Thursday w/ Maylene and the Sons of Disaster

Perhaps no band was more responsible for keeping the post-hardcore torch burning into the turn of the century than Thursday, the New Jersey group that inspired many of the last decade's harder-edged emo bands. After a near breakup in 2004, though, the band began to drift away from their trademark sound, starting with 2006's darker, softer A City by the Light Divided, the first of three albums the band recorded with Flaming Lips producer Dave Fridmann. The band's latest, this year's No Devolución, is the best and most fully realized of the bunch, a record that's every bit as visceral as the group's earliest work, even though it tames the aggression considerably.