Hotel St. George's music is the kind of damaged pop that we've grown to know through bands like Spoon or Guided By Voices - as disparate as those bands might seem. Their melodies are pure and catchy as all get out, but the vocals and lyrics are desperate, longing pleas for love - or maybe just help. The guitars are strummed with veined forearms and gritted teeth, and the vocals keep it cool over an undertone of panic and unease. This kind of dark pop sustains music in general, coming along every so often to make sure it prospers. And we, as its consumers, inherit its riches to someday pass on to our heirs. Music - pop music - is the circle of life. Hotel St. George live on in that tradition. 

[Le Voyeur, with Johnny Cheezbrgr, Apes of Wrath, Fine Slew, 10 p.m., no cover, 404 Fourth Ave. E., Olympia, 360.943.5710]