In Up & Coming:

Dirty Projectors, What's Up?

(Chop Suey) Portland's What's Up? create the sort of manic, netherworld pop that makes them ideal openers for Dirty Projectors. Restless, odd rhythms spasm below weirdly tuned keyboards and guitars that unpredictably billow and surge. A quasi-African notion of intonation animates the playing; songs sound like they're headed to non-Western places via the prog-rock path of most resistance. Their Content Imagination CD (on the Obey Your Brain label) is all instrumental and mostly rewarding, in a puzzling, furrow-browed way. DAVE SEGAL See also Stranger Suggests, and preview.

Derrick May, Pezzner, Nordic Soul

(Neumos) If you've never seen Derrick May work the decks, you need to catch this DJ gig at Neumos. Forgive me if I've written this before, but it bears repeating: The Detroit techno innovator is a brilliant electronic-music historian who invariably does the crucial job of educating and entertaining over multiple eras and styles; dude dropped a Pigbag cut in a fantastically polyrhythmic house and techno set last time he came through Chop Suey. Seattle's Pezzner (of Jacob London fame) is a freewheeling producer ushering minimal techno into some of the most enjoyable hot spots it's ever been taken. Fellow local Nordic Soul (Sean Horton) possesses an uncanny ability to read crowds and adapt to myriad situations, abetted by deep crates and deeper knowledge. DAVE SEGAL

Green Day, the Bravery

(KeyArena) Recently, a friend suggested that my continued, if seldom expressed, affection for Green Day's classic albums Kerplunk and Dookie was just misguided nostalgia, that these albums hadn't aged well, that my teenage tastes were just bad. While I'll concede that last point on some occasions, in this case, my friend is very, very wrong. I gave these records a spin the other day just to make sure that they were still exemplars of the East Bay pop-punk genre, and sure enough they totally rule. I lost touch with Green Day before they entered their current phase of scoring big, radio-ready, face-palmingly political mall-punk rock operas, but a quick listen to American Idiot and the new 21st Century Breakdown reveal the band have managed to take to their new role without completely embarrassing themselves. ERIC GRANDY

Valis, Stone Axe

(Comet) Featuring ex—Screaming Trees member Van Conner, Valis peddle heavy rock that's neither outwardly psychedelic nor exceptionally beautiful nor bracingly powerful enough to stand out from muscle-bound rock's middling masses. Sorry, Van. Screaming Trees wrote much better melodies, and so did Solomon Grundy, Conner's other group, for that matter. Port Orchard, Washington's Stone Axe conjure a guttural, soulful hard-rock cauldron that suggests they've absorbed their share of Humble Pie and Thin Lizzy. Singer Dru Brinkerhoff valiantly rasps in ways that make Steve Marriott and Rod Stewart comparisons seem not at all absurd. DAVE SEGAL

Octagon Control, Le Face, B-Lines, Le Shat Noir

(Funhouse) Line Out commenter (and Police Teeth guy) J. Burns pointed my internet browser in the direction of Bellingham's Octagon Control recently, and I can't thank him enough. Octagon Control remind me a whole lot of the convulsive punk rock deployed by Seattle's defunct Popular Shapes, only here the guitars are replaced by one fuzzed-out bass guitar and some spastic keyboard riffs. Everything is going about a million miles an hour, and the singer has the ideal sort of smart-assy snarl to complement the racket. Dudes currently have a split 7-inch out with Philadelphia's Doctor Scientist; here's hoping we hear some more from them in the record department soon. GRANT BRISSEY

The Fall of Troy, Black Houses, Beware of the Sea

(Sunset) Seattle's guitar-shredding, screamo-influenced trio the Fall of Troy have been very quiet this year, as they've been hiding out in the studio writing new material with Terry Date (Pantera, Deftones, Smashing Pumpkins' Zeitgeist). Tonight we'll finally be able to hear the fruits of their labor, and you folks who might've shrugged off the band in the past may want to reconsider not attending, as working with Date has uncovered a new sound for the band. Singer and guitarist Thomas Erak says people can "expect a more mature and musically pleasing Fall of Troy. The new material is a lot more grown-up. It's darker and more moody, as opposed to just being fast and wild." MEGAN SELING

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