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Photo courtesy of the artist
Tony Catania
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Photo credit: John Robert Williams
Sally Rogers and Claudia Schmidt
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Photo credit: Ethan Covey
Garcia Peoples
With The Mekons, Garcia Peoples, Armillaria, Rhonda Jean, the Nightinjails, the Bobby Boom Trio and more, there isn’t any time left for boredom this week in Milwaukee.
Thursday, Jan. 16
Photo courtesy of the artist
Tony Catania
Armillaria w/ Tony Catania Trio @ Woodland Pattern Book Center, 7 p.m.
Formations is a monthly music series dedicated to fostering the growth of new and improvised music. Armillaria (Eli Smith and Lonnie Martin) started playing freely improvised music, slowly accumulating instruments like autoharp, experimentally tuned acoustic guitars, found objects and cello. The nature of their music is continually in flux, orbiting between warped psych-folk implosions, ethereal vocal dialogues, colorific atonal diffusions and droning ambient sounds. The Tony Catania Trio includes Catania on tenor sax, bassist Barry Clark and drummer Devin Drobka.
Rhonda Jean—Unplugged @ Rock Country MKE, 7 p.m.
Rhonda Jean’s debut unplugged show at Rock Country MKE features the music of this seasoned singer-songwriter and member of That’s What She Said.
Friday, Jan. 17
The Nightinjails, Roxie Beane and Ted Hajnasiewicz @ Riverwest Public House Cooperative, 6 p.m.
A triple bill of talent featuring Milwaukee duo the Nightinjails, the acoustic funk-rock of Roxie Beane and Americana sounds of Minneapolis singer-songwriter Ted Hajnasiewicz.
Photo credit: John Robert Williams
Sally Rogers and Claudia Schmidt
Sally Rogers and Claudia Schmidt @ Unitarian Church, 7:30 p.m.
Sally Rogers performs traditional, contemporary and original ballads and songs interwoven with stories taken from her life as a performer, a wife and a mother. Much of the material performed by Sally includes compositions of her own, many of which are considered classics of the folk and popular genres.
“Creative noisemaker” Claudia Schmidt may be from Michigan, but anyone who has experienced one of her live performances knows that the stage is her natural habitat. Claudia has recorded 14 albums, participated in the delightful Les Blank movie, Gap-Toothed Women, performed on Public Radio International’s “A Prairie Home Companion,” but her craft is at its best in live performances where she mines the humor and poignancy of our lives and shapes it into a one-woman revitalization movement. Expect anything at a Schmidt concert: a hymn, poem, bawdy verse, torch song, satire and the gamut of emotions.
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Photo credit: Ethan Covey
Garcia Peoples
Garcia Peoples w/ Kendra Amalie @ The Back Room at Colectivo, 8 p.m.
A pleasant surprise at last year’s Milwaukee Psych Fest, consider Garcia Peoples to be your heady, friendly reminder that it's alright to let the sunshine in. The band’s latest album, Natural Facts, is an emerging conversation, with songs and structures drawing from musicians who cross Garcia Peoples’ collective transom. The classic rock guitarists of yore might be obvious subsequent touchstones, but bend your ear and newer colors emerge.
Saturday, Jan. 18
Jon Langford and Sally Timms w/ Deano Schlabowske @ Anodyne Coffee Roasting Co. (Walker's Point), 7 p.m.
The Mekons formed in Leeds, England, in 1977 (and partially relocated to Chicago in the early ’90s). They evolved from ground-zero punk-rock to cosmic-country (with the album Fear and Whiskey in 19-freaking-85!) and found ways to survive, evolve and thrive: tours, albums, side projects, performance art and duo gig like this one.
Veering from The Mekons’ mothership, Jon Langford and Sally Timms remain obstinate and tenacious as ever. As the PR person says, “This crafted duo set (augmented by John the Pieman Szymanski on his wooden guitar) will include mighty stirring anthems to send you home to bed with a smile on your teeth.” Opener Ramblin’ Deano Schlabowske cut his musical teeth in Milwaukee with the band Wreck before moving to Chicago to play with Langford’s Waco Brothers.
Bobby Broom Trio @ The Jazz Estate, 8 p.m.
In a career spanning three decades, guitarist Bobby Broom has embodied the truism that it’s the player, not the tune, that makes for a memorable performance in jazz. After years as an elite sideman with the likes of Sonny Rollins, Stanley Turrentine and Dr. John, Broom reintroduced himself to the jazz world with Stand! (2001), a brilliant foray into the pop music he grew up hearing in the 1960s and ’70s. Subsequent releases demonstrate a keen ear for rarely played material, a gift for composing evocative tunes and impressive facility with the knotty rhythmic puzzles of Thelonious Monk, which is what makes his album, My Shining Hour, such an unexpected revelation.
