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SCHEDULE for JUNE 2002
| < Schedule for May 2002 | Schedule for July 2002 > |
| Date | Show/Event | Additional Information | Buy Online |
| Sat 1 |
THE
BROTHERS CREEGGAN
JIM CREEGGAN 9 PM $10 ADV/$12 DOS |
At ages 16 and 17 respectively, Andy and Jim Creeggan (THE BROTHERS CREEGGAN) rented their first four-track and learned how to use it over March Break. With their voices on the brink of changing, the brothers recorded several fledgling teen anthems - odes to the boys' gruffer voiced heroes, James Brown and George Thorogood. From these humble forays into the savage woods of rock 'n roll, the brothers emerged seven years later as seasoned band members of the Barenaked Ladies. It was 1992, while Jim and Andy were on tour with BNL, that they played their first gig together. With a spiffy new name, THE BROTHERS CREEGGAN was born. After the second album of the new incarnation, Andy had left the Barenaked Ladies to take a short break from pop music. Compelled by the siren songs of composers like Jaco Pastorius and Toru Takemitsu, Andy was drawn to explore far away islands of instrumental compositions, some of which appear on album two. Although Andy initially brought many of his instrumental projects to the band, Jim and Andy gradually discovered that as a duo, they loved to tell stories to each other and to their audiences. Documentation is a big theme for Jim and Andy. The fact that they are brothers definitely influences the band. It allows them to musically explore the nooks and crannies of their lives in a way that they might shy away from if they were playing with unfamiliar people. Perhaps Ian's greatest strength as a drummer is that he is always game. Whenever the brothers venture into new musical territory, Ian follows without missing a beat. BROTHERS CREEGGAN audiences also influence the band. "Reactions from live audiences, comments via our web site, and reviews are invaluable to us," says Andy. Perhaps the band's biggest lesson from the Barenaked Ladies is the way they approach a live show. Like BNL, the band is acrobatic on stage. They stomp or croon, depending on an audience. They scoop up their listeners and stroke their ears until the whole bar starts purring. |  |
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10PM $7 |
THE BALSA GLIDERS, a Washington-based rock/pop band, have developed a loyal following among area alternative pop music fans who appreciate accessible yet deceptively complex song-writing, subtle and melodic arrangements, and wryly funny lyrics. | ||
| Sun 2 |
THE SCENE CREAMERS 10 PM $8 |
Jay Poggi (aka MR. QUINTRON) has described his organ playing as a cross between the stylings of cartoonist Raymond Scott and jazz organist Jimmy Smith. Aside from his organ playing, Poggi is a multi-instrumentalist who performs on traditional items like guitar, drums, and trumpet, as well as homemade inventions such as the Disco Light Machine, an attachment for drums where light is triggered by sound; the Spit Machine, a drum machine powered by saliva; and the Drum Buddy, which contains five oscillator circuits that create drum sounds when exposed to light. Poggi has always kept his life very guarded from the press, granting interviews only on rare occasions. Since this has resulted in many unanswered questions about his life, he is viewed as a modern-day enigma. He has been known to pull such stunts as showing up for interviews in wheelchairs claiming he suffered injuries from falling out of a roller coaster. By 1990, he was playing drums for the indie band Math and founded Wicker Park's Milk of Burgundy club. After four years of performing together, Math broke up. Poggi took the opportunity to start a one-man band. He dubbed his new project QUINTRON, after the name of the company where his dad was employed as an electrical engineer. He followed the release of a debut album with a tour of the United States. One of the stops he made was at the Pussycat Caverns, which was located in an old theater in New Orleans' Ninth Ward District. The venue was operated by Panacea Theriac (aka Miss Pussycat), with whom Poggi became instantaneous friends and lovers. Theriac visited Poggi in Chicago during 1995 at the Milk of Burgundy, and while she was there, Poggi was given his eviction notice. The club shut its doors later that year, and Poggi set out for a tour of the Southwest with Theriac backing him up on vocals and maracas. It was on the tour that Poggi and Theriac joined hands in marriage while they were stopped in Las Vegas. At the time of their vows, neither Poggi nor Theriac knew their spouse's true identities. Upon completion of the tour, Poggi settled in with Theriac in New Orleans. Both of them worked day jobs, Theriac as a seamstress and Poggi as an elementary school science teacher. Poggi also started the Mighty Mouse Electric Service, where he worked as an electrician. It was in 1995 when Theriac managed to persuade Poggi into setting aside his drums in order to focus on playing organ. Poggi began writing a number of tracks on his Hammond S-6 organ for his second full-length album, The Amazing Spellcaster, which was released on Bulb a month prior to the closing of Pussycat Caverns in March of 1996. Looking for a new home, Theriac and Poggi purchased an old home in the Ninth Ward district of New Orleans. In the summer of 1997 a new club opened, the Spellcaster Lodge, under the ownership of Poggi and Theriac. | |
