Don't have anywhere to go on Thanksgiving? Or maybe your family eats at 3 o'clock in the afternoon and you need something to do at night since everyone usually passes out around nine. Either way, I recommend you head over to The Prospector in Long Beach for a special Thanksgiving night show with Crystal Antlers and DJ Frederick Phases.

Crystal Antlers just finished recording a new ep up in San Francisco last weekend with Ikey Owens (Mars Volta, Look Daggers, and sometimes second keyboardist in Crystal Antlers) that they plan on releasing on the 10" vinyl and 0's and 1's formats sometime next year.

Read Dave's review of their show at The Prospector from back in September.

Avenged Sevenfold is playing a secret show tonight (Friday 10/26) at the Slidebar in Fullerton.
Sometime around 9ish.
No cover.

122 E. Commonwealth Ave., Fullerton, 92832.

Listen, I love reggae just as much as the next guy, but there’s only so much irie I can take when it’s all coming at 60 beats per minute – for three hours. What is that? 10,800 beats. I think I hit my peak last night at about 10 grand even, and it was all over. I had to leave.

Last night was the Ziggy Marley and Donovan Frankenreiter concert in the Pacific Amphitheatre, which as I’ve said before, is a fantastic place to see a show. First, and I’m sure this depends on the performer, it’s not swarming with a bunch of preteens who text and have awful taste in music. Second, it is similarly devoid of the usual OC nightlife scene: club rats, tough guys, fish lips, and flat-billers. Sure, this might have to do with the fact that it was a reggae show, but the crowd was so warm. Smiling faces, welcoming, polite vibes, beautiful people, and an oddly familiar aroma – very pleasant.

So now that you understand the social concern, you surely understand that people are there to be roped in by the band and had the groove laid down on ‘em right? You get it, right? Not the bands, so much. Donovan Frankenreiter came back on stage to what seemed like an unexpected encore to “slow it down a bit,” to the audible chagrin of the crowd, who afterward, was sufficiently slowed.

After a quite leisurely, lengthy intermission – I guess they were just moving slow – Ziggy Marley finally came on stage to, apparently, slow it down even further, pausing to spout off the usual: “Governments should be afraid of their people!”

Yeah, totally!

“I and I will never fear Babylon!”

Woooo!! Next irie jam, mon!

A third set of this caused much of the already sleepy-time-prone audience to sit down, and for me to leave. I was about gyrated out. I have nothing to complain about, it was great. I just need to go listen to some Dead Kennedys for a while.

'80s California psych-rock group True West reunited in 2006 after a two-decade hiatus and now they're opening for Violent Femmes on the latter's dates at Anaheim House of Blues tonight and Aug. 4 at San Francisco's Fillmore. And, finally, True West have their canon reissued on CD, with the nicely packaged, 21-track Hollywood Holiday Revisited (Atavistic). Prominent TW fans included Prince and Television guitarist Tom Verlaine, the latter of whom produced True West's 1983 three-track demo (included on Revisited).

True West's dual-guitar attack (featuring six-string studs Richard McGrath and Russ Tolman) jangled blissfully, stung caustically, and fluctuated mellifluously. It would be glib to call True West a Left Coast Television, but the two bands do share a predilection for incisive yet expansive guitar leads and upliftingly poignant melodies. Furthermore, “Steps to the Door” and “I'm Not Here” remain some of the most powerful, thrusting specimens of psychedelia to emanate from the evanescent Paisley Underground scene that flourished on the West Coast in the mid-'80s. Another highlight is True West's suitably sinister cover of Pink Floyd's early garage-psych chestnut “Lucifer Sam."

One should be skeptical of most band reunions, but I have a feeling that True West won't tarnish their glittering, if little-known, legacy. Dig out your finest paisley shirt for this one, man.

The talent-heavy hip-hop festival Rock the Bells (which we previewed here) will now take place at Hyundai Pavilion at Glen Helen Saturday, Aug. 11.

Performers include Wu-Tang Clan, Public Enemy and MF Doom.

All tickets for the originally scheduled National Orange Show Events Center will be honored.

I know this is in Upland, and I know Upland is far, and I also know that I can't make it tonight because of a previous engagement. BUT Tonight you can see a shit-ton of sandblasting superstars: BARR, John Thill, AM, and This Song is a Mess but So Am I. Just drive out there with a friend and ask somebody to recommend a burrito place to you or something, swear to god all of these bands are worth it. I saw AM recently and I can't say enough good things about these dudes, they make me proud to be from Orange County like no other band has. I've never heard or seen (or can find a website) for I'm A Fucking Gymnast, who are also playing, but don't let that discourage you from going. All of these bands can and will do ANYTHING to put on a tight show so I have no reason to think of them as an exception. More details: it is at the Old Baldy Brewery in Upland (271 N. Second Ave), get there at eight. GET THERE.

