1) I’ll be honest: I only know a few of the names – Brandon “Broke String” Burnett, Joe Savage, Johnny Mack – listed on Thursday night’s “Westside Showcase” at Randi’s 2-to-2 (3109 Alta Mere), but suffice to say, it’s a songwriter night comprised entirely of local talent, and if your tastes lean toward solo acoustic performances, you’ll probably find some new artists to get into. Not only that, I bet most of you have never been to this bar, unless you’ve popped in while waiting for a show at Tomcats West or the Rail. I went there when it was called a different name, and this dude told me a story about a guy getting a rattlesnake bite on his dick. Gotta love West Fort Worth. Never a dull moment! This is a clip of Joe Savage and Johnny Mack from a couple years ago at Keys Lounge. Were you there???
2) Daniel Pujol fans rejoice: the Nashville-based artist and musician is bringing his eponymous band to Club Dada on Friday, with Daniel Pujol-fan Joey Gorman’s Joe Gorgeous band in the opening slot. Pujol has a new, 8-song EP out called KISSES, which boasts “three poems and five rock & roll songs” (from the artist’s website). My eyes just rolled a little bit, but PUJOL the band is kinda mindbending to see live, and certainly merits inclusion in this weekly “what show should I go to list.” Here’s a PUJOL video, apparently directed by none other than Stewart Copeland:
3) Aw, who am I kidding? If you’re going out on Friday night, you’re probably going to the Chat Room instead of driving all the way to Dallas to see PUJOL, because the Chat Room is celebrating 15 years of being the city’s “8th Best Bar,” or, as I like to think of it, as the Fairmount’s unofficial rec room. The bar is toasting its 15th anniversary with performances by Burning Hotels, as well as long-time Chat Rat favorites Rest^vnt. Rest^vrant (pronounced like “restaurant”) is a Los Angeles-based electro-punk duo who now goes by the name Snakearm, but apparently they’re playing all their old tunes under their former name for the party. Like nearly all shows at the Chat Room, Friday night’s party is free. Incidentally, if you click that Burning Hotels link, it goes to a Wikipedia page about them written in Portuguese. This video is of Resavrant when they were still called Restavrant:
4) Have you been in a conversation about Fort Worth music and gotten to the part where someone mentions how underrepresented local hip hop and rappers are? I don’t know what to tell you; I know that the people who put on these shows work their asses off, and it seems like a lot of promotion goes into putting on this type of show. And yet, I bet few local music fans (or musicians, for that matter) can name more than a couple Fort Worth-based rappers. I am guilty of this, but in my defense, the only bills that have more names on them than a local hip hop show are a Jerry Warden-assembled metal concert. I fully acknowledge that failure has as much to do with laziness as it does with not really listening to hip hop – unfortunately, I have a tough time determining which artists are good and which ones are (sorry) wack. While I should give these artists the critical scrutiny reserved for genres I have more experience listening to and appreciating, the least I can do is tell people when there’s an all-hip hop event. So without further ado, if you have opinions on hip hop and rap, don’t miss Grinding at the Grotto on Saturday night, promoted by the local hip hop organizers, Broken Home Entertainment. Along with Gorilla DJ Looneytunes (and here again, I feel like an idiot, because I don’t know if “Gorilla” is an adjective or part of the DJ’s name) spinning, the following artists will be making an appearance:
5) Finally, this is less a show and more a dance party, but on Sunday, Republic Street Bar is throwing a benefit for bartender Jesse “Catfish” Flores, better known as Fish. Fish is due for a surgery that will put him out of commission for a while, and the bar is matching donations to keep him on his feet while he is unable to work. Help a dude out on Sunday by getting your groove on with DJ’d tunes and cheap drinks.
