Black Breath
Thursday, May 9
See one of Seattle’s heaviest acts before it heads to France to play for thousands at next month’s massive Hellfest. Black Breath mixes a variety of metal styles with hardcore and an HM-2 guitar pedal in an intimate environment. The band is playing tonight with Finnish grindcore band Rotten Sound, which is celebrating 20 years of musical brutality with a world tour as well as its recent Species at War EP. Bring your neck muscles (for headbanging, duh) and prepare to have your senses assaulted. With Heiress, Baptists. The Highline, 210 Broadway Ave. E., 328-7837. 9:30 p.m. $12.
DAVE LAKE
Infamous Stringdusters
Saturday, May 11
This Nashville quintet combines the instrumentation of a bluegrass act with the sensibility of a jam band. You’re just as likely to hear a Police or U2 cover in the band’s set as something from its latest album, Silver Sky (produced by Billy Hume, best known for working with Nas and Ludacris). But that’s the beauty of the Infamous Stringdusters: They’re a non-traditional band stretching the boundaries of a classic American style, and their live show is the best way to experience what they do. But don’t worry—if you miss the show, you can always check it out on the band’s website, which archives full sets for streaming. With BigE of Sugarcane. The Neptune, 1303 N.E. 45th St. 682-1414. 9 p.m. $18 adv./$20 DOS.
DAVE LAKE
Seattle Rock Orchestra performs the Beatles
Saturday, may 11–Sunday, May 12
It has been a harrowing couple weeks for the Seattle Rock Orchestra. While preparing for this, the most highly anticipated of its ongoing series exploring the Beatles’ catalog, orchestra director and founder Scott Teske came home to find both of his upright basses missing. For five days Teske fretted over the fretless instruments while an impressive Facebook campaign got the word out. Then police discovered the massive instruments in the back of the thieves’ cracked-up SUV—along with some meth and guns—after a fence-crashing chase. A dramatic prelude to what will likely be an inspired performance of the Beatles’ most pivotal works, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and Magical Mystery Tour, featuring vocalists John Roderick and Sean Nelson, among many others. The Moore, 1932 Second Ave., 877-784-4849. 8 p.m. Sat., 2 p.m. Sun. $20 adv.
MARK BAUMGARTEN
Kurt Vile & the Violators
Sunday, May 12
Though singer/songwriter Kurt Vile has made a name from his solo catalog—heavy on angsty, lo-fi indie-rock cuts—this time around he’s bringing a full band. The irony? The album he’s supporting, Wakin on a Pretty Daze, may be his mellowest yet. Honing in on the “I’m hella stoned and feeling super-deep” vibes characteristic of his earlier releases, Wakin’s country-tinged title track has Vile talking about “living on the straight line” while hinting all along that that might not be the case. In true Vile tradition, convention is not the goal (dude announced his album via a mural), which shows in the six-minute-plus songs that pop up throughout the album. It’s this looseness, this knack for sprawling guitars and room for spontaneity, that allows Vile to explore—and explode—onstage. With the Fresh & Onlys, Steve Gunn. Neumos, 925 E. Pike St., 709-9442. 8 p.m. $16 adv. 21 and over.
KEEGAN PROSSER
Karaokegrass
Tuesday, May 14
Karaoke backed by a live band has been done before. Karaoke backed by a live bluegrass band isn’t totally novel. What’s new at Nectar Lounge is the bar’s bet on Seattle’s appetite for twangy karaoke, upping Karaokegrass’s standing engagement to two nights a month starting this month. “We’ve had so many fingers come up and we couldn’t get to everybody in a night,” says Tammy Haugen, the group’s “karaokeretary.” As The Gourd’s cover of Snoop Dogg’s “Gin and Juice” proved, there’s something magnetic about bluegrass treatments of top-40 hits, and Haugen says it has a way of warming people up to karaoke, too: “We get fans of bluegrass and fans of karaoke, and people who don’t like either tend to like this,” she says. For the record, Karaokegrass does offer “Gin and Juice” as a song option, though Haugen says they typically stay away from hip-hop (“They’re just two-chord songs!”). Also for the record, the band will not play “Call Me Maybe.” So don’t ask. Nectar Lounge, 412 N. 36th St., 632-2020. 8–11 p.m., second and fourth Tuesdays. 21 and over. Free.
DANIEL PERSON
Of Monsters and Men
Tuesday, May 14
Seattle music aficionados caught on to this Icelandic sextet early on, when KEXP started playing its super-infectious breakout single, “Little Talks.” The band has since released a full-length album, 2012’s My Head Is an Animal, and taken the world by storm, playing every major festival and sharing its collaborative folk-pop with the masses. As festival darlings with Nordic roots, the band’s tunes often sound best backed by wind and doused in sunshine. Even so, it’s safe to say the explosive instrumentation and monstrous choruses will sound just as lovely and full of enthusiasm on a proper stage. The
Paramount, 911 Pine St., 682-1414. $35 (plus fees). 8 p.m. All ages.
KEEGAN PROSSER