I could never understand why the biggest Southern California music festival is in the middle of the desert. To me, enduring triple-digit temperatures to catch the Pixies reunion just seemed like pure sadism on behalf of Goldenvoice. Nevertheless, Coachella always draws a crowd. And this year, the festival has grown to epic proportions.

Amidst the perpetual rumors of a Smiths reunion and the last-minute news of a possible Police show, Coachella's 2007 lineup was announced today. There's a ton of big names: Björk, Interpol, Sonic Youth, The Arcade Fire, Jesus and Mary Chain, The Decemberists and a bunch more.

The big news, however, is that Rage Against the Machine are reuniting just in time to headline day three. If you read Gustavo's story on Zack de la Rocha a couple months back, you'll know that de la Rocha had previously, as Gustavo put it, "gone Mexican" and eschewed his rap-rock roots. Well, turns out that he must still have a little rhyme in him because RATM is going to be back at their overtly-political thrashing pretty soon. My guess is that, at the very least, they'll be able to put a new spin on "People of the Sun."

My biggest qualm with this year's lineup? Red Hot Chili Peppers headlining the second day. I don't know how many more songs about California I can take, people. Seriously.

Tickets go on sale this Saturday, January 27th at 10:00 A.M via Ticketmaster.

Sad day for all ages rock, which is now back down to Chain Reaction, Plush Cafe and a few churches. SolArt owner Sali Heraldez wrote in seconds ago to announce that her gallery/cafe/experiment in human decency is ending:

We were given a 30 day notice to move out a few days ago. According to the owner, he is upgrading the building and will be renting to a "profitable business with a license." We are still in shock . . . of course . . . but nothing we can do.

I haven't been excited by any music in a long, long time.

Wait, wait. Was that pretentious enough for you?
No?

Well, how about this: I haven't been excited by any new music in a long, long time.

But Friday night's My Morning Jacket show at the House of Blues, Anaheim was the first concert in awhile that I was actually anticipating.

Hell, I was even standing on the floor and—lucky me—next to two thirty-something bros, double-fisting Rockstars and Budweisers, with Peter Pan complexes who felt the need to provide running commentary throughout the entirety of the show.

Elvis Perkins and his Dearland band opened up the show. The first time I saw Perkins live was at this past summer's Lollapalooza—sitting cross-legged on the grass underneath the shade of some trees, the breeze coming in from Lake Michigan (behind the stage) blowing through Grant Park—it was perfect. But Friday night's set proved to be a little mournfully slow for the restless House of Blues audience. However, Perkins managed to win over even the skeptics with the help of the Cold War Kids, who joined them on stage for two (Bro #1: What is this—The Last Waltz disc two???") of his more upbeat songs, like my personal favorite, "May Day!"

I've read somewhere that Perkins adjusts his setlists after gauging what he feels the audience can handle—the particularly heart-wrenching "Ash Wednesday" being a song he doesn't perform often live.

After the third or fourth melancholy (but oh so good) song, my friend turned to me and asked, "Are all his songs like this?" And then I explained that it might have something to do with the fact that his mother was on that American Airlines flight that had crashed into the North Tower during 9/11 and that his father (actor Anthony Perkins) had passed away from AIDS.

"Oh," she said. And then she diverted her attention back to the stage again. "I get it."

Perkins finished his set off with "Doomsday" (Bro #1's wife/girlfriend/whatever: "He sounds like Neil Young!"—he doesn't) and then it was time for My Morning Jacket, whose lead singer later remarked that Perkins is beautiful like a wisp of cotton candy.

The gloriously long setlist:
1. It Beats 4 U
2. Gideon
3. The Way That He Sings
4. What A Wonderful Man
5. Off the Record
6. Golden
7. O Is The One That Is Real
8. The Bear
9. Lay Low
10. Heartbreakin' Man
11. Wordless Chorus
12. Dondante
13. Phone Went West
14. One Big Holiday
ENCORE
15. Tonight I Want To Celebrate With You
16. How Could I Know
17. I Will Sing You Songs
18. Anytime
19. Run Thru

Admittedly, I actually disliked My Morning Jacket for years and years—it wasn't until I heard "Off the Record" (easily the "Maps" or "Float On" of 2006) one day in a friend's car did I give the band another listen.