| Mon 3 |
BLOODTHIRSTY LOVERS 10PM $8
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ENON is John Schmersal of Brainiac, and Rick Lee and Steve Calhoon of Skeleton Key. Following the demise of his band, Schmersal records a sobering album of 4-track ruminations, Forget Everything (under the name John Stuart Mill), in an abandoned Masonic temple in Kentucky. ENON is created shortly thereafter, christened after a small town in Ohio, microwave manufacturer, or vacation resort in eastern Alabama (Schmersal can't decide). Schmersal realizes that he hates Kentucky and moves to New York City. Friendships are reestablished. Calhoon and Lee are quickly subsumed into the ENON vortex. "At the point where I decided I really wanted to put together a band," he explains, "I'd been playing with these guys and it was sort of like, 'Ding!'. Listen keenly and you'll hear an abundance of samples, crackling vinyl, processed vocals and poor, defenseless signals distressed beyond recognition. Which is exactly the point. "A lot of sample-oriented music is about referencing things and the nostalgia of it, and we're definitely not about that," says Schmersal, who claims to like the first Jackson 5 record, Ornette Coleman and The Residents equally. "It's more about finding sounds than referencing things that people recognize." Surprisingly melodic songs built with layer upon layer of noise, samples and keen musicianship. | |
| Tue 4 |
Soul duo ZWEI presents:
A 15th anniversary celebration of Come and party with some of D.C.'s hottest new stars as they pay tribute to the man that paved their way. Zwei will feature special guest stars: W.
Ellington Felton Also introducing a new artist, known simply as Q 7PM $7 |
Part '80s musical retrospective, part angry social document and all booty-thumping housequake, Prince's 1987 classic stands as pop's last great double album. After three albums with his band, the Revolution, "Sign O' the Times" brought Prince back to the one-man shows that made him famous, but it was much different, in scheme and concept, from his first classic, "Dirty Mind," and although "1999" and "Purple Rain" were pop-culture milestones that introduced the masses to the Wonderful World that was Minneapolis and started their own respective crazes, but "Sign O' the Times" was Prince at his creative and technical best. This was a more mature and refined Prince than the one most had grown accustomed to. Those early albums had no songs as brilliantly crafted as "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker," as soulful as "Adore" or as intelligent as "If I Was Your Girlfriend." |
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10PM $7 |
The Chandler Travis Philharmonic was born in the fall of 1996 at the Lizard Lounge in Cambridge, on the occasion of Chandler (best known for his "work" with the Incredible Casuals and Travis & Shook) doing a guest shot there with a house band led by multi-instrumentalist/singer Dinty Child. When asked if he would like to add any additional instrumentation, Chandler, having always hated when elderly bands ran out of ideas to this extent, facetiously suggested "oh yeah, let's get some horns and chick back-up singers." Having worked with Chandler on many occasions previously (and consequently lusting for revenge), Dinty complied with the horn part, booking (among others) crazy trumpeter Keiichi Hashimoto, and lo and behold, it worked! Later on, cross-dressing drummer Rikki Bates, a pal of Chandler's from the Casuals and one of the more amazing instrumentalists on the planet, and Keith Spring, (NRBQ, Martin Mull) helped complete the picture. Since then, the band -all colorfully garbed 8 pieces of them - have introduced the concept of alternative dixieland to dumbfounded/delighted audiences all over Massachusetts (most frequently in Cambridge at the Middle East, Toad, or the Lizard Lounge; or on Cape Cod at the Beachcomber), with occasional excursions beyond (on their three successful visits to the Mercury Lounge in NYC, the Village Voice declared them "keenly entertaining", called Chandler "a true New England eccentric and a master of daft power pop", and the band "a blend of Ringling Bros. and Ra" that "puts the harm back in Philharmonic.") Opening
is Durham's |
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| Wed 5 |
FOURTH OF JULY HEMP COALITION presents: THE
HEMP SEED CAFE TBA also: Guest Speakers 8PM $5 |
The Fourth of July Hemp Coalition now hosts a new activist night, THE HEMP SEED CAFE, where people can come discuss ideas and keep up with current events involving Drug Policy Reform. Our monthly event benefiting the Fourth of July Hemp Coalition features a new artist at every event. |
