UK neo-post-punk hacks EDITORS have recently graduated from the club circuit — they play the Orpheum Theatre (1 Hamilton Place, Boston) with HOT HOT HEAT and LOUIS XIV January 19; meanwhile across the river MARAH — who, if you believe them, sound like “Townes Van Zandt fronting the Faces, Bob Dylan leading AC/DC, Sly Stone fronting the Ramones or Nick Drake fronting the Dead Milkmen” — play downstairs at the Middle East. The next night, MISSION OF BURMA put their money where their, er, name is with “BURMA FOR BURMA,” a benefit for the US Campaign for Burma at Great Scott (1222 Comm Ave, Allston). And down the street at the Paradise, NYC art-rock cosmopolitans BLONDE REDHEAD share a bill with former Secret Machine Benjamin Curtis’s SCHOOL OF SEVEN BELLS. Indie rock darlings BAND OF HORSES play the same room January 23. Starting the following night hip-hop intellectual DJ SPOOKY takes up residence at the ICA (100 Northern Ave, Boston) to give a talk entitled “Rhythm Science” (January 24), to spin records at an “Experiment” event (January 25), and to perform “Subliminal Strings” (January 26).
Six-string fiends won’t want to miss THE ASSAD BROTHERS’ BRAZILIAN GUITAR FESTIVAL, a Celebrity Series event at Sanders Theatre January 25 that features Sérgio and Odair Assad, plus their sister Badi, Romero Lubambo, and Celso Machado. Out in Worcester that night Brooklyn rapper FABOLOUS plays the Palladium, and back in Boston, Fab’s fellow Brooklynite COLIN QUINN kicks off a two-night stand-up stand at the Comedy Connection (upstairs at Faneuil Hall, Boston).
One of the best-named tribute bands we’ve ever come across, AGE AGAINST THE MACHINE — old dudes covering Rage, natch — play T.T.’s January 26, while MARILYN MANSON holds court at the Orpheum. The following night psych-folk guitarist Ben Chasny’s SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE play upstairs at the Middle East (472 Mass Ave, Cambridge), and CHUCK RAGAN, BEN NICHOLS, and JOSHUA ENGLISH — of Hot Water Music, Lucero, and Six Going on Seven, respectively — do the solo things in the downstairs room.
The reunited pop juggernaut SPICE GIRLS, kick off their US tour at TD Banknorth Garden (100 Legends Way, Boston) January 30 and then hit the DCU Center the next night. Also on the 31st, the similarly sartorially-conscious LENNY KRAVITZ plays the Orpheum, while the decidedly less primped electro-nerd hero DAN DEACON plays MassArt’s Pozen Center (621 Huntington Ave, Boston) with local party-rap purveyors BIG DIGITS.
FEBRUARY
Kick off February with Beirut-born, London-based kitsch-pop heartthrob MIKA at the Orpheum, or for less in the way of teenage swooning, there’s venerable British singer-guitarist RICHARD THOMPSON and his “1000 Years of Popular Music” show over at Berklee Performance Center (136 Mass Ave, Boston). Also that night, the trad Armenian folk group SHOGHAKEN ENSEMBLE are at the Somerville Theatre (55 Davis Square), and MICKEY BLISS’S 15TH ANNUAL CLUB BOHEMIA MARDI GRAS MASQUERADE BALL AND ZULU PARADE OF THE GOLDEN BLADE goes down at Ryles (212 Hampshire St, Cambridge). This year’s wingding, which features the CHICKEN SLACKS SOUL REVUE, the CONFEDERACY OF DUMPSTERS, and the SECOND LINE SOCIAL AID AND PLEASURE SOCIETY BRASS BAND, will be the first Club Bohemia Mardi Gras not to be held at the Kirkland Café, which closed in May. The celebration continues the next night with SHAUN & SUZI’S 15TH ANNUALMARDI GRAS BALL, a benefit revue at T.T.’s with proceeds going to the New Orleans Musicians’ Clinic; meanwhile MOE. jams out at the Orpheum, Malian kora master TOUMANI DIABATÉ and his SYMMETRIC ORCHESTRA hold forth at the Somerville Theatre, and Old 97’s frontman RHETT MILLER plays the Paradise with indie songstress JENNIFER O’CONNOR.
