It’s a little bit late notice, but then this one probably isn’t for everyone. At the Top Hat this evening, local filmmaker and writer Andy Smetanka will present a short program of films, highlighted by the second-ever public screening of his animated ode to Missoula, “City in Shadows,” and the public premiere of another film, “The Miller’s Daughter.”
The first of those was produced during a month-long residency at the Missoula Art Museum this past spring, and features music by locals Gibson Hartwell, Lisena Brown, Hermina Harold, June West, and Smetanka.
The second one…well, that’s a little bit of a different story. [Read More...]
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Today is tax day, which we all, of course, hate. But pot-heads the world over know that it’s also the eve of eve of the eve of the eve of the eve of 4/20, which makes it all good, bro. And when that cannabically celebrated date finally comes next Wednesday, the Top Hat will host a stoner’s delight in the form of a triple-bill show by two Chicago-based acts — the Hood Internet and Shapers – and Missoula’s own up-and-comers, Sick Kids XOXO.
Dubbed a “Medical Mashup,” but sounding more like a Recreational Rendezvous, the show won’t lack for mind-expanding tangents and high contrasts. [Read More...]
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Four years into a ten-albums-in-ten-years vow, Missoula band Secret Powers is still making good on its pledge – and making more good music in the process. Just a few weeks ago, the band’s third album, “Lies and Fairy Tales,” was named the best power-pop album of 2010, by the Absolute Power Pop blog.
Tonight, the five-piece outfit (featuring Shmed Maynes on keyboards, John Fleming on bass, Dan Strachan on drums, and Ryan Farley and new member John Brownell on guitar) will release its fourth full-length record, “What Every Rose-Grower Should Know,” which reinforces the band’s reign as one of the country’s tightest and most adventurous power-pop outfits. [Read More...]
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To generations of Americans, the Airstream Safari travel-trailer serves as a sleek symbol of the leisurely life.
To the current generation of Missoula clubgoers, the band known as Airstream Safari pretty much stands for the same.
Comprised of guitarist/singer Isaac McElderry, bassist Miles Cottrell, and drummer Ryan Weingardt, the local band has fashioned a shining example of power-trio rock on its debut, self-titled album, which the group releases tonight at a double-bill CD Release Party with Secret Powers at the Top Hat. [Read More...]
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The Stone Foxes are stone cold rockers. Storming out of San Francisco with a blizzard of riff-heavy guitar distortion and thunderous backbeats, the four-piece band has the audacity to write a song like “I Killed Robert Johnson,” and the power to convince you that they might just mean it. [Read More...]
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Somewhere along the meandering course of the now-waning jam-band decade, horn-driven funk acts seemed to largely drop out of the regional nightclub circuit. While local bands such as Reverend Slanky and Sweet Low Down filled in the gap for fans of 70s-style get-down music, the number of busload bands blowing through town has dwindled noticeably since the turn of the millennium.
It’s no surprise, really: These days, a keyboardist with a decent rack of gear can fill in the ornamental gaps, while not requiring nearly as much space in the van – or food in the belly — as three honking homeboys. With the price of gas continually on the rise, many large bands have abandoned touring altogether, unless they’re able to fill theatre-sized venues.
And then, of course, there are the shifting tides of taste, which have turned in favor of techno-oriented acts in recent years. Where the Missoula-founded jam-band Signal Path once boasted five members playing mostly traditional rock-band instruments, it has now slimmed to two, who make their music mostly on electronic gadgets. New Orleans-based Galactic – one of the earliest and most successful bands in the jam-band movement – has dropped three members (including its vocalist) over the years, replacing them with looped samples and other electronic effects. Other nationally touring acts have similarly slimmed and techno-fied.
Point being, when a good old-fashioned horn band shows up in town, it’s an occasion in the eyes of old-school fans of the bump-and-grind. And when that band is Lubriphonic, hungry fans of the genre are likely to get what they’re looking for. [Read More...]
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