Dan DeLuca's Mix Picks: George Clinton's P-Funk, Hop Along's return and music from 'American Folk'
The return of Hop Along, P-Funk at the Tiny Desk, a Philly rocker's alt version, two guitar wizards, and a folk duo straight out of the movies.
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George Clinton & the P-Funk All-Stars, Tiny Desk Concert. The classic lineups featuring Bootsy Collins and the late Eddie Hazel are in the distant past, but anyone who's caught the now-76-year-old and less-outrageously hairstyled Clinton live on his club tours in recent years knows his new band — featuring his grandchildren Tonysha, Potavian, and Tairee — still has a real type of thing going down, getting down, and a whole lot of rhythm going round. Last week, the nine-member ensemble made its debut on NPR Music's Tiny Desk Concert. The band plays the Keswick Theatre on Feb. 8.
Hop Along, "How Simple." The first track from the Francis Quinlan-led leading lights of the thriving Philadelphia indie rock scene augurs well for Bark Your Head Off, Dog, the band's follow-up to 2015's breakout Painted Shut. The new one is due April 6 on Saddle Creek records. The band plays Union Transfer on May 19.
Joe Purdy & Amber Rubarth. The musicians/actors who star in American Folk, David Heinz's road movie about two folkies thrown together for a cross-country car ride in the days after Sept. 11, 2001, when air travel was curtailed across the U.S. The duo shine on the soundtrack of the movie, which is playing at the AMC Cherry Hill 24. Purdy and Rubarth are at World Cafe Live on Wednesday.
Strand of Oaks, Harder Love. A full-length alternative to Philly rocker Tim Showalter's 2017 release Hard Love, this set of recordings cut with Ben Vehorn at Tangerine Studios in Akron, Ohio, is a looser, hazy, unedited take on the officially released version. Not necessarily harder, but trippier and more relaxed, with additional songs and expansive jams.
Stanley Jordan / Trevor Gordon Hall. Guitar geek freakout, with Jordan, the jazz virtuoso whose two-handed touch technique of tapping the strings made him a star in the 1980s, and who now often plays guitar and piano at the same time. Joining him is Hall, the up-and-coming Philadelphian who plays an instrument of his own making called the kalimbatar that combines an acoustic guitar and an African finger piano. Thursday at Sellersville Theater.