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Team spirit
Team Sleep awakens, plus Pinback at the Paradise and more
BY CARLY CARIOLI
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Any anticipation that still existed regarding Deftones singer Chino Moreno’s side project Team Sleep likely evaporated about three years ago, when the group’s debut album was already about three years behind schedule. Back in 2000, though, it seemed pretty ballsy for the frontdude in new metal’s most promising band to declare that he wanted to sound like Björk and Billie Holiday. On Team Sleep (Maverick), Moreno does indeed have a few diva moments, in settings that hint at glitchy indietronica and trip-hop. Even with Hella’s Zach Hill on drums, and production help from big-money metal guys Ross Robinson and Terry Date, Moreno is at times breathy enough to pass for the louche, cigarette-smoking dame who graces the album cover; and when he isn’t, he makes way for guest vocalists Mary Timony, of Helium fame, and Rob Crow, of Pinback, who appear on a half-dozen tracks. Crow and Moreno mesh really well — perhaps too well for those fans on the Deftones’ message board who’ve been discussing the topic "Team Sleep should have been Rob Crow’s side project." Tonight (May 26), Crow brings Pinback to the Paradise (617-562-8800) in Boston behind last year’s slow-burning Summer in Abaddon (Touch and Go). Moreno brings Team Sleep to the same room on Saturday, and to the Webster Theatre (860-525-5553) in Hartford on Memorial Day. If it seems odd for a major-label metal frontman to be dabbling in indie rock, it’s downright freakish to find the drummer in a major-label emo-prog band dreaming of hip-hop cred. Just don’t tell Coheed and Cambria’s Joshua Eppard, who’s performing as Weerd Science, his indie-rap alter ego. Weerd’s debut album, Friends and Nervous Breakdowns (on his own Super Rap Records — does Grandmaster Flash know about this?), may leave him with less of the former and more of the latter, but he’s supporting it with gigs tonight (May 26) at the Living Room (401-521-5200) in Providence, Friday at 242 Main (802-862-2244) in Burlington, and Saturday at the International Community Church (617-782-8120) in Allston. He’d better have his heckle comebacks ready, since he’ll be opening for New England old-school hardcore thugs Bane. We’ve long held that it isn’t the solstice but the legendary Dick Dale who brings springtime to New England. He starts his annual visit Saturday at the Middle East (617-864-EAST) in Cambridge on a surf-and-sand bill with ex-Kyuss dude Brant Bjork, then hits the Iron Horse (413-584-0610) in Northampton on Sunday before going on to a Memorial Day outing at the Wellfleet Beachcomber (508-349-6055) on Cape Cod.
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