THE WHISTLER (BLOG)

Garden Music is doing a live recording session at the Whistler on Wednesday, July 13th from 9pm-midnight. Here’s a preview.

via Peter Margasak, Chicago Reader:

On her knockout second album, Black Terry Cat (Anti-), beguiling Brooklyn singer Xenia Rubinos sharpens her knack for nonchalant genre juggling, colliding contemporary R&B, hard funk, and punk into one high-energy blur. Working again with drummer Marco Buccelli, who provides pitch-perfect rhythmic settings for her expansive ideas, Rubinos slyly delivers trenchant commentary about race in many of the tunes. The irresistible stutter of “Mexican Chef,” with its hard-rock update of early-80s South Bronx band ESG, includes the seemingly ebullient chorus “It’s a party across America / Bachata in the back,” though ultimately the track suggests a darker, catch-22 reality in today’s charged state of immigration “reform.” The lyrics break down a litany of unsavory things Latinos are subjected to: “Brown breaks his back, brown takes the flak, brown gets cut ’cause his papers are whack / Brown sits down, brown does frown, brown’s up in a hospital gown / Brown has not, brown gets shot, brown got what he deserved cause he fought.” On “Lonely Lover” Rubinos forges a delivery between Billie Holiday and Erykah Badu without stealing from either as she ruminates on a difficult day during which she requests some space, while “Laugh Clown” follows her through the same sort of pressure-cooker misery, but with a sense of humor. Rather than embrace some positive bullshit, Rubinos acknowledges skepticism, singing, “Don’t know where I’m going, only where I’ve been / I know that cliche’s tired but I feel it on my skin.”

Xenia Rubinos performs at the Logan Square Arts Festival on Friday, June 24th. $5 suggested donation.