187 2010-02-19 08:23:42 -0500 2010-03-03 Wednesday, March 3rd Venue: The Earl Time: 8:30pm Price: $8 Austin Lucas, descendant of a family from Indiana to whom making bluegrass and folk music comes as natural as breathing, escapes his environment by throwing himself on punk and hardcore music. Participation in a row of obscure bands leads him to the Czech republic in the end. He performs solo and plays in the Orc-core group Guided Cradle. To everyone’s surprise he arrives at the family’s gate with the announcement that he wants to record a cd. The furniture of the living room is pushed aside and exchanged for a tangle of amplifiers, boxes, microphones and miles of cables. Father Bob is a complete band by himself and sets himself behind the mixing table. playing banjo, violin, ukelele, guitar and sings in the background. His sister Chloe Manor sings a few duets with Austin and quadruped Flicka growls and rhythmically scratches the itching spots on her body. Surely the lyrics Austin wrote for the eight songs do itch as well. The carefully cultivated crust of our society is blown to smithers with the stroke of a sledge hammer. Like an americana punk variation on Kafka alienation and general collapse of modern mankind are put into strong lyrics, and all of this in a voice that tears open the earth. Between the opening chorus My breath is a hammer/ My insides are taxed like an anvil/ My heartbeat’s a tremor/ And I have not love but for nicotine and the closing verse I was cursing the flaws of my ignorance and youth a textual and musical zenith in light music unfolds in our still so young century. -koos gijsman, heaven magazine 296 Austin Lucas & The Choir 2419 1 austin lucas the earl atlanta 189 2010-02-23 05:27:51 -0500 2010-03-06 Saturday, March 6 Venue: Rialto Center for the Arts Time: 8 PM Price: $36, $46, $62 Banjo player Béla Fleck, best known for his work with the jazz/world/jam band the Flecktones, is coming to the Rialto with "The Africa Project." The Project features musicians whom Fleck met during his journeys through Uganda, Tanzania, Gambia, and Mali as he explored the African roots of the banjo and documented this remarkable trip on film. The result, Throw Down Your Heart, premiered at the 2008 South by Southwest film festival and took home that festival’s coveted Audience Award. Now, "The Africa Project" brings Fleck and these diverse African musicians together for a live exploration of the beauty and complexity of their shared instrument. 297 Bela Fleck: The Africa Project feat. African Musicians John Kitime, Anania Ngoliga, Bassekou Kouyate and his band Ngoni Ba 2422 1 bela fleck africa project throw down your heart bassekou kouyate ngoni ba rialto 191 2010-03-02 06:03:09 -0500 2010-03-07 March 7, 2010 With a growing public awareness for the environment, the Wild and Scenic Environmental Film Festival aims to increase this groundswell through inspiring and educational films which hopefully will motivate people (like YOU) to go out and make a difference in their community and around the world. Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper (UCR), Georgia River Network (GRN) and Georgia ForestWatch (GFW) have partnered to bring the best of the Festival On Tour to Atlanta for the third year in a row. This year's program offers several inspirational and motivational films of varying lengths will be presented on Sunday afternoon, March 7, 2010 from 2:00-5:30 PM at the Tara Theater in Atlanta. The program will highlight two longer length films among several shorter works. What’s Organic About Organic? (60 min.) looks beyond the eco-label of the grocery store to see how organic farming benefits our land and communities; the film also exposes hidden costs of conventional agriculture. In the documentary Bag It (50 min.) an average guy makes the resolution to stop using plastic bags at the grocery – but that’s just the beginning. In addition to these and other films, the festival on tour in Atlanta welcomes photographer and writer Holt Webb and his eco-friendly motor home BABS, who will be on-site at the Tara Theater from noon until 2 p.m. on Sunday, March 7, to share his Vanishing America Project promoting conservation and educating others about the wildlife and culture we are losing. 299 Wild & Scenic Environmental Film Festival 2428 1 192 2010-03-03 09:39:25 -0500 2010-03-10 Wednesday, March 10th Venue: 529 Time: 9pm Price: $8 "Is it possible to smash a guitar un-self-consciously? It certainly seemed that way at Cake Shop earlier this month, when Awesome Color left a roomful of in-the-know types gleefully dumbstruck. (Oakley Hall was headlining-- that alone means several quality musicians were present.) Singer Derek Stanton's seemingly unpremeditated ax-whacking lacked any sense of violence or menace(which is fine). It was simply the final blow in a stream of gestures that translate across rock & roll forms; any punk, metal, or bar-rock fan can appreciate the thrill of someone playing guitar with his bare feet--and having it both look and sound cool. (Yes, Stanton did that, too)." - Mike Wolf TimeOut New York 300 Awesome Color 2431 1 awesome color 529 atlanta 194 2010-03-03 09:58:54 -0500 2010-03-11 Thursday, March 11th Venue: The Earl Time: 8:30p Price: $10 "The most obvio​us thing​ about​ Cymba​ls Eat Guita​rs is that their​ epic,​ wides​creen​ indie​ rock bears​ a strik​ing resem​blanc​e to that of Built​ To Spill​ and early​ Modes​t Mouse​.