Jenny Lewis plays the Showbox at the Market tonight with the Sadies and Mimicking Birds. In this week's music section Ned Lannamann interviewed the singer about her new record and life on the road:

There's a lot of moment-following on Lewis's latest, Acid Tongue, an alternately precise and ramshackle record that dips into country, soul, and blues-rock with plenty of verve if little sense of risk. More than anything, it feels like a series of pastiches; opener "Black Sand" should by all rights be a show tune, while "The Next Messiah" strings together three disparate song fragments into a medley. "That's the most exciting one to play on the road," she says. "It feels really different from when I toured for Rabbit Fur Coat—there was nothing that gritty and up-tempo.

"I think second tours on any record are always more fun," continues Lewis, who did a brief tour on the heels of Acid Tongue's release last year. "As a performer, I treat every night like it's a play, and I take certain cues that allow me to free up vocally. I always want to be a little more spontaneous, but there's just something about the repetition that inspires me. It's weird. It really allows me to get to new places every night if I know where the set is going."

Also tonight, J Dilla's album-release party with DJs Topspin, Marc Sense, and Rev. Shines at the War Room. Larry Mizell says:

Hyperbole time: J Dilla Changed My Life. Well, at the very least he enhanced the shit out of it. I know that phrase is almost synonymous with the dorky hiphop-message-board tryhards' favorite T-shirt (and yes, I got one too—I hear the hipsters call that irony), but James "Jay Dee/J Dilla" Yancey legitimately blew minds worldwide during his too-short life, mine included. How, you ask? Well, I definitely recall the moment I went from "this guy's fucking amazing" to "this guy is God and he's actually speaking to me": when I first popped in Welcome 2 Detroit and heard his celestial cover of Donald Byrd's "Think Twice," a tune my father cowrote and produced. Who cares, right? Well, you asked.

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Tonight, against Dave Segal's good advice, Prodigy plays the WaMu theater.

Also available for your enjoyment:

Black Celebration, Fascination Street, Love Vigilantes, This Charming Band
(Showbox at the Market) This would-be faux-'80s extra-mopey mini-Woodstock brings together four bands that play the music of other bands: Depeche Mode, the Cure, New Order, and the Smiths, respectively. I'm tempted to say "pretend it's 1985," except these bands would've never shared a stage in 1985. So pretend it's heaven, with '80s-themed cover bands, and hope no one takes their roles too seriously (I'm looking at you, fake Robert Smith and fake Morrissey). Also: The order of acts above also functions as a perfect worst-to-best listing of the source bands. (Though perhaps the last two should switch places.) DAVID SCHMADER

DaKAH Hip Hop Orchestra, Project Lionheart, the Let Go
(Neumos) Unlike the Reggae Philharmonic Orchestra of the '80s, daKAH Hip Hop Orchestra, which is based in Los Angeles, is an actual orchestra. It has a big sound, lots of horns, strings, and all sorts of percussion. The orchestra has 60 professional musicians and is led by Geoff "Double G" Gallegos, a composer and saxophonist trained at Boston's Berklee College of Music. The music, however, is so big that it works much better with soul singers than rappers. The feelings expressed by a singer tend to be universal, where as those expressed by a rapper tend to be very personal. The singularity of the rapper is easily overwhelmed by soaring strings and a thriving jungle of beats. Nevertheless, it's worth checking out the show for no other reason than to see and hear giant hiphop. CHARLES MUDEDE

Truckasauras, Pica Beats
(Healthy Times Fun Club) Local teens are hosting a fundraising concert for 826 Seattle, the nonprofit, free-for-students writing center started by Dave Eggers. Those kooky kids, they've named the show YUSOFYNE. Is that gangsta? A retro throwback to "Oh Mickey"? I'll tell you what it is: It's MISSPELLED. Thing is, I'm a volunteer tutor at 826, so I don't care that the headliners are top-quality locals Truckasauras and Pica Beats, or that The Stranger's own Michaelangelo Matos will be at 826's Greenwood center earlier in the day to dole out free writing advice to budding writers ages 14 to 18, because I'm too hung up on the spelling. Where'd I lead you guys astray? Still, I'll attend and hope that my $5 pays to teach my students how to write in freaking English. SAM MACHKOVECH

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Local techno crew Knightriders are throwing an audio-visual spectacular tonight in honor of SIFF, whose film-bedazzled attendees they hope to lure to Re-bar so they can indoctrinate them to the secret knowledge of metronomic beats traveling at 128+ per minute. Killing Frenzy will provide the images while Red Pony (aka Rebecca West) will deliver a live performance of techno, and DJs Struggle (Made Like a Tree) and Travis Baron (Knightriders) will tagteam on the decks, as will wife/husband duo Saigon and Justin Byrnes under the name Tandem House. And much-loved spirit-lifter DJ Eddie will be spinning records from his vast, impeccable collection.

SIFF goers: You’re going to need to unwind after a long, grueling day of cinema absorbing. Final Cut can help you do that.

Re-bar, 1114 Howell St, 10 pm-2 am, $9 with SIFF ticket stub/$12 without, 21+.

Jesus Christ on a crostini, there's a lot of stuff happening tonight: a Critical Mass ride, Shepard Farey spinning at the War Room, U.S.E. and Throw Me the Statue at Neumo's, Mad Rad at the Comet, the gay stylings of Comeback at Chop Suey... And, except for the bike ride, all of that's within an eight-block radius. Something's gotta go. I'm looking at you, U.S.E/Throw Me the Statue. It's not that I don't love you. But one can only be in so many places at once.

