Candy Golde: As side projects go, this one has plenty of talent to recommend it, with Nick Tremulis joined by Eleventh Dream’s Day Rick Rizzo, Cheap Trick’s Bun E. Carlos and Wilco’s John Stirratt, plus man-about-town Mark Greenberg. Jon Langford opens, and no doubt will be putting in an appearance as well with the headliners, 9 p.m. Friday at Double Door, 1572 N. Milwaukee, $18 and $20 (door); ticketfly.com.

Grails: This shadowy Portland quartet, which includes band members who have worked with everyone from Neurosis to M. Ward, incorporates hammering metal and ambient drone in their instrumental explorations, lately adding an element of electronic manipulation to further deepen and disturb the sound, 7 p.m. Saturday at Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western Av., $10; ticketweb.com.

greg@gregkot.com

Wilco took another step Wednesday toward becoming a self-contained music company when the Chicago band announced it was forming its own label, dBpm Records.

The label will be based in Easthampton, Mass., and run by the band's manager, Tony Margherita. Distribution will go through Anti- Records, an offshoot of Los Angeles punk powerhouse label Epitaph. In recent years Anti- has released albums by a wide range of acclaimed artists, including Tom Waits, Neko Case and Mavis Staples.

Staples’ 2010 album, “You are Not Alone,” was produced by Wilco singer Jeff Tweedy, who expressed his admiration for the label in an interview last year with the Los Angeles Times’ Todd Martens: "I think they’re pretty smart. I think they’re music lovers. I really respond to it. It’s very similar to the way I am. It’s a lot more like the way the world exists now than when I was growing up. There are less lines drawn in the sand between genres."

The move severs Wilco’s ties with the major-label system. All of Wilco’s previous albums since its 1995 debut, “A.M.,” have been released by labels affiliated with Warner Brothers: Reprise and Nonesuch. By creating its own label, Wilco brings virtually all facets of its operation in-house.
     
"Wilco's independent streak is well documented and nothing new," Margherita said in a statement released by the band, "and this is the culmination of what we've been working towards for the last 15 years. As we reached the end of our last deal, it felt like it was time for a change and the one thing we were certain we did not want to do was to sign another traditional recording agreement. Our discussions with Anti-, coming on the back of a great experience working with them on the Mavis Staples record, led us to thinking we might be able to come up with something quite different from the norm that could potentially be better for us and, frankly, a lot more interesting.”

The sextet is working on its next studio album in its rehearsal space on Chicago’s North Side. No release date has been set. The band’s 2011 tour dates include an appearance at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and a reprise of its Solid Sound Festival in North Adams, Mass., on June 24-26.

greg@gregkot.com

Mavis Staples performs at 2010 Lollapalooza. (Terrence Antonio James, Tribune)

The story that most fans know about Mavis Staples’ rousing new album, “You Are Not Alone” (Anti), is that the singer recorded it with Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy, who produced it and also wrote two songs.

But the most underappreciated aspect of it is that Tweedy didn’t leave his thumbprints all over the session. On the contrary, he not only let Mavis be Mavis, he ensured that she would record the album with her touring band: guitarist Rick Holmstrom, bassist Jeff Turmes and drummer Stephen Hodges.

“All the interviewers want to talk about Tweedy, and I can understand that, but the band is really an important part of this and most write-ups aren’t including that,” Staples says while sitting at a South Loop hotel lounge, with her sister Yvonne at her side. “The first thing Jeff said to me after he saw us play together was, ‘That band is good for you. They leave you space to be yourself.’”

The relationship with Holmstrom began around the time she was recording her 2007 masterpiece, “We’ll Never Turn Back,” with producer-guitarist Ry Cooder in California.

Photo courtesy of Jonathan Pines

It’s possible to lay all sorts of emotional baggage atop Jay Bennett’s posthumous album, “Kicking at the Perfumed Air.”

As with much of the songwriter’s work, it has a haunted air of introspection that sometimes ventures beyond poignance into far queasier terrain (“Kicking at the Perfumed Air” is available HERE).

Indeed, the album-closing “Beer,” in which the narrator drinks himself into a stupor and imagines his death, is tough to hear, given that Bennett died in May 2009 at his home in Urbana, Ill., of what the Champaign County coroner described as an accidental painkiller overdose.

But as anyone who knew Bennett would likely say, the sometimes brutally introspective artist was not necessarily a mirror image of the person he was in life: a driven multi-tasker with a constant craving to create.

Edward Burch, who will headline Saturday at Subterranean in a benefit concert for Bennett’s music-education fund, was one of the late singer’s closest friends and musical collaborators, and he was as devastated by his death as anyone. But he’s also happy to clear up a few things about the master musician’s final days.

Jeff Tweedy: As Wilco has grown to an arena-level act, it has lost some of its spontaneity, which is why the solo concerts by the band’s founder tend to be a little looser and freer. And, oh yeah, it’s a chance to see some pretty good songs stripped down to their essentials. Why the steep price? The concerts are a benefit for a children’s scholarship fund. Update: Ticket prices have been cut to $50. 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday at the Vic Theatre, 3145 N. Sheffield, originally $100, now $50; ticketmaster.com.  

Ted Leo and the Pharmacists: In a career marked by extraordinary consistency, Leo has never released a duff album while sticking to his guitars, drums, and political convictions; 7 p.m. Saturday at the Bottom Lounge, 1375 W. Lake, $15; ticketweb.com.

greg@gregkot.com

    Wilco is making a couple of concert recordings available on the band’s Web site in exchange for a minimum $15 donation for Haitian relief.
   
    The band posted 2009 concerts from Brooklyn and London, available for download here.

