Ash and The Bravery at The Whole Music Club

Friday, April 8th - HowWasTheShow's Week in Music


Photo: Ash at The Whole.

Last night (Thursday, April 7th) I saw the sold out Ash and The Bravery show at the 250 capacity Whole Music Club at the U of M. Golly. There we were, 5 feet from Tim Wheeler and Charlotte Heatherly. Though I've seen Ash a couple times now, each previous time I've been in a throng of thousands of people a hundred yards from the stage. Look for a full review on the main site soon. In the meantime, the short version is that Ash play just as well to a small audience as they do to a festival crowd of 50,000. And the Bravery are a great live band that live up to the hype.

The Fine Line show Friday 4/8 is your last chance to see Friends Like These until June

Friends Like These is (are?) going back into the studio, and Steve Murray will be going to Europe to tour with Ben Weaver, so Friday will be the last FLT show for a couple months. It's also their first time at the Fine line, and it's quite a bill. Philadelphia's The Capitol Years headline (Remember them? They opened the bill at The Pixies "Sell Out" tour kickoff show at the Fine Line last Spring.) Detroit's The High Strung fill the second slot, and Minneapolis' Melodious Owl open the show, so get there on time. (21+ $7, 8PM)

Melodious Owl reports that work on their new disk is going quite well. They've finished tracking and mixing their first full-length with Mark Mallman. They are now just awaiting a special remixed track for the album (the details of which will be announced later.) The band says, "Working with Mallman has been a blast, a learning experience, and mildly frightening."

Mallman to tour UK

Mark Mallman has announced his European tour, or at least gigs across the UK. For our UK readers (and I know you're out there) here's the poop. Come see the guy who won SXSW two years in a row!

Monday, April 11 - THE MET, Market Street, Bury
Tuesday, April 12 - ST. BONAVENTURE'S CLUB, Berkeley Rd, Bristol
Wednesday, April 13 - THE BORDERLINE, London
Thursday, April 14 - THE BORDERLINE, London
Friday, April 15 - THE CLUNY, Newcastle
Saturday, April 16 - KING TUT'S WAH WAH HUT, Glasgow
Sunday, April 17 - THE MUSICIAN, Leicester
Monday, April 18 - THE (NEW) ROSCOE, Leeds
Tuesday, April 19 - THE BOARDWALK, Sheffield
Wednesday, April 20 - THE RESCUE ROOMS, Nottingham
Thursday, April 21 - THE SHED, Bedford
Friday, April 22 - THE RAILWAY, Winchester

HowWasTheShow is going to ask our web campadre in London Andrew Zincke to cover one of the Borderline shows as, alas, I can't fly over to London for those shows on the 14th and 15th because I have to work.

Drummer Peter Anderson will be accompanying Mallman to the UK where they'll be opening for singer-songwriter Chuck Prophet all across England. Anderson said in an email, "If you have friends or family over there, for gosh sakes let 'em know we're coming."

Festival Central at the Suburban World

Festival Central at the Suburban World kicks off today. Music tonight features:

DJ Paul Harding (5PM)
Quilimbolas (8PM)
Felonious Bosch (9PM)
Crush Collision Trio (10PM)
E-DAWG & Mighty White: Your Soul
Solution (11PM)

Beer, Wine, Soda, Water and Pizza Luce pizza will be available. See the whole music schedule here.

What's going on at the Varsity?

In announcement this week, Jason McLean said, "Little by little we have made the necessary changes and little by little the city of Minneapolis lets us know what else needs to be worked on. (Last week we found out we had to change the tile in the bar.) "

The inspectors were in the theater this week, and McLean promises to post details of the ongoing saga on the varsity's website.

P.I.N.T.S. – People in Need, Tsunami Survivors

Dan Israel, JoAnna James and Apryl Electra perform at a benefit show at Lee's Liquor Lounge on Sunday, April 10th to help Tsunami Survivors. The event is a microbrew beer tasting that comes with a $25 suggested donation. Snacks will also be provided for your admission fee, and 100% of the proceeds go to Tsunami Relief. The event runs from noon to 4 PM.

JoAnna James, by the way, will be including an electrifying version of Dan Israel's song "Waiting So Long." I heard her perform it live at Lee's on a recent Saturday on a bill with Israel, which prompted him to nearly cut it from his own set for fear of having been shown up.

After the show, on your way home from Lee's, tune in to The Current 89.3, from 5-6 pm. The Bleeding Hickeys will be on Chris Roberts' Live Local show. (I'm slowly but surely catching up on my backlog of archived shows.) The Hickeys pointed out in an email that it's a "Free, All Ages afternoon delight."

Miscellaneous



Billy Idol's entire new album Devil's Playground is available for streaming here. I was almost scared away with disappointment at the opening track "Super Overdrive," but I'm glad I stuck it out for a full listen to the disk. "Sherri" is a great pop song, and Idol's cover of Cromarty and Rush's "Plastic Jesus" is a pleasant 3 minute diversion. I've heard other writers theorize that Devil's Playground is not likely to spur a Billy Idol comeback, but at least it's a step back in the right direction after 1993's Cyberpunk.



New Order's new album Waiting for the Siren's Call arrived in my mailbox this week. (The album will be released in the US on April 26th.) Though the album is as inconsistent as every New Order album to date (god love 'em though, and the album cover concept is brilliant) the disk includes my new vote for the feel good hit of the upcoming summer "Krafty"--knocking Stereophonics' "Dakota" out of that spot. "Krafty" is about as good a pop song as you're going to find on the radio these days, and blessedly full of the self-deception requisite in all truly great New Order songs. I've adopted a line from song as the theme for my 3rd Annual 39th Birthday (June 4th, Turf Club): "This Time I'll Get It Right."

Oh, and Springsteen tickets for the May 10th Xcel Center show go on sale tomorrow (Saturday) at 11.