Anonymous American  at Slowdown Jr., Nov. 30, 2011. The band reunites tonight at The Barley Street Tavern.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Feels like a Saturday, doesn’t it? The holidays will do that to you, especially if you have the day off.

Lots o’ shows going on this weekend. Let’s get right to it…

Expect a nutso crowd at The Brothers Lounge tonight for a reunion of Capgun Coup. Today as in 2004 when the band first got rolling, Sam Martin, Greg Elsasser and the rest of the crew were/are on the verge of something. Find out what that “something” is tonight. Joining them is hip-hop crew M34N STR33T. $5, 9 p.m.

Listen to “Bad Bands” from Capgun Coup’s Maudlin (Team Love, 2009), below:

Also tonight at brand new all-ages rock venue Milk Run there’s a three-band bill featuring Lincoln band Domestica — consider it a christening of the club as only Jon and Heidi can. Also on the bill are The Morbs (Lincoln indie-pop trio featuring members of Manic Pixie Dream Girls) and Relax, It’s Science (Jeremy Stanosheck and Co.). $5, 9 p.m.

Read more about Milk Run in my detailed interview with the club’s proprietors, Chris Aponick and Sam Parker, and watch this interview from Hear Nebraska.

Speaking of reunions, Matt Whipkey and the boys of Anonymous American reunite at The Barley Street Tavern tonight. The band, which also features Wayne Brekke, Bobby Carrig and Corey Weber, hit its stride with the 2004 self-release of When the Drummer Counts to Four. Opening is Travelling Mercies. $5, 9 p.m.

Tomorrow night is all about The Good Life at The Slowdown main room. Consider it a victory lap for the band whose been touring on and off since the release of Everybody’s Coming Down (Saddle Creek, 2015) this past August. Read about the record here. It’s a star-studded bill with the return of Big Harp, whose new cassette Waveless (Majestic Litter, 2015) is a career high-water mark. If that wasn’t enough to get you to Slowdown, the hottest Omaha band of 2015, High Up, opens. $13, 9 p.m.

Also going on Saturday night, Ocean Black (the band formerly known as Nightbird) headlines at O’Leaver’s. Joining them are Laughing Falcon and Montee Men (Matt Baum and Co.). $6, 9:30 p.m.

And John Klemmensen and the Party headlines at Lookout Lounge, 320 So. 72nd Street. Also on the bill are Anthems, Low Long Signal and Super Ghost. $5, 9 p.m.

Consider Sunday a day of rest.

That’s what I got for this weekend. If I missed your show, put it in the comments section. Have a frosty weekend.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2015 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Anonymous American perform The Replacements at Slowdown Jr., Nov. 30, 2011.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

We’ll get to the above photo in a sec, but first…

A tradition at The Reader, the writing staff has put its collective head(s) together and developed the annual “Top 20” bands list, followed by the “Next 15,” a designation that can be interpreted any way you wish. Some might say that these are the writers’ favorite bands; others might say these are the bands that made the biggest impact in 2011. I would say the list is a combination of both. No one said anything about these being the “best” local bands in 2011.

So if you pick up a fresh copy of The Reader, you’ll see the Top 20 list along with brief descriptions of each band, a limited discography and personnel. What you won’t see is the Next 15 because for reasons unbeknownst to everyone involved The Reader didn’t print them. But fear not faithful reader, because I have both lists below. Before I get to them, the usual caveat: This list is purely for fun and, of course, means nothing. It should mean nothing to those who are on or not on the list. That said, I know being excluded can sting (last year or the year before, Dan McCarthy did a playful riff on not being on the list that ran throughout an entire set at The Waiting Room. Needless to say, I’ve always included Dan on my list…).

So without further ado, below is The Reader‘s Top 20 and Next 15:

Top 20
Tim Kasher
Bright Eyes
All Young Girls Are Machine Guns
Darren Keen/The Show Is the Rainbow/etc.
Simon Joyner
Noah’s Ark Was a Spaceship
Digital Leather
Magic Slim
Emphatic
Skypiper
Conduits
Brad Cordle Band
Matt Cox
Kris Lager Band
Mynabirds
Brent Crampton
Somasphere
Yuppies
Depressed Buttons
McCarthy Trenching

Next 15
Travelling’ Mercies
Rock Paper Dynamite
Mitch Gettman
Millions of Boys
Lil Slim
Eli Mardock
Answer Team
Icky Blossoms
So-So Sailors
Voodoo Method
Back When
Machete Archive
Funk Trek
Baby Tears
Conchance
DJ Kobrakyle

And now, in the name of full disclosure, here is the Lazy-i Top 20 / Next 15 (i.e., my initial list submitted The Reader):

