Sky Larkin & Peggy Sue @ The Whistler 10/31

With all the talk of vampires, werewolves and the New Moon soundtrack these days, the Whistler daringly gave their bar over to a group of undead to liven up the evening. From the land of 28 Days Later, Leeds' Sky Larkin and Londoners Peggy Sue treated the small cocktail bar to a mixed concoction of indie and folk not yet seen in Chicago. Granted only a few people got bloodied up, lost a limb or were irreparably transformed while everyone got a dose of the up and coming British indie scene in their own Logan Square backyard.

Noah and the Whale @ Lake Shore Theater 10/29

Noah and the Whale's sophomore release The First Days of Spring indicated a departure in tone from a mere year earlier, when their single "5 Years Time" garnered a Saturn commercial and was a radio hit in the United Kingdom. Gone was the brightly colored folk, replaced instead by orchestrated melancholy. With this sophomore sea change in mind as well as their prior Chicago appearance last autumn at the Empty Bottle, I was quite apprehensive going into the Lake Shore Theater Thursday night. Would this be the same free-wheeling folk band I discovered on La Blogothèque's Take-Away Shows? Or had they permanently changed?

Flanked by a wonderful and helpful staff decked out in Halloween regalia, I entered to find the theater's seats nearly filled for the night's performance. Needless to say the upbeat, gleeful 2008 quartet of Noah and the Whale was supported by the moderated, mellow 2009 quintet version. This provided two distinct sets in one performance. The repressed mallet drumbeat of "Blue Skies" opened the curtain on what has happened to the Londoners; more withdrawn in tone yet oft giving in to soaring flourishes. That main apprehension persisted until it dissipated on the follow-up, "Give a Little Love" off Peaceful, the World Lays Me Down. The audience ate it up, relishing in the encouraging choruses pinnacling up into the call-and-response between Charlie Fink and the rest of the band.

Koji 10/24 @ Summer Camp

Chances are you haven't heard of Koji. I hadn't heard of Koji until I bumped into two gentlemen at Kevin Devine's Metro gig on the 22nd who I got to chatting with. Ends up they were pals of this Koji fellow and they encouraged me to hit up Koji's house show at Summer Camp if I didn't have anything going on on the 24th. I told them I didn't and after hearing their description of Koji (A Hawaiian gentlemen with a huge fu manchu who plays the most unexpectedly wonderful folk music), I told them I would definitely come. It wasn't until later that night I realized that on the 24th, I was going to be at Lincoln Hall to see David Bazan. Thankfully, after a bit of research, I discovered doors wouldn't even be opening for Bazan until 9:30 pm, giving me ample time to head over to Summer Camp and check out this Koji fellow for myself.

David Bazan 10/24 @ Lincoln Hall

One of the musicians that has impacted my life the most is doubtlessly David Bazan, who I first discovered about ten years ago after the release of Pedro The Lion's It's Hard To Find a Friend. Most of the musicians that have impacted my life for as long as Bazan has have either died or disbanded so when it was announced earlier in the summer that Bazan's headlining tour would bring him to Chicago in October, my excitement levels started building immediately.  The fact that the show was at my new favorite venue, Lincoln Hall, just added to my anxiousness.

Dawes and Langhorne Slim @ Lincoln Hall 10/23

After missing Dawes during Daytrotter's second Barnstormer Tour, I was pretty excited to see the band play with Langhorne Slim. In fact, I was also quite excited to see headliner Langhorne Slim as well. But the thing that made me the most excited about the events of the 23rd was the fact that it marked my first attendance to fledgling venue Lincoln Hall. All three of those elements together made me a very happy camper indeed.

I've been excited for Lincoln Hall to open it's doors since I first heard about the venue all the way back in June. It is, after all, presented to you by the same folks that own and operate one of my favorite venues in the country, Schubas and the things that make Schubas special are all present at Lincoln Hall- The relaxed hipness of the restaurant and bar, the genuine niceness of the staff, and amazing sound quality in the concert hall itself. When I say that Lincoln Hall just might be my favorite venue, I mean that. Atmosphere is everything and Lincoln Hall has just the perfect amount of it.

