list.in.to.chicago this week: 02.18.2008

In which our hero has trouble with MySpace and mercilessly plugs Nicholas Barron at Long Room.

Pick of the week
As mentioned once already, I absolutely have to go with the Nicholas Barron Quartet in their final Sunday night at Long Room. Steve would kick my ass if I didn't. After that, the one show that's not sold out that still sticks out would be Galactic at Park West on Friday.

list.in.to.COZ
I think Saturday at Cullen's is the only Diver show until St. Patrick's Day weekend, so there's that.

Recap
If you know me, you know I tend not to be impressed easily, and certainly not by cover bands. But Rock Candy brought it on Saturday at Cubby Bear. As far as cover bands go, they've got their bases well-covered, and yes, part of it is that they covered The Buggles. And I caught a bit of Nicholas Barron last night, as sort of a warm-up to the big final Long Room show this week. Have I mentioned that?

2.18   monday
Wilco (Riviera Theatre)   SOLD OUT!
Greg Kot at the Tribune has been doing a good job of giving the blow-by-blow for each of these shows. Which is subsequently lost on me, as I'm not any kind of Wilco completist.

2.19   tuesday
Open Jam (Vaughan's)   COZ SINGS!
I don't want to get your hopes up, but I hear Anto might actually be in the house for a change this week. Of course, the weather is going to absolutely suck again. I can't think of any way to spin President's Day into a theme, so it's open skate. We're still close enough to Valentine's Day that I may reprise my sentiments from last week.

Wilco (Riviera Theatre)   SOLD OUT!
I will say that this residency is making it much easier for me to find shows to mention in the beginning of what is otherwise a really slow week.

2.20   wednesday
Wilco (Riviera Theatre)   SOLD OUT!
And, just like that, it's over. I think the last band to do something like this in Chicago was Cheap Trick over four nights at Metro a while back.

Gene Loves Jezebel with I Love Rich (Beat Kitchen)
Not sure what to make of an 80s band playing in 2008 in the cozy confines of a place like Beat Kitchen. Could be a very Spinal Tap kind of moment. And I think the opening band is goofing on them, or whoever booked the show is being clever.

2.21   thursday
The English Beat with RX Bandits (House of Blues)
Dave Wakeling and his crew used to come through town at least twice a year, it seemed, but it's been a while since I've seen him on a bill.

Jason Seed Elixir with Crawl, William Kurk Enterprise (Martyrs')
Since the last time I wrote about this band, I have not been able to verify if it's the same Jason Seed that used to be my friend Scott's roommate.

2.22   friday
Galactic with Chali 2na, Ohmega Watts (Park West)
The New Orleans funk outfit is one of those bands that I agree with in principle -- knowing a bit about drummer Stanton Moore gives me the utmost confidence that they're legit -- but still haven't ever actually seen live.

James Blunt with Sara Bareilles (Riviera Theatre)   SOLD OUT!
I'm not sure I'd be able to tell the difference between Blunt, Damien Rice and David Gray ("Babylon" notwithstanding), and I don't really care to, but I may be in the minority on that one, seeing as how this show outgrew its original booking at The Vic. I just need stuff that's got edges to it, you know? And I'd tell you something about Sara Bareilles, but I seem to have broken the music player on MySpace.

Matt Costa with Johnathan Rice, Delta Spirit (Double Door)   SOLD OUT!
I tend to want to lump him in with the aforementioned Mr. Blunt and all the other "sensitive" singer/songwriter types, but a quick spin of "Mr. Pitiful" from his new record has quite a bit of indie/lo-fi whimsy, even if it seems to be borrowing pretty generously from the overall sound of "Ob-la-di Ob-la-da".

Larry McCray with The Cash Box Kings (Buddy Guy's Legends)
If his style hasn't changed in the twenty years or so since I saw the Detroit bluesman, it's blues with a healthy dose of Jimi Hendrix-influenced lead guitar, which is not a bad thing at all.

Sunhead King with Verona Red, Lucas (The Note)
They call their style "space funk rock" and cite Frank Zappa as an influence, so there's that. First impressions off their MySpace page is a little too sloppy on the funk side. The space part is certainly there, with a heavy psychedelic influence that belies a bit of a jam band side which isn't ever going to win me over.

2.23   saturday
Diver (Cullen's)   SEE COZ LIVE!
I now feel like I have to qualify this show as having "all the original members," as we've been doing a handful of trio shows and using substitute bass players for the last couple of months. Everyone's in the house for this one, though.

St. Vincent with Foreign Born (Schubas)   SOLD OUT!
Once again, follow the trail of sold-out shows at Schuba's if you want to know what's really happening. St. Vincent is the band of guitarist Annie Clark, a veteran of both The Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Stevens. Which has piqued my interest, but it looks like I would have to either quit Firefox or reboot my machine to get either MySpace or YouTube to work properly, so we'll have to leave it at that.

New York Dolls with We Are The Fury (Double Door)   SOLD OUT!
I know they're an important band from the early days of punk rock, but David Johansen is seriously creeping me out these days.

Todd Snider with David Zollo and Kevin Kinney (Old Town School of Folk Music)
I know he's got a respectable body of work and all, but he's still the guy who did "Talkin' 'Bout the Seattle Grunge-Rock Blues" -- a clever little hidden track on his 90s record Songs From The Daily Planet -- to me.

Bon Jovi (United Center)
What, no sellout? Has the New Jersey hair product spokesman finally started his inevitable decline?

Bump with The Good (Martyrs')
According to their website, the band embodies the "NEW Detroit sound" that consists of a combination of electronica and Motown, which they then go on to call "electronic science fiction rock." Between that and the "space funk rock" of Sunhead King earlier, I'm detecting a bit of a theme, and the link on their site to full live show downloads kind of confirms it. Same rules about not being able to get the MySpace player working apply.

2.24   sunday
Nicholas Barron Quartet (Long Room)   FRIENDS OF COZ!
After eight years of playing nearly every Sunday night at the beer snob's paradise on Irving Park, Nicholas, Steve, Vijay and Shawn are playing their final gig. Their final gig at this particular bar, anyway. Steve tells me there are some new digs on the horizon, but I'm reasonably sure I won't be able to walk there.

Angels and Airwaves with Meg and Dia, The Color Fred, Ace Enders (Riviera Theatre)   SOLD OUT!
These guys stick out in my mind because I remember hearing some twit on Q101 talking about how freakin' amazing they were, and how the guy from Blink-182 was totally taking it to the next level, and then the music was pretty much just the same boring mainstream pop-punk as everything else. This was when the honeymoon of their initial switch to the "shuffle" started to wear off.

Bon Jovi (United Center)
See Saturday's gleeful and probably premature dancing on a grave.