FEATURE SHOW
Monday, April 1, 8 p.m.
James River Benefit Concert featuring Black Girls, The Northerners, People's Blues of Richmond @ The Camel– Donations please - ALL PROCEEDS donated to the James River Park System and The Chesapeake Bay Foundation/18+
No April fool’s joke here. This event is as serious as a Belle Isle cleanup. What an incredible lineup--for an incredible cause. The James River needs our help; it is easily the best resource this great city has, and we've got to keep it running strong. Getting folks in the mood to give and groove tonight will be the glamorous funky rock and soulful psychedelic sounds of Black Girls, People’s Blues of Richmond, and the Northerners. The man himself, Mr. James River, aka Ralph White, who is the inspiration behind this event and the reason why the James River is God, will be on hand to discuss the river culture of Richmond.
There will be a raffle which includes some amazing items from event sponsors for you to win, thanks to Active Soul Design, Eddie Bauer, EQ Produktions, Hot House Yoga, OAP, and Riverside Outfitters. So be sure to enter these raffles as your money, win or lose, goes to a great benefit.
Let’s keep the James River, our city’s treasure, clean, safe, and fun for all. I mean it this time; go out on a Monday night for Christ’s sake! If ever there was a show both full of beautiful music and beneficial to our day to day lives, this is the one.
Wednesday, March 27, 7 p.m.
Lil’ B the BasedGod @ Kingdom - $20/ All Ages
If you've never heard of Lil’ B the BasedGod, then you are missing out on a quality artist. This charismatic emcee from Berkeley, California built a cult following via the internet, and hasn’t looked back. Lil B has been noticed and heard primarily via social media. He has flat-out worked the system to his advantage. Like me, you should tip your baseball cap with the New Era sticker still on it to the guy. It was absolute drive, along with serious skills, that brought this rapper above ground. For almost ten years now, Lil B has left audiences enthralled and has had them ransacking anything in sight just to get more of this visionary in the art of rhyming and promoting. Folks just can’t be without this guy’s lines, which are part flow, part spoken word, part chanting, part rhyme circus. If you are a fan of the rock music and not just hip hop, well, watch out--Lil B can also kick it on a rock tip. According to Lil B’s people, he will have a "rare" studio album out soon, but not before a rock album. This guy is a renaissance man determined to lead America’s music listeners into the future of music. Having him at Kingdom tonight is quite the catch.
Thursday, March 28, 10 p.m.
Twangtown Thursdays featuring Locust Honey, Sweet Fern @ Balliceaux– Free/21+
It must be the fourth Thursday of the month because Twangtown Thursdays is back! I hate waiting forever for this true guts to glory stripped-down evening of pure music from the soul, for the soul. It’s the long and winding roads of Virginia put to music. Who can’t love that?
It’s amazing what three lovely ladies can develop off an appearance at a Fourth of July party. North Carolina’s Locust Honey morphed into a group that intertwines harmonies with raging old timey fiddle tunes that will keep the feet stomping for more. Chloe, Ariel, and Meredith of Locust Honey are young, lovable, sure-to-break-hearts chickadees that blend the fiddle, banjo, guitar, and bass into a style that will have you clapping, dancing and swilling, no problem. Swing your partner round and ‘round, Locust Honey is in town.
Twangtown Thursdays' curator, Alison Self, who joins with Joshua Bearman to make up Sweet Fern, will open up this hoedown. See you there!
Friday, March 29, 10:30 p.m.
Psychic Mirrors, The Miami Players Club, DJ Sean Lovelace @ Balliceaux - $6/21+
Miami's Cosmic Chronic label is taking over Richmond tonight, bringing their touring showcase to our beautiful city. Psychic Mirrors is a 10-piece ensemble that mixes smooth bass lines and punchy beats to create modern boogie jams. The ensemble incorporates a horn section, synths, and vocals. They are guaranteed to get the best dance venue in Richmond, Balliceaux, jumping like it’s never jumped before. That’s saying something, folks. But if that isn’t enough for you, great Fan District resident bitching about everything under the sun, there’s more!
