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Dweezil Zappa

[ROCK] The music of Frank Zappa was, and continues to be, extremely challenging. The experimental musician wasn’t afraid to grapple with new technology, tackle heady concepts, or wrestle with complex song structures throughout his nearly four decade-long career. His son Dweezil Zappa is not, and never has been, afraid of the challenge of recreating his father’s music. Throughout his career, the now 48-yappa has presented his father’s music to new audiences, and has also used it as a jumping off point for his own original music.

Here Come the Mummies

[FUNK] A 10-piece mummy themed funk band is either going to your thing or it’s not. If this seems like it might be your thing, know that Here Come are good at what they do, which is deliver light-hearted, goofy, and tight funk-pop songs. Here Come the Mummies bring their spectacular, funky show to the Rapids Theatre for a show this Friday, April 13.

Eric Anderson

[FOLK] A Greenwich Village folk scene original who grew up in nearby Snyder, Eric Andersen, now 75, has written tunes recorded by Johnny Cash, Dylan, the Dead, Linda Ronstadt, Judy Collins and many others. He even appeared in an Andy Warhol factory film, and is often used as an interview subject in films about the work of his contemporaries. All the while, he’s maintained a fairly low profile for himself, quietly releasing some 35 albums along the way.

Tommy Emmanuel and Suzy Bogguss

[COUNTRY] A bona fide star in Australia and a bit of a Chet Atkins protégé, guitarist Tommy Emmanuel has spent his career honing his own brand of Travis picking—a finger picking style that allows you to simulate bass lines, chords, melodies and harmonies simultaneously, using the thumb and fingers of the right hand. Emmanuel also makes percussive use of his instrument, striking harmonics and slapping the wood in different places to emit particular drum-like sounds.

Moose Blood

[EMO] We all know that emo is still alive and well, and Moose Blood attests to its presence in the UK. Coming over from Canterbury, Kent, the quartet is brandishing it’s punk-pop chops for American audiences in support of Blush, which came out last summer on the L.A.

Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo

[ROCK] So, for anyone that might be wondering: it has, essentially, always been “Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo.” Benatar, now 65, met Giraldo while she was on the cusp of recording her stellar 1979 debut, In the Heat of the Night. He was dating Linda Blair at the time, she was in the process of getting divorced. There’s no denying, and Benatar is the first to admit: it was the energy he brought to re-working her demos for the album that really shaped the sound we came to associate with Pat Benatar in the heady years of stardom that followed.

Dan's Dragon

Artist Dan Galas’s current project is a 100-foot-long functional sculpture dragon. To function as a Burmese gourd tunnel, an arbor-like structure—but in this case in the shape of a dragon—for growing gourds and other types of vegetables and fruits, hanging gardens fashion. To be situated on part of a large plot of open land—several contiguous city lots—on the East Side, on which refugee assistance organization Journey’s End now operates a community garden.

Spotlight Mary Grace Sullivan

In her performance project, Feedback Loop: Art practices in constraint, artist and dancer Mary Grace Sullivan, a 32-year-old MFA dance student at the University at Buffalo, examines the relationship between the constrained and the unconstrained, as well as the surveilled and the surveillers. What does it mean to be watched? What does it mean to be put into a box or on a stage? Feedback Loop examines these ideas through improvisational interpretive dance that’s influenced by those who are watching it.

Book Launch: Where the Streets Are Paved With Rust

[BOOK LAUNCH] This event is a twofer. First, it’s a party marking the publication of a new collection of essays by The Public’s Bruce Fisher, comprised primarily of Fisher’s columns for this newspaper and illustrated with a stunning selection of artwork from the collection of the Burchfield Penney Art Center. (That is to say, it’s a book full of smart, thoughtful consideration of politics and policy surrounded by beautiful art.

Boom Days

[FESTIVAL] It’s springtime in Buffalo, and naturally our thoughts turn to ice: to great swaths of churning river ice, set loose at last to rush toward the Niagara Falls, freeing our riparian city of its chilling effect. It is time for Boom Days, the annual celebration marking the removal of the ice boom that prevents lake and Buffalo River ice from clogging the intakes of the Niagara Falls power turbines. This year’s festival has grown out of its usual habitat at Silo City to encompass the entirety of the old First Ward neighborhood.

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