Top New Year's Eve concerts
Jesus Lizard at Metro on November 28, 2009. (Tribune photo by Mieke Zuiderweg)
New Year’s Eve can sometimes feel like a chore – you’re supposed to go out and have fun and spend lots of money doing it. Fortunately, there are plenty of great musical options well worth your investment. Here are my choices for the best way to celebrate the arrival of 2010:
The Jesus Lizard at Metro, 3730 N. Clark St., $51 and $61; etix.com: Right now, this is the last show on the schedule for the original quartet, which reunited this year after a decade away. The band remains in top form, playing with renewed purpose and energy, and singer-showman extraordinaire David Yow should be healed from the bruised ribs he suffered over the Thanksgiving weekend at Metro when he crashed to the floor while crowd-surfing. Prepare to enter 2010 kicking and screaming --- Yow and the boys wouldn’t have it any other way.Fiery Furnaces at Lincoln Hall, 2424 N. Lincoln Av., $20 and $25; lincolnhallchicago.com: Siblings Matthew and Eleanor Friedberger, who grew up in west suburban Oak Park, are among indie-rock’s most inventive duos, with Matt’s twisted art-rock tunes providing a platform for Eleanor’s rapid-fire yet conversational vocals. With their band, they revel in reinventing their studio albums on stage, stringing together songs like they were playing the rock opera “Tommy” – or was that “Jesus Christ Superstar”?
Local H with Electric Six and White Mystery at Double Door, 1572 N. Milwaukee Av., $65; ticketfly.com: Local H singer-guitarist Scott Lucas will be a busy man, with a solo show earlier in the evening at Reggie’s. With drummer Brian St. Clair, he is an unstoppable force; Local H is a two-person rock machine that presaged the rise of everyone from the White Stripes to the Japandroids. Openers White Mystery won’t back down from anyone with Alex White and her brother Francis celebrating the release of their new knock-down-the-walls studio album.
Marcia Ball at FitzGerald’s in Berwyn, $35 and $40; ticketweb.com: The piano-playing Louisiana native is a regular at this Berwyn institution, and for good reason. Her blend of swamp blues, zydeco and New Orleans swing brings a Southern road-house party wherever she goes.
Girl Talk at the Congress Theatre, 2135 N. Milwaukee, $35; ticketweb.com: Armed with little more than a laptop and a few well-chosen props (an inflatable life raft came into play the last time I saw him, the better to float on a sea of outstretched arms), former Pittsburgh biochemist Gregg Gillis is the sample-based composer of choice when it comes to filling a dancefloor with sweating, madly dancing celebrants. Conga lines optional.
Pegboy and Shot Baker at the Beat Kitchen, 2100 W. Belmont, $20 and $25; ticketweb.com: Pegboy doesn’t play out that often anymore, but it’s always a thrill to see and hear John Haggerty with a guitar strapped from his neck. The quartet, all veterans of Chicago’s brawling ‘80s indie-rock scene, know the value of bare-knuckled riffs, anthemic choruses and cement-crushing beats. Openers Shot Baker share those values, so there will be no shortage of hoarse voices and bruised body parts on New Year’s Day from happily exhausted audience members.
Magic Slim and the Teardrops with John Primer at Buddy Guy’s Legends, 754 S. Wabash, $25; etix.com: Slim (aka Morris Holt) is a pro when it comes to working a room, his imposing physique and cowboy hat a sign of a showman who cut his teeth in the blues clubs for decades, playing alongside the great Magic Sam in the ‘50s. Primer has played many of the same rooms and was a member of Slim’s band for a decade-plus. He’s an extraordinary guitarist in the razor-blade South Side tradition, working with the likes of Willie Dixon and Muddy Waters.
greg@gregkot.com
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