LucaBrasi
LucaBrasi's second full-length album, The Norris Division, out last November, used melodic pop touches to soften the band's hard-rock edge. Singer Matt McInerney can scream with the best of them, but his voice turns out to be most effective when he's actually, you know, singing, and the single "Turned Around" is downright catchy. The quintet is filled out by Jerry Jost on guitar, Mike Jost on drums, Josiah Werner on bass and Bill Reiter on keyboards. (RFT)
9:30 p.m., The Side Bar
Greek Fire
Radio-ready rock quartet Greek Fire features Story of the Year's Ryan Phillips and Philip Sneed. Since the band formed in May 2009, its profile has continued to rise on the strength of hard-to-pigeonhole tunes and strong songwriting. Greek Fire incorporates the best bits of classic rock and '80s-era rock and metal; its music hints at Queen's pristine vocal and harmonic layering, Cheap Trick's driving power-pop and KSHE riff heroes. Greek Fire has a three-song sampler EP for sale at shows, and its official debut single, "Doesn't Matter Anyway," came out in March. (AZ)
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Machree
Much has been written about Machree's genre-defying balancing act, but those who analyze the band's progressive rock through a microscope might miss the grand scheme behind its shape shifting. Every influence that materializes in a Machree tune is boiled down to its dramatic extract and reassembled with cinematic purpose. "Vulchurch," the A-side from the band's recent seven-inch, sets up mystery with Patrick Baum's opening line: "I came in the front door, but I left out the back way." The song maximizes confusion with a math-rock scatter of drum hits. New-wave synths overshadow the band's propulsion with an uncertain fog, and a metal-inspired bridge gives the already conflicted tune a climax worthy of scoring a fight scene. It doesn't much matter how many genres Machree fits into its cauldron when the final product is so organic, seamless and deliberate. (RW)
8:15 p.m., RFT Outdoor Stage at 11th & Washington
Sine Nomine
While it is comforting that DIY-minded trio Sine Nomine appears content staying in the deepest realms of the underground, it's also a damn shame. The group's full-throttle 2011 album, Super Molecular Dust Separator, is the record that millions of disenfranchised, Metallica-raised teenagers worldwide don't realize they need to hear. The record is heavy and artistic and effortless. Thrashy screams share space with spoken dialogues (best line: "Fuck your insurance"), visceral gut-punches are layered with intellectual depth, and sensory-overloaded repetition draws dangerously close to hypnosis. In a perfect world, Super would be as influential to the heavy-handed bands of 2020 as Botch's We Are the Romans is to today's crop. Instead, Sine Nomine is likely to remain St. Louis' most triumphant little secret. (RW)
There's a Killer Among Us
For over a decade this combustible quartet has been creating a highly toxic brand of heavy rock defined by fragmented melody and discordant guitar wizardry. Too art damaged to fly the post-hardcore banner and too fragile to be classified as metal, its fusion of different influences meld into an unholy coalescence. Parallel to the likes of Colossamite and Murder in the Red Barn, TAKAU's sound is characterized by lyrics laced with anxiety and dejection combating hallucinatory guitar work and hyperactive percussion. This is dysfunctionality at its finest. (JL)
BEST NATIONAL BAND
Bunnygrunt
You'll find two disparate things on Bunnygrunt's Facebook page: One is the world's most vague bio, which sums up the band's eighteen years thusly: "Matt [Harnish] and Karen [Ried] liked some of the same bands, so they formed a band together to rip them off. Then some other stuff happened." The other is a meticulous list, compiled by Harnish, of every show the band has ever played, organized by year, since 1993. But for a band that has shuffled its members more than a dealing shoe, it has remained true to its sunny-punky sound and animated performances. The band's latest seven-inch, Lady, You Just Got Von Damaged! is no exception. (RFT)
10:45 p.m., Hair of the Dog
Bottle Rockets
Nearly twenty years after its inception, the Bottle Rockets has managed to create music that remains as vibrant as ever. Songwriter Brian Henneman's matter-of-fact social commentary on Midwest life is as frank as it ever has been. Now he's added a wiser, albeit salty, sense of cynicism. The back-porch storytelling over blues-drenched guitar licks have helped define the Bottle Rockets as the quintessential Americana rock band. And after spending the early part of the year serving as backup for Marshall Crenshaw, one has to wonder if Crenshaw's British invasion-infused soul has found a way to creep into TBR's reliably defined sound. (MD)
Story of the Year
The year of Story of the Year was 2003. The post-grunge upstarts released Page Avenue on Maverick Records, a subsidiary of Warner Brothers, and the world outside of St. Louis began to take notice. The brooding but somehow exhilarating singles "Anthem of Our Dying Day" and "Until the Day I Die" had enough crunch and angst for the Warped Tour demographic and were just hooky enough to appeal to Green Day fans. But the band's ace in the hole has always been its anthems, the way it makes emo seem less about the individual obsessions of a charismatic singer like Dan Marsala and more about a world bigger than all the hardcore genres put together. In the eight years since Page Avenue, Story of the Year has continued to develop. Last year's The Constant made a play for the arena on a suite of bold — sometimes power pop, sometimes full-out metal — raves. (RK)
