Top 5 Concerts in Metro Phoenix This Weekend

Hear that? It's the clock counting down the hours until your weekend begins and it's nearing the magic moment known as quitting time. To help the time pass more quickly, you might consider what it is you'll actually be doing during the next couple days and nights of work-free bliss.

Luckily, if you're in the mood to get in a live show or two, there are more than a few options to choose from over the next 72 hours (check out our extensive online concert calendar for proof of such). In the meantime, here are five of the best concerts in Metro Phoenix this weekend.

VagFest - Friday, May 2, and Saturday, May 3 - Yucca Tap Room

It's no longer about women in rock; it's just about women making good rock. Oh, and having a damn good time doing it. It's one of the reasons the annual VagFest not only has survived five years but keeps getting bigger and better each time out, with the 2014 version bringing in up-and-coming national acts Bleeding Rainbow and White Murder to headline the two-night, two-venue event.

More than 20 bands, solo acts, and DJs --including headliners Bleeding Rainbow and White Murder -- will take the stage at Yucca Tap Room and neighboring all-ages venue 51 West in Tempe. Cruz also is trying something new for VagFest this year -- a marketplace set up inside 51 West that showcases zines, records, and the work of local visual artists and photographers. --Melissa Fossum MarchFourth Marching Band - Friday, May 2 - Crescent Ballroom

There's nothing quite like MarchFourth Marching Band. Think of it as Sgt. Pepper's meets Cirque du Soleil and Gogol Bordello playing at a New Orleans Mardi Gras party.

"Our sound is really all over the map," says leader John Averill. "We started off playing with a lot of NOLA [New Orleans], samba, Afrobeat, jazz, and Eastern European Gypsy brass elements, but over the past five years, we added guitar, and now our music has a lot more funk and rock going on."

But there's an element of ska and punk, compliments of trumpet player Katie Presley, the Ska Queen from Warsaw Poland Brothers. And the musical layers keep on building. This show is not to be missed. --Lauren Wise

Bro Safari -- Saturday, May 3 - Monarch Theatre

College rules. Forget the stupid classes -- we're talking about all the partying, drinking, and wasting time. We miss those days. Sometimes we even want to relive those days, and in that scenario, the best thing to do is go see a topnotch DJ known for making the college kids go wild. How wild? Wild as an African safari, bro.

Wait, switch that up -- we're talking about Bro Safari, the Texas-bred bassaholic who'll stomp through our hunting grounds and deliver the kind of trappy, dubby, hardstyle joints that will get you on your feet and freak the beat. Come out and get white-kid wasted, whether or not you're white or collegiate. It's going down at Monarch Theatre. See what everyone -- from Diplo to DJ Craze and Knife Party -- is so stoked about. And, y'know, act like you can hang around the college kids. Maybe you'll get lucky. -- Katie Bain

My Body Sings Electric - Saturday, May 3 - Pub Rock

The first hints that My Body Sings Electric was pissing people off came long before the brutal reviews. Shortly after getting together in 2007, the band's members went out of their way to be as self-indulgent and strident as possible. They specialized in making "musicians' music" -- songs with experimental structures, extended solos and bizarre instrumentation. Their attitude came through in the title of their first EP in 2008: They Don't Want Music.

"We were pretentious," admits bassist Jason Bower. "We were like, 'These people don't want music,'" referring to the scant crowds that would show up at venues like the Marquis and offer tepid responses. "We were writing complex stuff in weird time signatures."

But the intricate music wasn't the only mark of the band's brash attitude. When My Body landed a coveted spot playing the Denver stop of the Warped Tour in 2009, lead singer and guitarist Brandon Whalen alienated audience members and fellow artists alike before the group even played a single note. "The first thing I said was, 'We're My Body Sings Electric, from Denver, and we're fucking awesome,'" Whalen recalls between chuckles. "Jon [Shockness] from Air Dubai once told me that when they first met us on that tour, they hated us. He was like, 'Who are these guys?' And that was our whole attitude at the time." -- A.H. Goldstein

The Mowgli's - Sunday, May 3 - MIM Musical Theatre

A quick listen to this peppy southern California band might misplace them among '90s-era alternative rock circa 1997, when TRL seemed to have a strict no worrying policy. Maybe these Jungle Book-loving rockers didn't get the memo about the pity party that followed, but it's refreshing to hear crackling pop with a love conquers all aesthetic and a propulsive beat. "San Francisco," with its "can you feel the love" mantra in the chorus, is a decent entry in contention for song of the summer. -- Aidan Levi

Find any show in Metro Phoenix via our extensive online concert calendar.

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