At the Masquerade:
Friday April 26 6:30 p.m. $17 All ages
Relient k with Hellogoodbye
Relient k is, sort of, a Christian rock ensemble. They’re trending toward a more secular, less youth group worship band-ish sound, but a few “Hallelujahs” may slip during the show. I think they sound like a mix between Coffee Shop Soundtrack and early Good Charlotte. Something about their chord progressions and sugary choruses reminds me of Fall Out Boy’s debut on “Take This To Your Grave.” They say they’re pop-punk, but there’s more pop than punk. I have to give Relient k their due though, in 2004 “MMHMM” scored a 13 spot on the Billboard 200, and then they jumped up to number 6 in 2007 with “Five Score and Seven Years Ago.”
Hellogoodbye is trying to give me diabetes. Hellogoodbye sounds like Motion City Soundtrack fell into a vat of ones and zeroes and came out covered in glitter. They gained momentum in 2006 when they appeared on “The Real World: Austin” and just kept rolling after their “Here (In Your Arms)” music video made Hellogoodbye the summer band of 2007. If you haven’t noticed, it’s 2013, but there were hundreds of thousands of 16-year-old girls that loved “Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!,” now they’re 22 and listening to “Would it Kill You?” With Relient k, this show will provide the sugar rush you’re looking for from the late 2000’s.
Sunday April 28 6:30 p.m. $12 All ages
Maylene and The Sons of Disaster
Here’s the thing about Maylene and The Sons of Disaster, If you listened to their self-titled debut or their follow up album “II,” then you won’t recognize them anymore. I used to think of several bands in the hardcore genre that were pressing the envelope, and Maylene was one of those bands. They were faster, louder and overall grittier than Oh, Sleeper or Every Time I Die (and both of those bands are good for different reasons), but since “III” dropped in 2009, they’ve been aggressively watering down their sound. And let’s not go too far with this idea, it’s like Maylene used to be a shot of Jim Beam and now they’re more like an Old Fashioned, but what happened to Dallas Taylor (lead vocals)? His throat blistering screams and guttural lows have become whispy, whiskey drenched lullabies and strangely enough, I’m okay with that. You can’t survive as a metalcore band without introducing something new, without experimenting, and that’s what Maylene’s been doing for the past five years. They’ve tapped into their Southern rock roots and twisted their own metal-y juices into the framework.
I’ll be live tweeting from the show on Sunday night. Follow me on Twitter @SethCarterCrowe to get the scoop.
At the Drunken Unicorn:
Saturday April 27 9 p.m. $6 for 21 and up, $8 for under 21 (18 and up show)
Bearknuckle prom themed “Lost Woods” EP release show
BearKnuckle is, like they broadcast on reverbnation.com, a furry fist to the face. A Lot of people compare them to Queens of the Stone Age or Eagles of Death Metal, but I think they’re the love child of Mastodon and Black Sabbath. It’s bluesy; it’s haggard and well executed. There’s no shortage of guitar solos and the vocals are reminiscent of Ozzy Osbourne. Go check out their EP Release show, which is, yes, prom themed and pick up a copy of their first record “Lost Woods.”