When The Lights Go Down In The City
Our concert picks for the week of 6/2-6/8.
Are you feeling festive? Lucky for you, the Mission Creek Music Festival takes over several fine San Francisco venues starting this week. They've curated some of the best bands this city has to offer while throwing in a national act or two to satisfy your wanderlust. Chances are one of your friends is playing MCMF at some point, so there's no excuse not to go.
Start tonight off right with a free instore at Amoeba with the R&B hip-hop of Platinum Pied Pipers at 6pm, or catch their full set later at Mighty. Of Montreal returns to the Great American with openers Numbers and Tilly and the Wall. If you ever wished a band would replace their drummer with a tap dancer, get there early to hear the joyous co-ed hipster folk of Tilly and the Wall. Support your local crafters and designers at 12 Galaxies' Rock and Shop. Peruse some locally made garments and accessories by fabulous designers including She-bible (SFist wears a small/medium - just sayin') while you rock out to the Husbands, the Nagg and the Everlasting Arms.
Ring up your favorite drum n' bass fan and head to 1015 on Friday when they present Groundscore: the Ten Year Anniversary featuring Aphrodite, DJ Fierce, Shimon, Genome, and Audio Angel. If you prefer beats of the electro-disco variety, invite your friend with the coolest combo of angular haircut + fresh dance moves to Out Hud with Tussle at Bottom of the Hill. Meet your most adventurous, open-minded buddy at the Hotel Utah for the strange, brainy hip-hop of locals the Subliminal Twinkeez opening for Phil Krumar. If all your friends swill PBR and have been wearing trucker hats since their daddies first gave 'em one, you'll be at Hemlock to see the delightfully unpolished folk pop of Jackpot and Nik Freitas.
On Saturday afternoon, Amoeba presents a free sneak preview of Djangofest (which kicks off next week) with the gypsy jazz guitar stylings of the Robin Nolan Trio with Howard Alden. Later that night, Visqueen guzzles straight from the bottle down at the Parkside. The Fillmore presents the electro spectacle of Fischerspooner with West Indian Girl, and Sleater-Kinney rocks steady down at the Warfield with Mary Timony. We were mildly horrified to see that Swing Out Sister, perpetrators of the intolerable 80's hit "Breakout" which gets damnably stuck in our heads just by thinking of it, is playing at Bimbo's.
Get you some free Italian opera when the geezers in the Golden Gate Park Band welcome guest artist Simi Cantori to perform with them on Sunday. Come on, you need some culture and some sun. Skulking around dark clubs is giving you a sickly pallor. Sunday also marks the official start of the Mission Creek Music Festival. Check out the stellar line up here.
While the MCMF should serve you well through next week, non-MCMF highlights include Taleb Kwali at the Independent on Monday, Kathleen Edwards at the Independent on Wednesday, and the it-band line up of Caesars and Amusement Parks on Fire at Bottom of the Hill also on Wednesday.
And if you're a hot, talented female in your late teens or early twenties and have always wanted to be in a prefabricated pop/R&B group, start practicing your scales and your dance moves now. Next week Suede will be hosting tryouts for P. Diddy's "Making the Band."
Photo of Tilly and the Wall from AuralMinority.com. Mission Creek Music Festival logo from their website.