Dawes - When My Time Comes

Langhorne Slim - Restless

Kevin Devine and The Get Up Kids @ Metro 10/22

My most prominent memory of The Get Up Kids is, doubtlessly, driving from Detroit to Ohio for a concert in the early summer of 2002. It was shortly after On A Wire was released and my friend and I decided to spin the album quite a few times during our 4 hour drive. "Overdue" was an anthem for my 18 year old self and it's a song that still holds a special place for me. In the seven years since, The Get Up Kids broke up, reformed, did a sweet Daytrotter session featuring the aforementioned favorite Get Up Kids song and I have fallen a bit out of step with the band. Let's be honest, when their two days stint at the Metro was announced over the summer, I was more excited for Kevin Devine's return engagement to Chicago although the prospect of seeing The Get Up Kids did make me slightly nostalgic and leave me trying to remember what the last name was of my friend who accompanied me on that Ohio trip almost ten years prior so I could look her up on Facebook.

On day two of The Get Up Kids brief tenure at the Metro, I made my way to Wrigleyville to observe the die hard fans in surprisingly rowdy crowd sing along with Matt Pryor in downtown Chicago.

Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band - Carnival

The Get Up Kids - Overdue

Wax Tailor @ Schubas 10/12/2009

Mondays are notoriously burdensome, but added with the encroaching autumn temperatures and drizzle, last Monday night could be called downright ominous…except at Schubas Tavern. While everyone's scavenging for scarves and coats, Wax Tailor tempered our Midwestern weather with a coalescence of hip-hop, jazz and trip-hop. For his Chicago debut, the French producer warmed hearty hip-hop enthusiasts with his flutist, cellist and two collaborators; Norway's Mattic and Paris' Charlotte Savary.

Monotonix @ Logan Square Auditorium 10/3/09

During these years of show going, choosing concerts has been predominately based on an emotional attachment due to the music striking some interior, unseen chord. Seeing Tel Aviv's Monotonix falls into altogether different category; due to the sheer visual and auditory experience overpowering the discography. With the latter basis, the Monotonix achieved being the most memorable concert of the year without even completing a single song.

Cocoon @ The Empty Bottle 9/28/09

This spring I had the opportunity to attend intimate, small venue shows of well-known artists across the arrondissements of Paris, basking in the fact that such an event is rare and prized in Chicagoland for the likes of Ben Lee or Alkaline Trio. Reverse nationalities and nations and you can anticipate how excited many were to see Cocoon, a heralded French folk-duo from Clermont-Ferrand, play our Empty Bottle lat Monday night. Cocoon conquered television and radio stations in France, earning gold-certification for their debut album and a nomination for the country's Mercury Prize-equivalent the Prix Constantin before playing their first dates on American soil.

fun. @ Schubas 9/24/09

One of the buzziest bands of the summer was undoubtedly fun. Rising from the ashes of the Format, Antathallo and Steel Train, fun. is the happiest, freshest thing to happen in indie in quite a while and the minute I heard about them, I knew they were something special if only for the attention they were receiving from every facet of the blogosphere.

It's true that when I heard fun. (as you may remember from my summer review of their debut, Aim and Ignite), I wasn't crazy about them but in the months in between my first listen and now, bits of Aim and Ignite filtered into my subconscious and soon, fun. became my default good mood music because it's just impossible to feel down and out when listening to a song as infectiously upbeat as the tunes that pepper the vast majority of fun.'s debut.

fun. brought their first headlining tour to Schubas September 24th and within a week of tickets going on sale, the show sold out, no small feat for most national acts that hit the venue, let alone a band who only just released their debut.

fun. - All The Pretty Girls

Miike Snow @ The Empty Bottle 9/25/09

Friday night's Miike Snow set, to be blunt, was short. While the concert attendee consciousness of me wants to criticize the length heavily, I couldn't help but be tempered by the fact that Miike Snow nails the performance harder than a carpenter turned snake oil salesman. Yes, it was six songs…clocking in at sixty minutes. Though reiterating the remix, Christian Karlsson and Pontus Winnberg transform the tracks at their fingertips into a musical experience more than an album showcase. They experiment without stumbling, having turned Silvia from its city glow ghostliness into a wistful spacey epic; a zero-gravity free floating electropop connected back to its base.

