Yr. Weekend, Pt. 1, er 2: football, etc. + Hoofprints + Valens + Paper Route + A Thousand Colours + Fire Moth + WAR + More

Sorry for skipping most of this week, folks; spent the last few days with the fam, so y’know… Trying to make up for lost time somewhat now, all while juggling cleaning the house for a big-ass neighborhood party tomorrow (which we’ve just learned will probably have to be inside, rather than outside like we’d planned). Happily, there’s some damn good stuff going on tonight, Saturday, July 6th:

Valens/Pswingset/football, etc./Hoofprints @ Mango’s ($8)
This one’s the highlight for me, honestly, being the grown-up emo kid I generally am… I’ve heard good things about out-of-towners Pswingset, but the real draw, for me, is the other three bands, all of whom are locals.

{football, etc.} is flat-out one of the coolest emo bands I’ve heard in a decade or so, with frontwoman Lindsay Minton‘s warbly, impassioned-yet-low-key vocals and thoughtful lyrics, plus that awesome guitar sound, just rough enough and never breakneck-speed. They’ve got a recent split-7″ out with Brits Plaid, with whom they’ll be touring the UK next month, and they apparently recorded their second full-length this past March; looking forward to hearing it soon…

Then there’s {Hoofprints}, a splinter off the sadly-gone Stadium rock and a cool, cool indie-rock monster in its own right — their late-2012 EP, Secretly Destroying Honesty, is damn good, seriously. And headlining the night (I think) is newish outfit {Valens}, who I talked up a bit (along with Hoofprints) earlier this year. They do some freaking great indie-pop-punk stuff that’s got a nice, nice roar to it.

Paper Route/Halfnoise/A Thousand Colours @ Fitzgerald’s
And again, the non-Houstonians take a back seat to the locals… Don’t get me wrong: I actually like Tennesseeans Paper Route quite a bit, with their ultra-melodic, semi-soulful indie-pop sound, but I’ve been seriously itching to hear more from {A Thousand Colours} for quite a while now; singer/guitarist Paul Pelc has one of the best damn voices in town, and his band does dreamy, mesmerizing, harmony-vocal-filled post-emo rock like nothing I’ve heard since Elliott’s heyday, and that’s not a comparison I make lightly.

Check out the band’s brand-new EP, The River, right here:

Fire Moth/Darwin’s Finches @ The Continental Club
Two bands I’ve seriously been meaning to give some more attention to for a long, long, long (esp. in the case of Darwin’s Finches) time now. sigh. {Fire Moth} used to be called Blackie Dammett, and in that incarnation, at least, they were a cool, rough-edged rootsy band; the Finches, for that part, have been strange and funky and intense when I’ve (briefly) heard ’em in the past. Get on out to The Continental Club to hear more.

WAR @ Miller Outdoor Theatre
Oh, yes. Granted, it is hot as fuck outside right now, but there’s a part of me that’d seriously love to go hang out on the grass at Miller Outdoor Theatre while ’70s pop-funk legends WAR rip through “Me And Baby Brother” and “Why Can’t We Be Friends?” under the blistering H-town sun.

Runners-Up:
Brutalfest, featuring 8ETRIBE, Mike Terror, The Razorblade Dolls, EraseTheVirus, Necrotic Priapism, Sever The Silence, A Day Of Bloodshed, Opulent, Dead Trip, Sirenicide, Behelit, Entrenched Defilement, Beyond All Deception, & Myra Maybelle @ Numbers (4PM-1AM)
Super Summer Smashup, featuring Prince Cobra, Nikkhoo, FLCON FCKER, Josiah Gabriel, Leckie, Dapper Dan, & Brandon West @ 2010 Commerce
Concrete Violin/Zahava/Last Rape/Inhalant/TEF/Steel Hook Prosthesis/Kai-ros/Aunt’s Analog/Endless Blinding Sunshine/Ascites/Muzak/Annoysters/Black Leather Jesus @ Super Happy Fun Land
Morgue City/Finding Reason/Love Knife @ Rudyard’s
The Ugly Beats @ The Big Top