Welcome to Seven in Seven, where we look at shows coming to the region over the next week. As always, whether your musical tastes are rock and roll, jazz, heavy metal, R&B, singer-songwriter or indie, there’ll always be something to check out.
Here are seven of the best on the docket for the week of Sept. 22:
Macklemore — Friday at The Met
Earlier this year, rapper Macklemore released his hotly anticipated third album, “Ben,” which is technically a self-titled effort. Born Benjamin Haggerty, the Seattle sensation’s latest cracked the Top 20 on the charts and spawned five singles to date. The record features a slew of collaborators, hip hop legends and — most importantly — solid tracks. Among those lending a hand were Gang Starr’s DJ Premier, NLE Choppa and Sarah Barthel from electronic duo Phantogram. And for the tour, Macklemore has partnered with PLUS1 so that $1 per ticket goes to supporting the organization Bridges and their work bridging the gap from active substance abuse to recovery for adolescents and their families.
Death Grips — Saturday at Union Transfer
There are few bands who have changed the course of alternative music in the way that Death Grips has with equal parts abrasive, nuanced and enigmatic compositions. Despite being notoriously elusive, the band has carved out their own space in the music world, which has proven difficult to ignore. Their signature sound blends hip-hop, contemporary electronic and digital hardcore in a way that has become vital in the current age of music where getting pigeonholed as a one trick pony can sometimes be a death knell.
Black Veil Brides and Ville Valo — Saturday at Wind Creek Event Center
This fall, the classic season for dark and romantic music is epitomized by the co-headlining union of Black Veil Brides and Ville Valo, coming to Bethlehem on Saturday. The latter is best known as frontman for goth rockers HIM, one of the most commercially successful Finnish bands of all time. This year saw the release of his debut solo album under the moniker VV. Black Veil Brides is a transcendent celebration of life-affirming power and anthemic catharsis while also a gothic vision summoned in a small town by an isolated kid — frontman Andy Biersack — fascinated with death, rock, theatricality and monsters real and imagined. BVB is now a postmodern heavy metal institution with a legion of like-minded fans and supporters worldwide.
Bully — Saturday at First Unitarian Church
Released back in early June, “Lucky for You” is Bully’s most close-to-the-bone album yet. It’s an album that’s searing and unmistakably marked by its creator’s experiences, while still retaining the massive sound that Alicia Bognanno — the face of Bully — has become known for over the last decade. Her fourth album draws from personal pain and the universal struggle that is existing, learning and moving on, all soundtracked by her rock-solid melodic sensibilities and a widescreen sound that’s impossible to pin down when it comes to the textures explored. Live, Bognanno delivers a ferocity and intensity with an undeniable undercurrent of melody which only adds to the depth of the music.
Becca Mancari — Monday at The Foundry
Following the release of their last record, indie folk singer-songwriter Becca Mancari was in despair, despite the undeniable success of 2020’s “The Greatest Part.” Illness in their family, coupled with a realization that their alcohol dependency had become untenable, all led Mancari to begin the hard work of taking ownership of their existence by mending broken relationships and investing in their mental health. The result is the just released and self-produced “Left Hand,” which came from darkness, but is joyous, wide-open and welcoming, with the music beckoning all listeners and encouraging community among strangers.
Rhiannon Giddens — Tuesday at the Keswick Theatre
Rhiannon Giddens has made a singular, iconic career out of stretching her brand of folk music, with its miles deep historical roots and contemporary sensibilities, into just about every field imaginable. A two-time Grammy Award-winning singer and instrumentalist and MacArthur “Genius” grant recipient, she this spring also was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music for the opera “Omar,” which she co-wrote with Michael Abels. Giddens isn’t just a composer of opera, ballet and film, she has centered her work around the mission of lifting up people whose contributions to American musical history have previously been overlooked or erased. Last month, she released her third solo album, and first of all original material, “You’re the One.”
Ratboys — Tuesday at Johnny Brenda’s
Beloved Chicago post-country outfit Ratboys this summer released their fourth album, “The Window,” which finally captures them as they were always meant to be heard; expansive while still intimate, audacious while still tender — basically the sound of four friends operating as a single, cohesive unit. The album is sonically diverse, shifting wildly from track to track and flexing everything from fuzzy power pop choruses to warm country twang to mournful folk. Live, that’s what one hopes for — especially on a Tuesday night — to be kept on their toes with a varied sonic palette.
Soundcheck
• Macklemore: “No Bad Days”
• Death Grips: “Get Got”
• Black Veil Brides: “The Mourning”
• Ville Valo: “Neon Noir”
• Bully: “Hard To Love”
• Becca Mancari: “Over and Over”
• Rhiannon Giddens: “Yet To Be”
• Ratboys : “It’s Alive!”
Source: Berkshire mont
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