Body Worlds

Opens Thursday, July 9th

See for yourself if it’s really what’s on the inside that counts at Gunther von Hagens’ Body Worlds and The Story of the Heart, which exposes the hidden anatomical world that lies just below the skin’s surface. Opening next Thursday (July 9) at the Buffalo Museum of Science, the exhibit presents viewers with over 200 authentic human specimens, including entire bodies with their intricate networks of muscles, tendons, and blood vessels pristinely intact. Body Worlds is made possible by Von Hagens’ own innovative process of plastination that halts decomposition after death and allows permanent preservation. The artist’s approach to his work is one of an anatomist and teacher; in his own words, to “reject the taboos and convictions that people have about death and the dead.” This perspective has been faced with both world-wide critical acclaim and hostility as von Hagens’ challenges his viewers to “transcend their fundamental beliefs and convictions about our joint and inescapable fate,” and to view life and death as intertwined. The exhibition will be open during regular Museum hours through October 4, 2009. It may not be suitable for all ages. Visit www.sciencebuff.org for more information.

—lindsay berman

9am. Open 7/9-10/4, M-Sa 9am-9pm, Su 11am-7pm. Buffalo Museum of Science, 1020 Humboldt Parkway (877-687-3359 / 896-5200 / www.sciencebuff.org/bw). $12-$22, box office, www.museumtix.com, or 877-687-3359.

Friday, July 3rd

Bad Boy Bill

Factory Nightlife presents the Annual “Sudoku Independence Day Party” at Pure Nightclub, the indoor/outdoor dance club that now hosts the monthly event. This Friday (July 3) is extra special, being the weekend of our nation’s birthday, so international—but still American—DJ Bad Boy Bill is the star of the night along with special guests Lex Da Funk and Factory Nightlife artists Jesse Aaron, Nate Howell, Jarvis & Corey Downy, DJ Dubbs, Active 8, and “Buffalo’s Best DJ” L’il Joe rockin’ the rooftop. Hailed by DJ Magazine as “one of America’s most popular and influential DJs,” Bill came up in Chicago just when the club scene started jumping. Starting out as a radio mix show DJ, he soon moved on to club DJ, recording artist, producer, songwriter, and entrepreneur. The grandson of an opera singer, Bill comes from a distinguished musical background but was drawn to the clubs for the rush he gets from his unique a bility to spin—not only up to 20 records in the time your average DJ might spin five or ten, but to spin the audience/crowd into a dancing frenzy.

—k. o’day

10pm. Pure Nightclub, 75 W. Chippewa (www.purebuffalo.net)

Saturday, July 4th

Fourth of July, 2009

Whether or not you’ve been taken by the patriotic spirit, the 4th of July remains a day where drinking in the sun and playing with fire are encouraged. In addition to your neighbors’ back yard bash, these outdoor festivals and concerts promise live music, family friendly activities, and fireworks. Buffalo’s “Official 4th of July Celebration” at the Erie Canal Harbor’s Central Wharf will host local music acts Michael Oliver & The Sacred Band, Cadenza of the Colored Musicians Club, and Tom Stahl And The Dangerfields (5-10pm, www.buffaloplace.com, 856-3150). The Friendship Festival at Riverside Park and Fort Erie Ontario offers simultaneous free concerts and parades (11am-11pm, www.friendshipfestival.com, 1-888-333-1987). Nostalgic for winter? Get close to your favorite slopes at Ellicottville’s Summer Festival of the Arts and its arts and crafts show, pet parade, and performance by the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra that evening at 8pm at Holiday Valley (www.ellicottvilleny.com, 800-349-9099). As a part of the Gateway Harbor Concert Series in Tonawanda, the free music by Sugar N’ Jazz (7pm, Niawanda Park) and Terry Buchwald (6pm, Gateway Harbor Park) await you. And finally, if you are yearning for a more country vibe, Jam in the Valley (1-2 day passes, www.jaminthevalley.com, 1-877-744-5488) at the Buffalo Hill Village in Varysburg can provide you with your fix of camping and cowboy hats.