As the core of Cosmic Chronic, The Miami Players Club is a collective of Miami-bred boogie DJs. Within the Cosmic Chronic family, there are many eclectic tastes, but the Miami Players Club, comprised of labelmates DJ’s Arun Brown, Benton, Edg4r, Erick Rojas, and Mickey de Grand IV, are a sensation at getting you moving with their various genres of dance music stylings. I hope you have water with you as you are dancing, because the dance floor will be on fire. True boogie-style dance music, coupled with more current genres, will do that. No question about it at all. If you ever were to actually bring your dancing shoes to a Balliceaux event, make it this one. The word special doesn’t even give justice to what kind of night this is going to be.
Friday, March 29, 8 p.m.
Black Liquid& The New Juice Crew present Face Melt Friday XIV: Meltage Of Doom featuring MC’s: 5yve Footaz, Antoine, Black Liquid, Big Ty, Bobby Capri, Crossover, Cullen Bonham, Curt Cobane, DaFuture, Doeboy Da Dude, Emphasys, Falmouf, Fundamental, Goad Gatsby, Joe Threat, Knuckles, Ice James, Official Freeze, P & R Records, Rah Billz, Regius Green, Sleaze, Soul Sun, Spazz, Split Personalityz, Supastar Spitaz, Tatum, The New Juice Crew, Trance X Dilly, Tray Bien, DJ's Swerve 36 & Bandolero @ Strange Matter - $5/18+
If by any chance you are majoring in oil spills at Florida Gulf Coast University, might I suggest you take a break from your studies and come experience the real hip hop. If I had a son, I would name him after Black Liquid. I tell you, this man, self described as half man/half malt liquor, has singlehandedly made Richmond the best home for the lyrical divine anywhere in America. You cannot miss any Face Melt Fridays ever again, as it's time to reach the peak of your life. Lowbrow mainstream club hip hop is dead. Want to experience the opposite? Well, make 929 W. Grace St. your destination tonight where you can get reacquainted with your ear’s delights as you bob heads. Don’t forget to finish that blunt and forty at the same time, otherwise you will be spotted as a card carrying member of the bridge and interstate crowd. Good thing those goons are banned from this soiree. Rhymes call the dances tonight, not some hog caller. No matter your race, ethnicity, or socio-economic status, get your ass down here. Richmond is now a unifying force, thanks to the rap of emcees that carve and deliver, like a passionate ninja feeling the aesthetics. The vibes be ballin’ and the ladies be dancin’. So chill, and let’s step it up to the best concoction of hip hop science this side of beat street.
Saturday, March 30, 6 p.m.
The Vignettes, Objectum Sexuals, The Blue Rajas, Christi, Hot Dolphin @ Strange Matter - $5/All Ages
What a wild, wonderful and wacky night of good old fashioned rock and roll. And, it’s for the kids. Hell yes! It’s time to lets the kids rock out with their socks out. Memphis’s The Vignettes are a rock duo that spreads the gospel of rock and roll and hold séances with Elvis. On tour with the Vignettes is a sensational group from over the pond in London, Objectum Sexuals. Holy Piccadilly Circus, this band will blow your fish and chips away. As far as local support, my Shaka Smarts, what a nice Richmond collage this will be. The twee pop meshed with riot grrl duo, the Blue Rajas, will have you in smiles. Then those fabulous ladies of Christi will smack you in the face with their dark surf, doo wop, and punk mix. Before that, there’s Hot Dolphin--oh Hot Dolphin, where you been all my life? Your rock and roll has everyone on lock down with skates and batons. Going to be a show of shows, I can’t wait to see you at the all ages show that will have every early evening nomad crossing their ‘T’s and dotting their ‘I’s.
Saturday, March 30, 8 p.m.
The Evens @ Plant Zero (0 E. 4th and Hull St. - Manchester) - $5/All Ages.