(A note to Mad Rad haters everywhere: If you think Mad Rad coverage in The Stranger has been too much lately, you better stop reading The Stranger, because between Buffalo Madonna climbing onto the roof of the stage at Sasquatch, the fact that Stranger campers at Sasquatch listened to Mad Rad's White Gold on repeat through Lindy West's car's speakers while dancing in the red glow of Lindy West's brake lights, and the scarcity of Mad Rad shows ever since the trio got banned from almost every club in town, a bunch of us have graduated our liking of Mad Rad into full-on love. And you know how love is.)

is the Get Off! They were mistakenly left off the listings in this week's paper, they look and sound like this:

Mad Rad and the Tempers are also on the bill. It starts at 9 pm and costs $7 at the door.

Gun Outfit play Easy Street Records tonight—Eric Grandy introduces us to the band in this week's music section:

Something of that posture still exists in Gun Outfit—not the screaming or flailing, but the shrugging and smirking. Sharp sings about dead-end drudgery ("Work Experience"), bad feelings ("Guilt and Regret"), deprivation ("In the Dark"), and refusal ("Had Enough," "Your Will"), all in a tunefully deadpan baritone. When he sings, "Want to feel good all the time/Feeling good is feeling... fine," there's a sardonic, slightly sly inflection to the last syllable, as if wanting to feel good were just so pedestrian. Keith acts as a counterbalance with her relatively airy and earnest vocal presence, and it all plays out over lively drumming and surprisingly bright, catchy guitar melodies.

Also tonight, via this week's Stranger Suggests:

Chain and the Gang, the Hive Dwellers
Tonight, two titans of left-field indie rock, Calvin Johnson and Ian Svenonius, debut their new bands for Seattle. Chain and the Gang are another round of radical funk and soul power from Svenonius, the former Make Up frontman, although more musically minimal than that project—often just a loose bass line and a beat, but with just as absurdist-political lyrics. Their debut, Down with Liberty... Up with Chains!, is his finest album in years. Johnson's the Hive Dwellers feature the same players as Chain and the Gang, including former Saturday Knights guitarist/organist Brian Weber. (The Vera Project, Seattle Center, 956-8372. 7:30 pm, $9/$8 with club card, all ages.) by ERIC GRANDY

And now, a few picks via Up & Comings:

Built to Spill, Ra Ra Riot
(UW HUB Lawn, 3 pm) Just two weeks ago, the UW hosted Lawnapalooza—a free show on the lawn in front of the Husky Union Building with Hey Marseilles, Telekinesis, and the Cave Singers. "Why don't they do this more often?" I wondered. And wouldn't you know, the UW is doing it again! This time the show features Built to Spill and Ra Ra Riot, and once again it's totally free. Plus, it starts at 3:00 p.m. (the last one started at 11:30 a.m., and who goes to a rock show—even an outdoor rock show—before noon?), so it should be easier to excuse yourself from the office or class or the unemployment line to enjoy Ra Ra Riot's new-wave tinged orchestral pop and Built to Spill's classic Built to Spilliness. MEGAN SELING

Pela, U.S.E, Iran, Throw Me the Statue
(Neumos) Pela are a very likable indie-rock band from Brooklyn fronted by a handsome high-school dropout. The bass player (met while busking in the subway) is classically trained, as is the guitarist/keyboardist. Their MySpace profile photo happens to be a Polaroid of one of them holding a guitar in front of the Space Needle. Their rock is of the sweet, happy, pleasant-music-to-listen-to school, which makes them perfect for a bill that also features U.S.E (electro-pop dance anthems about unapologetic love for the Emerald City) and Throw Me the Statue (an extraordinarily pleasant bunch of guys from the Central District who sometimes throw in a horn section). CHRISTOPHER FRIZZELLE

Mad Rad, the Tempers, DJ Darwin
(Comet) This just in: The Comet is a great place to see a show, particularly if the act you're seeing has a reputation for being feral. Mad Rad weren't raised by wolves per se, but they do seem a little unable to play by the rules. Their hiphop only barely sounds like hiphop. Their songs have all sorts of extra stuff in them—airplanes flying overhead, Santigold-ish wailing that turns out to be one of the guys' falsetto. They are three white guys in colorful clothes. There will be jumping around. Tables will be stood on. Things will be spilled. CHRISTOPHER FRIZZELLE

Conservative Dad, Pablo Trucker, the Torn ACLs
(Sunset) Tonight's show is an EP release for Seattle's own Conservative Dad. Didn't they just have an EP-release show three months ago? They did. Following the release of their debut full-length last year, the band decided to record four EPs over the course of 2009 to "make a snapshot of our songwriting every three months." While their mellow full-length sounds similar to mid-era Death Cab for Cutie (the guitar work of We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes, the hooks of The Photo Album), their first EP of the year, Mechanical (released in March), has a bit more bite. I like that side of them—the more assertive, less romantic daydreamer side. But don't get too attached. They promise May's EP will be "very different." That's the whole point of the project, after all. MEGAN SELING

Thee Emergency, Strong Killings, Sugar Sugar Sugar
(Funhouse) It's a bummer that Strong Killings haven't been playing out quite as often lately, but the relative downtime has been for a good cause: They're finally hunkered down in a studio and making a record (it's about time, dudes). According to drummer Mike Loggins, the album will be a self-titled long-player with 12 songs, recorded by Justin Cronk at the Toy Box studio, and it's due out sometime in late summer on Don't Stop Believin' Records. Shit, sounds like cause for celebration. Add to the equation a lineup including Thee Emergency—another Seattle outfit decidedly on top of its game—and Bellingham low-end scuz rockers Sugar Sugar Sugar, and we've got ourselves an appropriate party. GRANT BRISSEY

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