Sam Jamsen
Audio By Carbonatix
Finnish death-metal outfit Amorphis plays the Oriental tonight with a big bill of metal acts spanning a variety of subgenres – black gaze, anyone – while indie-rock project Waxahatchee takes the stage at the Ogden.
Denver’s Cipriano plays low rock at Goosetown Station in Golden on Saturday, while Fuzz brings the fuzz to the Gothic. Soul-inspired seven-piece the Dip plays the Gothic on Sunday, and PUP brings its snarky Canadian style to the Ogden.
Amorphis
Friday, April 22, 7 p.m.
Oriental Theater, 4335 West 44th Avenue
$28-$200
Finnish metal band Amorphis just released Halo, its 14th album, and is bringing its melodic strain of death metal to the Oriental. With this show you get UADA, black metal from the Pacific Northwest; the Norwegian black gaze of Sylvaine, the one woman project of Kathrine Shepard and Portland dark rock duo Hoaxed.
Waxahatchee
Friday, April 22, 9 p.m.
Ogden Theatre, 935 East Colfax Avenue
$30-$75
Waxahatchee is the solo indie-rock project of singer-songwriter Katie Crutchfield, formerly a member of Alabama pop-punk band P.S. Eliot. She started off playing acoustic music but has added a backing band over the past twelve years. Her most recent record, 2020’s Saint Cloud, took inspiration from Crutchfield’s struggles with alcohol and her decision to get sober. The band is playing the Belly Up in Aspen the following night if you feel like a drive.
Cipriano Ortega, who plays a jazz-influenced style of minimalist music. The band Cipriano plays what he describes as “low rock,” featuring his two-string slide bass along with saxophone and drum accompaniment. The genre was pioneered by Mark Sandman of the band Morphine, a big influence in Ortega’s sound.
Fuzz
Saturday, April 23, 9 p.m.
Gothic Theatre, 3263 South Broadway, Englewood
$22.50-$25
Let there be riff rock. Fuzz brings the noisy, psychedelic-tinged fuzz rock we’ve all come to know and love. Get ready to party like it’s 1970.
The Dirty Knobs
Saturday, April 23, 8 p.m.
1135 13th Street, Boulder
$32.50-$25
If you still aren’t over Tom Petty’s untimely demise in 2017, it’s okay. We aren’t, either. Fortunately, Mike Campbell played in the Heartbreakers and has his own band, the Dirty Knobs, which plays a kind of harder-edged version of that stoner blues rock that Petty made famous. If you need a double dose, Campbell is playing the Bluebird Theater the following night.
The Dip
Sunday, April 24, 8 p.m.
Gothic Theatre, 3263 South Broadway, Englewood
$20-$22
The Dip is a seven-piece band from Seattle with a style of music that takes it cues from the soul bands of the 1960s and 1970s. Think Wilson Pickett and all those wonderful Stax Records acts – Sam and Dave, Otis Redding and the Bar-Kays, but with a modern take on the classic genre. The band has released three full-length albums and is part of a small scene of soul-inspired acts currently playing in Seattle.
PUP
Sunday, April 24, 8 p.m.
Ogden Theatre, 935 East Colfax Avenue
$28.50-$32.50
PUP apparently stands for Pathetic Use of Potential. But it has put out nine records and a ton of singles in the past ten years, so that sort of self-deprecating humor seems a little misguided. The band is primarily associated with punk rock. One could label it post-hardcore, but the songs are too soaked with sarcasm and a sense of humor to really allow the band to fit into that sourpuss of a genre.
Have events you want included on this list? Send the details to editorial@westword.com. Looking for more to do? Visit the Westword calendar.