Noam Chomsky
April begins in earnest this week with a wealth of words and music. The calendar includes: live music by Jucifer, American Brass Quartet, Titus Andronicus, Jason Collett, Joe Jack Talcum, The Paul Marinaro Trio, John Chappell Stowe with Edith Hines, Baaba Maal, Galactic, and The Hood Internet; A Room of One's Own 35th anniversary party; and talks by Warren Kozak, James Magruder, and Noam Chomsky.
Monday 4.5
NOTEWORTHY: Nirvana frontman & grunge icon Kurt Cobain commits suicide, 1994.
BIRTHDAYS: Visionary director Peter Greenaway, 1942; singer-songwriter Paula Cole, 1968.
High Noon Saloon, 8 pm
The sizzlin' sludge-metal duo returns to town for a much-anticipated show to promote a much-anticipated concept album, Throned in Blood, which will hit stores the day after the show. With Wife and Romero.
Tuesday 4.6
NOTEWORTHY: Plasmatics frontwoman Wendy O. Williams dies, 1998.
Wisconsin Veterans Museum, 7 pm
The author, journalist and Wisconsin native discusses his new book, LeMay: The Life & Wars of Curtis LeMay, about the general who executed the punishing air raids over Japan in World War II. In the 1940s and 1950s he made the Strategic Air Command an always-airborne nuclear force.
UW Humanities Building's Mills Hall, 7:30 pm
The prolific, internationally acclaimed chamber ensemble performs an eclectic program of early music, Ludwig Maurer (1789-1878) and 20th- and 21st-century works by the likes of Osvaldo Lacerda and Shafer Mahony.
Project Lodge, 7:30 pm
These New Jersey indie rockers have a penchant for guitar distortion and, most recently, Civil War stories, which fill the tracks of their new concept album, The Monitor. With His & Her Vanities.
Majestic Theatre, 8:30 pm
The singer-songwriter, sometimes of the Canadian indie aggregate Broken Social Scene, tours to promote his new release, Rat a Tat Tat. It's getting mixed notices, but that won't keep away the faithful. With Zeus and Bahamas.
Frequency, 9:30 pm
The founder of the Dead Milkmen stops by from Philly with solo material he's recorded over the years in his basement. Keep your fingers crossed and maybe, just maybe he'll treat you to a one-man version of "Punk Rock Girl." With Samuel Locke Ward & the Boo Hoos and Bondage Ghandi.
Wednesday 4.7
BIRTHDAY: Oscar-winning filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola, 1939.
Overture Center's Capitol Theater, 10 am
Chicago-based jazz crooner Marinaro performs a program called "Sinatra: The Capitol Years" for this entry in St. Mary's Hospital A.M. series.
A Room of One's Own 35th Anniversary Party
High Noon Saloon, 7 pm
Madison's feminist bookstore celebrates 35 years of books, authors and activism with a special performance by Bitch, a.k.a. one half of queercore duo Bitch & Animal. The singer, poet and electric-violin virtuoso will also unveil a new album, Blasted!, which recently received a thumbs-up from The Village Voice. Also playing: The State Of.
Thursday 4.8
NOTEWORTHY: First issue of Isthmus hits the streets, 1976.
A Room of One's Own, 6:30 pm
The Baltimore-based novelist reads from his latest, Sugarless (University of Wisconsin Press), about a 1970s gay suburban youth who finds solace in Broadway records. You're telling our story, Mr. Magruder.
Orpheum Theatre, 7 pm
The famous linguist/lefty talks about "The Role of the Radical Intellectual: Some Personal Reflections." The talk is presented by the UW's Havens Center for the Study of Social Structure and Social Change, which gives Chomsky its Award for Lifetime Contribution to Critical Scholarship.
John Chappell Stowe, Edith Hines
UW Humanities Building's Mills Hall, 7:30 pm In this UW faculty concert, two local luminaries of early music, harpsichordist Stowe and baroque violinist Hines, perform Bach's six sonatas for violin and obbligato harpsichord.
Wisconsin Union Theater, 8 pm
The Senegalese Afropop icon's latest album, Television, with its electronic infusions, is an eclectic wonder. Maal is bound to get the Union Theater crowd moving with his energetic show.
Majestic Theatre, 9 pm
The funky, jazzy jam band from the Big Easy hits Madison with a brand-new CD, Ya-Ka-May, along with hometown buds Cyril Neville and Corey Henry. Also playing: T Bird & the Breaks and Aaron Williams & the Hoodoo.
High Noon Saloon, 9 pm
Chicago's Hood Internet present their crazy hip-hop mashups, with a little help from Dirty Disco Kidz and DJ Clayton Colwell.