The Scene

MusicDetour.com’s commentary on music, performances, and the DC metro area music scene

The Ottobar in Baltimore will be hosting the Summer Swarm Festival Saturday beginning at 5pm. Be sure to come out and support research on bee Colony Collapse Disorder (ccd) while seeing some great bands.

The Funkmnkyz are playing at Fat Tuesday’s in Fairfax, VA Friday night. This five piece band presents a funky blend of hip-hop and hard rock, so come out and bob your heads. The show starts at 8:00pm and the following bands are listed to play.

• Crazy Anglos

• Funkmnkyz

• The Common Threat

• The Breaks

A great up and coming band, Everyone But Pete, is playing at Fado’s in Washington, DC Thursday night. The show starts at 9:30pm. Catch these guys before they hit it big.

One of our goals at Music Detour is to make the music community aware of issues regarding the digital distribution of music. As a site that wishes to change the structure of music distribution and creation, it is important to make our readers aware of legislation, FCC rules and lawsuits that relate to music. The internet has created an opportunity to detour previous expensive forms of music distribution, but there is a constant effort by those entities that benefit from the current system to limit new forms of distribution.

Net Neutrality is an important issue because it lies at the heart of the idea that limiting access on the internet can benefit some companies while harming others. What Net Neutrality proposes to do is stop internet service providers (ISPs) from limiting access on their networks. Without Net Neutrality, the FCC has ruled that an ISP can limit the bandwidth of companies using the internet. In turn, the ISP can either charge a fee for higher bandwidth or strictly limit the access of companies that provide competing service.

Allowing ISPs to determine who has access to their networks has profound implications for artists using the internet as a media distribution network. Read what The Future of Music Coalition’s (FMC) director Ann Chaitovitz wrote on Net Neutrality to get an introduction to the issues. Limiting who can use the internet to distribute music traps in the current distribution system while that system changes from a hard media to a digital media.

Aspiring artists be ready, Wednesdays are ideal nights for Open Mic performances. Both Iota in Arlington and Grog and Tankard in Washington, DC have Open Mic nights on Wednesdays while the Old Bowie Town Grill in Bowie, MD has an Open Jam on Wednesdays. Go out to these venues and catch some great undiscovered talent.

The Summer Swarm Fest is coming up at The Ottobar in Baltimore, MD Saturday, May 31st. Its going to be a huge event with a beer garden and motorcycle rides in addition to some great music. Some money for the event will go to honey bee research to understand Colony Collapse Disorder (ccd), which has hurt agricultural production for the last couple years. The following bands will be performing beginning at 5pm:

• Glenmont Popes

• Ironboss

• The Rude and The Reckless

• The Headshakes

• The Expotentials

• Headwounds

• The Lysine Contingency

• King Giant
  

For the 31st straight year, the City of Alexandria will be holding its Memorial Day Jazz Festival beginning Monday @ 1pm. Its at Fort Wade Park and will be moved to the Lee Center’s Kauffman Auditorium in the case of rain.

Schedule:

1 p.m. – Difficult Run Jazz Band
2 p.m. – Project Natale
3 p.m. – Larry Brown Quintet
4 p.m. – Sandra Johnson Quintet
5 p.m. – Al Williams

Hip-hop legend KRS-One is playing at 9:30 Club tonight. He’s out promoting his new album “Keep Right.” He will be performing with DC’s own Kokayi starting around 9:30pm.

On Saturday, Politicks is playing at The State Theatre in Falls Church, VA. They are a great local funk/rock band that has been touring regionally for several years. In addition to Politicks’ funky beats, you’ll also be able to catch the jam oriented music of Square Trio and Midnight Spaghetti & The Chocolate G-Strings.

Its Memorial Day Weekend, the official kick off of the summer and while that means some of you are rocking out at some great shows this weekend, it also signals the start of summer festivals. The weather is great and everyone wants to be outside, luckily musicians do too and you can catch your favorite acts in the open air. Music Detour is your source for keeping up with the summer festivals in the Washington, DC area. From the Fairfax Fair to Rock the Bells at the Merriweather Post Pavilion we’ll have these shows listed for you.

Its also the time of year when cities and towns have weekly outside shows. We want input from people about these, so if you are aware of a weekly show that is not listed on the website email dave@musicdetour.com and let us know about it. Its our goal to have every show possible on the site and these are big local/community events.