The Best Concerts in L.A. This Weekend
Chelsea Wolfe
Friday, February 8
Chelsea Wolfe, Sarah Jaffe
FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH
In the past, Chelsea Wolfe's dark folk songs have often been deepened with a hard-rocking, psychedelic veneer, but on the Sacramento native's latest album, Unknown Rooms: A Collection of Acoustic Songs, her mournful plaints and desolate ballads are stripped down and carried out to sea on the wings of soft guitars and austere violins and violas. Wolfe's contemplative music is just as beautiful now, but it's simultaneously starker and grander with the addition of Andrea Calderon's eerie tendrils of violin slithering through the sadness. "The only thing I've ever trusted was the trees," Wolfe murmurs amid the welling strings of "Flatlands," a pastoral reverie too soulfully yearning to be merely escapist. Texas singer Sarah Jaffe is another nominal folkie whose intimate balladry and piercingly personal lyrics are arranged into wintry, compulsively mesmerizing soundscapes. --Falling James
Off!, Negative Approach
HENRY FONDA THEATRE
Before surrounding himself with the Circle Jerks in 1979, Keith Morris was the first, and arguably best, of the four Black Flag singers, so you can't blame him for wanting to reclaim his legacy with the new project Flag, in which he reunites with former Black Flag members Chuck Dukowski and Bill Stevenson and The Descendents' Stephen Egerton to blast the ancient hits. But it's in Morris' other new project, Off!, that the dreadlocked warrior draws upon that early punk inspiration and places it in a fresh and creatively relevant context. Off! is a supergroup of sorts, with the terminally manic and energetic Morris backed by Redd Kross bassist Steven McDonald, Burning Brides guitarist Dimitri Coats and former pro skater/drummer Mario Rubalcaba. Songs like "Wiped Out" combine the short, fast intensity of early punk with the fulsome power of hard-rock explosiveness. John Brannon barks out orders with his revamped Detroit combo Negative Approach, one of the Midwest's key early-'80s hardcore iconoclasts. --Falling James
The Flytraps, Smelly Tongues
REDWOOD BAR & GRILL
The Flytraps have been knocking people dead at their live shows for a good long time now, but finally we've gotten the long-awaited vinyl debut of this four-piece girls-in-the-garage band. It's on a four-way split 7-inch compilation from local label Sick City, and The Flytraps do their high-octane, Cramps-in-a-car-crash-with-Billy-Child-ish thing alongside tracks by fellow L.A. wild people Death Hymn #9, The Ugly Kids and the supremely screamin' Cigarette Bums. This is trashy, nasty stuff in all the best ways. The name says it all: The Flytraps wanna eat you alive. With Smelly Tongues, the newish L.A. band that shares its name with a Residents song and includes members of the noted and notorious Piranhas, as well as The Red Aunts and Detroit's maniacal Demolition Doll Rods. --Chris Ziegler
Vikter Duplaix
THE ARENA
Seasoned songwriter, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and deejay Vikter Duplaix has collaborated with some of music's most celebrated artists -- in fact, it's a fateful friendship with respected Philly deejay-producer King Britt that convinced Duplaix to expand his horizons and venture into the dance/house genres. In 2005, Duplaix established the Los Angeles-based "Kiss 'n' Grind" party with DJs Garth Trinidad (of KCRW) and Rashida. The long-running monthly wrapped a star-studded East Coast tour in December. "Make a Baby," from Duplaix's sophomore release, Bold and Beautiful, scored a Grammy nomination in 2008 for Best Urban/Alternative Performance. Details about a forthcoming solo project are hard to come by, so tonight's attendees best be ready for anything. --Jacqueline Michael Whatley
Location Info
Venue
Map
First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles
2936 W. Eighth St., Los Angeles, CA
Category: General
|
0 user reviews
|
Write A Review |
| Save to foursquare |
|
Email to Friend
Write to Editor
Print Article
