Sunday, June 20: Shellshag

Northern

By Matt Driscoll on June 16, 2010

Mark it down. This will be one of the best shows of the week. Brooklyn's Shellshag - one dude, Johnny Shell, and one lady, Jen Shag - have built a decade-plus career on underground, awesome-as-fuck sludgepunk. Never creeping too close to the surface and managing to stay endearingly "underground" - in a world where the word means very little anymore - Shellshag don't need your sad-sack White Stripes comparisons. They're better than that, so to speak. Not necessarily better than the White Stripes, but better in the fact they're doing something that doesn't need easy, pop-culture-accessible comparisons to translate. Shellshag's Rumors In Disguise, released earlier this year on the Don Giovanni label, is a good place to start. But see this band live and tell me I'm wrong about them. I dare you.

Shellshag

Sunday, June 20, 8 p.m., all ages, $6
Northern, 321 Fourth Ave., Olympia
northernolympia.org