There’s more than just emo nostalgia to be had at local music venues this week as renowned punk bands OFF! and Agent Orange are also due in town over the next few nights, as are indie pop act Superorganism, experimental rockers The Legendary Pink Dots, and Black Jacket Symphony.
Read on for more details about all of these shows or click over to Phoenix New Times' concert calendar for more live music from Monday, October 24, to Thursday, October 27.
The members of OFF! (from left to right): Justin Brown, Autry Fulbright II, Dimitri Coats, and Keith Morris.
Jeff Forney
OFF!
Monday, October 24Valley Bar, 130 North Central AvenueWhen OFF! burst onto the scene in 2009, the original quartet of vocalist Keith Morris (Circle Jerks/Black Flag), guitarist Dimitri Coats (Burning Brides), bassist Steven McDonald (Redd Kross/Melvins), and drummer Mario Rubalcalba (Earthless) had a pedigree that showed great promise, and the band promptly delivered. Early OFF! records and shows put the punk back in punk rock with short, succinct blasts of pure first-wave hardcore fury. In the last couple of years, OFF! found itself with a brand-new rhythm section after McDonald and Rubalcalba were gone from the band. Tensions between the original members arose due to differences of opinion on how much time would be spent developing the material that became OFF!’s new record, Free LSD. While the record is clearly OFF!, the expansion of their influences is more than apparent. The seeds sown by Morris and Coats when it comes to the songwriting on Free LSD have yielded some intense fruit. There are hints of Stooges-esque bursts of heavy noise layered throughout, especially on the tracks where Jon Wahl (Claw Hammer) adds heavily distorted saxophone. New bassist Autry Fulbright II and drummer Justin Brown have more than filled the large shoes left by McDonald and Rubalcalba, respectively. 7:30 p.m., $25 via seetickets.us. Tom Reardon
Superorganism
Monday, October 24Crescent Ballroom, 308 North Second AvenueFew bands sound as much a byproduct of the Internet age as Superorganism, and even fewer can boast an origin story that wouldn’t have been possible in an analog world. The group’s original eight members hailed from across the world: Australia, the UK, and the US. Lead singer Orono Noguchi (whose laconic, sweetly compelling vocals anchor the band’s ADD sound) met her bandmates online and bonded over a shared love of memes before a fortuitous meeting with them during a trip to Japan sealed the deal. Like their eclectic backgrounds, the band's beautiful, unpredictable music runs a gamut of styles: electropop, psychedelia, synth, and dance music. They’ve collaborated with fellow musical magpies CHAI on “Teenager.” No matter how much their style shifts (sometimes in mid-song), Noguchi holds it down as the band’s calm, charismatic center. While the group’s numbers have dwindled over the years (in part due to some troubling sexual allegations against some of the founding members who’ve since left the band), Superorganism still sound as expansive. 7:30 p.m., $23 via seetickets.us. Ashley Naftule
Hawthorne Heights
Monday, October 24Marquee Theatre, 730 North Mill Avenue, TempeFew bands captured the MTV rock essence of the mid-2000s quite like Hawthorne Heights. At its core, the band was relatable in ways that made its fans ball their fists in angst and A&R heads smile greedily. Hawthorne Heights captured the Fall Out Boy crowd without the twee and the My Chemical Romance crowd without the theatrics. Hailing from Dayton, Ohio, Hawthorne Heights also appealed to the restless suburban set and became the poster children for Hot Topic shoppers around the country, whether the band liked it or not. Regardless of your take on that much, much maligned term "screamo" (for which Hawthorne Heights also became the unwilling poster children), there's no denying the band's early brilliance in their instrumental approach. With the original lineup including three guitarists, there was less layering and more interplay, lending weight to an attack that was much more than just the palm-muted downpicking of their contemporaries. If not for the millennial nostalgia alone, JT Woodruff and company have always been apt songwriters — even if their aesthetic dated them, the discontent that fueled the band's songs is ageless. With Armor For Sleep, Action/Adventure, and Sundressed; 7:30 p.m., $25-$55 via ticketweb.com. K.C. Libman
Agent Orange
