Bottom of the Hill

Vampire Weekend

It feels like it was just yesterday when the festival touring circuit was over. Well, the winter hibernation is over, and with festivals like SXSW, Coachella, Sasquatch and Bonnaroo just around the corner, there are some big music decisions to make on the home front. Here are our March and April suggestions.

The crowd at Bottom of the Hill last night was overwhelmingly dude, with just a spattering of female support.  It’s been twelve years since Far released their critically acclaimed second album, Water and Solutions, but the nostalgia for the emotive (though never weepy), post-hardcore album was very, very present.

NOMO.

Space-age bachelor-pad theremins and fuzzed-out riffage meet going-places-fast brass and West African twang? You get that and ‘mo when it comes to NOMO, performing Tuesday, Feb. 2, at Bottom of the Hill.

Felix Da Housecat

Time flies when you're having fun, and we sure must have been having a lot of it because January came and went with a blink of an eye. However, February in San Francisco is an exciting time for music lovers. Not only does it signify the beginning of festival season (Noise Pop's pre-party is on 2/18 and they're pumping music nearly every night straight through 3/1), it's also the start of big artists' West Coast legs of their tour. Yay for us! Noise Pop coverage to come, but to warm you up  here's this month's hot list.

Cold Cave.

It’s more than a mere ‘80s revival at this point: the pulsing beat and almost Afropop-like rhythm guitar of the title track of Cold Cave’s newly reissued full-length, Love Comes Close (Matador). Are you listening to a great, new track by New Order, returned to its old form, rather than a coolly hot Iladelphia/NYC threesome? Like La Roux, Glass Candy and umpteen Yazoo and Human League acolytes, the group hews that closely to the chilly mechanics of Reagan-era pop. Frankly faux, sharply minimal keys are intertwined in an icy clinch with ennui-laden, art-damaged vocals.