Shows at Joe's

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy took the stage at the Tower Theater wearing suits, and put on a professional performance, but they were anything but formal. They are a 9 piece jazz swing band from SoCal, and they ripped for 90 minutes straight. Non stop horns with high tempo rhythms and tasty accents from a piano. I closed my eyes and I was transported to another time and place, surrounded by Nick and Daisy and the rest of the West Egg crew at one of Gatsby's lavish parties with alcohol

Brujoz is your standard punk rock band, which is not at all a bad thing. Guitar, bass, drums. Their set started with rapid fire, fast paced songs with unintelligible lyrics. Very punk with the stage antics to match. Partway through the set they transitioned to more grungy songs with ultra heavy distortion, and then ended with more warp speed punk. They are kids, but they are politically aware kids. They talked about ICE and Palestine, which everyone knows about, but also brou

Eric Church has a massive backing band, probably the largest I've ever seen. A string section, a horn section, backup singers, and your standard rock instruments. Some songs sounded like the Stones, and another sounded like Van Morrison. That's about all I have to say about the show.... I started talking to a very good looking and interesting girl partway through the show and stopped paying attention to the music. I've got a date with her on Sunday, and I really hope it goes

Riki took the stage first at a sold out Strummer's. Her sultry, plaintive, almost whispered vocals paired with the smooth sway of her hips got the night off to a very sensual start. The industrial driving dance rhythms, with syncopated beats and layered synths, provided an energetic backdrop to the more laid back stage presence. She was making love to the audience, not fucking us. She took out a guitar for a few songs and used it to add more layers to the beats, no solos just

This was one of those nights at Strummer's, which doesn't happen that often, when the venue is close to empty but the performers deserve a packed house. It was an all-acoustic show, with each act providing a different flavor of folk music. First up was a man, a banjo, and a whole lot of honesty and vulnerability. Little Foot took the stage first with a voice that sounded like a cross between Ryan Bingham and Marcus Mumford, but he played banjo instead of guitar. He's got some

Qiensave, a quintet from Salinas, got the night off to a high energy start. Their energy was infectious with choreographed dance moves and big smiles. I'm not exactly sure how to categorize their music. Latin, caribbean rhythms with guitar that was Santana-esque at times and lyrics almost (entirely?) exclusively in Spanish. Some of their songs had nice, long jams. Their website describes them as a 'Cumbia Urbana group... with roots stretching back to Michoacan', which is an a