Great Music Coming Soon to the Boston Area
Here are some upcoming music concerts in the Boston area that I’m interested in. I hope to go as many of these as possible. Note that the Van der Graaf Generator concert is only two days from now!
Tuesday June 23 8:00pm, at the Regent Theater, Arlington Center. This is their first American tour in 30 years, and the first time they’ve ever appeared in New England. There’s also an opening act: The Acoustic Strawbs, which is the current version of The Strawbs. Van der Graaf Generator is Peter Hammill’s group. The lineup appearing here are the three surviving members of the original lineup of four who did “Pawn Hearts” and “H to He Who Am The Only One”. My friend Olin Sibert (a huge fan of this band) and I are going. If you like progressive rock, this is an opportunity not to be missed!
Saturday July 11 7:30pm, at the Regatta Bar in the Charles Hotel, Harvard Square, Cambridge. Greg Bendian’s band that plays the music of John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra. (McLaughlin himself is a big fan.) Greg is a close friend of my friend Tim Blackman, which is how I know about it. Tim and I are going.
Saturday July 18 9:45pm, at Johnny D’s, in Davis Square, Somerville. They are said to be an excellent Beatles tribute band, although I haven’t heard them. Here’s their web site. There’s a video of them, performing at Johnny D’s, on their MySpace page.
Saturday July 25 7:00pm, at the South Shore Music Circus in Cohasset. Asia will open. Benoit David will substitute for Jon Anderson, who is still ill, and Oliver Wakeman will substitute for his father, Rick Wakeman, who no longer tours. I’ve been to see this lineup before: Oliver is only OK, but Benoit is fantastic and sounds amazingly like Jon. I’ve seen Yes seven or eight times and it never gets old, for me. Asia is also an excellent progressive rock band. Tickets on Ticketmaster.
Thursday July 30 9:00, at Johnny D’s, in Davis Square, Somerville. I have a lot of recorded music by Birdsongs and have seen them live several times over the years. “Boston seminal art-rock.” Check out their web site, and their MySpace page (which has music samples). Ken Field (sax, flutes, keyboard, percussion) used to be a software developer at BBN, but now he’s a full-time musician (and married to well-known local animated filmmaker Karen Aqua).
Friday July 31 9:45, at Johnny D’s, in Davis Square, Somerville. They’re a Steely Dan tribute band. I haven’t heard them yet. They’ll be doing music from Aja, Royal Scam, and Gaucho, which are definitely my favorites.
Hint for Johnny D’s: come early and have dinner. The food is fine, and then you get a good seat for the music. Allow time to find parking in David Square if you’re coming by car, or take the Red Line.
July 4th, 2009 at 5:46 am
By the way, I know about a lot of these concerts because I was notified by http://www.tourfilter.com. You just tell Tourfilter what bands or artists you’re interested in, and it tells you when they’re performing in town. It’s excellent and free.
October 22nd, 2009 at 9:27 am
NO STATIC is returning to Johnny D’s on Friday, October 23rd, 2009!
We will play the entire “Countdown to Ecstasy” album in it’s entirety as well as many other Steely Dan favorites!