Dear and the Headlights @ Reggies 9/16

If things had gone a slightly different route, Arizona's Dear and the Headlights might be the next big crossover indie act, bringing their alt-country sound to a small audience with a slow burn buzz that, eventually, would have them doing time on CBS's Sunday Morning ala Wilco. Instead, Dear and the Headlights signed to Equal Vision records, home of Chiodos and Circa Survive and became the darlings of Warped Tour; although their organic, earnest music has little in common with your average Warped Tour fare.  Touring in support of their latest album, Drunk Like Bible Times, Dear and the Headlights hit Reggie's Rock Club on Wednesday to bring their sincere, clever rock music tinged with country and folk to Chicago to great affect.

Playing to a fairly small yet devoted crowd, Dear and the Headlights opened with an energetic one-two punch of two of the most infectious tracks off their latest disc, "Talk About" and I"'m Not Crying, You're Not Crying, Are You?"

Dear and the Headlights - I'm Not Crying. You're Not Crying, Are You?

Jeff Pianki @ Schubas 8/17/09

Unless you have roots in Michigan, chances are you don't know who Jeff Pianki is.  And that's a shame  because he's quite the gem of modern folk and deserves more attention than he's getting.  But everyone has to start somewhere, right?  Pianki, for one, is starting by self-distributing cds and mp3's of his lovely songs and youtube-ing a buzzworthy cover of Fleet Foxes' White Winter Hymnal. 

He seems like the archetypal sensitive indie guy - Laid back with a sense of humor and quite proficient with his guitar, how can anyone not be charmed by a gentleman who writes a love letter to the perfect girl he hasn't met but knows is out there?

Jeff Pianki featuring Christie DuPree - Throwing Coins

Daniel Johnston @ Metro 8/15

I don't think it would be going out on a limb to say that Daniel Johnston is a living legend.  There are few  artists that are still with us that have had the affect that Daniel Johnston has had on music today - From inspiring countless up and comers to having a documentary made about him and even having a toy in his honor, Daniel Johnston is known for the simple truths he's been writing about for nearly 30 years.

On August 15th, Daniel Johnston brought those songs to the Metro.

He walked out on to the stage to thunderous applause from the small but tight knit crowd, carrying a binder of his songs and a six pack of diet coke.  Looking less like an influential indie musician and more like your goofy, beloved (albeit troubled) uncle, Daniel Johnston opened his set solo with a mix of old tracks and new material off his forthcoming fall release.  Daniel Johnston was nervous and shaky in front of the crowd at the Metro as he played by himself, not gaining his footing until his college friend, Brett Hartenbach, joined him as accompaniment.

Daniel Johnston - True Love Will Find You In The End

Shearwater @ Millennium Park 8/10/2009

The worst part about taking the train in Chicago is that, despite what certain billboards may lead you to believe, it is not always on time and thus, I did not to get to catch all of Shearwater's set in Millennium Park on August 10th.  I wasn't disappointed however because being late gave me the wonderful experience of making my way down Madison, past Starbucks and 7-11 with Jonathan Meiburg's melodic voice guiding my closer to the shore of Lake Michigan.

The best thing about Shearwater is not the understated and commanding drums, the intricate guitar or use of atypical instruments like glockenspiels but the fact that it's all anchored by lead singer Jonathan Meiburg's impossibly smooth voice.  Ethereal and beautiful, Shearwater defines pretty indie but not in the way you might expect.  While Shearwater is conceptual and doubtlessly gorgeous, their music is so real that it prevents it from being nearly as pretentious as it sounds.  Sure, Shearwater is art rock but instead of finding their influence in post punk, Shearwater relies on nature and Jonathan Meiburg's seemingly favorite subject, birds.  Shearwater, to me, exemplafies the place in between waking and sleeping where you're not ready to face the world yet but you can't quite go back to bed.

Shearwater - Rooks