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Listening to the Brooklyn-based ensemble Woods, which is equally fascinated by harmony and sprawling improvisation, develop over the last six years has been a sometimes confusing endeavor. For folks reintroduced to the band since it dislodged its punkier inclinations, going back and taking in tracks like “God Hates the Faithless,” from its earliest long-player, is gonna be startling. The effort ranks as the group’s only foray into gutbucket hollering. Read the rest of this entry »

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Working under the stage name Delicate Steve, Steve Marion issued “Wondervisions” last year through the David Byrne helmed Luaka Bop imprint. The disc was an odd combination of pop music run through international concerns and dashed with enough polyrhythmic fervor to garner a touch of underground acclaim amid releases by all those beach bands. The same sort of optimism bursts from each Delicate Steve composition as from the coastal stoners’ work; Marion’s recordings are just better orchestrated and performed. Returning with “Positive Force” (it has nothing to do with straight-edge hardcore), Delicate Steve forgoes some of the more electronic moments of his debut. Read the rest of this entry »

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Andrew Jackson Jihad wrapped up criticism pretty succinctly on its 2009 album, “Can’t Maintain.” A track called “We Didn’t Come Here to Rock” proclaims “If that’s what makes your dick hard/Telling people they’re bad at making art.” The band delivers its message over hamfisted bar-chords at a pace best suited for high-school punk bands. And singer Sean Bonnette does the whole thing in a voice sounding more full of medium-roast coffee than booze. Dismissing all the negativism associated with a commentator’s craft works back to punk’s impetus, though—if you want to do something, do it. Even if it sucks. Luckily, Andrew Jackson Jihad hasn’t incurred such jabs. The Arizona ensemble, which includes a number of players at any given time contributing mandolin or kazoo, is jacked into a late-nineties punk network despite toting around its acoustic instruments. Read the rest of this entry »

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Psalm One hasn’t fallen off the face of the earth, but performing live doesn’t seem to be the focus of this Chicago native’s life—unfortunately. Woefully underrecorded, the Rhymesayers’ MC towers over label mates not in stature or output, but through sheer ability. It’s a rare thing to hear a rapper with enough confidence to not just ride a rhythm, but to become part of it. Applying niceties like intelligent or thoughtful really aren’t enough. Hearing “The Nine” should convince just about anyone of Psalm One’s storytelling abilities, not to mention her innate understanding of music and ability to turn in a memorable chorus. She opens the show along with Add-2, J. Pinder and a few other folks. Read the rest of this entry »

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Back during the first few years of the aughties, Chicago’s The Primeridian, comprising See-Me-On and Race, issued “I’ll Meet You in Greenwich.” It was before Kanye dropped out of college and about the same time Common was readying the ill-advised “Electric Circus.” No one knew who No I.D. was. Still. “Musical Mirages,” a single compiled on Primeridian’s first long player, remains sturdy enough to dig up as work exemplifying the group’s style as a whole. But a lot’s happened since 2002. Read the rest of this entry »

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A decade-old band fronted by a dead guy probably isn’t the best reference to begin with, but Indian Jewelry, especially on a compilation of early cuts called “Sangles Redux,” summons a bit of the Lost Sounds. Coming out of Houston, though, sets up Indian Jewelry in a lineage reaching back to the Red Krayola. Since the early aughties, the band’s gone and trampled on any number of sub-genres, leaving some of its more garagey leanings behind. Read the rest of this entry »

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Since Blu’s last Chicago visit in early April, the Los Angeles-based MC issued “No York!,” his long awaited major label debut. The disc’s arrival, though, doesn’t seem to have done much for the rapper’s visibility. In part, electronic tunes like “E V E R Y T H I N G O K” have something to do with that. The bouncy track accompanied by a femme-vocal chorus is a pretty drastic departure from the A-Tribe-Called-Quest-on-the-West-Coast thing Blu’s been working over the last few years. Read the rest of this entry »

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Musical quality is ensured when the rhythm section from Hepcat joins your group. At least, it’s been true for The Aggrolites, a SoCal quintet dedicated to vintage-sounding Jamaican music, swinging from rock steady derivations to latter-day Peter Tosh-styled rock-inflected compositions. Beginning life as a pick-up band serving at the pleasure of a variety of touring luminaries, Jesse Wagner and company founded the proper recording ensemble back in 2003 with an ode to skinhead dance music entitled “Dirty Reggae,” the name, perhaps, referring to the band’s penchant for American soul as much as Jamaican sounds. Read the rest of this entry »

Kurt Vile/Photo: Shawn Brackbill

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This “unofficial” Pitchfork after-show sponsored by CHIRP Radio features two bands whose intricate sounds definitely merit live, indoor listening. Woods and Kurt Vile have ties going back to 2009, when Woods frontman Jeremy Earl’s label Woodsist re-released Kurt Vile’s first full-length solo album, “Constant Hitmaker.” Formerly a member of the Philadelphia band The War On Drugs, Vile has since released two full-lengths and one EP with Matador, and can claim both Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon and Animal Collective as famous fans. Vile has a voice that gently echoes alongside hypnotic guitar work or growls as loudly as his backing band, the Violators, who are playing with him both at Pitchfork and at Subterranean. His long hair hangs in his face as he plays, and his melodies, sometimes haunting and sometimes elating, seem to change a space rather than just fill it. Woods, known for engaging live shows, plays well-crafted psych-folk songs that range from being poppy enough for a sing-along to unpredictably and excitingly strange. Arc In Round, dream-pop hailing from Kurt Vile’s hometown of Philadelphia, also plays. (Rachel Lazar)

 July 16 at Subterranean, 2011 West North, (773)278-6600, 9:30pm. $15. 17+.

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Matthew Mondanile is probably equally well known for performing as Ducktails as he is for being guitarist in the Woodsist-affiliated band Real Estate. Recording endeavors from both groups arrive with a breezy, tossed-off feel angling at nonchalance. Success at being another troupe of slacker musicians has been fully realized for both outfits even as Ducktails, since its first 2007 releases, moved slowly towards the normalcy of Real Estate’s rock escapades. Mondanile, not always touting lackadaisical New Jersey shoreline beach pop, began Ducktails with the mindset that creating loops from a handful of vintage, and sometimes African, recordings would serve as ample foundation for his spindly guitar noodling. It worked, pretty much from the start after dispensing with the ambient experiment “Dreams in Mirror Field.” From the 2009 self-titled disc on Los Angeles’ Not Not Fun, “Beach Point Pleasant” circulates a keyboard pattern and accompanying drum beat snatched from some Ethio-jazz offering and grants Mondanile almost four minutes worth of time to explore modes his guitar can fit to the aging melody. Improvising in such a fashion only lasted a short while, with the following albums, “Backyard” and “Landscapes,” beginning to incorporate a pop consciousness previously absent from Ducktails releases. Issuing “III: Arcade Dynamics” with tracks like “Don’t Make Plans” completed the sonic shift with Ducktails aping a summery pop confection not dissimilar from anything Real Estate and its brethren have dispensed. The music hasn’t improved or gotten worse. It’s utterly different, but holds onto enough low-fidelity ambience to get over. Of course, if you don’t catch Ducktails opening up for Wild Nothing on Friday, just wait until Sunday to see Mondanile perform with Real Estate. It’s pretty much the same thing at this point. (Dave Cantor)

July 15 at Subterranean, 2011 West North, (773)278-6600. 9:30pm. $15. 17+.