Willis Earl Beal

Every time Soundboard laments the end of summer festival season, a new wave of music reminds us that summer festival season never actually ends. If only that were true.

This week the wave brings in the Hideout Block Party & A.V. Fest, a two-day bash that features Neko Case, Mavis Staples, and plenty more. Case and Staples both perform Friday, and both recently released albums that earned glowing praise from Peter Margasak. They also had a conversation for our Artist on Artist feature that will make you smile, even if you’re Peter Margasak. Young the Giant, Superchunk, and the Hold Steady top the bill on Saturday.

On Friday Post Honeymoon play a release party at Burlington for their second LP, Second Skin, on Saturday the Cairo Gang headlines Bric-a-Brac Records’ celebration of International Cassette Store Day (which is apparently a thing). Also on Saturday, King Louie supposedly headlines at the Congress Theater (Alex Wiley opens).

So many more great shows in our Soundboard listings and more Soundboard picks below.

Thu 9/5: House of Ladosha at Smart Bar

House of Ladosha specializes in twisting big-bodied hip-hop into raunched-out club music built for the increasingly resurgent drag and ball scene. Their shows are notoriously outrageous, and that’s the point. They don’t just deconstruct hip-hop masculinity, they destruct it. Tonight’s show comes courtesy of Banjee Report.

Thu 9/5 at Laurie’s Planet of Sound and Fri 9/6 at the Old Town School of Folk Music: Robbie Fulks

“There are many good living songwriters,” writes Peter Margasak. “But then you hear a new Robbie Fulks record, and you can’t remember who they are.” As Fulks’s first proper release of new material in eight years, Gone Away Backward offers a long-awaited opportunity to do just that. It’s his most focused work and perhaps even his best. Thursday he plays at in-store at Laurie’s with violinist Jenny Scheinman. Friday at the Old Town School’s Maurer Hall, he has his full band.

Fri 9/6: Willis Earl Beal at Schubas

Willis Earl Beal has always been an eclectic artist—just read Leor Galil’s profile from 2011. But his new album, Nobody Knows, takes the experimentation to a whole new level. Overall it’s deeply left-field pop, but any attempt to describe the record as a whole is doomed to inadequacy. It moves in so many different directions that Galil says it sounds like “a ‘best of’ collection from a restless musician with a much longer career.”

Sat 9/7: Marc Anthony at Allstate Arena

Marc Anthony’s 3.0, his first salsa album since 2004, continues down the line between salsa and pop, a balancing act Anthony has mastered. His voice is as remarkable as ever, scaling clave grooves with a deft intensity that prevents the formulaic song structures from ever feeling tired. And Anthony still sounds vulnerable under all the polish added by executive producer and modern salsa hit machine Sergio George.