City Planner: Thursday 11/30

DeVotchKa @ First Avenue
Photo by Michael Calanan

From today's A-List: "Boulder, Colorado's DeVotchKa could be from anywhere in the world that has a folk music amenable to accordions, strings, and brass. Which is to say, Mexico, Slovakia, Russia, France, Italy--anywhere but Boulder, Colorado. A smart quartet with a taste for tinkering (their tour bus also fits a sousaphone and a theremin), DeVotchKa are too tasteful to let the musicology get in the way of the music. Their mini-smash, 2004's How It Ends, proves that whether you're blazing through a mariachi chart or channeling a band of gypsies, a tune is a tune is a tune, and through the velvety veil of singer Nick Urata's baritone, that tune's a damn good one. It's the perfect soundtrack to red wine nights, Parisian days, Day of the Dead parades, and, it turns out, movies (they and shoegazer heartthrob Sufjan Stevens scored the bulk of Little Miss Sunshine). On DeVotchKa's new EP, Curse Your Little Heart, their antique sound breathes new life into old songs, including the Velvets' 'Venus in Furs' and Siouxsie and the Banshees' 'The Last Beat of My Heart.'"

With My Brightest Diamond. 18+. $13/$15 at the door. 6:00 p.m.

Elsewhere

Making Music: Ant @ the Whole

Go to the A-List now!