Husband and wife Ian MacKaye (of Fugazi and Dischord Records fame) and Amy Farina are coming to Manchester with their group The Evens. Formed in 2001, this scaled down indie-punk rock duo has played everywhere. I’m not talking about traditional venues either. They could be anywhere from art galleries to daycare centers. This duo may have folks getting all nostalgia for MacKaye’s past marvels, but the Evens are their own thing. They are a luxurious musical combination that has to be taken on the merit of their own sound and lyrical revolutions. The Evens are a delight in this world of too much of everything in regards to music. Leave it to MacKaye to go all ‘And now for something completely different’ on us. The Evens are his and his wife’s vehicle to the true artistry that they both possess. For only five dollars you can witness musical honesty, as the Evens are touring in support of their new album The Odds. It’s a delectable listen, and I for one will be front and center at Plant Zero, a spectacular spot to see and hear the Evens.
Sunday, March 31, 10 p.m.
RVA Noise Night #9, featuring Zack Kouns, Champagne of Rats, Awawtum, Scoughs, Josh Russell and Matt Boettke, Inkling Juror, and special guests @ The Nile– Donations please/21+
Well, look at here, it's night number nine full of nit wits and sounds only the devil himself could turn to gold. Gary Stevens has down it again, as this night has become the angst-ridden future for those still seeking out Van Gogh’s severed ear. I bet anyone a Visual Sound Comp 66 V2CMP66 that RVA Noise Night #9 will be a night of continuous Beatles-style references towards the number nine. There’s a stacked deck of murder and suicide tonight, and no head cut off a boar can stop it.
The guests of dishonor will be Zach Kouns, out of Ohio, as he gets ghostly with his deeply-thought noise that can be construed as ambient electronics to free-jazz. Amen playa, amen. Then there’s ol' Leo and JK’s thing, Champagne of Rats. Oh blessed by thy sun, this is the sound of the manatee. The other caramel chocolate sweets will be none other than a reversed Mutwawa. That’s right, Awawtum, Mutwawa sans masks and African dinner jackets, will be bringing up the vibes from the dirty Sanchez. Careful ladies, these lads are actually quite cute when they’re open, carefree, baring all and loving every minute of it.
Norfolk, Virginia will be getting in on the act, as Scoughs deliver, on a silver platter once used by retarded heroin addicts, the freakish-punk-out-noise only you, a lamp post, or a dandelion, for that matter, could love. Those lovable skew-it-on-the-bar-b-q chaps, Josh Russell and Matt Boettke, open with some weird alien, wino-sounding arthropod type noise guise. Oh yeah, the lovely Iona, formally of Chicago, now living here, opens as well with her spitfire paranoid molasses she calls Inkling Juror. So, if you have any sanity, I guess it’s safe to say you’ll be at The Nile tonight. Get some, rhinoceros, get some.
Tuesday, April 2, 8 p.m.
Right on Productions presents Mansions on the Moon, Carousel @ The Camel– $10/18+
The Los Angeles band Mansions on the Moon, formerly of Virginia Beach, may just be one of the hardest bands to pigeonhole. Nothing wrong with that, as this band’s sound collides with both ends of the spectrum. Though this band may draw comparisons to the Postal Service or M83, Mansion’s sound is a more poppy ambient and electronic new wave. Then you've got to throw in a stylish jam-band-like indie pop sound, amongst stirring lyrics, at which point, without a doubt, Mansions on the Moon is all yours to undergo.
Currently on tour promoting their 2012 EP Lightyears, Mansions on the Moon continues to flourish as a rising band everyone should pay attention to. As their live shows are already the stuff of legend, Mansions on the Moon is back in Richmond to make you a believer. If you missed their last show in Richmond, don’t make the same mistake twice. Mansions on the Moon have turned many heads, including Virginia music royalty and fellow Virginia Beach natives Chad Hugo and Pharrell Williams of N.E.R.D. Those cats have worked extensively with Mansions on the Moon, and Pharrell is the executive producer on Lightyears. This show will be hot, scorching hot. Have fun, and may Mansions on the Moon take you to new heights.
By John Lewis Morgan (onewayrichmond.com)