Top 20

Bright Eyes
Conduits
So-So Sailors
Icky Blossoms
Darren Keen
McCarthy Trenching
Simon Joyner
Tim Kasher
Digital Leather
Noah’s Ark Was a Spaceship
Skypiper
It’s True
Brent Crampton
Yuppies
Mynabirds
Eli Mardock
Gus & Call
Matt Cox Band
Ideal Cleaners
Little Brazil

Next 15

Con Dios
Fizzle Like a Flood
InDreama
Watching the Train Wreck
Peace of Shit
AYGAMG
Tilly and the Wall
Honeybee & Hers
Thunder Power
Baby Tears
Depressed Buttons
Millions of Boys
Satchel Grande
The Answer Team
Capgun Coup

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So who won last night’s Replacement challenge at Slowdown? I’m happy to say that it was a tie. As expected, Anonymous American came out of the gate with guns a-blazing, ending their set with a sweet cover of “Left of the Dial” Then on came Witness Tree. I’ve never seen these guys before, and dug what I heard (though I have no idea what their actual music sounds like). Travelling Mercies’ two songs were muddled and off-kilter. A post on Facebook this morning indicated last night’s performance may have been their last show ever. Opener Aaron Parker gets the Guts of Steel Award for his two solo acoustic numbers. It takes cajones the size of melons to go on stage first after a 123-minute tribute to The Replacements and play covers alone in front of a room filled with die-hard Replacements fans. Unfortunately, Peace of Shit and Well Aimed Arrows were no shows.

As for the film: I was sort of dreading having to sit through more than two hours of talking-head interviews by people I (mostly) didn’t know (The movie contains no music or footage of The Replacements). I was afraid I wasn’t going make it to the end. But director Gorman Borchard’s editing style kept things moving right along. The film hit its sweet spot about 60 minutes in when we started getting more detailed info about the band’s history from those who were there. Unfortunately, a series of “fan” interviews brought the film to a crawl toward the end, including an in-depth interview with some guy who grew up isolated on a farm who developed an almost cult-like love for the band’s music. So much time was spent on this guy that it took away from the film’s real focus — the band. If I were Borchard I’d cut all the fan interviews and trim the film to around 90 minutes. If he wants to land a distributor, he’s going to have to make about 30 minutes of cuts anyway.

By the way, nice crowd, at least 100.

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There’s one band on my Top 20 list that you won’t find among The Readers‘ 35 — Gus & Call. Those other editors at the newspaper who mocked my inclusion will shrivel at their oversight this time next year, when Gus & Call are the “special musical guest” on Saturday Night Live. Or tonight, when Gus & Call celebrates the release of their debut album, Wait ‘Til the Weather Breaks, at The Slowdown.

The event also marks the first week of Gus & Call’s month-long residency at Slowdown. Joining them tonight are InDreama and Honeybee & Hers. Tickets are $5, but tonight if you pay $20 you get admission to all five G&C residency shows in December and a copy of the new CD.

Also tonight, ’80s punk legends The Queers are playing at The Waiting Room with Knockout, North of Grand, Cordial Spew and DSM5. 8:30 p.m., $13.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Well, well, well… Looks like Matt Whipkey’s old band, Anonymous American, has taken the Slowdown / Replacements challenge and will be among those performing after the screening of Color Me Obsessed… at The Slowdown Nov. 30 (See yesterday’s blog entry for band search details). Whipkey, Wayne Brekke and the rest of the band are a perfect fit for this showcase.

There’s room for more.

I was thinking it would be cool to see one of the young, dirty O’Leaver’s punk bands also play this gig, say, a Rainy Road, Doom Town or Grotto Records band. After all, their take-it-to-the-edge no-bullshit garage aesthetic is in synch with The Replacements’ early days of punk excess.

But then it dawned on me that those guys may not have even heard of The Replacements. The band’s heyday was between ’81 and ’84 — that’s 30 years ago, folks — and they technically broke up in ’91. So while songs like “Fuck School” and “Dope Smokin’ Moron” off Stink or “Hangin’ Downtown” and “More Cigarettes” off Sorry Ma, I Forgot to Take Out the Trash would fit nicely in the current-day garage punk milieu, they could also be viewed as “old people’s music.” Let’s hope not. For those of you who were around in the ’80s, what did you think of music from 30 years prior to that time, music from the ’50s? Say no more…

* * *

Mates of State have a new album out called Mountaintops (Barsuk) that is a right turn from the calliope keyboard sound that I remember from their Polyvinyl days. When I interviewed the band in 2002 (the story is still online here), their two-piece keyboards-and-drums approach was rather innovative, if not grating taken in large doses — you could only stand so much of that whirling organ. These days their sound, especially on this new record, is more fleshed out and approachable. When they played on Letterman in early October (watch it here), the duo was backed by a couple more musicians. Who will they have in tow tonight when they play The Waiting Room with The Generationals? Find out. $13, 9 p.m.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.