Philly music this week is stacked with shows by Angélique Kidjo, Patterson Hood, Pink Sweat$, and Philly’s greatest Pogues cover band
Friday is FOMO night. Plus, John Legend, Black Keys, and Nas with the Philadelphia Orchestra concerts announced.
This week in Philly music features a busy weekend with a West African superstar, a solo Drive-By Trucker, an indie trio who have released one of the best albums of the young year, and a New Orleans brass band paired with one of Philly’s most promising groups. We cap off the St. Patrick’s Day season with two stellar Irish music bands.
Let’s start with Arnetta Johnson, the Camden trumpeter who backed Beyoncé at the Super Bowl, has played with The Roots and Victoria Monét, and runs her own music education Arnetta’s Band Camp every summer. Her 2022 solo album is If You Hear a Trumpet, It’s Me and she plays 118 North in Wayne on Wednesday. Atlanta rapper SahBabii plays the TLA that same night.
On Thursday, Tennessee death metal band Whitechapel — named for the London neighborhood where Jack the Ripper roamed — plays the TLA.
Friday is FOMO night.
The indie show of the week is Horsegirl, the now Brooklyn-based trio of Nora Cheng, Penelope Lowenstein, and Gigi Reece. It attracted attention when its then-teenage members, with an affection for ‘90s alt-rock, released the Ballroom Dance Scene EP in 2020. The excellent Velvet Underground-influenced new Phonetic On and On is a huge leap forward. The band plays the First Unitarian Church with Free Range and Empath.
Friday at Johnny Brenda’s is the St. Patty’s week blowout I’ve been waiting for, with Bar Dust, the fab Pogues cover band featuring members of the Menzingers, Modern Baseball, and other Philly bands. Shane MacGowan lives! The Tisburys opens.
And if you’d prefer more quietly stirring Irish music that is actually from Ireland, Ye Vagabonds will soothe the soul at the Lounge at World Cafe Live; boygenius fans might recognize the band from the time it paired with Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Lucy Dacus on a 2023 version of “The Parting Glass,” a song that was subsequently covered by the Philly Specials last year.
While that’s happening upstairs, downstairs at the WCL Music Hall will be Soul Rebels, the forward-thinking NOLA brass band that was part of the Super Bowl pregame show last month, when the Eagles crushed the Chiefs in the Crescent City. Philly’s Cadre Noir is also on the bill.
Still more Friday options: Memphis soul and blues band Southern Avenue that features sisters Tikyra, Tierinii, and Ava Jackson does Free at Noon at World Cafe Live. Its Family is due on Alligator Records in April. Confidence Man, the Australian electro pop band that shares a name with a Herman Melville novel, plays the Foundry at the Fillmore, and bluegrass quintet Yonder Mountain String Band is at Ardmore Music Hall.
Reggie Watts, the former James Corden bandleader and comedian, plays Underground Arts. And it’s ‘90s R&B night in Atlantic City with Ginuwine and Montell Jordan teaming up at Ovation Hall at the Ocean Resort.
Patterson Hood, the Drive-By Truckers co-founder, plays the Sellersville Theater on Friday in support of Exploding Trees & Airplane Screams, his first solo album in 13 years. The sweetly ruminative album features Waxahatchee, Wednesday, and Lydia Loveless, who also opens Friday’s show.
On Saturday, Beninese French songwriter, activist, and all around force of nature Angélique Kidjo plays the Zellerbach Theatre at the Annenberg Center in West Philly. Kidjo, a five-time Grammy winner, released a song-by-song reinterpretation of the Talking Heads’ Remain in Light in 2018.
Her most recent album is 2021′s Mother Nature, which included contributions from Burna Boy, Sampa the Great, and The Roots’ keyboard player James Poyser, who scored the music for the new City of Brotherly Drugs drama Long Bright River on Peacock.
Also on Saturday, Canadian folk singer and autoharp player Basia Bulat plays World Cafe Live behind her lush new Basia’s Palace. Philly rock band the World Is a Beautiful Place and I Am No Longer Afraid to Die celebrates the 10th anniversary of its album Harmlessness at the First Unitarian church.
Philly soul singer Pink Sweat$ had a “Welcome Home Tour” show that had to be rescheduled due to the Super Bowl parade. It happens at the Perelman Theater on Saturday, and Michael McDermott plays the Jersey Shore Arts Center in Ocean Grove.
On Sunday, Brazilian pop band Terraplana plays a 4333 Collective show at Ortlieb’s, with All the Flower and Pale Shade also on the bill. San Francisco Bay Area singer-songwriter Logan Ledger, whose 2020 self-titled debut was produced by T-Bone Burnett, has just released The Golden State. On Sunday Ledger plays 118 North.
In upcoming concert news, this week’s announcements include rapper Nas performing his 1994 classic album Illmatic with the Philadelphia Orchestra at the Mann Center on July 25. The Black Keys plays the Borgata Event Center in Atlantic City on Aug. 9. And John Legend will mark 20 years of his debut, Get Lifted, at the Met Philly on Nov. 5.
And for summer festival travel planners, Bucks County’s Sabrina Carpenter’s road to world domination continues in Chicago where she will be a Lollapalooza headliner, along with Olivia Rodrigo, Doechii, Luke Combs, and A$AP Rocky. Philly’s Zinadelphia and South Jersey’s Mk. Gee are also on the bill.