You know, I've got to hand it to My Morning Jacket. They're definitely showmen, something not so common in these times of quiet bands that just play-and-leave. I'd love to shake the hand of the dude who takes care of their lighting: spot lights, slow strobe lights, fast strobe lights, backlights, toplights, pitch darkness staccatoed by bursts of spotlight in all the right dramatic spots! All of which totally created awesome lighting for their awesome hair. (And it was just bright enough to coo at the giant grizzly bear plushie in the poncho and Mickey Mouse sorcerer hat onstage.)

But Jim James' impassioned-but-dreamy, far-far-away vocals pierced through the darkness. Not to mention the many, many hair thrashing, guitar solos in a lone spotlight. It was all one big throwback to the sounds of classic rock—with cutesy indie rock losing its momentum, what else could explain the fact that shoegazer, psychedelia and alt-country have been deemed as cool once again?

And here's where I reach my disgustingly cliche (I called myself out on it, so you don't get to laugh, k?) conclusion: My Morning Jacket's just something you need to experience live. And not live like in a crowd of thousands at a X, Y, or Z summer festival live, but in a club, in the darkness, with a mass of fans feeding off every note, wail and flash of the strobe light.

So I'm a little late on this, but I went to go check out Cold War Kids at Detroit after the Weekly's Christmas party (on a stationary riverboat?) this past Saturday night.

It was the third time I've seen CWK at Detroit—and probably the last (I mean, really, at this rate, you kids can sell out the House of Blues... or bigger)—and, as always, it was... a good show.

Energetic. Interactive.

All that good stuff that's already been said about their live performance.

But the tightly packed-in crowd kind of lost its energy five or six songs into the set—and guess what? We didn't really deserve an encore.

(Apparently the band thought so, too.)

Anyway, the success story that is the Cold War Kids continues tonight at 11:30 p.m., when they'll be performing on CBS' the Late Show with David Letterman.

Yup.

Letterman.

TONIGHT! Members of Slowpolk play tonight at Table Ten in Fullerton. Let's listen to what Bekah has to say: "you can't miss this one... mr. erich wood will be playing along with danny and myself. he will be adding his wonderful guitar, bass and cello skills to slowpolk songs. also! he will opening the evening with some originals of his own... you will want to kill yourself if you don't make it. jonny will be behind the bar, as usual, providing many libations for all... hope to see everybody!"

WOAH, UPDATE!: The band is called Dead Ponies! That is heavy! (Thanks, lil' Z.)
Rumor has it: Robert Giampa (a.k.a., the man who's shot 1 squillion OC band photos) breaks on through to the other side, playing with, I'm told, a band that's called "something like Dig Pony" or something. No direct confirmation on this, since Detroit Bar doesn't list support acts for this month's resident band, Briertone. (Click at your own risk. I've never visited that page in me whole life.) Word is "Dig Pony" plays "heavy" shit. See you there at 10 p.m. with my very best red flats on! p.s. It's free.

It's been a few slow days for blogging 'round here (what could I possibly show you that Brit-Brit already hasn't?) so I let our rockin' intern Miles Clements do a little work while I took a four hour lunch. Let's read what he has to write:

There needs to be more bands willing to crank out good ol' fashioned rock & roll. Almost every Orange County band I've come across recently sounds like its gunning for a spot on The O.C. soundtrack, for some imagined scene where a pair of young lovers first spot each other at a party and share a delicate kiss on the balcony. Ugh. (Note to said bands: Stop. Please.)

Thankfully, there's the Henry Clay People, a group of young lads (read: my age) [Editor's note: he's 21!] who crank out concise and catchy rock songs. The band says that they pull from the Replacements, Pavement and Neil Young. All good references, especially since I can hear a dash of each of those. But there's one influence that the band neglects to mention: Conor Oberst. Vocalist Joey Siara more than echoes the slurred lisp of Oberst, and while it's a little over-the-top, a bit brash and even polarizing, it'll elicit a reaction at the very least.

Like all good rock bands, the Henry Clay People are best seen live. Whether they're accompanied by a PowerPoint presentation in a university lecture hall or donning some ridiculous Halloween costumes, rest assured that there'll be lots of energy and youth. And there's no substitute for that. [Sad, but true.]

As an added treat, this weekend you can discover what happens when you throw them into the mix with a few beers and some bowling!

Henry Clay People play the Eagle Rock Sunday Night Bowling and Drinking Club, 4459 Eagle Rock Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90041. Sun., Dec. 3, 8 p.m. $5. 21+.

