CRITICS' PICKS

  • The Billy Block Show feat. Phoenix Mendoza, The Low Down, Mike Freeman, Juliet and the Lonesome Romeos, Sara Syms & Leah Scott

    Nashville Scene Critic's Pick …

    Its combination of grit and equanimity makes Juliet and the Lonesome Romeos’ No Regrets an assured full-length debut — the record skirts Americana, but it’s more formally acute than the genre’s usual country-rock pastiches. North Carolina native Juliet Simmons Dinallo sings in a soulful alt-country voice on such originals as “Narcissus,” and her songs — most written with guitarist Michael A. Gray — breathe life into time-honored tropes of individualism and constraint. The Boston band benefits from the production of Ducky Carlisle and Michael Dinallo, who add chiming guitars and accordion to the mix. At its best, No Regrets suggests the influence of Southern-style power pop — with its nervous, Beatles-esque chord changes, “Last Kiss” could almost be an outtake from The dB’s Like This. Juliet’s songs are as tough as her vocals: “Goodbye to you / I deflect all those daggers that you self-project,” she sings on the title track, and you believe her.

    Tue 5/21/13 - 6:00 PM
    @ The Mercy Lounge
    buy tickets

  • Tommy Emmanuel w/Brent Mason, Richard Smith, Thom Bresh, Buddy Greene, Darrell Toney, John Knowles & Craig Dobbins

    Nashville Scene Critic's Pick …

    I was browsing through the list of songs that a rented karaoke setup had to offer recently, and I saw a couple of Jerry Reed numbers: a 1970 single, the tall swamp tale “Amos Moses,” and the Smokey and the Bandit theme song “East Bound and Down.” (This, of course, was an especially Nashville-centric song list, loaded up with George Strait, even dipping into Donna Fargo and yet lacking a single Prince song.) If those two songs — or even just the trucker movie tune — are all people think of when they hear the late picker/singer-songwriter’s name, then his greatest gifts are being overlooked. Once Chet Atkins got a hold of Reed in the mid-’60s, he really came into his own as a funky fingerpicker of an electric gut-string guitar, not to mention a soulfully eccentric wit. This lineup is rich with pickers who really get Reed, including Tommy Emmanuel, Brent Mason, Buddy Green, John Knowles and Thom Bresh, the son of Merle Travis. Even better, it’s a benefit for MusiCares.

    Tue 5/21/13 - 7:00 PM
    @ 3rd & Lindsley
    buy tickets

  • Mutts

    Nashville Scene Critic's Pick …

    Chicago trio Mutts’ nimble, funky rhythm section, with Bob Buckstaff on the low notes and Chris Paganini behind the kit, would be entertaining to watch on its own, but throw in growling, keyboard-wielding frontman Mike Maimone, and you’ve got a monster on your hands. Their fall 2012 album Separation Anxiety focused on Maimone working through the process of coming out, fueling a stormy blast of garage-revival blues with touches of prog and swampy metal. Scant months later, the group is touring behind a new album that represents a nearly 180-degree shift in style: Object Permanence sees them unplugging their amps and digging into their jazz and blues roots, with Buckstaff scaling back to an upright bass and Maimone focusing on grand piano and organ. Comparisons to Tom Waits are inevitable, but more than just approximating one of Waits’ styles or inhabiting one of his many characters, the band members use their own skills and world-weariness to develop an original take starting from Maimone’s perspective, from the bouncing “If It’s Hot It’ll Sell” to the pointed New Orleans R&B number “Pray Like a Vigilante” to the smoke-wafting closer “Uncivilized.”

    Tue 5/21/13 - 9:00 PM
    @ The 5 Spot

  • Last Year's Men w/CHEAP TIME

    Nashville Scene Critic's Pick …

    Musicians might not deserve extra credit for being child prodigies — after all, talent is talent, whether you suffer from detention and braces or credit card debt and back pain. But a band that can perform rock ’n’ roll with the unjaded enthusiasm of youth is always something to treasure. That’s the case with Last Year’s Men, a Chapel Hill four-piece who recorded their first LP while some of them were still in high school. Their music is garage rock in the vein of Jacuzzi Boys, Black Lips, Strange Boys and Reigning Sound (for whom they frequently open). Their songwriting bristles with ’60s pop hooks and savage guitar licks; the songs on Sunny Down Snuff range from aggressive garage-punk to slide-guitar-tinged slow dances. According to a Scene Spin column from December 2011, their last Nashville show ended with “a display that can only be described as ‘utterly apeshit’ — they ripped apart the drum kit, hurling cymbals across the stage and into the audience before tearing through the crowd [and] rolling around a bit on the floor.” Don’t miss it.

    Tue 5/21/13 - 9:00 PM
    @ The Stone Fox

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