10 cant-miss concerts in the D.C. area this June
D.C.’s decades-long status as a capital of punk and DIY music has been well documented, in books, documentaries, zines, tribute records and this publication. But the weight of that history often threatens to engulf the present scene, like towering stacks of old newspapers in a hoarder’s garage.
But the tenets of a do-it-yourself — or, more accurately, do-it-together — scene have always served as an invitation for new acts and audiences to join as others age out or otherwise move on. While there are live shows featuring local acts nearly every night of every month, June presents a special opportunity to check in with the current crop of D.C. bands continuing the city’s tradition.
Flowers for the Dead have been budding up for the last few years, delivering loud-quiet-loud dirges about the depressive themes that their name suggests in lyrics and out-of-phase riffs from bandleader Jessie Szegö and the hypnotic rhythm section of bassist Ella Buskirk and drummer Ten Bears. The power trio are marking their first single release since their 2022 album “Quiet Corrosion in the Dancing Hall” with a show at Songbyrd. They’ll be joined by Milliseconds, a new band of old collaborators. Milliseconds brings Dismemberment Plan rhythm section Joe Easley and Eric Axelson together with guitarist Leigh Thompson for throwback indie rock that sees Axelson overcoming a lifelong anxiety around singing to get in front of the mic. (June 6 at 8 p.m. at Songbyrd. songbyrddc.com. $16-$20.)
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Flowerbomb shares a floral name and a similar period of influence with Flowers for the Dead but has a sunnier disposition. The four-piece churns out impeccable pop melodies with lyrics that nod to ennui and nostalgia (“I know that my heart beats faster/ Every day since ’98”) and will be celebrating an EP release as part of the band’s ongoing and au courant “Gloom Scroll” project. Flowerbomb will be joined by Pinky Lemon, a group that specializes in pop that is alternatingly synthy, spacey, gazy and dreamy with irony-heavy lyrics: “I’ve got big money down on pop criminal stocks,” it deadpans on “Pop Criminal.” “Everybody goes to jail when you hand me the aux.” (June 14 at 10 p.m. at Comet Ping Pong. cometpingpong.com. $15.)
D.C. favorites Ted Leo and the Pharmacists are celebrating the 20th anniversary of the impeccable “Shake the Sheets,” but make sure to catch tour mate Ekko Astral, a D.C. act that is quickly building buzz and opening its self-described “mascara mosh pit” to wider audiences. The punk band’s debut album, “Pink Balloons,” is full of vicious kiss-offs for the terminally online, local D.C. flavor and hooks that live up to their physical definition in the way they take hold and don’t let go. But at Ekko Astral’s core is a dialogue informed by and about the queer and trans experience, from its revelatory highs to violent lows. “If you walk through a cemetery/ You’ll find people buried under gravestones of strangers,” frontwoman Jael Holzman sneers. “I have friends still hiding while you throw a parade.” (June 20 at 7 p.m. at 9:30 Club. 930.com. Sold out.)
As Spring Silver, Maryland-based songwriter K Nkanza makes, according to their Bandcamp page, “the wrong music for the wrong people.” That tongue-in-cheek descriptor nods to the way that Spring Silver’s tunes throw varied influences — post-hardcore, experimental electronica, power pop, what have you — into pop songs for folks who have been marginalized by various -isms and -phobias. No two songs sound alike: The expansive “Gold Star” feels like “OK Computer”-era Radiohead, but the impossibly sunny “Another Perfect Day, Another Perfect Night” belies deeper anxieties: “Are you content to be consumed,” Spring Silver asks, “passed around like a chalice?” The band will be joined by Soul Meets Body, a D.C.-Baltimore band also working to lift up under-heard voices and build a supportive community through music. (June 7 at 8 p.m. at the Pocket. thepocketdc.com. $15-$18.)
Shaed is its own community in microcosm, a family band that pairs twins Max and Spencer Ernst with vocalist Chelsea Lee (who is married to Spencer). The D.C.-born band whistled its way from a MacBook commercial to streaming and chart success with the moody electro-pop hit “Trampoline,” but after a pandemic and the birth of Chelsea and Spencer’s daughter, it’s refocused on the forthcoming “Spinning Out.” From the early singles, the trio’s sophomore album promises breezy ballads and bops and plenty of sun-kissed, streamlined pop. (June 15 and 22 at 6:30 p.m. at the Atlantis. theatlantis.com. First show sold out, second show $30.)
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The dream of the ’90s — specifically of cross-pollinators like Rage Against the Machine and Incubus — is alive at this dual record release party. Outerloop rips riffy rock with touches of punk, funk and jazz and the powerhouse, operatic vocals of Taisha Estrada, who changes language as the song necessitates. On “Huracán,” a song about displacement and gentrification in Puerto Rico, she voices the oppressed in Spanish and the oppressor in English. Meanwhile, prog-hop act XK Scenario pair dense instrumentation with Kaleab Elias’s rapped missives. (June 29 at 10 p.m. at Comet Ping Pong. cometpingpong.com. $15.)
Nick Bairatchnyi has been in emo-pop band the Obsessives since he was a teenager, but after a few years in Philly amid the city’s vibrant indie rock scene, he sharpened his edges into something more immediate and raw and reemerged as Prude. Backed by friends Ray Brown and Alex Bass (who also serve as the rhythm section for Snail Mail), Bairatchnyi makes songs to sway along to, capturing the sense of friendship amid familiarity on “Cowboy Beatdown” as he sings, “I’ll be at every single show/ It’s something to do/ It’s people to see/ All that I want, I want is no mystery.” (June 12 at 7 p.m. at Songbyrd. songbyrddc.com. $15-$18.)
On the cover of its last EP, Massie went for the flesh: a close-up portrait of a bloody smile, the band’s name spelled out in braces. The female-fronted pop-punk trio grins and bears it on the project, and will release a new single alongside Baltimore alt-rockers Dosser (not to be confused with their sonic cousins in D.C.’s Tosser). (May 31 at 8 p.m. at Pie Shop. pieshopdc.com. $15.)
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Birthday Girl opted for a similarly smash-mouth image on its latest EP, which features a fleshy photo of an open mouth with an open socket. If not “Dirtier” like the title suggests, it’s more dynamic than the already-promising tunes of the band’s sweeping debut, with clever lyrics that are still youthful and vulnerable: “The grass I’m on is the first I’ve touched/ Everyone says that the other’s always greener/ But I think this plastic turf is not enough/ I can feel this real stuff through my sneakers.” The young trio is opening for Les Savy Fav, indie survivors more in the musical lineage of the bands that two members of Birthday Girl are literally descended from: Guitarist Mabel Canty and bassist Bella MacKaye are the daughters of Dischord originals Brendan Canty and Alec MacKaye, respectively. (June 28 at 8 p.m. at the Black Cat. blackcatdc.com. $25-$30.)
Just as Dischord was founded to release a record by Ian MacKaye’s Teen Idles, Breakfast All Day Records was launched by Bethesda high-schoolers last year. The “School’s Out” matinee features alt-rockers Scoria; jammy act Lola; and the Plastic Toys, a trio that features one-third of the label’s brain trust on drums. The label’s mission statement was published on Instagram but could have been released any time in the last 40 years: “With so many exciting things happening in the teenage music scene locally, we want to work to document and share it with you.” (June 8 at 1:30 p.m. at Songbyrd. songbyrddc.com. $12-$15.)
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