Friday 10
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HUGE PONTOONS Chicago’s Huge Pontoons are a guilty pleasure for grown-ups who have Weird Al tapes hidden in their sock drawers. The band’s sole album, last year’s Honky if You Love White People (Kapi-Tel), is an obnoxious but affectionate parody of 90s metal, pop punk, and college rock–the goofy cliches are packed so densely that not even light can escape. Over thrashin’ ax, mullet-worthy drums, and the occasional low-budget synth, front man John Velousis belts out tunes like “RR2K (Race Riot 2000)” and “Taco Man” in a Kermit the Frog voice (and no particular key). For your money you get the obligatory carrying on about girls, a sprinkling of half-assed social consciousness (“There’s even evil inside a quarter pounder”), and of course loads of the shameless gooning that makes my inner 12-year-old roll on the floor: over the pummeling, boneheaded riffs of “Cookie Monster,” Velousis howls, “Oh dear God, how I long to digest a cookie / But they just fall crispily from my impotent tongue.” The Slats open. 9 PM, Underground Lounge, 952 W. Newport, 773-327-2739, $6. –Ann Sterzinger
CHARLIE ROBISON Texan Charlie Robison’s songs pile on details about rustic life in his home state, but as much as he strives for the poetry of the workaday–a la Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clark, or Joe Ely–the results are workaday poetry. On the new Good Times (Dualtone), Robison (who’s married to Dixie Chick Emily Robison) occupies a milquetoast middle ground between Nashville orthodoxy–like the faux-Bruce Hornsby piano tinkling on “El Cerrito Place”–and alt-country shit-kicking, further proof that balancing good taste with commercial impulses usually benefits neither. The Kevin Gordon Band opens. 9:30 PM, FitzGerald’s, 6615 Roosevelt, Berwyn, 708-788-2118 or 312-559-1212, $10. –Peter Margasak
RIVER CITY REBELS Four albums in, the River City Rebels seem eager to progress from trashy punks to trashy rock stars–agreeing to open for Velvet Revolver probably wasn’t a hard decision for these guys. Their new Hate to Be Loved (Victory) has most of the good points of G n’ R’s bitter-hearted party rock (lustiness, liveliness) and some of its bad ones (stridency, stupidity). But there’s also the occasional fist-pumping, melodic reminder of their Gun Club-meets-Joe Strummer roots, which makes me wonder if glam Americana might not make a pretty awesome genre. Street Brats, Manhandlers, and 7 Shot Screamers open. a 6 PM, Bottom Lounge, 3206 N. Wilton, 773-975-0505 or 800-594-8499, $10. All ages. –Monica Kendrick
BY DIVINE RIGHT This band’s the brainchild of Toronto sonic whiz Jose Miguel Contreras, who’s gone since the early 90s without settling on a steady group of bandmates or a signature sound. On this year’s Sweet Confusion (SpinArt) he’s found a formula worth sticking to: part New York Dolls, part Soledad Brothers, part Blackhearts sans Joan Jett, it’s a thick, flexible, engorged mass of thundering drums and splattering guitars with the occasional spectacularly groan-worthy rhyme (“I got e-mail / I got a female”). Oh My God headlines, University opens. 9 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport, 773-525-2508, $10. –Monica Kendrick
