When summer rolls around, bringing its inevitable onslaught of good (barbecues, swimming pools, vacations) and bad (that squishy flip-flop noise, mosquitoes), loads of concerts heave into view. That list is also a mixed bag: musicians who spent the '80s in pink spandex, wrestling shoes and makeup always seem to choose summer to tour in pursuit of a legitimacy their androgynous years never brought them. Bands who remain permanently devoted to rehashing the cliches of old genres threaten to break out the harmonicas nationwide. And power chord-fueled upstarts sporting the hairdo of the week gather in clusters to play muddy, multi-band extravaganzas. Not that it's all bad. The scent of coconuts and strains of summery rock and roll always bring an air of pleasant expectation, and some true gems inevitably pop up.
The Pines Theater in Florence always snares a really cool show or three (the Modest Mouse appearance was a particular highlight of recent years), and classical festivals sprout like high-class weeds. Tanglewood becomes inhabited by the designer shoe set. Outdoor opportunities arrive, from the Green River Fest to massive stadium shows.
We offer here a few humble suggestions for your summer concertgoing, some of them informed by the pegging of the hipness meter, some informed only by an intense desire to bask in the love-hate nature of summer's buzzing heat.
Jimmie Dale Gilmore and
The Lonesome Brothers
Asylum Street Spankers
July 22 (Gilmore)
July 25 (Asylum Street Spankers)
Iron Horse
If summer heat turns your thoughts southward, you've got a couple of very good opportunities to indulge your inner Texan this July. First up is renowned Lone Star songwriter Jimmie Dale Gilmore. He may have gotten more widespread recognition thanks to his role as Smokey in The Big Lebowski, in which John Goodman pulls a gun on him for stepping over the foul line at the bowling alley. (But, to be fair, it was a league game.) Cameos notwithstanding, Gilmore possesses an unusual tenor voice and a sure sense of pleasant texture and melody. His sensibilities ought to make for a fine night of Southern back-porch cool. Local openers The Lonesome Brothers will proffer some "hick rock" Valley-style to begin the proceedings.
If that's not quite your Southern style, try the Asylum Street Spankers a few nights later. This Austin-based crew have a good time, every time. They sing so many odes to illegal substances you might be guilty of possession just by showing up. Still, their sloppy onslaught of acoustic-based folk/rock/what-have-you is a portable party somewhere between 1920s ukulele-backed crooning and James Brown.
Melissa Etheridge
Ani DiFranco and
Kimya Dawson
July 11 (Etheridge)
July 12 (DiFranco and Dawson)
Pines Theater
Melissa Etheridge is an acquired taste not a lot of folks have acquired. But one goes to see her not for the vein-popping over-singing, but for the experience of seeing the purveyor of melodramatic rock balladry in Northampton—her status as a prominent lesbian role model and champion of gay rights ought to draw a distinctly Valley crowd for this party at the Pines.
If you like role models who are less classic in their rock 'n' roll sensibilities, hit the Pines the very next night. Ani DiFranco brings her flailing guitar hand and catchy tunefulness to town to rock the joint. She's joined by the odd-voiced Kimya Dawson, the songwriter who filled the movie Juno with a twee brand of disjointed lyric and stripped-down acoustic strumming.
Wilco and Andrew Bird
Aug. 12
Tanglewood
The ever-praised Wilco are the big-name draw for this show. But the more intriguing performer is opener Andrew Bird. Bird is a violinist of unusual proclivities, and turned his fascination with more unusual ends of the musical universe (like Gypsy music, klezmer and South Indian music) into a brand of pop that's all his own. His instrumentation choices are hardly the stuff of mainstream bands—he backs himself up with glockenspiel, electric guitar and sampler—and he's a performer who delivers the unexpected in high style. So sure, go see Wilco, but keep in mind that this time around the early worm catches the Bird.
Brian Wilson
July 15
The Calvin Theatre
He gets called a genius, but that's beside the point. The Beach Boys are so summery it's hard to imagine a California beach and not hear their strains of reverbed tenor and '60s surfboard hipness. Wilson may have more years on the clock, but he'll no doubt bring a healthy dose of Beachy goodness to the Calvin. Plus, by going to this show instead of the inevitable summer appearance of Cinderella or Poison, you can avoid having to mumble when your friends ask you who you saw last night.
Mavis Staples
Los Straitjackets
July 19
Green River Fest
These two may have nothing at all in common musically, but they share their status as top of the heap at this year's Green River Festival at Greenfield Community College. Staples, who started her career in 1950 with the Staples Singers, is a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer, and one of VH-1's 100 Greatest Women of Rock and Roll. Her most recent album, Have a Little Faith, cements her reputation as an important voice of American soul and gospel, and her singing remains inspiring half a century on.
They may not be legends, but Los Straitjackets provide a very different kind of party. Kiss may have been pretty cool with the whole makeup thing, but Los Straitjackets up the ante by donning wrestling masks and laying down instrumental grooves of a particularly retro, surfy, Californian variety (even though they're really from Nashville). They provide the most twang for your buck of any of the summer's best. You don't need lyrics when you've got wrestling masks, but the presence of Big Sandy on the Green River Fest roster points to some vocal tunes—Big Sandy paired up with the band to perform songs with vocals in Spanish for a recent album."
