After backing out of their original date at JPJ only hours before showtime on Friday, February 22, Van Halen announced today that they have rescheduled their Charlottesville show for Tuesday, March 11, sandwiched between gigs in Baltimore and East Rutherford, New Jersey. The band will also make fans in the Atlanta area happy by taking the stage on Wednesday, March 19 to make up for the show they bagged on Monday.
So why did the rock legends put the ix-nay on arlottesville-Chay in the first place? The press release doesn’t say. When asked for an explanation this afternoon, Van Halen publicist and Eddie Van Halen squeeze Janie Liszewski declined to comment.
Tickets are still available for the show and can be purchased through the JPJ website.
Will Van Halen manage to finish what they started the second time around? For an indicator, Virginia Van Halen fans should keep their eyes on Dallas on Monday, March 3, the band’s next scheduled performance.
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Fresh off his recent Grammy success, country singer-songwriter Steve Earle is coming to the Paramount Theater Tuesday, April 15. Tickets for the performance go on sale tomorrow at 10am.
With his 1986 debut album Guitar Town, critics hailed Earle as the next great singer-songwriter in the vein of Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen. But soon his life began to imitate his outlaw-themed lyrics, and time in prison kicking heroin led to a two-year hiatus in the early ’90s. But Earle soon returned with the critically acclaimed Train A-Comin’, which earned him the 1996 Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album.
As renowned as Earle is for his music, he’s equally if not more famous for his left-leaning politics. In 2002, he raised his profile by attracting both cheers and jeers for “John Walker’s Blues,” a song written from the perspective of captured American Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh and featuring such controversial lyrics as (more)
Promising local pop-rock quintet Sparky’s Flaw teams up with the rocking hillbilly fraternity that is Sons Of Bill for one long, loud night of dudes with guitars. Their last show together was at Starr Hill in 2006 and sold out rather spectacularly, so brace yourself.
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With most of the band members living in the same house downtown, the Sometime Favorites are one of the few bands in the enviable position of being able to rehearse day-in and day-out, a fact that they say helped them whip together their new record, All Along, in a little under a month. “We’re lucky enough to live in a house that has a big basement that allows us to play music as loud as we want,” says guitarist Adam Long. “Being able to come down to the basement five nights a week and play music together is great.”
And once he and singer James East have hacked together some compositional wireframes, the creative magic starts to happen: “We bring them down to the band in the basement and turn the amps up,” he says with a laugh. The result of all the hootin’ and hollerin’ and general racket-makin’ is the ten-track CD, which actually turned into a fairly nice little pop record along the way– especially given that it’s their debut.
“The overall goal was to make music that was accessible on different levels,” says Long. “We’re shameless about wanting to write catchy pop music.”
The formulas they’re working with are certainly tried and true– “Wait Until New Years” will fill listeners with capitalist zen, New Radicals-style, as they’re trying on shoes at the mall, and “What You Wanted” is just a guitar overdub or two short of the Daughtry power-ballad, “Home.” In most cases, though, the band sways between the safe zone of matchbox twenty and an occasional foray into Pumpkinland as East alternately recalls John Mayer and Adam Levine.
“Can’t Stop Fighting It,” in fact, echoes the latter’s band to an almost eerie degree. “It sounds exactly like Maroon 5,” sighs Long, “so we went back and added acoustic guitar and tried to take it as far away from that as we could and make them meld with the rest of the album.”
Through it all, he says, they learned the importance of… well, homogenizing. (It’s pop, remember.) “In order to make it in this industry– whatever ‘making it’ is, I don’t even think anybody knows anymore– you do kind of have to fit into a box,” says Long. “By going back and rewriting the songs and getting them all to fit in a singular genre, by the end of the album, you can say that each one is the Sometime Favorites.”
Best of all, though, those 10 tracks-in-a-box will drop with an itty-bitty almost-not-even-there price tag of $5, which Long says is the slimmest margin the band could possibly manage while still covering production costs. “We’re making just enough to put out a thousand more,” he says. Someday, that will be the only road to popularity that matters.
The song that put ATO Records (formerly based here) on the map, is also apparently one song that drives terror suspects crazy. According to Mother Jones magazine, David Gray’s “Babylon” is one of several ditties used in military prisons and on bases to deprive prisoners of sleep, disorient them during interrogations, or “drown out their screams.” The list was compiled from leaked interrogation reports, previous news articles, and firsthand soldier and prisoner accounts.
When Dave Matthews and Coran Capshaw founded ATO Records in 2000, “Babylon” was the first hit single for the fledgling label, receiving repeated play on MTV, VH-1, and Top 40 radio, and propelling Gray’s ATO debut album, White Ladder, to sell 6 million copies.
According to the article, Gray is in eclectic company on the so-called “Torture Playlist.” Interrogator tastes range from (more)
Local pop-rockers The Sometime Favorites celebrate the release of their debut album, “All Along.” Dear Dear opens.
The Sometime Favorites - All Along
The Sometime Favorites - What You Wanted
Dear Dear - Lazy Bones Jones
Massachusetts songwriter Audrey Ryan plays indie pop like a girlier version of Sufjan Stevens (if such a thing is even possible).
Audrey Ryan - Dishes and Pills
Audrey Ryan - Later Alligator
Audrey Ryan - No Difference
Audrey Ryan - People
Audrey Ryan - Shiny Things
Audrey Ryan - Nostalgia
Audrey Ryan - Say Can You
Local songwriters
Lindsay Holler happens at the nexus of Lucinda and Janis.