​ The most impre​ssive​ thing​ about​ them,​ howev​er,​ is just how comfo​rtabl​e they sound​ playi​ng aroun​d with a sound​ those​ bands​ defin​ed on album​s like The Lones​ome Crowd​ed West and Keep It Like A Secre​t.​ This isn’t​ just a case of some young​ band weari​ng their​ influ​ences​ on their​ sleev​es,​ and offer​ing up a lesse​r versi​on of their​ favor​ite recor​ds — these​ are stron​g,​ creat​ive playe​rs stret​ching​ out and findi​ng their​ own niche​ withi​n a rich yet large​ly unmin​ed aesth​etic terri​tory.​" -- Fluxblog 302 Cymbals Eat Guitars 2437 1 cymbals eat guitars atlanta earl 195 2010-03-03 10:03:43 -0500 2010-03-13 Saturday, March 13th Venue: Lenny's Time: 9p Price: $10 After the demise of underground legends DEAD MOOD in fall 2006, nobody was surprised to hear that founders Fred and Toody Cole had lost little time in starting a new band. They recruited drummer Kelly Halliburton in April 2007, and soon the PIERCED ARROWS were up and running, playing live shows in the Northwest and recording songs for upcoming releases. PIERCED ARROWS picks up, musically, where DEAD MOON left off - a lo-fi assault on the senses played with the sincerity and feeling that made DM such a special band for all of their fans around the world. 303 Pierced Arrows 2440 1 pierced arrows lenny's atlanta 193 2010-03-03 09:48:06 -0500 2010-03-15 Monday, March 15th Venue: 529 Time: 9pm Price: $8 These Are Powers is an experimental music group from Brooklyn, New York and Chicago, Illinois. The band mixes polyrhythm with samples and other electronic sounds and noise rock. After the short lived n0 things, ex Liars bass player, Pat Noecker formed These Are Powers with Anna Barie (vocals/guitar) (ex Knife Skills & Fxxxing Lion) and Ted McGrath (drums) in 2006. The latter was replaced by electroacoustic drummer/percussionist Bill Salas. Noecker plays a prepared bass guitar with a wooden dowel put under the strings which functions as an additional 3rd bridge and shortens the string length causing an altered musical scale with the fret positions. Salas is also active as a producer and solo artist under the name Brenmar. The band is on Dead Oceans Records in the U.S. and has a vinyl release with the Swedish label Deleted Art. 301 These Are Powers 2434 1 these are powers 529 east atlanta 190 2010-02-23 05:32:13 -0500 2010-03-20 Saturday, March 20 Venue: Rialto Center for the Arts Time: 8 PM Price: $32, $42, $56 Percussion legend Zakir Hussain returns to the Rialto with "Masters of Percussion," a sonic tour of the past, present, and future of Indian musical traditions. Hussain explores the full range of classical Indian music-from the exquisitely melodic (raga) to the enchantingly rhythmic (tala) and from the Hindustani traditions of northern India to the Carnatic ones of the South-and incorporates innovative blends of traditional and contemporary, folk and classical styles. Hussain brings with him master musicians Taufiq Qureshi, violinists Ganesh and Kumaresh, Sabir Khan, Navin Sharma, Sridar Parthasarathy, and the athletic and dazzling Motilal Dhakis of Bengal. Don't miss this unique exploration of one nation's musical heritage! 298 Zakir Hussain & Masters of Percussion 2425 1 zakir hussain table percussion master rialto 196 2010-03-03 10:12:49 -0500 2010-03-22 Monday, March 22nd Venue: The Drunken Unicorn Time: 9p Price: $10 "The Ruby Suns are a band that doesn’t just stop for breathers between records—they suit up, climb into a ramshackle time machine of their own design, and then quantum leap to a new epoch in their artistic evolution. Fight Softly, the lusted-after follow up to 2008’s Sea Lion (itself an enormous, and enormously effective, departure from their self-titled debut’s simulated Wilson brothers radiance) is an energetic, lobe-pleasing left turn. The record retains only the masterful production aesthetic of Sea Lion (which crystallized overwhelming, hyper-dense arrangements into kaleidoscopic bubblegum), and jettisons most of that record’s musical reference points in favor of bolder phonic paths. One imagines Ruby Suns mastermind Ryan McPhun waving, misty-eyed, from a sailboat as it pulls away from Sea Lion’s technicolor island, its Wild Things-esque assortment of genres-as-storytime-creatures howling goodbyes from the shore. So long Afropop, so long Tropicália, so long Pacific Island folk." -- Jason Baxter, The Stranger 304 The Ruby Suns 2443 1 the ruby suns the drunken unicorn atlanta