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| Thu 6 |
DARK WATER TRANSIT 10PM $8 |
Performing with an array of homemade instruments, industrial waste percussion, and the legacy of John Kane Sleepytime Gorilla Museum presents a highly orchestrated yet intensely visceral set of musical exhibits . The group features vocalist / guitarist Nils Frykdahl and bassist Dan Rathbun, formerly of the art-rock cabaret group Idiot Flesh, violinist / vocalist Carla Kihlstedt of Charming Hostess and Tin Hat Trio, found object percussionist Moe! Staiano, and Species Being drummer Frank Grau. Opening is Baltimore's DARK WATER TRANSIT. |
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| Fri 7 |
7PM $10 |
After years of doing all that it takes to develop a large fan base, including grass-roots promotion, touring, and releasing two albums, the Charleston SC-based BLUE DOGS are in full stride with their Americana-tinged contemporary rock. Primary songwriter Bobby Houck has found that the key to successful writing is writing what he knows. Throughout college and beyond, Houck's music has been an alloy of sounds from the southern landscape resulting in music that is at once folk, roots, blues and bluegrass that appeals to adventurous rock fans. The influence of artists such as Little Feat, Bob Dylan, and Tom Petty is immediately apparent yet serve as suggestions rather than blueprints for the Blue Dogs' style. WEEKEND EXCURSION is a powerhouse, North Carolina rock act that has risen from the tobacco road turf to become one of the mid-Atlantic's rising stars with a hook-laden, melodic rock sound that is both infectiously upbeat and thoroughly intimate. |
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| Sat 8 |
Kengosha
Entertainment N-Session featuring:
DJ Zair and DJ Hector 8PM $10 |
HIP-HOP SHOWCASE | |
| Sun 9 |
B-SIDE
PLAYERS 10PM
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Somewhere in northern Oregon, on a winding stretch of mountainous Interstate, the seven members of B-SIDE PLAYERS nearly lost their lives. Following a spring drizzle that gently darkened the asphalt, the band's tour van suddenly lost traction, upending their trailer and narrowly missing a cliff at seventy miles-per-hour. "It was one of those things that's supposed to change your life and send you running to church," deadpans frontman Karlos Paez. "We missed one show." This isn't a surprising statement when you consider that Karlos is a child of the road, having virtually grown up on a tour bus with his father's band Los Moonlighters, who have been touring throughout Mexico since the 70's and, to this day, haven't stopped. It's not a quest for fame, unyielding dedication, or even sheer balls that allow this brash band to so easily shrug off the specter of death. It's the deep-seeded knowledge that their furiously infectious blend of Latin, funk, rock, reggae, and soul brings new life to nearly everyone that hears it. An ethnically diverse group of artists with various passions for a broad range of musical styles, THE B-SIDE PLAYERS have been turning heads since their beginning in southern California in 1993. In addition to fresh, dynamic performances from the B-Side Players themselves, the show and recent album features a guest appearance from legendary funk drummer Mike Clark of Herbie Hancock fame. THE B-SIDE PLAYERS exceed all expectations. Karlos Paez's inspiring vocals and shimmering trumpet lines are buoyed by bright melodies from saxophonist Regan Branch and guitarist Giovanni Mejia, which are in turn supported by bassist Gerry Guevara, percussionists Victor Tapia and Luis Cuenca, and drummer Ryan Moran. When confronted by an uncommonly shy audience, the entire band is capable of dropping their instruments in favor of percussive tools, including traditional Latin instruments such as timbales, shekere, and cajon, and urging the reluctant crowd to a spinning frenzy with a blistering barrage of syncopated polyrhythms. | |
| Mon 10 |
8PM NO COVER |
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| Tue 11 |
THE NAYSAYER ADAM RICHMAN ALISON PIPTONE 10PM $7 |
A good song can be deadpan, cutthroat, heartbreaking. A good song can be perverted and romantic and crestfallen in the same breath. On their new album, The Naysayer delivers 12 such songs that will make you laugh out loud, rethink everyday gestures, and hit "play" again. "Deathwhisker" (saki024), the debut Naysayer record, showed newcomer-to-music Anna Padgett to be an instinctive and talented songwriter. Here, the songwriter/guitarist/singer shows she's not a one-stop visitor: like a good novelist, her powers of observation and ability to cut to the heart of things are growing year to year. Cynthia Nelson's (Retsin, Ruby Falls) un-drummer drumming, mischievous angel singing, and strangely beautiful melodic additions are also in full flower, while Tara Jane O'Neil (Retsin, Rodan) provides the inimitable guitar and bass work and finely-honed engineer skills that tie it all together. Everything about this album feels more assured - the singing, the playing, the production, the bitter sarcasm - more assured, but still like a rare, fleeting thing that's hard to label. It reveals its strong Texas roots and the spirit of the title's ZZ Top reference: it's got backroads and beer drinking (whether mentioned or not, the beer's there) as well as a healthy dose of sex, but the Naysayer is not down-home, porch-sitting country. More Flannery O'Connor than Mark Twain, the Naysayer has a darker agenda and vision, with elements of a southern gothic novel infused w/classic pop music. | |
