“When I die, gimme six crap-shootin’ pall-bearers / Chorus girls, sing me a song / Put a red-hot jazz band at the top of my head / Hallelujah as we roll along.”

The question of how to dispose of my mortal remains has weighed on me of late. Raised Baptist and Episcopalian by turns—with a meager annuity of Judaism courtesy of certain paternal relatives—I’ve since strayed from the path of righteousness into the turpid thickets of cohabitation and Crescent City blues. Which means, of course, that for this agno-mystic, ruminations on divine judgment and soul-transposition present thickets of their own—as does the cadaverous question that opens this paragraph.
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I know you lost your 401K. Times are hard. The stock market is currently going all screwy. It’s time to invest in the one thing that never loses its value: Vinyl LPs.

Legendary Jazz Hero Tom Porter is hosting a massive vinyl sale in the back of his house located at 1435 Chapin Street NW. The sale is on Saturday (tomorrow!) from 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. and will include jazz, soul, and hip-hop vinyl, posters, books, CDs, and clothes.

Porter will be selling tons of vinyl and will be joined by two more sellers. So make plenty of time in your schedules for some serious crate digging. I was over at Porter’s house last night and got to peek at his records. I saw plenty of Charlie Parker, Roy Ayers, Nina Simone, and so on. Much of his stash will be selling for $2, $3, Porter says. Also, expect to see a few Blue Note LPs as well! (I spotted a mint Grant Green).

Feeling down about the financial mess? “Help is on the way,” Porter says.

So show up!

French-American pianist Jacky Terrasson’s most recent album is 2007’s Mirror, one of the best discs of last year and his first as a solo performer. I wrote at its release that the album “takes a step toward a more progressive school of playing, perhaps because there’s no rhythm section keeping him back…Terrasson hasn’t made a hard left turn, yet he still breaks away from the mainstream he’s long strained against.”

But if the album allows Terrasson to be more of an adventurer, it also casts him in a much more intimate setting…one that will be wildly magnified by seeing him in an intimate venue like the Bohemian Caverns. Terrasson will be performing there tonight and tomorrow with no band, no rhythm section, just himself and the piano. The show is sponsored by the Alliance Française of Washington and is $32 a pop. An expensive ticket, but a wonderful and renowned performer—so expect a crowd.

Berklee-trained neo-psychedelic rockers Apollo Sunshine play tonight at DC9 before heading to London for a European tour. Their sound is a throwback to ‘60s-era underground pop/rock, combining big fuzz with eclectic orchestration. Their songs swell with wah-wah and bounce with heavy echo and break into bouts of chaos, blending the Violent Femmes and the Kinks—a refreshing change for a moment saturated with formulaic indie dance bands. As Sam Cohen recently told Paste: “We were much more imagining things, considering all possibilities, and that led to, ‘you know what’d be great here is a whole string section, or a bunch of horns,’ and just going for it and indulging in every far-out idea we had.”

The show starts at 9 p.m.; tickets are $12.

Anyone familiar with Brooklyn-based experimental folk outfit Grizzly Bear noticed a new sound emerging from their performance of two unreleased songs on KCRW and Letterman; the songs kept their charming reverb and signature vocal harmonizations, but they departed from the dissonance and sound experimentation that marked Horn of Plenty and Yellow House. With the newest Grizzly Bear album still in production, singer-guitarist Daniel Rossen has just released In Ear Park with Department of Eagles, a project Rossen started while an undergrad at NYU. With production by fellow Grizzly Bear Chris Taylor, the album reflects the band’s later work—it’s grounded in a more radio-friendly, pop-infused style but still evokes the choruses and multi-instrumental collaborations that are Grizzly Bear’s trademark. Check out their performance last week on Late Night With Conan O’Brien:

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The Residents performed their latest musical/theatrical concept, “The Bunny Boy,” at a seated 9:30 Club show last night—our resident Residents expert, Mike West, has posted a review, but here are the images. Click on any image for a bigger version, or see lots more here at Flickr.

