LITTLEWOMENKURTWEISMANPETERBONOSCHRISCOOPER

At Hampshire Tavern, 9pm, February 9:

LITTLE WOMEN - myspace.com/littlewomensounds
(live review) Little Women is a great sort of punk-jazz quartet. The band--2 saxes, guitar and drums--often works with jagged, proggy rhythms. For the improvisations, the band atomizes, constantly splitting up into different mini groups. The guitarist Ben Greenberg (of ZS) plays with a crazy snarling tone and extreme volume, giving the music a real attack feel, and the saxists just completely go for it as well. Tenor player Travis Laplante has an absolutely huge sound, with an apocalyptic-free-jazz meets R&B kind of vibe. the set ended with this amazing coda: the two saxists--the other being the excellent Darius Jones--took off their mouthpieces and just started basically ranting/moaning/emoting into their horns, using the keys to fuck with the sound. It was unsettling and beautiful.

KURT WEISMAN - myspace.com/kurtweisman
Kurt has played with Feathers, Witch, Devendra Banhart and god knows who else. Pitchfork's review:
Sometimes music can sneak up on you like the answer to a prayer you didn't know you had uttered. This self-released CD-R EP on the Vermont collective Feathers own inhouse label is a case in point: it's got the sure, steady acoustic folk fingerpicking and gender-hurdling helium-tinged vocals you might expect from that crew, but it's also got some startling, heavily chopped and processed sound design that refracts the performance into a spectrum of jarring, dazzling shapes. As the melody telescopes in and out of reach behind him, Kurt doesn't just whisper about "a sad, broken heart." He breaks the whisper into pieces, and builds it back. Whoa!

PETER BONOS - www.myspace.com/peterbonos
Hampshire College Div III student Peter Bonos fucks us up with mind-shaking creativity and the presence of a ghost.

Angst Hase Pfeffer Nase - Chris Cooper of "Fat Worm of Error" surprise cameo! Elastic strings, warbly moustache.

Be there & square.