Providence's Elvis Perkins plays Club NME at Spaceland tonight, along with Pernice Brothers.

Perkins' despondent (yet somehow soothing) vocals are somewhat reminiscent of crooners Jeff Buckley, Colin Meloy (eh) or Rufus Wainwright—but minus all that excessive theatricality. And recently signed to XL Recordings (home to indie powerhouses Devendra Banhart, M.I.A., Basement Jaxx, Thom Yorke, Ratatat, Peaches and Tapes 'n Tapes), we've seen Perkins' name exalted in all the major music blogs in the past few months. Or maybe—just maybe—you recognize the name from his tour opening for local pseudo-celeb Matt Costa.

Listen to his tracks off Ash Wednesday here.

Oh, and P.S.? Here's what music blog favorite Brooklyn Vegan had to say about Perkins' July 1st, 2006 Bowery Ballroom show with Costa:

7) There were more people at the show for Elvis Perkins than for Matt Costa who was headlining (I left too).

ELVIS PERKINS PERFORMS WITH PERNICE BROTHERS AT SPACELAND, 1717 SILVER LAKE BLVD., LOS ANGELES, (323) 661-4380. WED., NOV. 22, 9 P.M. $10. 21+.

Buck Owens is Black Sabbath and Totimoshi knows why: distinctive guitar tone and songs about Satan make a boy from Bakersfield do good, and Totimoshi guitarist Tony Aguilar learned the necessary lessons from both. Central Valley-raised—where he grew up on country/western as much as rock & roll and Mexican corridos—Aguilar and now-wife/always- bassist Meg Castellanos have been the Rose and Buck of Oakland's noted heavy-rock scene for almost 10 years, nosing their band Totimoshi through a disruptively unreliable rotation of drummers toward latest album Ladron, which is metal-meets-Morricone with production by Helmet's Page Hamilton and bitter what's-wrong-with-the-world? lyrics that could be from the last years of any of America's failing wars. As a kid, says Aguilar, he used to put on Hendrix and the Band of Gypsys' "Machine Gun" and listen over and over and over, "and it used to kill me. You can read any book or any well-written novel about the times when Hendrix was living, or you can understand it subconsciously by listening to that song—one song that tells the story of a million things going on."

Ladron—Spanish for "thief," picked to suggest "you stealing from yourself, or society stealing from you," says Aguilar—is Totimoshi's album for troubled times, a nihil-political record that follows up the more personal Monoli and Mysterioso with credit to the menacing mood and loose, open feel of "Machine Gun." Ladron takes a traditionally heavy '70s-scum-'90s chassis—Hamilton's influence might explain the Bleach/Meantime moments; the title track could fit with dirthead worthies like Mad Dog or JPT Scare Band—and then piles on stranger and quieter asides from a winding line of influence, looping in short snippets from Beatles (just a few seconds of the intro to "Gods of Earth" or maybe Neil Young (something about the guitar on the acoustic "These Meanings") or even a string section to match a scene from El Topo (the final suite of the instrumental "The Drunken Sun Forever Watching"). Since we're both serious grown men, we can straight-facedly discuss things like the qualifications for heaviness: Aguilar says to him it's his lyrics, which he spins out in unconscious freewrite and then edits back to reveal some kind of coherency, but besides the fearsome low-end—Castellanos and new drummer Luke Herbst—that Totimoshi honed to stand before tourmates like Mastodon and the Melvins, you could also credit Ladron's weird sense of weight to the band's weird and wide-open sense of dynamic. Aguilar even sings—nice notes and everything—on this album. It's like they do when they load their van: "You gotta be careful how you dispense the weight," he says. (CZ)

TOTIMOSHI PERFORMS WITH FU MANCHU AND GUESTS AT DETROIT, 843 W. 19TH ST., COSTA MESA, (949) 642-0600. THURS., NOV. 16, 9 P.M. $10. 21+.

Top noisy British shoegaze/etc. band on their first US tour ever! Cannot indicate correctly how good this band was/is/will be and how much you should go. Any fans of Jesus & Mary Chain/Spacemen 3/Loop/Spiritualized/Ride/etc. need to be at this. Telescopes were contemporaries and easily equals but never hit it in the US due to label/bureaucratic bullshit. This tour should be hitting El Rey for like $50 and instead it's cozied up in Long Beach for practically nothing. I can't find anyone else's reviews that adequately adore this band but trust me like hell that you need to be at this, and we'll cut straight to the audio here and here and vid below. Openers Fuxa and LSD and the Search For God at good ol' Prospector!

