The No. 1 album in the country this week is by the biggest band on Earth. All is right with the world? Well, hold that thought. Unlike textural forbears U2 and Radiohead, much less the Clash or Nirvana, most people even willing to concede that Coldplay is a relevant force do not think it has made great albums. A Rush of Blood to the Head was very good, and surprisingly spiky when it wanted to be (which was not often), while X&Y and Parachutes were singles-plus-other-stuff. Viva La Vida was Something Different, sort of. It had a huge title hit and will almost certainly age better than Zooropa (played "Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car" lately?). But Eno's not exactly Nigel Godrich these days. Where does that leave Mylo Xyloto, which is allegedly named after the protagonists in a probably total bullshit storyline? With Coldplay's best reviews since Rush. Let's test them.
"Mylo Xyloto"
I'm sucker for the title-tune fakeout trick. Remember when you finally got to "Birds" on Quasi's Featuring "Birds" and it was literally just a minute of recorded birds? This isn't as fun.
"Weird Al" Yankovic
Nov. 6, 2011
Fox Theater, Oakland
Better than: Being a nerd in high school.
First, "Weird Al" Yankovic turned Lady Gaga's "Poker Face" into a pop-skewering polka. Then, he ribbed Taylor Swift with a song called "TMZ," about public obsession with the minutiae of celebrities' lives. (It was a perfect copy of Swift's hit "You Belong With Me," with only the lyrics changed.) Then he showed a fake interview with Eminem in which the rapper told Weird Al that his parody of "Lose Yourself" "was repetitive and it sucks."
"I could only change the words," Weird Al rejoined to Eminem in the video, as the theater erupted in laughter. "I couldn't change the music, too."
Is there a better antidote to the self-assured mindlessness of pop than the 52-year-old Weird Al? For much of his more than two-hour show at the Fox on Sunday, it felt as if the curly-haired, Hawaiian-shirted parodist was taking revenge on behalf of the smart, the shy, and yes, the nerdy. He was dragging the cool, pretty kids out into the light, exposing them for the airheads they usually are. And of course, he was also besting them at their own game, regurgitating three decades' worth of pop blockbusters as biting parodies laced with laugh lines and performed in ridiculous costumes.
Carl Craig
Nov. 4, 2011
A church in Oakland
Better than: Not seeing Carl Craig.
Few things compel me to drive around canvassing churches in Oakland at midnight. Yet that's exactly what I found myself doing last Friday as Avalon and I cruised down that city's wide boulevards in search of a secret party (at a church) featuring Detroit techno heavyweight Carl Craig.
We finally settled on a dilapidated Baptist church that had the least shady looking people standing out front. Walking up to the gated door, a shadow called to us from the dark, "You here for the party?" And, with a quick exchange of credentials, we knew we had found the right place.
Inside, we entered to find a small apartment decorated with what appeared to be the fallout from a shopping spree at Spencers: beanbags on the floor, a giant butterfly on the wall, and a truly impressive collection of plasma spheres. Immediately the vibe was friendly, with people in good spirits hanging out and talking in the front room. We walked through a small hallway, up some stairs, and opened a wooden door to enter the nave. Immediately the energy inside sucked us through.
Das Racist
Danny Brown
Trackademicks
Boots Riley
Nov. 4, 2011
Ruby Skye
Better than: A typical night at Ruby Skye.
Don't blame Das Racist. The words "Ruby Skye" didn't bode well for a successful hip hop show at a club known for pedaling desensitized four-on-the-floor thump to a roomful of slithery homunculi and their glossy, well-medicated brethren. The 8 p.m. billing seemed awfully early, but any available space at the venue's entrance and box office were used to issue stern warnings that the show would be vacated by any means necessary come 10 p.m., at which time the venue's regular denizens would be taking back the place.
Initially the idea seem inspired. What better way for the sardonic trio to up the irony than play at Tiesto's usual San Francisco haunt? Unfortunately, it soon became apparent that the members of Das Racist weren't in on the joke -- especially when their microphones stopped working.
Wild Flag
Drew Grow and the Pastors' Wives
Nov. 4, 2011
Great American Music Hall
Better than: FM 107.7 The Bone -- usually.
Wild Flag played its fifth-ever live show in San Francisco almost a year ago, for a sold-out, ecstatic crowd at Bottom of the Hill. At the time, singer/guitarist Carrie Brownstein modestly told the audience that her first musical project since breaking up Sleater-Kinney was "just up here learning how to be a band."
Twelve months later, after these Pacific Northwest indie rock vets put out one of the year's best guitar records and played dozens more live dates, San Francisco got a chance to see what kind of band Wild Flag has learned to be. Friday's performance at Great American Music Hall, the first of two nights, was more polished and more subdued than last year's raucous performance, but more celebratory, and every bit as satisfying as that first show.
