Weekly Music Agenda
TUESDAY
>> DCist favorites the Vita Ruins are playing this very night at DC9 for $8. You're tired of barbequing and sitting around on your back porch by now, aren't ya?
>> Love them? Hate them? Secretly listen to them while you take a nice warm bath and have a good cry? Keane performs to a sold out crowd at the 9:30 Club tonight.
WEDNESDAY
>> DCist's own Sriram Gopal will be playing some latin inspired jazz with his Duology Band this Wednesday at the Red and the Black with CJ Boyd. Haven't you always wanted to see what we do besides blog? $6
>> Getting ready for this summer's release of Grand Animals, New York's solid Robbers on High Street are coming to the Rock & Roll Hotel for just $8.
THURSDAY
>> If you enjoy your rap underground and introspective, then get to the Rock and Roll Hotel today for Sage Francis and Buck 65. They perform with experimental rapper Alias and spoken word artist Buddy Wakefield. Doors 8 p.m., tickets are $15 in advance, $18 at the door.
>> Never forget: it's hip to be square. We won't tell anybody that we saw you living it up on the lawn at Wolftrap for Huey Lewis & The News. We promise. $22 to $40. 8 p.m.
Photo of the Vita Ruins by DCist Kyle
FRIDAY
>> Former Three Stars artist Anthony Pirog is performing with the loveliest of his many ensembles -- Janel & Anthony -- at the Velvet Lounge this weekend. We highly suggest bringing a date and sitting down with a glass of red wine while you take these two in.
>> LA's the Broken West -- apparently sensing two DC sets in the past two months weren't quite enough to win over the fickle crowd -- return to the Black Cat. This time they're opening up a triple bill for Chapel Hill's favorite WB-bashers the Comas, and, of course, long time DCist favorites Nethers. Nethers re-released their latest, In Fields We Will Lie, in 2006, and are in the process of laying down a follow-up, so expect some new material from the D.C. folk-psych-rock group. $12, Doors at 9 p.m.
>> As part of the “Rediscover Northern Ireland” film festival, nostalgic old-time pop-punk fans and those who are too young to have first-hand memories can see Stiff Little Fingers and others in “Shellshock Rock” (1979), and the Undertones in “Teenage Kicks” (2001) at a 9:30 p.m. double-bill at the AFI Silver Theatre.
>> The first of two back-to-back Garutachi DJ nights at the Rock & Roll Hotel -- tonight's features a set from Bauhaus' David J; tomorrow's features Andy Rourke of The Smiths.
>> Bunji Garlin’s speedy dancehall-inflected soca chanting has been drawing raves in Trinidad since 1998. He’ll be at Zanzibar on the Waterfront.
SATURDAY
>> It's a night so cute you might not make it home without encountering a giant stuffed animal. The UK's Pipettes (not to be confused with the Noisettes, who are playing Sunday at DAR with Bloc Party) join itty bitty indie rockers Smoosh at the Black Cat. $10, 9 p.m.
>> In 2004, a D.C. record collector who made his living as a private investigator stumbled onto a large set of hand-drawn fake 1970s era LP and 45 soul record sleeves. He eventually found the creator — Mingering Mike. Now the artwork is captured in a book, Mingering Mike -- The Amazing Career of an Imaginary Soul Superstar, whose release will be celebrated with a book signing, party and exhibit this evening at the Hemphill Gallery.
>> Capleton is a Jamaican dancehall toaster fascinated with fire imagery whose fans back home have sometimes gotten a little carried away with their use of lighters in his honor. Expect a little more restraint at Crossroads.
SUNDAY
>> Everyone's favorite bullfrog-throated indie rock impresario returns to his former hometown to play the Black Cat backstage on Sunday night. We're talking, of course, of Calvin Johnson, K Records founder and mouthpiece of Beat Happening, The Halo Benders, and Dub Narcotic Sound System, as well as all-around International Pop Underground sex symbol. Johnson is touring in support of his recent record of "reimaginings" of songs from his past, Calvin Johnson and the Sons of the Soil, and this tour might be your best chance to see him perform some of those old chestnuts you always wish you'd seen live in their original incarnations. With Julie Doiron, 9 p.m., $10.
>> The name says it all. Head to DC9 for the Beat Your Feet party, with Three Stars alum Flex Matthews and two other bright spots on the local hip hop horizon -- Math Panda and Rosetta Stoned. Free!
>> The annual Louisiana Swamp Romp at Wolf Trap provides a nice taste of that state’s traditional music riches. The New Orleans Social Club’s funk, Sonny Landreth’s blues-influenced rock, Steve Riley’s lilting Cajun, and Geno Delafose’s bouncy zydeco should all have folks dancing on the lawn and in the aisles.
Steve Kiviat, Andrew Wiseman, Graham Hough-Cornwell and Ian Buckwalter contributed to this week's agenda.