Pencil This In
By Tankboy in Arts & Entertainment on Apr 4, 2008 5:00PM
The listed events were chosen by the editors of Chicagoist and brought to you by the
2009 Toyota Corolla.
Seriously, there are so many bands worth seeing this weekend, we're making this a music-only edition of Pencil This In.
Spoon
Britt Daniel and the boys bring his coked-out Bowie croon to The Vic tonight. It's been odd seeing the band go from indie darlings that couldn't even fill Double Door, to modern rock stars that play prominent spots at Pitchfork and Lollapalooza, but they're such a damn fine combo we certainly don't begrudge them their success. The Walkmen open, and they'd better play "The Rat" or we're going to start a riot.
3145 N Sheffield, 8 p.m., sold out but we keep seeing free promo tickets floating around so you might just get in anyway, 18+
Yakuza
Yakuza's jazz metal -- yes, jazz metal -- never fails to confront, confound, and shock. We hear an awful lot of John Zorn in their spastic riffs, and we have yet to see the same live set twice. Actually, we practice a few doors down from them and admit we sometimes just sit there and listen in awe as they twist riffs around drum parts and make them do dirty, nasty, awful things. Excellent.
Hideout, 1354 W Wabansia, 10 p.m., $8, 21+
Nada Surf
Let's get the obligatory part out of the way fist. Nada Surf first became popular on the back of their mid-'90s single, erm, "Popular." Then they disappeared. Then they came back as an incredibly powerful, melodramatic little combo, consistently releasing great albums. Their latest, Lucky, continues this remarkable streak, taking pristine pop constructions, gritting them up, and then re-polishing them for mass consumption.
Metro, 3730 N Clark, 8:30 p.m., $20, 18+
Eels surf mostly under the popular radar, surfacing every once in a while with a genre-bending nugget that captures the public's attention, something like "Mr. E's Beautiful Blues," before sinking back to their private laboratory where they churn out album after album of mind-bending music that refuses to follow any single rule. They're touring this time behind both a greatest hits album, and a double disc of b-sides and rarities they released earlier this year.
Park West, 322 W Armitage, 7:30 p.m., sold-out but tickets can be found, all ages
Photo of Spoon from their MySpace