—lindsay berman

Monday, July 6th

Peter Hughes

Multi-instrumentalist Peter Hughes is probably best known as full time contributor to cult favorites the Mountain Goats. Along with founder John Darnielle, Hughes has helped craft the Mountain Goats from a lo-fi bedroom outfit to a sweeping statement of intricate storytelling. Although Hughes has been working with the Mountain Goats as a constant member since earlier this decade, he has also made music under his own name. Although similiar in its aesthetic, Hughes’ music is far more experimental in nature than his collaborative work with Darnielle, concentrating on Eno-esque soundscapes and electronic catharsis. Opening the show on Monday (July 6) is Buffalo’s own Kyle Broad, and also performing is the Chicago outfit Sonoi, whose music falls somewhere between the aforementioned Eno, Wire, and Neu! Although Sonoi is a relatively new collective, their members have recorded and performed with the likes of Califone, Smog, Edith Frost, Jon Langford, and Will Oldham.

—eric boucher

8pm. Mohawk Place, 47 E. Mohawk St. (855-3931 / www.mohawkplace.com). FREE

Tuesday, July 7th

The Church

You’ve been at it for some time if the “new guy” in your band has been with you for 15 records. The church—and I don’t know when the band members stopped capitalizing that “c,” or if they always have and were simpy misrepresented throughout most of their careers—formed as a trio in 1980 in Sydney, Australia. There’s no sense in reciting the litany of lineup changes and solo outings that attends any band that has worked together for nearly 30 years. Instead, recall the remarkable early records—The Blurred Crusade, Heyday, Starfish—that placed the band at the fore of the neo-psychedelic movement of the 1980s. The church suffered some schisms and setbacks in the 1990s, but continued to release records, and by millennium’s end the orginal lineup (plus the “new guy”) had regrouped. The band brings its lush, shimmering sound to the Tralf this week on Tuesday (July 7), with special guest Adam Franklin

—brian blackwell

Doors 7pm, show 8pm. Tralf Music Hall (622 Main Street, 852-2860). $25 presale, $30 at the door. Tralf box office or Ticketmaster.

Tuesday, July 7th

Castanets

Castanets is the pseudo solo project of musician Raymond Raposa, a San Diegoan who relocated—like so many others— from the area with the best actual climate to the area with the best musical climate, Portland, Oregon. The only constant member of Castanets, Raposa is joined by an ever-changing cast of guests, the lineup sometimes different each night of any given tour (depending on where he lands and who is available). As a forerunner of what is now known commonly as “freak folk” or the “new weird Americana,” Raposa is no less freaky or weird now than when he came on the scene in the early 2000s. Fresh off some kind of “sailboat tour” with colleagues and sometime collaborators Jana Hunter and Peter & the Wolf (aka Red Hunter), Castanets is headed our way for a show on Tuesday (July 7), along with tourmate M.A. Turner. Raposa—as Castanets—has been releasing nearly one album a year since signing to Asthmatic Kitty in 2004. His upcoming record, Texas Rose, the Beasts, and the Thaw is due out late this year.

—k. o’day

9pm. Soundlab, 110 Pearl St. (www.bigorbitgallery.org/soundlab). $8

Thursday, July 9th

Rick Smith CD Release

It’s summertime in Buffalo, so if you don’t know him already, you’ll recognize Rick Smith as the guy driving the big green Delta 88 convertible around town, wearing a mustache and a cowboy hat and, inevitably, a smile. If you do know Smith, it’ll come as no surprise that the businessman, arts patron, and Allentown fixture is releasing his fourth CD of songs that travel the continuum of folk, country, and laidback rock and roll. Recorded on his own label, Kick Some Pigs, in the company of his usual gang of ace local musicians, the new record is called WheeWhoops, and Smith and his many, many friends (and as far as Smith is concerned, that includes you, whether you know him or not) will mark its release next Thursday (July 9) at his home base, Nietzsche’s. You may not walk away with a mustache and a cowboy hat, but you will walk away smiling.

—geoff kelly

8pm. Nietzsche’s, 248 Allen Street (886-8539 / www.nietzches.com)