    Funds will go to the emergency relief funds at OXFAM and Doctors Without Borders.

    greg@gregkot.com
   

   

Read the review of Wilco's performance at the UIC Pavilion.

1 Wilco (The Song)
2 A Shot in the Arm
3 Bull Black Nova
4 You are my Face
5 I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
6 One Wing
7 Misunderstood
8 At Least That’s What You Said
9 Deeper Down
10 Impossible Germany
11 It’s Just that Simple
12 I’ll Fight
13 Handshake Drugs
14 Sonny Feeling
15 Jesus, Etc.
16 Theologians
17 I’m Always in Love
18 Hate it Here
19 Walken
20 I’m the Man Who Loves You

Encore
21 You Never Know
22 Heavy Metal Drummer
23 Just a Kid
24 Kingpin
25 Monday
26 Outtasite (Outta Mind)
27 Hoodoo Voodoo
28 I’m a Wheel

Wilco's Jeff Tweedy performs at the UIC Pavilion Sunday. (Tribune photo by Andrew A. Nelles)

Surveying a near-capacity audience Sunday in the first of two concerts at the UIC Pavilion, Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy responded to his band’s newfound arena status with self-mocking humor.

“We got more lights, we got a gong,” he said. Then he let the crowd sing most of the next song, “Jesus, Etc.” – an arena-rock gesture that Bon Jovi surely would’ve appreciated.

It’s been a long, steady, 15-year climb for the Chicago sextet. With the exception of the aforementioned lights, the concert was notable for its modesty and restraint. Even Glenn Kotche’s gong went untouched until nearly two hours into the show. The band played 28 songs, performing particularly precise versions of those from its two most recent albums, “Sky Blue Sky” (2007) and “Wilco (The Album).” The latter is more like a career survey of musical styles than a ground-breaker, and the concert followed that format: a solid overview that took few chances.

There was the loping Little Feat-like amiability of “Walken,” the tense guitar rhythms of “Bull Black Nova,” the cathartic surge of “Misunderstood,” the plaintive twang of “It’s Just that Simple” (with a rare lead vocal by bassist John Stirratt), the triple-guitar rave-up of “Handshake Drugs,” and the soul cries of “Theologians.”

The band has evolved into something of a mini-orchestra, with keyboardists Mikael Jorgensen and Pat Sansone coloring in the gaps between Tweedy’s vocals, Stirratt playing graceful bass lines that straddled melody and rhythm, and Kotche a whirlwind of constant invention on drums. Amid this glut of talent, guitarist Nels Cline was easily the band’s most watchable stage personality, his lean frame further exaggerated by high-water pants. Cline’s tasteful guitar parts frequently morphed into corrosive explosions that provided the show’s most striking moments, especially during the somewhat conservative main set.

Jorgensen had the best seat in the house, directly behind Cline. When the guitarist went off on “A Shot in the Arm,” wrenching feedback from his amplifier, Jorgensen joined in on the fun, wiping what looked like a dish rag violently across his keyboard to match Cline’s sonic mayhem.

As the show progressed, the band allowed more chaos and spontaneity to creep in, and a shaggy and highly appealing looseness prevailed during the show’s last half-hour. That’s been the arch of most Wilco shows for the last couple of years, and one wishes that let-it-all-hang-out attitude would show up a little earlier. During the extended encore, Tweedy and the band played with smiles – how else to pay tribute to everyone’s favorite sea sponge, SpongeBob SquarePants, on “Just a Kid”? As Cline and Sansone traded mad solos on “Hoodoo Voodoo,” they embraced their inner Jack Black by raising their guitar picks on high. There were no more gong hits, but Jorgensen supplied the next best percussion option for such a wonderfully over-the-top arena-rock moment: more cowbell.   

greg@gregkot.com

Editor's Note: Greg Kot is the author of the 2004 unauthorized biography, “Wilco: Learning How to Die.”

Check out Wilco's set list from Sunday night's show here.

Web exclusive:

 

Sponsored Link: Amazon's Wilco Store

    Wilco will be back to play in its hometown Oct. 18 at the UIC Pavilion.

        Tickets ($39.50 plus service fees) go on sale at 10 a.m. Saturday through Ticketmaster or at the UIC Pavilion box office.

        The concert marks the sextet’s first Chicago concert since the release of its latest album, “Wilco (The Album),” and also represents a leap in venue size. The UIC Pavilion, with capacity of about 9,000, more than doubles the capacity of the venues that Wilco usually plays in Chicago, such as the Auditorium Theatre.  Instead of playing multiple nights at the Auditorium, the band chose to play one night at the bigger venue.

    greg@gregkot.com

Sponsored Link: Amazon's Wilco Store

Former Wilco member Jay Bennett died of a pain-killer overdose, the Champaign County coroner said Wednesday, and his office is investigating Bennett’s death as an accident.

Tests showed Bennett died from fentanyl, often prescribed to treat chronic pain, said the coronor, Duane Northrup. Bennett, who died May 24 at his home in Urbana, Ill., had posted a few weeks earlier on his MySpace site that he would need hip-replacement surgery. 

“A decade plus of multiple nightly stage jumps and various other rock and roll theatrics had finally taken a toll that I could no longer merely deal with or ignore,” he wrote, but added that he did not have health insurance to cover costs of the surgery.

Bennett, born in northwest suburban Rolling Meadows, was a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and engineer in Wilco from 1994 to 2001, when he departed the band acrimoniously. He sued Wilco founder Jeff Tweedy in early May, claiming that he was owed royalties for songs.

greg@gregkot.com

Tribune wire services contributed to this report

Amazon's Jay Bennett Store