The Residents don’t do “concerts.” I recently compared their live show to “avant-garde cabaret.” Last night’s, however, was closer to a one-man musical—well, with a video monitor over the stage. The Bunny Boy webisodes can be seen at home on YouTube, but here they were fused with the music and new revelations to the story, making them infinitely more compelling.

The Singing Resident played the Bunny Boy, explaining the mysterious circumstances behind his brother Harvey’s disappearance on the Greek island of Patmos. He’s a terrible actor, particularly in the YouTube videos, but better onstage because of his commanding presence. In the first act he skulked around under a scraggly beard and a cape, raving like King Lear. After intermission, he popped out wearing a head-to-toe bunny costume (he “hoped it would be more entertaining”). It’s hard to take your eyes from a middle-aged man with untamed beard, horn-rimmed glasses, and a bunny suit.

The show’s lighting designer deserves an award. The stage was a mosaic of colored light and shadows, executed so that even when the Singer showed his whole face, he wasn’t entirely visible. (We got some tantalizing views in the second act, though by then the bunny suit disguised him.) A photographer friend pointed out how it used a red-and-blue color scheme that distorted perspective like 3-D glasses.

The music itself was full of weird, often ugly tunes and electronic voicings. But just as the onstage drama was better than its YouTube version, the onstage music was better than the CD. The band (at stage left) inserted fresh layers of sound into songs like “The Secret Room” and “My Nigerian Friend,” and a new clarity to “Secret Messages” (the best track of both album and concert). There were even new songs: the show opened with a tune probably titled “I Have a Story to Tell,” and ended with at least two others that aren’t on the album. The music functioned in the service of the story, but it may have been even more successful on its own terms.

See Brandon Wu’s post to see photos from the show.

In support of the third volume of Tompkins Square’s fantastic Imaginational Anthem series devoted to compelling interpretations of the acoustic guitar, three performers from the latest compilation will make a stop at the Velvet Lounge tonight: Ben Reynolds, Cian Nugent and George Stavis. Released in April, Imaginational Anthem, Vol. 3 highlights a stellar cast of performers past and present, bending time, technique and tradition through a powerful kaleidoscope of acoustic compositions.

The tour is the first U.S. expedition for both Reynolds and Nugent, hailing from Glasgow and Dublin respectively. Reynolds has been rather prolific over the past several years, releasing a smattering of his own solo material among collaborations with fellow UK outfits—most recently with Alex Neilson’s Trembling Bells. April’s release of Volume 3 also coincided with Reynolds’ latest full-length, Two Wings, for Portland imprint Strange Attractors Audio House.

At just 19, Nugent has already caused a stir with his take on pre-war blues and Takoma style; his debut EP was recorded with large reel to reel machines, infusing his sound with the crackle of an old 78.

At the other end of the experience spectrum is George Stavis, who originally released his debut full-length of peculiar banjo compositions, Labryinths, back in 1969. The tour marks his first string of public performances in decades. Check the MP3 below for a cut off his lost treasure, which is also his contribution to Imaginational Anthem.

It’s hard to think of a more appropriate stop for the tour than D.C.—childhood home of John Fahey (he grew up in Takoma Park, graduated with degree in Philosophy from American) and technical birthplace of the American Primitive school of guitar that he fathered. Tompkins Square itself is dedicated to exploring the American Primitive tradition, and has released several records by emerging young talents like James Blackshaw side by side with reissued material from folk icon Robbie Basho. The label is set to release full-lengths by both Reynolds and Nugent in early 2009, and has already made the Imaginational Anthem series available as a beautiful box set. Essential listening for Fahey fans and acoustic enthusiasts alike.

DOWNLOAD: George Stavis, “Goblins”

As promised, some stills and vids from Friday night:

La Timbistica:

Chopteeth:

Fertile Ground:

…and the Chopteeth videos…

“Struggle“:

Nice horn bit:

Trouble viewing? Check out the YouTube versions here and here.