After teasing followers on its Twitter, the Charlottesville Pavilion made another exciting announcement this morning: LCD Soundsystem and Sleigh Bells, two of the most acclaimed bands in independent music, will play the Charlottesville Pavilion on October 2. Visit the Pavilion’s website for details.
Lots of goodies in this week’s paper. Resident film guru Jon Kiefer reviews Get Low, which stars Bill Murray, Robert Duvall and Sissy Spacek and opens at Vinegar Hill Theatre this Friday; I reviewed Sarah White’s Saturday show at the Jefferson Theater, after she rescued the evening from Neko Case; and my column this week is about the densely layered exhibit on Man Ray and African Art showing through October at the UVA Art Museum.
And onward:
An exhibit called "Virginia Rocks! The History of Rockabilly in the Commonwealth" opens at the Virginia Historical Society in Richmond on Friday, to shine light on the contributions of native Virginians to the popular musical canon. The project stems from the Virginia Rocks! compilation, released last year on Rebel and Country Records and compiled by Christopher King. Rockabilly put ecstatic frontmen before restless, huge, reverbed-out guitars when "Beatles" was still a word spelled with two consecutive Es. Among the included are Link Wray, who lived for a time in Norfolk, and whose guitar will be on view in Richmond.
Link Wray’s "Rumble"
Taking the nearby opening as a cue, I ask, "What is the indigenous music of Virginia," not because I have anything that resembles an answer. But here’s a few suggestions.
- Gary U.S. Bonds, the R&B ringleader and pioneer of the "Norfolk sound." Gary "U.S. Bonds’ "Quarter to Three
- At the other end of Virginia, Patsy Cline was a Winchester, Virginia native who went on to sing the "Nashville Sound." (Alternate name for that sound: the Virginia sound?) Patsy Cline’s "Crazy"
- Call me a product of my generation, but one
nonnative Virginian, reared in Ohio in Texas, captured the spirit of my Virginia—the laziness of summer, living in drafty houses on the cheap, the knowing too much to seem so lazy—and his name is David Berman, of the Silver Jews. The Silver Jews’ "We Are Real"
Who does for Virginia what Springsteen does for New Jersey?