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Yankee
Remix Festival
MASS
MoCA, North Adams, Mass., Saturday
Keeping
in tune with the spirit of July 4, the Yankee Remix Festival
at MASS MoCA will feature American music and art (the gallery’s
Yankee Remix exhibit to be exact). One of the founding fathers
of the outlaw-country group the Flatlanders, Jimmie Dale Gilmore,
will headline the show. He’s joined by the Persuasions, who
sold out the venue two years back and who will perform from
their album of a cappella versions of Grateful Dead songs,
and West Indies rockers the Reggae Cowboys, whom we believe
live in Toronto now. Massachusetts-based Amusia and Melodrome
round out the bill. The festival also includes plenty of food
(can you say lobster roll?) and games for kids of all ages.
Tours of the gallery, which is open from 10 AM until 6 PM,
are included, and admission is included in the ticket price.
The music starts at 6 PM. (July 5, 6 PM, $27, $22 members,
$11 kids, 413-662-2111)
Big
Day Out
Saratoga Performing Arts
Center, Saturday
Channel
103.1 is hosting its third annual Big Day Out concert on Saturday,
a day of music and mingling at SPAC. This year’s performers
include Staind, Evanescence, Eve 6, Static X, Lo-Pro, Hoobastank,
Trapt, the Exies, and the Bruise Bros. Albany’s “new rock
alternative,” as the station calls itself, claims to bring
edgier musicians to the venue while mixing newer artists Trapt
(who took their name from feeling “trapped” by record labels),
and Evanscence (best known for their tormented lyrics and
lead vocalist Amy Lee) with the old favorites Eve 6, Hoobastank
and Staind. Make sure to locate the autograph tent, where
fans can chat up their favorite band members. Local heavy-rock
act the Bruise Bros., who won their opening slot through a
lengthy Battle of the Bands this past winter, will hit the
stage at noon. (July 5, noon, $25-$15, 476-1000)
Steel
Pulse, Alfred St. John’s Trinidad and Tobago Steelband
Washington
Park, Monday
In
the late ’70s, gigs were tough to come by for Steel Pulse.
The first- generation Brits wore their attachment to the culture
of their parents’ Caribbean homeland on their sleeves, and
professed and celebrated it in their music (which combined
island forms like calypso, ska, reggae and bluebeat with more
Eurocentric forms like flamenco). This—and their hankering
for ganja—made English club owners a touch nervous. But in
a curious twist of musical history, Steel Pulse were coattailed
into many of these clubs as an opening act by fans who also
happened to be headliners, such as the Police, the Clash and
XTC. Those bands, who also had been inspired by the sounds
of the West Indies, got Steel Pulse in front of eager audiences,
and before long they were cult stars. The fortunes of the
band have been inconsistent—an attempt at more mainstream
acceptance lost them fans in the mid ’80s—but, of late, they’ve
been working closer to their original style, a style you can
sample when Steel Pulse kick off the Second Wind series of
free concerts at Albany’s Washington Park Lakehouse on Monday.
Also on the bill, Alfred St. John’s Trinidad and Tobago Steelband.
(July 7, 7:30 PM, free, www.swconcerts.org)
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JAY
FARRAR
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Jay
Farrar, Anders Parker
Iron
Horse Music Hall, Northampton, Mass., Tuesday
Jay
Farrar is one of alt-country’s best-known artists. After all,
he and Jeff Tweedy cohelmed the roots-rocking Uncle Tupelo—the
band who prompted the coinage of “No Depression,” which sort
of morphed into “alt-country.” But the two had creative difficulties,
and in ’94 they dissolved Uncle Tupelo, some members of whom
Tweedy took with him to form Wilco. Farrar grabbed original
Tupelo drummer Mike Heidorn to form Son Volt, the more traditional
country-folk band of the two offshoots. After a critically
acclaimed first album, Trace, and lukewarm reviews
of the two following releases (with claims that they were
all too similar), Farrar recorded his first solo release,
Sebastopol, in 2001. He followed that with the EP ThirdShiftGrottoSlack—a
kind of sister-release to Sebastopol—and on June 24,
Terroir Blues saw the light of day on Farrar’s new
label, Act/Resist Records (“two words that I thought I could
live with,” the artist has said). Blood Oranges multi- instrumentalist
Mark Spencer is all over the 23-track album—on lap steel,
slide guitar, piano and such—and he’ll join Farrar for his
show Tuesday at the Iron Horse Music Hall. Also joining them
are Varnaline members Anders Parker and Jud Ehrbar—and Parker
also will open the show. (July 8, 7 PM, $18, $15 advance,
800-THE-TICK)
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Bella
Morte
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There’s
a big goth-rock show at Valentine’s tonight (Thursday),
with Charlottesville, Va.-based Bella Morte
and our own “bastions of Gothdom,” the Flying
Buttresses (9 PM, $10, 432-6572). . . . New
England premier newgrass band the Stockwell
Brothers will play the first show of the season
in the Concerts in Wiswall Park (Ballston Spa)
tonight. Bring a lawn chair, as the seating is
limited (6:30 PM, free, 899-6157)....On Saturday
at Valentine’s, the Scientific Maps, performing
“songs about space and ghosts but not Space Ghost,”
will play a show with MC and DJ duo White Lotus
and Gyro—whom the Maps played with a couple
weeks back, and whom the Maps claim “succeeded
in rocking everyone’s block.” Downstate rockers
the Audiants share in the bill (9 PM, $5,
432-6572). . . . Horn-fueled bluesy swing band
Roomful of Blues will celebrate their 35th
year together as well as their new release, That’s
Right!, on Saturday at Troy’s Revolution Hall,
with our own acclaimed blues cats the Maynard
Brothers Band opening (9 PM, $15, 273-2337).
. . . Irish-folk band the McKrells will
kick off the Collar City Live! season on Sunday.
The concerts take place every Sunday at 7 PM at
Riverfront Park in Troy, and Laurel Massé,
Mundo Nuevo and Dick “the Sun Mountain
Fiddler” Solberg are only a few of the upcoming
participating performers. You can check out the
schedule at www.city-of-troy.com/collarcitylive
(7 PM, free, 273-0834). . . . River City Rebels,
Burlington, Vt.-based punk youngsters (and
Victory Records recording artists) will play a
show Sunday at Valentine’s, with the Virus,
Blind Society, Two Dollars Short and Infected
Minds opening (7:30 PM, $12, $10 advance,
432-6572). . . . The music and video series Goodship
Tuesdays continues all summer at B.R. Finley’s
in Troy, and the featured video-artist for the
month of July is lmnopf, a “visual design
syndicate”; this Tuesday’s music will be provided
by laptop genius thejessestiles3000 and
turntablist master Flip One (10:30 PM,
free, 271-9190).
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