell Farm When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Alex Wilcox came up in Texas but spent some time in Austin, Texas and then LA where he worked at Chalice Recordings in production and further refined the techniques and aesthetics of pop and hip-hop which he has subsequently applied to and evolved from in making his own style of glitchcore/experimental electronic dance music. Now based in Berlin is pushing boundaries as a DJ and crafter of cutting edge dance pop. Church Fire just got off tour with Moonpussy so who can say how this show will be except finely honed and maybe with some even more amped up stage antics. Sell Farm hasn’t flexed his industrial ambient music in a while either so catch him at a now not as common live show.
Martha Wainwright, photo courtesy the artist
Thursday | 03.27 What: Martha Wainwright w/Brad Barr When: 6 Where: The Bluebird Theater Why: Martha Wainwright might have had a bit of a big legacy to live up to as the daughter of Kate McGarrible and Loudon Wainwright III and with her brother being Rufus Wainwright. But Martha came out of the gates, as it were, with the 2005 EP Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole and the title track which is like a response to her father’s manner of writing songs about his family rather than tending to them as people. The EP also established her as a songwriter of note with a passionately expressive voice and command of rhythm guitar inflections to match her singing. In 2025 Wainwright released her new EP 6 Songs, a collection of songs rendered in her signature nuanced and emotionally vibrant vocals and delicate and imaginative guitar accompanied by a touch of psychedelic shimmer.
Dreadnought in 2022, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 03.28 What: Faetooth w/Iress and Dreadnought When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Faetooth is the Los Angeles-based doomgaze band whose heavy atmospherics pair well with the fantastical lyrics. In moments bordering on dark folk but mostly feral energy and crunchy, crushing riffs with hovering menace to heighten a sense of otherworldliness. Think SubRosa leaning heavier into its Black Sabbath influences. Denver’s own Dreadnought will fit well with that rich atmospherics and science fantasy storytelling but more with touches of classical and orchestral sensibilities informing its dramatic compositions.
Advance Base, photo by Jeff Marini
Friday | 03.28 What:Advance Base w/”Horse Girl” and Ground Hum When: 7 Where: Glob Why: Owen Ashworth is fondly remembered for his project Casiotone for the Painfully Alone and its almost outsider songwriter take on lo-fi indiepop. But there was always something endearing about his emotionally open lyrics and tender melodies as well as his unvarnished yet tuneful vocals. When Ashworth retired the project in 2010 with a final tour. But it wasn’t long before he continued making music under the moniker Advance Base and starting his Orindal Records imprint. With the new name Ashworth has delivered entire albums worth of deeply observant and poignant pop songs both melancholic and a celebration of the moments in life that we take for granted but which connect what we might consider the more peak (for good or bad) experiences. In December 2024 he released his latest album, the luminously warm Horrible Occurrences.
Gleemer in 2016, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 03.29 What:Gleemer w/American Culture and Ampule When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Gleemer has been playing in the local scene in Colorado since 2011 but garnered an underground cult following by touring and making a bit of a name for itself far afield. Mixing emo, slowcore and shoegaze before that really became a bigger thing in the past handful of years, Gleemer’s musical instincts manifested most fully with its fifth and latest album End of the Nail (2024). Fans of Sunny Day Real Estate and Death Cab For Cutie will find a lot to like in Gleemer’s blend of grit and atmospheric melodies. American Culture came out of the indiepop underground but its players have real chops and lately have sounded more like they have been immersing themselves in the catalog of The Cure and the better end of early Britpop and C86.
Chloe Wilder, photo by Jesse Del Florio
Saturday | 03.29 What:Spencer Sutherland w.Stacey Ryan and Cloe Wilder When: 7 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: Spencer Sutherland is a pop R&B artist who was already honing his skills as a singer and arranger before appearing on Today in 2017 followed up by being a contestant on the UK edition of The X Factor and then signing to a major label the year after. It did his career no harm appearing in films and TV series. But his 2023 debut album In His Mania and subsequent national tour boosted his musical endeavors some with opening slots from Cloe Wilder also on this tour in support of Sutherland’s 2024 sophomore effort Drama. The new record builds on the singer’s sense of humor as well as reveals an obvious influence from Freddy Mercury. Wilder recently released her latest EP Life’s a Bitch (March 21, 2025). Like her prior output the songs have an immediacy and intimacy built around her breathy vocals and knack for writing stories vivid with images of people, places and the emotional resonances of her experiences. Although only 19 years old, Wilder’s songwriting is confident and has a depth of feeling and nuance of expression more in line with a veteran artist.
Bob Log III, photo by C. Elliott Photography, from Bandcamp
Sunday | 03.30 What:Bob Log III, The Black Gloves and The Oldmen When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Bob Log III has been doing his “One Man Band Boom” thing for three decades now performing with a Silvertone archtop guitar and percussion he provides with his feet. All while dressed up like a human cannonball. It’s unvarnished rock and roll played with punk spirit and although a bit of a gimmick it’s one that is entertaining and there is an appeal to the kind of music he’s doing that deconstructs rock and roll just a little while tapping into the spirit of the early era of that music. The Oldmen are a garage punk band that includes former members of Boss 302 so even if the name is a bit of a joke these guys will provide plenty of entertaining stage antics of their own with solid power pop hooks.
Amyl and the Sniffers, photo by Jamie Wdzieknoski
Monday | 03.31 What:Amyl and the Sniffers w/Sheer Mag When: 6 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Amyl and the Sniffers from Melbourne, Australia are one of the most prominent punk bands at this moment. Its sound came out of a pub rock sound but live the group has a joyously ferocious presence with charmingly pointed lyrics. In 2024 the group released its latest album Cartoon Darkness which expanded upon the bands sound with a more focused presentation without losing the unhinged energy the band has made part of its essential appeal. Philadelphia’s Sheer Mag also powerful threads together classic rock’s best instincts and modern punk and power pop. The band’s own exuberant live shows are like an American analog to what the headliner’s are doing though Sheer Mag has been at it a little longer.
Mayhem in 2015, photo by Tom Murphy
Monday | 03.31 What: Decibel Magazine Tour 2025: Mayhem, Mortiis, Imperial Triumphant and New Skeletal Faces When: 5:30 Where: Summit Music Hall Why: Decibel Magazine seems to put together a solid lineup for its tours and headlining this one is the legendary Norwegian black metal band Mayhem. The group’s storied history almost overshadows the music itself. But its iconic sound has been a template for the metal subgenre with sepulchral vocals over hanging atmospherics and headlong pacing. With Attila Csihar fronting the band expect plenty of theatricality and soul shaking vocals. Mortiis is from the black metal world of Norway but under this moniker he is more known for dungeon synth, ambient and what might be described as industrial darkwave. Imperial Triumphant is a more experimental black metal band from New York City whose new album Goldstar is like an avant-garde opera arranged in torrential black metal soundscapes. New Skeletal Faces might seem out of place here even though it fuses black metal guitar sounds and musicianship with death rock era The Cult. Fans of Final Gasp will appreciate what New Skeletal Faces are doing.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
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