| Wed 12 |
9:30PM $10 |
COREY HARRIS is a deliberate musical anachronism. In 1994 at the age of 25, he cut his first album, Between Midnight and Day, displaying a style of acoustic playing that crossed paths with Charley Patton and Robert Johnson, the Delta slide of Son House, and the Piedmont-style rags of Blind Boy Fuller. His music also reflects some of the influence of his New Orleans residence. And he makes it all work under one cover. In contrast to most of the white players (excepting John Hammond, who is a unique figure) who have adopted these or other antique blues styles, Harris' approach to the blues is more inspirational than scholarly, which lends a certain honest, direct urgency and emotional involvement to his music. He also has one of the richest and most expressive voices of any bluesman working today. | |
| Thu 13 |
K (from IDA) VPN THE MALARKIES 8PM $7 |
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DITCH 10PM $7 |
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| Sat 15 |
AVALANCHE: 10PM $5 |
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| Sun 16 |
DOUBLESPEAK 9:30PM $7 |
Drawing upon a wider variety of styles but a unifying concept of togetherness, Maryland's BLACK-EYED SUAN have slowly been gathering acclaim amongst area fans with their Cajun-jamband-slamgrass approach to the art. Equally as eclectic is New Jersey's RANA who come to Metro fresh off of the Widespread Panic tour. While drawing upon obvious Taj Mahal and similarly inspired influences, RANA has the underpinning in the pop sensibility found in The Talking Heads and Weezer. Opening are no strangers to the Metro Café, DC act DOUBLESPEAK takes the stage once more! |
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| Mon 17 |
8PM $7 |
Waves breaking on the beaches of the Northern California coast have always sounded like music to the members of THE ORANGE PEELS. Whether it's the wet sound of springs thrashing about inside a reverb tank, or the echoey tails of guitar tones washing across the stereo soundscape, you can almost feel the fog rolling in off the mighty Pacific and filtering down over the suburban lowlands of the San Francisco Bay Area as you listen. THE ORANGE PEELS are a product of their environment. While not listening to Carole King and Dionne Warwick albums (a definite influence), head Peel singer and songwriter Allen Clapp makes beautiful pop music with his California chums. Graham Smith has gained a reputation in the Chicago indie scene for his staunch DIY ethic and his band KLEENEX GIRL WONDER's short lo-fi pop songs. Smith single-handedly writes, records, and performs all the band's material, with other band members occasionally turning up for live shows. The band immediately garnered attention for both Smith's age and the band's similarity to Guided By Voices with its brief unfinished-sounding songs. Opening are punk cabaret specialists LES BATON ROUGE. |
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| Tue 18 |
MARTIYA
POSSESSION BELLY DANCE FUSION 9PM $3 |
Martiya Possession combines Oriental "Belly" Dance, Spanish Dance, and interpretive dance techniques to create a form all their own, exploring the dark and sensual side of movement. Performing to Tribal, Gothic, Industrial, and Medieval music. MP presents this Elegant and Enchanting Fusion Dance Style tonight! |
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| Wed 19 |
9:30PM $8 |
STEVE KOESTER, singer and guitarist for the indie rock outfit Punchdrunk, has dropped his first name and gone solo, backed by the Richmond, Virginia indie band Maki. His music is what you would expect from the veteran with his latest album filled with lazy, country-tinged, lyrically acute songs infused with a sense of space, of distance from tall buildings and traffic. There is a feeling of warm desolation to this music; it's both lonesome and intimate. Most of the instrumentation here is pretty minimal, consisting primarily of slow-burning bass and guitar and percussion and his husky, vulnerable voice. Arlington, Virginia trio METROPOLITAN plays interesting almost deconstructive music with an emo sheen. With an ear towards such acts as Dream Syndicate or even the Velvet Underground, the trio has catchy vocals, throbbing bass lines and well-placed drumbeats that are