Kim is relieved the debate is actually going to happen. She'll be watching with friends tonight before working all weekend. Saturday, she'll take a break for a quiet night out, and then she'll close the weekend off getting funky in the balcony of Jazz Alley with Maceo. You can take the boy off the farm, but...MvB will be spending Saturday in a barn, hauling away old equipment, so Sunday he'll be recovering at Top Pot,......

First things first: get thee to Decibel. Even if you think that electronic music's not your thing, there are plenty of acts on the lineup that are easily accessible to even the biggest electro-phobe (see: Sunday's schedule). Tonight, Blitzen Trapper kicks things off early (6 p.m.), performing a free, all-ages in-store at Easy Street Queen Anne. The Portland experimental alt-country six-piece aren't hitting Seattle on their current tour (they were just here for Bumbershoot, after......

Head to the Sunset tonight for Sub Pop band Oxford Collapse. Along with Love as Laughter, it's a veritable indie pop fest! It's hard to know what to expect from a hardcore band named Fucked Up, but apparently it involves manboobs and a bunny mask. They're also playing tonight, at the Vera Project.......

Break out the hackysack and butterfly wings, because former Phish bassist Mike Gordon is at the Tractor tonight in support of his new solo record, The Green Sparrow. Sub Pop singer-songwriters Sera Cahoone and Daniel Martin Moore play Neumo's, while The Architects bring the crazy to El Corazon.......

The Builders And The Butchers use lots of cool instruments. Photo by Josh of SoundOnTheSound So, no one has said anything yet about The Builders and the Butchers playing at the Sunset tonight, and that must be remedied. If you aren't going to Radiohead (in the rain), and you want to go to a kickass show tonight, there is such a show happening in Ballard. Foot-stomping rhythms, guitars, red-headed boys, three drummers: the works!......

SOPPING WET OPERA: Byron Au Yong has composed 64 mini-operas meant to be performed in water--fountains, pools, and streams--throughout the Pacific Northwest. In this weekend's installments of Kidnapping Water: Bottled Operas, musicians and vocalists will perform unique mini-operas at parks and beaches in Des Moines/Burien (Saturday) and South Seattle (Sunday). "Who publishes the sheet-music of the winds or the music of water written in river-lines?" wrote 19th century poet John Muir; maybe that someone......

Tonight, head to the Sunset for the shoegaze stylings of Film School. There's also L.A. pop mainstay Adam Marsland at the Skylark and local troubadour Rocky Votolato at Neumo's.......

Yes, there's other shows this weekend besides the Capitol Hill Block Party. Tonight, there's The Watson Twins, who will bring their lovely harmonies and creepy identical-ness to the Tractor. And if you're lucky, they'll cover The Cure: For something completely different, there's Kill Hannah, along with The Medic Droid and Innerpartysystem at El Corazon. Or head to the Sunset for the island-smooth pedal steel guitar stylings of Neko Case sideman Jon Rauhouse, with Visqueen's own......

While this weekend is mostly dominated by all that Sub Pop hooha (and once again, kids, 520's closed, so take alternate routes), there's still a few shows besides those that Katelyn already mentioned. Tonight, head to Ballard for the roots and Americana of Portland's Scotland Barr and the Slow Drags at the Sunset. Tomorrow afternoon (1-3pm), break out your best eyewear for Lisa Loeb's appearance at the downtown Barnes and Noble.......

Tonight, Das Llamas celebrate their new album Class Wars: K-12 at the Comet. The local rock fourpiece stomp out a little bit of everything, from synthy no-wave punk to dirty electro rock, offering up "a platypus of sound that is a new noise in a new era." Tonight is also the second of three shows (in three nights) for the CD release of Sounds from the Seattle Underground, care of the good folks at NadaMucho.......

It may not feel like summer in Seattle, but tomorrow afternoon is The End's Summer Camp II at Marymoor Park. It's a mix of the good (Nada Surf, MGMT), the bad (Flogging Molly, Pennywise), and the emo-ey (Armor for Sleep). Meanwhile, all weekend long Noise for the Needy marches on, raising money for Urban Rest Stop. Come tomorrow night, it's Matt and Kim, YACHT, and local band Feral Children at Neumo's. Here's a clip of......

Tonight, if you're not already at a SIFF film or checking out "Awesome" with side projects Jose Bold and the Half Brothers at the Sunset, head to the Comet to see local Mazzy Star-on-psychedelics Half Light. They're touring off their new album Sleep More, Take More Drugs, Do Whatever We Want. Tomorrow, the Honda Civic Tour brings Panic at the Disco, Motion City Soundtrack, The Hush Sound, Phantom Planet, and a couple thousand emo kids......

If you're not spending this weekend SIFFing or Sasquatching or otherwise out of town for the three-day weekend, there's plenty of live music for those who spend the holiday in Seattle. Tonight, instrumental Chicago rockers Pelican play the Showbox SoDo. No need to stay for headliners Thrice, just these guys: Or if you like your rock with more synthesizers, head to Nectar for the Presets.......

Hiphop's King of Ballard, an inspired young emcee named Grynch, sat down with us over chicken satay (which he thought was delicious, and said so several times) to discuss everything from backpack rap to The Program. Here's what the man has to say. And catch his set tomorrow night at The Sunset--it's your last chance until June! Where in the family tree of hiphop would you place yourself? I think you can't really put......

Seattlest has been uncharacteristically busy this week, so we were looking forward to a couple hours of mind-buzzingly beautiful harmonies at the Sunset. Little did we know that Johanna Kunin would be bringing an entire consortium of bandmates with her, and that they would be performing an entirely new repertoire of music from what we heard last time. Mind-buzzingly beautiful? Yes! But it was also crazier and louder than would fit comfortably in our......

Tonight, if you're not already going to the second sold-out Magnetic Fields show, there's still a few tickets left for John in the Morning at Night at Neumo's, with the Duke Spirit, the Voom Blooms, and Tulsa. There's also PWRFL Power's (aka Kaz Nomura) second CD release show at the Vera Project. Since Kaz won a slot at last year's Capitol Hill Block Party (via the Stranger's Block Star contest last spring), he also won......

We've already mentioned the lovely and talented Jesse Sykes appearing tonight at the Tractor with bandmate Phil Wandscher. Also tonight (and also in Ballard) is San Francisco's Citay at the Sunset. Think Sabbath and Zep meets the light pop touches of Big Star. Here's some footage of them from a previous visit to Seattle: Saturday night, besides Kultur Shock at Chop Suey, there's LA's Spindrift at the Comet, who play peyote-twinged cosmic cowboy jams. As......