Denzel Curry kept the energy flowing, recently leading a rapping crowd through a newly retooled mixtape as album at The Fillmore Silver Spring. His smile was as infectious as his verses in a show that never slowed down for a date on his Mischievous South Tour.
Bright Eyes recently returned to The Anthem after a few years in between albums with a fire that was partly fueled by the new record, Five Dice, All Threes, and, perhaps, equally driven by the current political climate.
There are only a handful of bands who I can say I’ve been following, or maybe I should say whose music seems to have been orbiting my life for at least a couple of decades. The first time I saw Bright Eyes — at the time Conor Oberst performing solo — was when he was on the bill with the band Grandaddy at the small Metro Café on 14th Street, NW, 25 years ago. I remember it was an intense performance, but, at the time, it wasn’t my bag.
A few years later, when I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning was released, an old friend recommended checking out Bright Eyes again. I remember being thoroughly impressed by the change from that first album to songs like “At the Bottom of Everything” that leads off I’m Wide Awake. Since that time, the ebbs and flows of each record that has been released seem to connect in some way with where things were in my life.
In the 2010s, singer-songwriter Lucy Dacus was playing house shows in her hometown of Richmond, Virginia, and emailing DMV venues like DC’s DC9, begging to make their night’s bill. This month, she embarked on her biggest solo tour yet and first since signing to major label, Interscope’s Geffen Records.
On her second stop of the Forever Is a Feeling tour, promoting her 2025 release of the same name, Lucy Dacus recently played two sold-out nights at The Anthem, alongside opening acts of jasmine.4.t and Muna’s Katie Gavin.
Oh He Dead released Ugly, a new album, last year, and they have been touring it on the road! The DC soul superstars recently performed live at 9:30 Club, and Steve Satzberg was there to photograph the action!
There’s a phrase everyone knows: guilty by association. It usually has negative connotations. Not in this case. I was asked if I wanted to see Jon Muq. He was going to be playing Rams Head on Stage in Annapolis. I had no idea who Jon Muq was. So I checked out the show. Turns out, he was opening for Valerie June. So my answer to “do you want to see Jon Muq” was an emphatic “F*** YES”!
The fantastic new punk-rock sensations The Linda Lindas recently hit the stage at the famous Black Cat for a sold-out show of great original songs intermixed with outstanding cover songs throughout the evening.
Grace Jones and Janelle Monáe perform live at The Anthem on Thursday, June 5 for World Pride 2025!
You can win a pair of tickets to see these powerhouse performers together with Parklife DC.
Cy Curnin is not your typical frontman. Theatric and expressive, he’s always in motion on the stage with his band The Fixx. In The Fixx’s recent visit to The Barns at Wolf Trap, Cy peered to the stars in a telescope, signed a declaration with a quill pen, and tossed a paper plane and balloon into the audience while he was pouring emotion into the lyrics of songs written by The Fixx from 1982 to 2022.
With his physical emoting, Cy, of course, reminds us that The Fixx is a thinking man’s rock band.
Mike Score recently led his new-look 21st century iteration of A Flock of Seagulls into a show inside of Washington, DC — their first solo headlining gig there in a long time — and they turned the sold-out room at The Atlantis in a a bonafide dance party.
Willie Nile soon releases a new album (he has an album release show planned for New York City in June), and he’s been on the road introducing some of his new songs into his set. He recently performed live at The Collective Encore, in Columbia, Maryland, and Steve Satzberg was there to photograph the show.