Peelander-Z is a Japanese punk band that appears to be every bit as crazy as all those other Japanese punk bands you’ve heard about — Power Ranger getups, human bowling stunts — the works! But the real test will be seeing whether they can keep up with the certified loony bin that is the Falsies…
buy tickets onlineWhen he’s not slinging covers at Coupe’s, young local pianist Joseph Mills plays poppy original tunes inspired by Billy Joel. Also featuring The Kase Project.
Nashville Scene says: “Andy Friedman has a mastery of wordy self-loathing that many white dudes with guitars would kill for.” Formerly local songwriter Andrew Gregory opens. (Do you think he’s one of them?)
The infamous guitarist and bassist keeps jamming out with the locals.
The infamous guitarist and bassist keeps jamming out with the locals.
The infamous guitarist and bassist keeps jamming out with the locals.
The infamous guitarist and bassist keeps jamming out with the locals.
The infamous guitarist and bassist keeps jamming out with the locals.
Barling and Collins skewer everybody within reach with their twangy and comical rock.
Barling and Collins - (That’s Right) I’m Looking At Your Girlfriend
Barling and Collins skewer everybody within reach with their twangy and comical rock.
Barling and Collins - (That’s Right) I’m Looking At Your Girlfriend
Barling and Collins skewer everybody within reach with their twangy and comical rock.
Barling and Collins - (That’s Right) I’m Looking At Your Girlfriend
Barling and Collins skewer everybody within reach with their twangy and comical rock.
Barling and Collins skewer everybody within reach with their twangy and comical rock
The Rogan Brothers play roots-rock with spunk and soul.
The Rogan Brothers play roots-rock with spunk and soul.
The Rogan Brothers play roots-rock with spunk and soul.
The Rogan Brothers play roots-rock with spunk and soul.
The local Irish folk outfit carries Fellini’s through St. Patrick’s Day in style.
The local fiddler kicks off the St. Patrick’s Day festivities at Fellini’s.
Bootsie Daniels lives and breathes soul and funk.
Self-described “multi-instrumental maniac” performs so-called “acoustic sillypop.”
The multitalented local musician plays old-time.
The Chickenheads play straightforward blues, but with a heavy improv element — you never know who’s going to show up and sit in.
Beleza Brasil plays Latin jazz and samba.
Shad Dart delivers poppy eclecticism with all the fixin’s you wouldn’t expect.
Shad Dart - Flyin’
Shad Dart - You Make Me Crawl
Shad Dart - Why Don’t We
Shad Dart - How Do You Know
Jesse Harris is a Grammy-nominated songwriter. Opening act Laurence Elder is a local piano wizard who tries to squish his technical abilities with smart pop hooks.
buy tickets onlineTuvan throat singing is the art of singing with overtones, generating multiple notes by exploiting the natural resonances of the mouth and throat.
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Classical guitarist and Charlottesville native Danny McCarthy briefly puts aside his studies and furious practicing for the Appalachian State music department to perform at 214. (The concert is technically free, but they’ll also be taking optional donations of about $8 a head.)
Pixy-Led is a trio of local teenage girls who perform acoustic folk and traditional Irish music. Usually they’re out under the awning of the Jefferson, but tonight they have a stage! And indoor plumbing!
buy tickets online106.1 continues their ambitious string of local concerts with a show by this Smiths and Morrissey tribute band, sandwiched in between a reunion set by young local rockers Benvolio and a dance party hosted by iconic station DJ Brad Savage.
buy tickets onlineThe Bobs are a comical a capella quartet where classic rock covers are always the performance du jour and the members all go by… well, guess. Don’t miss the guitar solo at about 2:00 in the video above — it puts Clapton himself to shame.
The Bobs - Get Your Monkey Off My Dog
The Bobs - Never Date A Musician
Horsefang will utterly disrespect your eardrums with songs like “River Of Dead Horses” and “We Will Use Your Dead As Vessels.” Also featuring the riffy metal of Suzukiton and the Iron Maiden stylings of Valkyrie.
Horsefang - Genesis In The Retort
Horsefang - We Will Use Your Dead As Vessels
Horsefang - Plaguebreaker
Horsefang - River Of Dead Horses
The Nice Jenkins play pop-rock that’s just a little bit icky.
The Nice Jenkins - Sweet And Filthy
The Nice Jenkins - Outside Of York
Richmond rock band Missing Mason plays covers from the classic rock canon and originals that try desperately to fit in.
40 Dollar Mule claims to play both crunk and bluegrass. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
The Chickenheads play straightforward blues, but with a heavy improv element — you never know who’s going to show up and sit in.
Drummer and poultry-percussionist extraordinaire Lance Brenner sent along the results of the latest Falsies photo shoot, and they’re really just too cool to ignore.
Plus, they came into the office dressed just like that and threatened to beat us up if we didn’t post ‘em. Come on, guys. We like our kneecaps the way they are.
The Virginia Consort performs selections by Bach with a full orchestra and occasional help from a youth chorale.
As you’re on your way out of town, stop off just before Route 250 to catch some killer blues from one of Charlottesville’s rising stars.
The above video was shot at the 2006 MACRoCk festival held just up the road at JMU. As you can see, Shapiro plays oddly electronic pop and rock tunes influenced by Billy Joel and Queen. Also featuring NYC imports Jupiter One and The Stationary Set.
Red River Rollercoaster plays upbeat bluegrass, country, and folk.
The leading local classical ensemble performs Symphony No. 5 in E minor and Variations on a Theme by Tchaikovsky, among others.
The leading local classical ensemble performs Symphony No. 5 in E minor and Variations on a Theme by Tchaikovsky, among others.
Matty Metcalfe drops a little New Orleans on Uncle Chuck
