Hip Hatchet is the project of alt-country singer-songwriter Philippe Bronchtein, who has a uniquely gifted sense of setting a melancholy mood. His songs are drenched in loneliness, without ever quite dipping too deeply into the well of sadness. On record, accompanied by a small group of supporting musicians, Bronchtein music swells and rises with a winsome energy. Seen solo, Hip Hatchet becomes about one man nimbly exploring his guitar, his oaken tenor guiding the audience through more than just dusty trails and mangy dogs. Hailing from Portland, Hip Hatchet's brand of folk has a distinctively Pacific Northwestern feel. Joining Hip Hatchet for a performance in the intimate Le Voyeur is Christopher Paul Stelling, a New Yorker who brings a fiery, frantic strum that should balance out Hip Hatchet's bucolic fingerpicking quite well.

HIP HATCHET, w/ Christopher Paul Stelling, Paul Mauer, 10 p.m., Le Voyeur, 303 E. Fourth Ave., Olympia, $5, 360.943.5710