friday13
LUCINDA WILLIAMS Lucinda Williams has the power to hypnotize with her voice, but that didn’t keep me from noticing the shortcomings of her new album, West (Lost Highway). It seems like she’s lost some of her lyrical sharpness, far too often plodding through verses that make a single point over and over, and though she and producer Hal Wilner assembled a stellar supporting cast (including guitarist Bill Frisell, violinist Jenny Scheinman, and keyboardist Rob Burger), the guests rarely contribute anything other than ethereal swirls of fluff or stolid grooves. Which is a shame, because despite the unfocused lyrics these are some of the most hopeful and grounded songs Williams has ever written. Austin’s Carrie Rodriguez, a regular collaborator of Chip Taylor who released a strong solo debut last year, opens. See also Saturday. a 7:30 PM, the Vic, 3145 N. Sheffield, 773-472-0449 or 312-559-1212, $34, 18+. –Peter Margasak
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cEDDIE ADCOCK Guitar and five-string banjo virtuoso Eddie Adcock of Virginia has been blessed with a biography that’d make a decent country song itself. Out on his own at age 14, he made his living as a boxer, drag racer, auto mechanic, and odd-jobber while building a musical career–his early gigs included a few months in Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys. The peak of his fame was probably his tenure in the late 50s and 60s with the great Country Gentlemen, one of many acts to serve as a link between “authentic” traditional music and the college kids who fetishized it. (Really all it took to walk both sides of that line was a smattering of innovation and a handful of Dylan covers.) Adcock took a stab at country rock in the early 70s with a California band called the Clinton Special (at the time this didn’t sound nearly so much like slang for a sex act), but since then he’s stuck close to his roots, acquiring some Grammy nominations and a devoted fan base for himself and his wife/duet partner, Martha. According to the venue, tonight the Adcocks and local bluegrass powerhouse the Special Consensus will alternate sets, playing two apiece beginning with the Adcocks. The band says it’s also very possible they’ll all end up onstage together at some point. a 8:30 PM, FitzGerald’s, 6615 Roosevelt, Berwyn, 708-788-2118 or 312-559-1212, $15. –Monica Kendrick
cChicago a cappella See Friday. a 8 PM (7:30 PM preconcert discussion), Pilgrim Congregational Church, 460 Lake, Oak Park, 773-755-1628 or 800-746-4969, $22-$35.
cKLAXONS See Monday. a 5 PM, Urban Outfitters, 1521 N. Milwaukee, 773-772-8550. F A
PSYOPUS Take everything anybody’s ever criticized about, say, Yngwie Malmsteen (masturbatory, noodly, coldly technical), turn it up to 11, and remove all shame, and you’ve got . . . well, Orthrelm. But if you also turn up the humanity, add some post-Ipecac shrieking, and arrange things so that after a few tunes the music starts to seem deliriously funny–the same way everything is hysterical when you’re tripping or suffering from a minor head injury–then you’ve got a fair approximation of Our Puzzling Encounters Considered (Metal Blade), the current full-length from this Rochester tech-metal band. Their MySpace slogan? “We rock you almost as much as we annoy you!!” Bless ’em for giving fair warning. Dysrhythmia and Behold . . . the Arctopus open. a 9:30 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600 or 866-468-3401. F –Monica Kendrick
FRAMES Glen Hansard, front man of this long-lived Dublin-based band, played guitarist Outspan Foster in The Commitments, one of the funniest, warmest, snarkiest movies ever made about music. Would that more of that grit and wit made it into the Frames’ sound: the sad, self-absorbed delicacy of their sixth album, The Cost (Anti-), is bittersweet and affecting at first but cloying and tedious by the end. Hansard hasn’t given up his day job, though: he stars as a busker in the 2006 film Once, directed by former Frame John Carney, which by all accounts went over well at Sundance. Archer Prewitt opens. In related news: On Friday Uncommon Ground Cafe hosts a release party for the band-sanctioned photo book The Frames: Behind the Glass. The band won’t be there, but coauthors Zoran Orlic and Janine Schaults will. It’s at 7 PM at 3800 N. Clark; call 773-929-3680. a 9 PM, Metro, 3730 N. Clark, 773-549-0203 or 312-559-1212, $18.50, 18+. –Monica Kendrick
