list.in.to.chicago this week: 12.05.2005

Give the gift of music this year, or at least the gift of some guy talking about music. Yes, I'm once again recommending you send this to friends and they subscribe using the information at the bottom of the page.

Pick of the week
All about House of Blues this week, with Living Colour tonight and Mos Def doing two shows on Friday. And it's the first Wednesday of the month this week, which can only mean Tributosaurus at Martyrs', this time as Simon and Garfunkel.

list.in.to.COZ
Well, I'm done for the year, save for Tuesday nights at Vaughan's, where I'll be getting into the holiday spirit this week, such as it is.

Recap
Got word of a last minute show on Wednesday that featured friends of Coz Soulfix opening up for Why Intercept and Staind at House of Blues. The 'Fix brought the rock. Why Intercept didn't grab me with their geeky math name or their overly long, meandering tunes. And while Staind is certainly very good at what they do, a power ballad is a power ballad no matter how you slice it.

Saturday's Diver "anniversary" show was notable in that it was the first time we played as a full band with Tony exclusively on acoustic guitar. That created some weird incongruities -- namely Blur's "Song 2" -- but also opened up for Avi showing off in "Maria Maria" where the guitar solo usually goes.

12.05   monday
Living Colour with Danielia Cotton (House of Blues)
Monica Kendrick makes a good point in this week's Reader. Seeing as how rock and roll was invented by the likes of Chuck Berry and Little Richard, why was Living Colour being four black guys playing hard rock such a big deal in 1988? I'm pretty sure this is their first show in town in three or four years, which then makes it most likely only their second in about ten.

Rob Thomas with Anna Nalick (Auditorium Theatre)
I'm in one of those difficult positions where I'd like to make fun of former Matchbox 20 frontman Rob Thomas, but the fact that Diver plays a Matchbox 20 song would make me look like a hypocrite. I have no such qualms about ripping Scott Stapp, though, and not just because we don't play "Higher" anymore. Did you hear about him and 311 getting into a fight at a hotel?

The M's with Stag Party, The 1900s (Schubas)
These guys are holding down the "Practice Space" series at Schubas, which means every Monday for the month.

12.06   tuesday
Open Jam (Vaughan's)   COZ SINGS!
It's December, that can mean at least one thing. Grinch time!

Carly Simon with Ben Taylor (Chicago Theatre)
You probably think this listing is about you.

Lady Sovereign with Ghislain Poirier, DJ Chris Widman (Empty Bottle)
I've seen a lot of buzz about Lady Sovereign, who is apparently big in yet another British electronica subgenre called "grime."

12.07   wednesday
Barenaked Ladies with The LeeVees (Auditorium Theatre)   SOLD OUT!
Since releasing a Christmas album -- they have Christmas in Canada? -- a few years ago, the band seems to come through town for the holidays with increasing regularity. Of course, that record may have come out only last year and this is the second such show, but checking would involve, you know, research.

Cameron McGill with The Year After, Absent Star (Schubas)
What's notable to me about this bill is that I think I've seen both McGill and Absent Star snag better spots than a Wednesday at Schubas. Not sure what that's all about.

Ray Lamontagne with Brandi Carlile (Park West)   SOLD OUT!
Lots and lots of buzz about this singer, who has a very naked, bluesy sound. I saw him open for the John Mayer Trio a month or two back, and while he does that whole back-porch vibe really well, it's not my thing.

Shiny Toy Guns with The Villains of Verona (Beat Kitchen)
I checked this band out last time they were in town, after having read about the buzz they're generating out in L.A., but came away somewhat disappointed. The singer/guitarist and the keyboardist seemed solid, and the sound was well-executed electronica in that Depeche Mode/Gary Numan vein, but the drummer and female vocalist were almost entirely superfluous to what was going on, the former to the point where they didn't even mike the drum kit.

Tributosaurus (Martyrs')   FRIENDS OF COZ!
This time around, the musical chameleon becomes Simon and Garfunkel. I don't know if this will include Paul Simon solo work, but I'm hopeful, because I have this vision of the band nailing "Late In The Evening" to the wall.

12.08   thursday
Backstreet Boys with Natasha Bedingfield, The Click Five, D4L, Rihanna (Chicago Theatre)
Barenaked Ladies are sold out, and Backstreet Boys, as of the last time I checked, are not. Maybe there is a Santa Claus after all!

12.09   friday
Mos Def with Talib Kweli (House of Blues)
I finally rented Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, which featured Mos Def as Ford Prefect, and it sucked enough that I'm rethinking my decision to ignore the bad reviews of Aeon Flux. That said, his last record, The New Danger, was one of my favorites from 2004, and one of the musicians on that record, Will Calhoun, will have also been on the same stage earlier in the week with Living Colour.

Air This Side Of Caution with Drowning Wallace, Frank Tribes, Brianne Bassetto (Cubby Bear)
Again, I like seeing original bands at the Cubby Bear, and this is now two Fridays in a row. Of course, the Friday before that was cover bands (mine included), so this doesn't necessarily constitute a trend.

Fareed Haque Group with Goran Ivanovic Group, Andreas Kapsalis Trio (Double Door)
Yeah, you read that right. Jazz at the Wicker Park rock mecca. I feel like I need to support this one purely on principle, but guitarist Haque is good enough to warrant a recommendation on his merits.

Vinx with Discopoet Khari B (HotHouse)
There a quite a few artists represented in my CD collection who I don't think show up in the collections of any of my friends, and singer/percussionist Vinx would be one of those artists.

12.10   saturday
Aerosmith wth Lenny Kravitz (United Center)
While Backstreet Boys not selling out is a pleasant surprise, this one not packing them in has me scratching my head a bit, although Aerosmith has been largely living on borrowed time ever since their original comeback.

Beatallica with Siderunners (Subterranean)
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that this is some combination of the styles and/or music of The Beatles and Metallica, which could be either intentionally or unintentionally amusing.

Justin Roberts and the Not Ready for Naptime Players (Martyrs')
Best name for a children's show that I've seen, not that I'm trolling the children's show listing with any great regularity.

Chin Up Chin Up with Milemarker, Tighty Phantomz, Lords, Disc Jockey CB (Metro)
I know it's morbid to keep bringing up the tragedy of losing a band member in this band's past, but with EXO planning their final show and tribute to Doug Meis next month, seeing these guys keeping it going after a similar situation and without a reality show tie-in does make me feel good about local music in general.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra (Allstate Arena)
I'm still afraid of these guys, even more so when I look them up on allmusic.com, and the first "similar artist" listed is GTR. And I even own that record. It's like the whole thing is based on the premise and promise of Emerson Lake and Palmer's "I Believe In Father Christmas."

12.11   sunday
Hawthorne Heights with Bayside, Silverstein, Aiden (House of Blues)
This band has the distinction of having driven most, if not all, of their popularity through the MySpace site, as documented in Wired magazine a month or two back. I'm still not convinced that a single success story makes a case for a sea change in the business model of the recording industry, but it still may be further than MySpace's predecessors -- sites like IUMA, MP3.com and Riffage.com -- ever took the "we don't need no stinkin' major record label" model.

Iron & Wine with Calexico (Congress Theatre)
My problem with this band is that I keep associating them with late seventies/early eighties FM staple April Wine. You know, they had the video where they were on a big truck, and the one guy was bald with a beard back when people who didn't look sufficiently rock and roll were actually allowed on MTV.