LA Weekly

Also playing Monday:

Brad Miller

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Horse latitudes: The Black Heart Procession

RADARS TO THE SKY at the Echo; THE MONOLATORS at Pehrspace; GO BETTY GO at Silverlake Lounge.

TUESDAY, APRIL 22

 
The Virginia City Revival at Safari Sam’s

For almost as long as there have been hypocritical preachers, snake-oil salesmen and tent-show revivalists, it seems like there have been an equal number of old-timey rock & roll parodists. The Virginia City Revival are the latest in a long line of pseudo-redneck visionaries that stretches back to such bands as the Hickoids and the Southern Restoration Society, and, while VCR’s brand of blasphemy and goofy irreverence probably isn’t all that shocking anymore even in the Bible Belt, they still crank out a rip-roaring good time. The strained title of the group’s 2007 CD, A Bandin’ the Herd, is punny without actually being funny, much like “Congo Lisa,” an ode to jungle fever in the White House that is more cute than outrageous. VCR are fronted by the Rev. Josey DeVille, who sings in the highly mannered, exaggerated slack-jaw drawl so typical of this genre’s faux-preacher types, but what really makes the band go is drag-queen lead guitarist Gaby Godhead (ex–Haunted Garage), whose sizzling solos elevate the songs from jivey satire into something that really rocks. (Falling James)

Also playing Tuesday:

KANYE WEST, RIHANNA, N.E.R.D., LUPE FIASCO at Nokia Theatre; B-SIDE PLAYERS at Cal State L.A., noon; SWEET HONEY IN THE ROCK at Cerritos Center; MICHAEL FRANTI at Wilshire Center, 3 p.m.; INDIAN JEWELRY at the Echo; 2 LIVE CREW at Malibu Inn; OLIVER FUTURE, KÁRIN TATOYAN at the Troubadour.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23

Lucinda Williams, Zack de la Rocha, John Doe at Skirball Cultural Center

“I ain’t looking to... analyze you, categorize you... define you or confine you,” Bob Dylan once sang on “All I Really Want to Do,” and later, on “John Wesley Harding,” he warned, “There was no man around who could track or chain him down.” Nonetheless, a host of musical acolytes will attempt to track Dylan down and define him at tonight’s Skirball tribute, “Like a Complete Unknown.” Folks have been covering, uncovering, interpreting, misinterpreting, analyzing and over-analyzing Dylan’s tunes since the early ’60s, and his music has remained stubbornly timeless and yet open to wild mutations. While tonight’s lineup isn’t as stylistically diverse as one might hope, it should nonetheless be a real kick to see which songs will be covered by Rage Against the Machine’s Zack de la Rocha, X bassist John Doe, Spearhead’s Michael Franti, former Lone Justice waif Maria McKee and the redoubtable country-rock singer Lucinda Williams. Let’s hope they reinvent his songs with the same bravery that Dylan (still) uses to remake himself constantly. (Falling James)

Also playing Wednesday:

CALVIN HARRIS at Henry Fonda Theater; JACKSON BROWNE at Fred Kavli Theatre, Thousand Oaks; NELLIE McKAY at Largo; SARA LOV at Tangier.

THURSDAY, APRIL 24

 
The Black Heart Procession at the Troubadour

“I have waited all these years beneath the snow,” Pall Jenkins croons somberly on “The Waiter #5,” from the Black Heart Procession’s most recent full-length CD, 2006’s The Spell (Touch & Go), and Tobias Nathaniel’s icy piano tinkling perfectly matches the song’s windswept chilliness. “Hiding in the smoke and trees we live,” Jenkins sings enigmatically on “Tangled,” as neat a summary as any for the San Diego band’s sense of foreboding elegance and shrouded mysteriousness. Matt Resovich’s violin quivers on “The Letter” and the title track, adding a layer of exotic restlessness to the aptly named Pall’s wintry obsessions. “Return to Burn” simmers in its own juices as Jenkins’ baleful lap-steel guitar hovers over a placid, funereal backing that’s positively mesmerizing. The BHP are working on an album that’s scheduled to be released by the end of this year, and it’s rumored that they’ll unveil some of their new songs tonight. (Falling James)

Fuck Buttons at El Rey Theatre

England’s Fuck Buttons — the name conjures both a fetishistic device and an anti-digital rebel yell — constantly summon forces seemingly in conflict. Their music is innocent and violent, bursting with horror and wonder, mechanical but organic. The duo of Andrew Hung and Benjamin John Power craft something like post-noise, if we must hang a genre signpost on the distortion-caked slush they shoot from amplifiers like sewage pumping out of a docked ocean liner. The acidic simmer, a toxic shimmer of overtones and percolating hiss, is underscored by single-note drones and music-box twinkles providing a melodic salve from the chaos. A voice chatters and screams, bursting with bleached harmonics in exorcised hysteria. But what nudges Fuck Buttons beyond total white-hot wipeout is rhythm. On “Bright Tomorrow”, the penultimate track on the group’s debut, Street Horrrsing, Hung and Power chop up the caustic ectoplasm with the Field’s flicker-flicker ecstasies and a brazen dance-floor-ready thump. (Bernardo Rondeau)

Siberian at the Silverlake Lounge

Importing coy boys with floppy bangs and vintage guitars to Silver Lake is a bit like having hypocrisy shipped to the White House. But Seattle quintet Siberian, though apparently an archetypal indie band, are far from superfluous even on the shoegazer-saturated Eastside, as they actually have some serious songwriting substance amid their well-worn aesthetics. Siberian’s debut full-length, last year’s With Me, is also with Radiohead: thick with the overthinking alienation and questioning vocals of that band’s first two records, but buffed with Interpol’s metropolis sheen, talkative bass and melodramatic dynamics. Remote arpeggios drown in crafted sheets of chord play; bustling beats crave both dance floor and dorm room. Defying its title, With Me is a lonesome record, but comforting too ­— evoking the night of the breakup next to an open fire. Without a hefty infusion of self-esteem and identity, Siberian will soon be forgotten, but for now this is about as good as melodic, under-the-radar rock gets. (Paul Rogers)

Also playing Thursday:

AGENT ORANGE, D.I. at Crash Mansion; BIRDS OF AVALON, TWILIGHT SLEEP at the Echo; WATKINS FAMILY HOUR at Largo; LESLIE & THE BADGERS at Taix; TIMBIRICHE at Vault 350.