Town and Country

The Distillers with The Bronx

Thursday · 20th Century Theater

Since their inception in 1998, The Distillers have been the Punk Rock equivalent of a prison riot, a thrashing homemade-shiv-and-flaming-mattress sonic blurt that has retooled the raw materials of influences from back in the day (Circle Jerks, The Plasmatics, The Germs). The Distillers' blazing focal point is guitarist/vocalist Brody Armstrong, an Australian expatriate who gene-splices Joan Jett's Runaways' energy and Wendy O. Williams's ferocious ethic into an irresistibly virulent Punk Chick hybrid. On their eponymous 2000 debut and then again with their sophomore outing, 2001's Sing Sing Death House, The Distillers offered up their less-is-more/louder-is-better philosophy in fine Punk fashion. Although the albums seemed slight at around a half-hour each, The Distillers played with a fury and abandon that left listeners breathless from first note to last. If there had been more to them, hearts and eardrums would have spontaneously combusted under the strain. Perhaps the band's greatest strength has been the emotional power of The Distillers' songs, as Armstrong howls out great Punk art from the pain and turbulence and uneasy resolution of a crappy childhood. Since their debut, The Distillers have wreaked as much internal havoc as external. Original bassist Kim Chi and drummer Matt Young were supplanted with Ryan and Andy (no last names needed) in their respective places, with second guitarist Tony finally filling the spot of long gone guitarist Rose Casper. Armstrong's marriage to Rancid guitarist Tim Armstrong shattered earlier this year, providing creative grist for both on their raging new albums (The Distillers' major label debut, Coral Fang, and Rancid's Indestructible). In spite of the band's upheavals, The Distillers seem ready to embrace some stability, if such a thing is possible in Punk circles. Armstrong, henceforth to be known as Brody Dalle in the wake of her divorce, has been romantically linked to Josh Homme from Queens of the Stone Age, and Coral Fang is generating a huge pre-release buzz. The one place where chaos is guaranteed to reign these days is in front of any stage The Distillers are standing on. (Brian Baker)

.moneen. with Saves the Day and Taking Back Sunday

Friday · Bogart's

Hailing from the wilds of Toronto, .moneen. exhibits a muscular Power Punk sound that defies the fact that the band is only four years and two full albums into their career. After forming in the wake of the breakup of Perfectly Normal in 1999, the quartet christened themselves after "a beautiful French girl" and began exploring a Post Punk/Emo approach that incorporated their love of everything from Jimmy Eat World to the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds. Which is to say anything with an irrefutable internal power and an innate sense of melody and harmony. Within a year, they had released their well-regarded debut EP, Smaller Chairs for Early 1900's, and by 2001 they had readied their critically acclaimed full-length The Theory of Harmonial Value. The two releases attracted the ear of Vagrant Records, one of the industry's fastest rising new indie labels, resulting in their signing last year. moneen.'s sophomore full length, Are We Really Happy With Who We Are Right Now?, licensed by Vagrant from the group's Canadian label Smallman, is a glorious blend of Smaller Chair's pummeling Rock and Harmonial Value's more ethereally ambient Pop, as evidenced by the gentle piano riff that launches the brutal Emo assault of "Start Angry ... End Mad" ("Screw you and die/I hope you burn") and the Pop hookish beauty of "To Say Something That Means Nothing to Anyone at All." All of .moneen.'s power and sonic agility are brought to bear on Are We Really Happy's magnum opus, the 10-minute workout "The Last Song I Will Ever Want to Sing," an alternately lilting and thumping rumination on the permanence of death and the cold comfort of memories. .moneen. has been well represented in a studio atmosphere so far, but it is in the live arena that their material, already boldly defined, is truly given its most effective setting. (BB)

Haymarket Riot

Saturday · Sudsy Malone's

Since the release of the album Bloodshot Eyes in late 2001, Chicago-based Haymarket Riot have had a rough road to get to where they are today. Not only do the members live in three different states, commuting back and forth to the Windy City for practice, but singer/guitarist Kevin Frank has had two major surgeries on his hand, and drummer Shane Hochstetler required surgery on his wrist. Bloodshot Eyes received heavy recognition from critics and a strong postponed/rescheduled tour schedule has gained the band a loyal fanbase, while sharing the stage with groups like Dismemberment Plan and Alkaline Trio. Haymarket Riot presents a Post Punk sound that completely ignores any resemblance to Emo-Core ... or anything that has anything to do with Emo period. Complex guitar, independent bass lines, and choir-like vocals are all woven together creating a tapestry of delicate melody and then, in half a note, they morph it into a crunch of heavy, solid sound. Haymarket Riot happens to be one of the few bands that have taken the all-so powerful influence of Fugazi and used it the right way. Having no complaints or regrets, and a new album set to release in early 2004, Haymarket Riot looks to be on the right (as rough as it might be) road to being a much bigger act in the next few years. (Nathan Linville)

Town and Country with Infinite Number of Sounds and Forty-One-Ninety-Two

Monday · Southgate House

Floating somewhere above the intersection of Jazz, Ambient Pop and Classical drifts the soul of Town and Country. Comprised of four distinctly talented multi-instrumentalists (Ben Vida on cornet, guitar and harmonium; Liz Payne on viola, hand bells and celeste; Jim Dorling on bass clarinet, harmonium and glass; and Josh Abrams on string bass and hand bells), Town and Country creates a soundscape that is rich yet sparse, sturdy yet delicate, melodic yet dissonant, beautiful yet disturbing. Sounding at times like a mutant gene splice of Brian Eno's ambient aural wallpaper with the Turtle Island String Quartet's minor key melancholia and Syntonic Research's Environments album series, Town and Country fashions an approach of quiet intensity and emotive power that is just as passionately felt as it is heard. For their fifth album, appropriately titled 5, Town and Country have taken the amazing step of recording everything acoustically, live in the studio with ambient microphones and with no computers or electronics of any kind. In fact, the only overdubbing used on 5 consists of layering different takes from various recorded versions of the songs to compile the final track. It is a stunning achievement, in terms of the production of the album itself as well as taking into account the incredible performances. The range of sound on 5 runs the gamut from the trance-like drone of "Sleeping in the Midday Sun" (the title is lifted from the chorus of "Buffalo Ballet" by John Cale, an artist whose own ambient experiments have influenced Town and Country) to the more chamber-driven atmospherics of "Aurergene" and "Non-Stop Dancer." If the Indie world is looking for its own version of the Modern Jazz Quartet, Town and Country might have just answered the ad. (Brian Baker)

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