ALLOY ORCHESTRA | SOMERVILLE THEATRE, 3.14
Hailed by Roger Ebert as "the best in the world at accompanying silent films," the visionary Alloy Orchestra now focus their ever-divided attentions on (a shiny new Paramount-issued print of) Josef von Sternberg's 1928 tale of a Hollywood extra plagued by his past in Tsarist Russia, The Last Command. Combining a ruckus of junk, electronics, accordions, saws, and vocals, the trio channels the sound of the spirit of the work rather than dumping noise all over it — a preference that has made them local legends. Though, as they well know, words can only say so much.
A.C. NEWMAN | PARADISE, 3.14
Those of you impatient for a new New Pornographers release will surely dig this intimate night of power-pop from their creative honcho. A.C. Newman's newest, Get Guilty (Matador), is no dashed-off solo dalliance. Anyone permanently caught on the Pornographers' hooks will eat up the jangly, hazardously catchy fare that characterizes the whole record. Expect nothing but a full-blown hootenanny when he rocks the place right into the Ides.
THROWING MUSES | MIDDLE EAST DOWNSTAIRS, 3.14
Of course, we'd be remiss not to mention that the very same night across the river, the venerable Throwing Muses are reforming for an hour or two to wrench open a portal to a time when your piercings were legitimately shocking, your hat was bigger than your head, and your selection of tights was directly linked to having just seen Beetlejuice. Not to boil this all down to a series of retro signifiers — after all, the Muses were at the height of a wave that never really got to crest — their mysterious melding of British shimmer and Providence grit was and is enduringly unique. Plan for an early arrival to catch Kristin Hersh's 50 Foot Wave open the show.
DEAN & BRITTA | ICA, 3.21
A minute-long trailer on YouTube pretty much gets to the core of what ex-Luna luminaries Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips have in store for their performance of 13 Most Beautiful . . . Songs for Andy Warhol's Screen Tests. A series of faces — the familiarly be-shaded visage of Lou Reed, the doe eyes of Edie Sedgwick, the welling tears of Ann Buchanan — flicker past in black & white, caught in a sort of grey area between Warhol's vision and his craft. Meanwhile, Wareham and Phillips unfurl lush, droning melodies — and the gallery of cool kids achieves a kind of surreal beauty. It'll be a spectacle you're glad lasts longer than 15 minutes.
IDAN RAICHEL PROJECT | BERKLEE PERFORMANCE CENTER, 3.24
Israeli keyboardist and composer Idan Raichel enlisted more 70 musicians to participate in a batch of recordings for his last album, and the result is a gorgeous mûlange of Arabic verse, Ethiopian folk, Yemenite chants, and jacked-up Caribbean-esque rhythms. Sound wholly unfamiliar? Perfect — you'll be shocked at how cleanly Raichel's seemingly indiscriminate tastes crystallize into such cohesive, satisfying, generous music.
BLIND BOYS OF ALABAMA | SYMPHONY HALL, 3.27
Friday will feel more like Sunday when the legendary Blind Boys of Alabama show up with the (whoa) Preservation Hall Jazz Band in tow for a massive performance at Symphony Hall. If you've yet to experience the Blind Boys in person, it's high time you fixed that. Put frankly, it's hard to imagine the Lord more psyched for anything else this season.
