On last fall’s MTV2 tour headlined by the Vines, it was another band from overseas that stole the show during the Providence stop at Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel. While Vines frontman Craig Nicholls was working himself into one of his now-notorious frenzies backstage, the four neo-hippies in the Music were throttling the crowd with turgid Zeppelin riffery that was set to limber dance rhythms and topped off with a vocalist who could do Robert Plant without sounding like just another Coverdale clone. This is what Whitesnake might have sounded like if they’d had any idea what made Zeppelin tick. The Music’s homonymous Capitol debut hits shelves this Tuesday, and the band is already out showcasing the material on a tour that lands at the Paradise (617-423-NEXT) in Boston, on Saturday — after which they jump on as the opening band for Coldplay’s big US tour, which makes its only New England stop at the Oakdale Theatre (203-265-1501) in Wallingford, Connecticut, next Thursday, February 27.

The Wilco documentary I Am Trying To Break Your Heart featured a particularly cruel depiction of multi-instrumentalist and songwriter Jay Bennett, who comes off in the film as such a whiny, precious, selfish brat that his off-screen firing halfway through the film seems inevitable. He didn’t last long enough in Wilco to enjoy the success of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, which just topped the Village Voice’s annual Pazz & Jop critics’ poll, but he went on to team up with singer-songwriter Edward Burch for a stripped-down disc called The Palace at 4am (Part I) (Undertow) — an album Bennett thinks so much of that he’s re-recording an acoustic version of the disc, as well as working on a proper follow-up titled The Palace at 4am (Part 2). Tonight (Thursday, February 20), Bennett and Burch are at T.T. the Bear’s Place (617-492-BEAR) in Cambridge; on Friday they’re at the Narrows Center for the Arts (508-324-1926) in Fall River.

New Haven’s major-label metalcore sensations Hatebreed seem on their way to becoming hardcore’s latest power brokers. They’re headlining above old-school lugs Biohazard at Avalon (617-423-NEXT) in Boston on Saturday and at Mass Skate (413-534-1000) in Westfield on Sunday, before returning to their home turf next Friday, February 28, at the Roxy (203-299-0175), formerly the Globe, in Norwalk, Connecticut, with Death Threat, Dead Wrong, the Distance, and With Honor. But a bigger indicator of their influence may be this: major labels haven’t been signing New York hardcore bands since the glory days of Biohazard and Sick of It All, but Queens natives Sworn Enemy are releasing their As Real As It Gets next month on Elektra. That’s thanks in part to the patronage of Hatebreed’s Jamey Jasta, who produced the album and hooked them up with Hatebreed’s high-powered label/management firm No Name (home also to Slipknot). Sworn Enemy open for the grrrl-fronted death-metal outfit Otep at the Paradise on Tuesday.

BY CARLY CARIOLI

Issue Date: February 20 - 27, 2003
Back to the Music table of contents.