Best concerts this week: Sturgill Simpson, Ashley McBryde, Om, Leela James
Tuesday
Radical Face: While your phone is lighting up with Super Tuesday updates, you can be at the Rex Theater, South Side, enjoying Ben Cooper, aka Radical Face, the indie-folk singer-songwriter from Jacksonville, Fla., who has an intimate sound comparable to Neutral Milk Hotel, Iron & Wine and Grizzly Bear. He’s touring behind a Deluxe Reissue of “Ghost,” his 2007 album that was featured in movies and shows like “Weeds,” “Blacklist,” “Skins” and “Humboldt County,” not to mention “Welcome Home, Son” becoming the theme song for Nikon. With Axel Flovent. 8 p.m. $22; ticketmaster.com.
Wednesday
Sturgill Simpson: Last seen here playing the Outlaw Music Festival with Willie Nelson in 2018, Simpson does his biggest Pittsburgh show yet, headlining the Petersen Events Center in Oakland on A Good Look’n Tour with Tyler Childers. The 41-yearold maverick from Kentucky is supporting his fourth album, “SOUND & FURY,” which he deemed a “sleazy, steamy, rock ‘n’ roll record,” one that takes him further away from the original country sound into psychedelic blues with more electronics than we ever expected. Fans can expect to hear the album in its entirety in the middle of the set, surrounded mostly by songs from the previous two albums, “Metamodern Sounds in Country Music” and “A Sailor’s Guide to the Earth.” This is a good time to see him because after this tour, we don’t know what’s to come. He told Uproxx last month that he’s had it with big tours and said of his label, Elektra, “I’m not going to give them anything ever again, so I guess I’m done.” 7:30 p.m. $50; ticketmaster.com.
Thursday
Ashley McBryde: The reigning CMA New Artist of the Year and ACM New Female Artist of the Year, stops at Mr. Smalls, Millvale, on her One Night Standards Tour. It comes in advance of the April 3 release of her sophomore album, “Never Will,” the follow-up to her debut album “Girl Going Nowhere.” The first single, “One Night Standards,” is another taste of what the Washington Post called her “blue-collar storytelling and straightforward singing.” 8 p.m. $23; mrsmalls.com.
Friday
Leela James: The Soul Sessions series at the August Wilson Center for African American Culture, Downtown, with Leela James, a soul singer more than capable of rockin’ the place. The singer, who was called “Baby Etta,” after Etta James, when growing up in Los
Angeles, started her career touring with the Black Eyed Peas and Macy Gray and sang on the posthumous Ray Charles album “Genius & Friends” before she even released a debut album. That came in 2005 with “A Change Is Gonna Come,” an album that harked back to the R&B/soul of the ’60s and ’70s. In 2012 she honored her biggest influence with “Loving You More … In the Spirit of Etta James.” Her latest project, “Are You Ready?” from Leela James & The Truth, finds her delving into Betty Davis territory of psychedelic soul. 8 p.m. $28.75; awc.culturaldistrict.org.
New Bomb Turks: Can they play with the speed and fury they did 30 years ago? Find out when the Ramonesinspired garage-punk band that formed at Ohio State University returns to play the Crafthouse in Whitehall. Back in the day, Chuck Eddy said of the Turks, who maintained underground cred throughout, “Why anybody would’ve cared about a ‘punk rock’ record in 1983, much less 1993, is a good question to ask your clergyman, but these four Ohio boys are the only band I can think of lately that even attempts to play said genre as the rock’n’roll it was intended to be … .” With The Spectres and The Filthy Lowdown. 8 p.m. eventbrite.com.
Dweezil Zappa: Dweezil continues to keep the legacy alive with a tour titled “Hot Rats Live! + Other Hot Stuff 1969.” The focus will be his father Frank’s second solo album (after the demise of Mothers of Invention), a largely instrumental record that began with one of his most famous compositions, “Peaches in Regalia.” Dweezil and his band will do the six-song, 43-minute record in its entirety and that will just be the appetizer. Jergel’s, Marshall. 8 p.m. $32; eventbrite.com.
Outsideinside: Would you expect anything less than killer from Dave Wheeler and company? The Pittsburgh band, now with James Hart (Harlan Twins) delivers yet again with this eight-song sophomore album that hurdles us back to the glory days of ’70s boogie-rock bands like Free and Humble Pie. It will be released with a show at Brillobox, Bloomfield, along with Pet Clinic and Sweat. Tickets are $10; brilloboxpgh.com.
Friday-Saturday
Brit Floyd: Rogers Waters returns to Pittsburgh in July, but you don’t need to wait till then to get your Pink Floyd fix. Brit Floyd, the clear favorite among Pink Floyd tribute bands, returns for two nights at the Benedum, Downtown. The band, formed in 2011 by former Australian Pink Floyd member Damian Darlington, will play songs from the entire catalog along with a 23minute “note-for-note” performance of “Echoes,” which appeared on the 1971 album “Meddle.” They come with a multimillion dollar light show, the iconic circle screen, lasers, inflatables and theatrics. 8 p.m. trustarts.org.
Saturday
Dashboard Confessional: Dashboard is on the road celebrating 20 years since “The Swiss Army Romance,” the record that started it all for the Florida emo band led by Chris Carrabba. The tour also coincides with the release of “The Best Ones Of The Best Ones,” a career-spanning compilation that follows 2018’s “Crooked Shadows.” They do a sold-out show at Stage AE with The Get Up Kids. Doors at 6:30 p.m.
Of Montreal: The Athens, Ga., indie-rock band Of Montreal turns up at Mr. Smalls, Millvale, touring behind “UR FUN,” the 16th album (since 1997) from Kevin Barnes and company. It begins at 8 p.m. with Lily and Horn Horse and Chariot Fade. $20; mrsmalls.com.
Sunday
Om/Wovenhand: It will be a pleasantly dark and heavy night at Spirit in Lawrenceville, when Om, the exotic San Francisco drone metal trio made up of two members of Sleep, rolls in with Wovenhand, the gothiccountry band led by former 16 Horsepower frontman David Eugene Edwards. Sleep has been the bigger focus for Al Cisneros, who hasn’t released an Om record since 2012 cult favorite “Advaitic Songs.” In December, Sleep posted the message “prep hypersleep facil for indef duration,” followed by a more straightforward tweet “Sleep has not broken up. After these NYE shows we are taking a much needed break for the time being. Thank you all and happy new year.” Earlier last year, frontman Al Cisneros talked about early inspirations, saying “the first four Black Sabbath albums and lots of marijuana, which truly brings focus to the way the riff and the rhythm breathe and move. For me, when I’m stoned it’s readily apparent whether a rhythm has a shelf-life or not. It cuts to the essence of it. The drums and bass are like the heart and lungs of the music, in a way.” 8 p.m. $20; spiritpgh.com.