FESTIVAL
Tacoma Wine and Jazz Festival
Tonight, the Tacoma Wine and Jazz Festival will celebrate what looks like a victory. It finally looks like Ted Brown’s dream will come true. For the past several years Brown (no relation to the music store by the same name) has been lobbying and fund-raising to build an outdoor concert stage in Old Town Park, at the base of North 30th Street in Tacoma. According to Brown, architects and engineers are working on the details of the project now. The new performance stage will match the small historic cabin that houses the Job Carr Museum in the park. To learn more about the museum that commemorates one of Tacoma’s founding fathers visit www.jobcarrmuseum.org.
This year the festival will feature a crowd favorite from last year: flutist Bradley Leighton, whose funk-infused jazz lends sex appeal to the flute that may change people’s ideas about the instrument all together. Co-headlining the festival is Olympia’s 7 on 7, a seven-piece jazz band, who will perform their energetic swing and jump style jazz.
This year the festival will focus more on Washington wines including Covey Run, Desert Wind, Houge, Red Diamond, Snoqualmie, and specialty wines by Tacoma’s own Vino Aquino. â€" Angela Jossy
[Slavonian Hall, Tacoma Wine and Jazz Festival, 5-11 p.m., $25, 2306 N. 30th St., Old Town Tacoma, 253.759.2518]
ROCK
Post Stardom Depression
Tonight at Hell’s Kitchen, something that hasn’t happened in 14 months will return to Tacoma â€" something T-town could once count on like onion rings at Frisko Freeze and hookers on South Tacoma Way. Post Stardom Depression will return to the stage, in a big way. The band will play an early all-ages show, and a signature late 21+ show for all their booze loving followers. Jeff Angell, Kyong Kim, Brent Saunders and Josh Fant â€" together once again. It’s a return most rock fans in the 253 have been begging for.
Sometimes you need a catalyst to make something happen. When guitarist Kyong Kim’s daughter was born with a birth defect of her esophagus and began racking up enormous medical bills without health insurance, that was enough to inspire PSD’s return. Angell told me this week the band had been discussing a return before the situation with Kim’s daughter arose, but the desire to help part of the PSD family was enough to seal the deal. Both of Saturday’s shows at Hell’s Kitchen will be benefits for Kim’s family. â€" Hell’s Kitchen
[Hell’s Kitchen, 5 p.m. all-ages show: Post Stardom Depression, The Jet City Fix, The Jury, The Pete Moss Band; 9 p.m. 21 and older show: Post Stardom Depression, The Jet City Fix, Foray, Bumma Stoge, $7, 3829 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253.759.6003]
LINK: Fear Train Caravan and others in local clubs tonight.
LINK: Figaro! Figaro! Fig-a-ro!
LINK: Let’s eat in a bar tonight.