On Saturday, Ty Segall plays Alex's Bar in Long Beach, headlining a bill featuring Tijuana Panthers and Okee Dokee. His hyperactive role in a slew of bands had already won him local fame, but the release of Melted seems to have woken up the rest of the musical world to what's been going on with him. The record finds Segall melding garage inspirations and rough noise hooks with the same kind of “try anything and everything once” aplomb that fellow travelers such as Jay Reatard loved to do. His newest solo album is called Live in Aisle Five, and that sounds about right.
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Saturday also marks the return of Tobacco to the Detroit Bar in Costa Mesa, his first after several past visits with his main group Black Moth Super Rainbow. Both he and fellow BMSR main member the Seven Fields of Aphelion released crackerjack solo albums last year; Tobacco's, Maniac Meat, brought out a slew of swirling, queasy noise that was half hip-hop exploration, half arty Finnish-style psychedelia. All that and a couple of guests appearances from Beck as well, though in modern fashion, he and Tobacco recorded their parts separately. You never know if he might turn up here, though.
Another Saturday show has RX Bandits at the House of Blues in Anaheim, with Fake Problems and Native opening. The path that the Seal Beach ska-punk heroes have taken has been a quietly remarkable one over time–maybe the best comparison point might be a band like Iceburn. If RX Bandits haven't completely transmogrified themselves from punk to avant-garde jazz, say, its own mutation from mid-'90s horn-driven goofs to harder-edged, exploratory and often explicitly politicized meditations on the world is the kind of arc that more acts should follow. Thank goodness RX Bandits have
On Tuesday, Cold War Kids will play a free record-release show at Amoeba in Hollywood, part of a busy week for the Long Beach-based group including a sold out show at the Bootleg Theatre in LA the previous night. Our featured artist in this week's music section, the Fullerton-born quartet has released third album with Mine is Yours and seems to be surging from strength to strength. They've got a pretty big world tour lined up and won't be back in the area for a bit, so it might be worth your time to brave the rush hour traffic for this one. If not, resign yourself to these YouTube clips:
Tuesday finds Motörhead kicking off the American leg of their The World is Yours tour at the House of Blues in Anaheim, with Valient Thorr opening. Led, as ever, by the seemingly deathless Lemmy–wart and raspy growl–Motörhead, one of our featured artists this week, has moved beyond metal to be its own institution. Their new song titles certainly haven't shown any need to change–what more needs be said with “I Know How to Die,” “Waiting For the Snake” and, of course, “Rock 'n' Roll Music.”
On Thursday Red Orchestra kick things up at the Prospector in Long Beach, along with other local favorites the Lovely Bad Things and Cat Party. Red Orchestra are relatively new, but already have a reason to be our Locals Only featured act this week–Errol Davis, long familiar in his earlier role as a member of Crystal Antlers, is one of the main figures in the group. While they're keeping a low online profile so far, the tracks you can find here.
Alex's Bar in Long Beach for the first of their 11th Anniversary Shows, running each night for three days in a row into the weekend. Opening night kicks off with Lucero, out on the road from Memphis for yet another one of the constant tours that these guys seem to thrive on. In the meantime, local heroes Steve Soto and the Twisted Hearts will also be tearing it up that night, while later in the week acts like the Humpers, Throw Rag, the Zeros and the Dragons will all be taking bows.
