Live music, no foolin’.

Another week, myriad opportunities to check out live music.

On Monday, Nektar is at Ludlow Garage. That’s a Brit prog rock band that’s been around since 1969. And the name is pronounced like “nectar”… although it’d be cooler if it were “Neck-Tar”… and it came from the instrument that was the ill-fated, banned-due-to-choking hazard follow-up to the Keytar.

Where was I? Oh, that’s right, gigs. Also on Monday, Relient K plays Bogart’s. (The “K” stands for Keytar!)

On Tuesday, Colin Hay (of Men at Work) comes all the way from the Land Down Under to the Peter Brady Icon Music Center, creating a magical marriage between vegemite sandwiches and pork chops & applesauce.

That same evening, Greta Van Zeppelin… I mean Led Fleet… I mean Greta Van Fleet, plays the Coliseum, creating a magical marriage of a band that reeks of the 70s and an arena that reeks of the 70s.

Also on Tuesday, Mike Zito and Albert Castiglia play Southgate.

Sylmar plays MOTR on Wednesday – it’s an 8 p.m. ticketed ($12 advance) show. And finger-style guitarist Yasmin Williams is at Ludlow Garage.

Thursday, Ludlow Garage has Church of Cash. It’s a tribute to Johnny Cash, not Kash Amburgy… although I’d be fine with either.

Friday is April Fools’ Day.

Celebrate with some Negative-Calorie Cookies and Tree Frog Beer… or just get sad that a formerly progressive radio station is now a parody of itself.

That evening, Johnnyswim plays the Ovation. The band features the marriage (literally) of Abner Ramirez and Amanda Sudano. Amanda is the daughter of Donna Summer, so she probably grew up around keytars.

Also on Friday:

• Kishi Bashi is at the Madison Theater
• The Wooks play Southgate’s Revival Room
• Rumpke Mountain Boys kick off a two-night stand at the old Annie’s
• EXTC plays Ludlow Garage. EXTC features Terry Chambers (drummer for XTC) plus Steve Tilling (vocals, guitar, ex-TC&I, the band of XTC’s Colin Moulding and Terry Chambers), Steve Hampton (guitar, vocals) and Matt Hughes (bass, vocals).

Saturday shows:

• Shawn Colvin is at Memorial Hall, and she’ll be playing her brilliant 1989 debut Steady On acoustically, along with other favorites.
• Buffalo Wabs & The Price Hill Hustle/The Harmed Brothers have a nice twin bill show at Southgate in the Revival Room.
• Rumpke Mountain Boys are back at Annie’s.
• The Ben Levin Blues Band plays Ghost Baby
• The Yugos play a free show at MOTR.

On Sunday, list member Dale Doyle just might win a Grammy in the Best Recording Package for his artwork/design on Matt Berninger’s solo album Serpentine Prison.

Even though Dale’s work should be feted during the evening telecast, he’s not a teenage pop songstress (at least he wasn’t the last time we checked his…er, recording package…). So you’ll have to tune in to the afternoon event where more than three-quarters of the 86 winners will be announced. The live stream will start at 3:30 EDT and will be available on the Recording Academy’s YouTube channel as well as on the website live.grammy.com. 

After Dale picks up his hardware, Ben Levin has a 6:30 show at Schwartz’s Point, the cool jazz club in OTR. The building’s been around since about 1870, and a keytar has never darkened its doorway.

Motherfolk is at Top Cats — yes Top Cats — on Sunday.

R.I.P. Taylor Hawkins

New tunes

Here’s a fun new song from Lucius:

Grant-Lee Phillips always delivers:

Digging the new one from Soccer Mommy too:

Old tunes

Gospel great Sister Rosetta Tharpe, born on March 20th, 1915 in Cotton Plant, Arkansas, was as rockin’ as any rock star. Here she is just shredding on a 1965 gospel TV show:

Album Cover of the Week

We heard that Bob was a fan of The Kinks. Or something like that.