actually quite simple but NEVER boring. Unlike most of the other art bands that go out of their way to sound like a car crash, Philadelphia's BARDO POND also throws in helpful dollops of structure, rhythm and a clear echo of the blues. Long before precautionary measures can be initiated, the Earth is caught under BARDO POND'S torrents of molten rock and handily annihilated waging intensity like none other. The music is a foaming, unbridled creature, constantly reinventing itself to unexplored parameters of outness. Any musicians you can mention - be it High Rise, Sun Ra, Dead C, Masonna, Ives, etc. - can only indicate the forceful uniqueness at play here. Bardo Pond is your band. It's best to have no other distractions because music rarely reaches this level of mindfulness, showering down equations of hypnotic effluvia to all entry points and filtering transcendent beauty through dirty undergrowth. Listen in through the layers of confusion to hear the inner structure of how the noise is contained--it's not unconditioned feedback but composed chaos, seething with soulful emotion set to slow tempo. Opening is brilliant DC art rock ensemble TONE. |
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| Thu 20 |
THE MINT 10PM $10 |
Former members of CONGREGATION reassemble for a new funky sound. | |
| Sat 22 |
GROOVE
GUMBO "JUST FUNKY 2" featuring live performances by: LYSETTE TITI SEKANI & MINGO BACKYARD BAND spinning
all night DJ RBI 10PM $10 |
Another funky night of soul, hip-hop, r&b and urban contemporary. Features live performances by LYSETTE TITI ("Young, Sad & Blue") and Baltimore's hottest SEKANI & MINGO from SERENGHETTI MOVEMENT. DC's
very own turntablist |
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| Sun 23 | TBA | ||
| Mon 24 |
SHARK HUNTERS EXPEDITION CHARM CITY SUICIDES MAX LEVINE ENSEMBLE 8 PM $7 |
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| Tue 25 |
10PM $8 |
Over the past half-decade, Athens, Georgia-based ELF POWER has evolved into one of the giants of the much-revered/maligned Elephant Six Collective (the loose-knit clan of indie rock outfits distinguished by their fondness for the fey retro sounds of The Beach Boys and The Kinks and their appreciation for analog recording techniques). They may not be as wildly experimental or borderline deranged as groups like Olivia Tremor Control or Neutral Milk Hotel (whose members regularly contribute to Elf Power's albums), but they have proven themselves extremely adept at crafting cohesive albums of extremely enjoyable, gently psychedelic, melodic fuzz-pop embroidered with a wealth of strange, exotic sounds -- albums which seem to get better and better each time out. Multi-instrumentalists and vocalists Andrew Rieger and Laura Carter, who issued their extremely lo-fi debut in 1995, founded ELF POWER. By the time of amore coherent and psychedelic 1997 follow-up, they'd signed on additional core members Brian Helium (who has since left the band after three albums) and Aaron Wegelin. The band's current sound replete with sleepy vocals, fuzzy tones and throbbing rhythms offers satisfyingly full-flavor psychedelic indie rock. Also from Athens, GA are support act THE GERBILS who emerged from the second wave of the lo-fi indie coterie of the Elephant 6 collective. |
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| Wed 26 |
DC
SOCIETY OF YOUNG PROFESSIONALS 7PM |
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GUERILLA
TRANSMISSION 10PM $7 |
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| Thu 27 |
TY-SHE ENTERTAINMENT presents: AN URBAN SHOWCASE featuring: RAW DIALECT 7PM $10 |
Hosted
by: As
seen on BET's Rap City & Check
out STORM's new EP Interested in showcasing your talent? Contact STORM at q.storm@juno.com |
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10PM $7 |
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| Sat 29 |
SPORE
MAGAZINE FIDEL OSTINATO ESTILO 10PM $8 |
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| Sun 30 |
FEE FOE V 10PM $8 |
Pittsburgh's THE CYNICS have matured a great deal, musically speaking, in the decade they have been around, and it's a tribute to guitarist Gregg Kostelich and singer Michael Kastelic that the group's '60s garage/punk/folk/psychedelic visions of tender love and hard breakups has endured. Utilizing a revolving lineup of bassists and drummers, Kostelich and Kastelic have released five genre-spanning albums on Kostelich's own indie-wunderkind label, Get Hip Records. A manic five-piece punk onslaught from Cleveland, OH, whose music merges the gritty drive of early Midwestern punk icons such as the Dead Boys and the Pagans with the over-the top showmanship of the MC5 and the visionary noise of Pere Ubu, THE CHARGERS STREET GANG first formed as the Chargers. The group signed with Get Hip Records in 2001, and released their first proper studio album, Holy the Bop Apocalypse, in the late fall of that year. Opening are DC's very own FEE FOE V. |
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