[INDUSTRIAL GOTH] + SAT, DEC. 6

As much as an album cover featuring a black-and-white photo of a nude woman chained up and wearing a black mask and leather gloves might seem like something out of This is Spinal Tap, it's actually the cover of The Killing Scene by Animal Bodies. Rather than the arena rock of Smell the Glove, Animal Bodies make industrial goth music, every track surging with cold synthesizers and drenched with menacingly hushed vocals. It's almost charming just in its devotion to throwing back to the '80s, when mechanical post-punk was really rearing its head. The music of Animal Bodies almost seems designed to soundtrack some sort of future-rave scene in a '90s cyber-thriller. Still, as with much of this kind of music, there's a certain giddiness that begins to crystallize out of the fog machines of self-seriousness that billow from Animal Bodies. {REV. ADAM MCKINNEY}

ANIMAL BODIES, w/ Dion Vox, Arc Ov Light, 10 p.m., Le Voyeur, 404 E. Fourth Ave., Olympia, no cover, 360.943.5710

[CLASSICAL] + SUN, DEC. 7

"'Comfort ye, my people,' saith your God." And with that, one of humanity's crowning achievements in inspirational music gets underway. Who couldn't use some comfort as we approach the winter solstice? Maybe that's why Messiah, which was written for Easter and first performed in April, has become so inseparably associated with Christmas. You know it; you love it. Like many oratorios, George Handel's 1741 masterpiece uses a technique called text painting, in which the score reinforces individual lyrics. That's why the line "Ev'ry valley shall be exalted," for example, sounds so ... exalted. Christ Lutheran's production will be conducted by Anne Lyman and highlights professional soloists and instrumentalists. If you'd rather wait till Thursday the 18th, you can catch the Tacoma Symphony Orchestra playing the whole blessed thing at St. Charles Borreomo in Tacoma. Alternate suggestion: you could lend your voice to Oly's Messiah Sing-Along at the Washington Center in downtown Olympia Dec. 22. {CHRISTIAN CARVAJAL}

MESSIAH SING-A-LONG, 2 p.m. Christ Lutheran Church, 8211 112th St. SW, Lakewood, $10 suggested donation, 253.581.0331

[PSYCH-HARDCORE] + SUN, DEC. 7

From Mexico, by way of Venezuela, the psych-hardcore outfit Cardiel make an ungodly racket that belies their status as a two-piece. Even if it's never quite said explicitly, there's a feeling of revolution that permeates their music. Every song seems to be violently pushing back against anything that threatens to hold Cardiel in one place or to one designation. With thunderous drums, squalling guitars and shrieking vocals, Cardiel are also unafraid to divert their usual sound in favor of playful experimentation - as on "Preveral en al Coping," which abruptly downshifts from a gut-punch of a rocker to a reggae-tinged ditty that never stops threatening to return to an ear-splitting rave-up. The message, they seem to be saying, is to never try to put Cardiel into any sort of box, leaving their roaring guitars to tear through expectations. {REV. AM}

CARDIEL, w/ Blanco Bronco, DJ Quan Fi, 5 p.m., The Valley, 1206 Puyallup Ave., Tacoma, cover tba, 253.248.4265