Late notice for a Long Beach appearance by brown-eyed soul star Brenton Wood, fixture at New Orleans' world-class rock & roll fest the Ponderosa Stomp and lots more. Says Ponderosa:

Brown-Eyed Soul isn't about color. It's a way of life—music that is passed from generation to generation like a family heirloom…the Latino culture is like one big family." So says L.A. soul singer Brenton Wood, and he should know, for his songs rank right alongside those of thee Midnighters, Billy Preston, the Shields, Ron Holden and the Thunderbirds and Rosie and the Originals as enduring East L.A. low rider classics. Wood is feverishly popular in the Latino community, and is part of the continuum of artists—the aforementioned along with many, many more—whose songs and reputations have risen to mythic proportions wherever Pendleton shirts, pachuko crosses and massive hydraulic systems are seen.

Born Alfred Smith in Shreveport, Louisiana, his family moved to the Los Angeles area when he was still a boy. He became interested in music during the late '50s, first joining the Dootones and then forming the Quotations while attending Compton College, where he also took up piano. Like many West Coast teenagers of the day, Wood's biggest influences were Sam Cooke and Jesse Belvin. After working with Little Freddie and the Rockets, who released "All My Love" b/w "Too Fat" on Chief Records in 1958, Wood signed a song writing contract with the company that would become Double Shot Records, but spent the entire decade of the '60s writing and awaiting a hit of his own. That hit came in 1966 with "The Oogum Boogum Song." As good—and popular—as "Oogum Boogum" was, his next outing, "Gimme Little Sign"—with its bluesy, reggae-esque backbeat, rhythmic vocals, killer breaks and ingeniously simple Farfisa organ solo—was truly mesmerizing. To this day, it can fill virtually any dance floor, no matter what crowd happens to be present, within seconds.

Tonight at Rhythm Lounge in Long Beach. Related: Brenton Wood Home Page; Ponderosa Stomp review though I didn't mention how Alex Chilton quietly sat in on guitar when Wood played "Oogum Boogum." And if you are thinking of visiting Brenton tonight then make sure you save some time on the way home to stop by the famous Good Foot soul club at the Que Sera.

Scanner Darkly score composer Graham Reynolds leads his Golden Arm Trio through movie compositions and other original music at Open in Long Beach. Read how polymath Reynolds got to make the music for the most faithful Philip K. Dick adaptation yet or just take the teaser:

The best thing about playing drums is you get to hit things a whole bunch of times and you can hit them as hard as you want. I don't think John Williams would sit down on the drum set and start bashing.

MP3s: The Duchess; Little Blue Flowers; The Tick Tock Club. And P.S.: that photo by the outstanding Aubrey Edwards, the best Texan I've ever met.

Courtesy tar pit:

Rapture are never going to untangle from the bubblegum of "House of Jealous Lovers" (best rollerskate jam of my legal drinking years) even with new album Pieces of the People We Something Something Something, which is considered/literate/produced so sharp as to cut glass but still sounds like it's chasing the stuff LCD Soundsystem did and dumped after their last record. Sort of a shame because Rapture was pretty early to the game and Mirrors/Out of the Races were post-Pop Group before Pop Group became the newest noodlehead namecheck—for how much longer must we tolerate mass culture?—but after "Jealous Lovers" it's been lonely ever since. As always I blame England and New York. At the Glass House.

SEE ALSO RAPTURE ON MYSPACE; RAPTURE HOMEPAGE WITH VIDEO/AUDIO.

back down from san francisco and ready to make you smile: mr. blank tapes himself, matt adams, performs tonight in long beach at portfolio cafe. if you haven't heard the blank tapes, don't miss out--dude writes some of the most sing song, lovey-dovey songs since stephin merritt started making music for movies instead of broken hearts. think magnetic fields structure with some vague v.u. rock and a wee bit of neutral milk and happy thoughts and you can get the idea. also playing is the simply gorgeous (and so so friendly) ghost town jenny, another member of the blank tapes/part the clouds collective, and creative genius matt mccluer. these folks are putting out some seriously great stuff. grab a coffee to make you perky and start your partying early.

the blank tapes and ghost town jenny (and matt mccluer!!!) @ portfolio coffee house, 2300 e. 4th st. (that's 4th and junipero), long beach. 9 p.m. if there's a cover, it'll be cheap.

SPEAKING OF LONG BEACH: weekly co-worker/fielding guitarist/promoter kevin poush, who throws pull your pants up every first and fourth tuesday at the prospector, got a nice write-up from la underground. read here.