Wednesday, October 26Yucca Tap Room, 29 West Southern Avenue, TempeOrange County punk legends Agent Orange have been serving up a mix of melodic punk and hardcore with ‘60s surf rock since 1979. A product of the same scene and era that birthed many seminal punk bands, Agent Orange rode the wave of the genre’s popularity after their song “Bloodstains” found its way into the hands of then-influential radio jock Rodney Bingenheimer. Their blend of loud, fast, and aggressive tunes featured angry riffs and plenty of attitude, helping kickstart skate-punk and pave the way for future bands like The Offspring, Green Day, and Blink-182. Guitarist and vocalist Mike Palm (who wrote practically every song in Agent Orange’s repertoire) is the only original member still around these days and continues to lead the band through rip-roaring sets at punk bars nationwide. This week, they’ll return to Tempe’s Yucca Tap Room, reportedly one of their favorite local venues, with support from The Venomous Pinks, Taken Days, and Skeleton Army. 7:30 p.m., $15 via ticketweb.com. Benjamin Leatherman
The Legendary Pink Dots
Wednesday, October 26The Rebel Lounge, 2303 East Indian School RoadFormed in early '80s England, experimental rock band the Legendary Pink Dots have mastered fusing elements of synthpop, noise rock, neo-folk, and psych to create layered pieces that, especially at live shows, provoke a simultaneous response of equal parts dance frenzy and heady restraint, keeping you riding a consistently boisterous wave, sometimes moving you into a closed-eye dream state. Longtime members such as vocalist Edward Ka-Spel, Phil Knight (keyboards, electronics), and Eric Drost (guitarist) give their devoted crowds a taste of their avant-experimental songs that come from a union of keyboards, electronics, and guitars. Ka-Spel's voice may sometimes sounds like a bastard child of his peers Peter Murphy and Current 93's David Tibet, but the way he commands it sets it apart. His vocal power and interest in lyrical tales of lore came through with some real intensity, especially in songs like "Casting the Runes." Over the past four decades, they’ve put out a total of 47 albums, including two releases earlier this year: The Museum of Human Happiness and The 13th Step. With Orbit Service; 8 p.m., $23/$25 via seetickets.us. Amy Young
Black Jacket Symphony
Thursday, October 27Marquee Theatre, 730 North Mill Avenue, TempeBeethoven died 195 years ago and yet you can still hear “Ode to Joy” played to note-to-note perfection by sober, black-clad professional musicians. What if you can have the same kind of experience listening to AC/DC’s Back in Black? That’s exactly what The Black Jacket Symphony has in mind. This group of touring virtuoso musicians are dedicated to applying that kind of symphony mindset to the classic rock canon, painstakingly recreating classic albums live in their entirety. Note for note, sound for sound, as true to the original vibes and instrumentation as possible. For more than 13 years, they’ve applied their sonic necromancy to classic albums by Prince, The Allman Brothers, Fleetwood Mac, Michael Jackson, and Pearl Jam. Their current tour is devoted to an album that has brought together generations of hard rockers, stoners, and D&D players: Led Zeppelin’s IV. If you’ve ever wanted to hear the iconic drum intro to “When The Levee Breaks” live in concert, this is the next best thing to calling up John Bonham on a Ouija board and hoping he’s got a kit handy in the hereafter. 8 p.m., $23-$33 via ticketmaster.com. Ashley Naftule
A Day to Remember and The Used
Thursday, October 27Mesa Amphitheatre, 263 North Center StreetFlorida-born rock act A Day to Remember has been blending pop-punk with metalcore into tunes that are filled with sing-along choruses and a variety of riffs for decades now. They’re often spoken about in the same breath as acts like Bullet For My Valentine and Killswitch Engage. Meanwhile, their tourmates have been mining the emo/screamo and post-hardcore vein since debuting in 2001. Both are touring in support of relatively recent releases (ADTR’s seventh studio album, You're Welcome, came out last year while The Used’s Heartwork dropped in 2020 during the early days of the pandemic) and will co-headline a show at Mesa Amphitheatre this week with support from Movements and Magnolia Park. We can assure you that this gig won’t be canceled at the last minute due to wind. 5:10 p.m., $72 via mesaamp.com. Benjamin Leatherman
