MONDAY, AUG. 4 2014 >>>

1. The students at Arbutus Folk School will put down their Pieh Har-Lev Ergonomic Cross Pein Hammers, Langstroth Beehive Frames, Spriggs Adjustable Frame Looms and Excalibur nine-tray food dehydrators and pick up guitars for the Arbutus Acoustic Open Mic, which happens every first Monday of the month from 7-9 p.m. The M.C. and organizer of the event is Mark Iler, who started and ran the open mic for Victory Music in Seattle for 20 years. It's a friendly environment, and certainly open to everyone, even if you don't make Scandinavian knives at the Olympia school.

2. Our ears perked up and our stomachs flipped a little when we heard the phrase "ultra cool spy themes." It sounds dangerous and sexy. Blues, that most American of musical forms, will receive a dose of spy music, as well as surf tones, at The Swiss' Monday Blues Night at 8 p.m. Seattle guitarist and singer Chris Stevens will fill the downtown Tacoma watering hole with electric blues lines via a big Gibson archtop. Taking their unusual name from a song title by legendary blues guitarist Freddy King, Stevens' back band, the Surf Monkeys, keep a firm footing in the blues while stretching the boundaries with "ultra cool spy themes," reverb drenched surf twang and Chris' own "blues on the edge of jazz" originals.

3. Kryptonite will play selections from the mid-'60s to the present - a mix of post-bop/modal jazz, a la Miles Davis, Wayne Shorter, Bobby Hutcherson, Joe Henderson, Herbie Hancock and John Scofield - at 8 p.m. in Rhythm & Rye in downtown Olympia.

4. Want to feel like a rock star without all the pain and annoyance of having to be a  fire-breathing demon that bleeds from the mouth? Then hit Jazzbones Monday nights for Rockaraoke, where you can belt out songs like the Whitesnake's "Here I Go Again," Bonnie Raitt's "I Can't Make You Love Me," Joan Jett's "I Hate Myself For Loving You" and enough INXS tunes to make you feel like you're on a reality show, and other hits from the days when you made mixtapes by recording the radio, all backed by a live band. Expect a college crowd enjoying $2 PBR drafts, $3 Sinfire shots and $4 Smirnoff Flavor Vodka Bombs. Dibs on "Hungry Like a Wolf."

5. Comedy open mics are where performers cut their teeth, develop their chops and other folksy idioms meaning "possibly suck to get better." Comedians nervously testing out premises they thought of while parking. These baby-steps are often tucked into weekdays as not to compete with the weekend's bigger events. Do you smell an opportunity? Or is that the Pabst sloshing around on the bar? Local comedian and host Eric Puddin Lorentzen want you to indulge in both with the brand new weekly, "Monday Madness Comedy Night with Puddin" at 9 p.m. in The New Frontier Lounge. Expect 6-10 minute sets, each recorded. The audience will choose a winner, who will headline the following week. It was the great Bill Cosby who said, "Puddin, you can't be a comedian without him," or something.

LINK: Monday, Aug. 4 arts and entertainment events in the greater Tacoma and Olympia area