The Athens Boys Choir is the hilariously fraudulent stage name used by adult, solo, and very transsexual spoken word slowly being labeled “homo-hop” by wordsmiths far more clever than The Hook. With educational and activist touches, it definitely sounds like a match for fans of Stevie Jay.

Athens Boys Choir - Erasing Too Hard
Athens Boys Choir - Dafodils and Macramé

Also featuring like-minded young emo-rap artist Katastrophe.

Samara Lubelski plays psychedelic folk using a multitude of instruments along the way. Pop duo the Terrordactyls open.

The Terrordactyls - Devices

Megan Huddleston is a local alt-country songstress and Pokey LaFarge plays folk and blues with a light touch of ragtime and other similarly nutty influences.

Pokey LaFarge - Sweet Seventeen

Even with continued primetime placement like his recent slots on Grey’s Anatomy, Gary Jules probably turned the most heads on the Donnie Darko soundtrack with his haunting solo piano rendition of the 80’s Tears For Fears cheeseball synthesizer tune “Mad World,” seen above used to fantastically ironic effect in an ad for the ultra-violent shoot-em-up video game “Gears Of War.”

AM is in the same boat — every song from his debut album was used either in either film or television. Hey dude, Moby called — he wants his business plan back.

AM - Old Song
AM - New Road
AM - Temporary One

Also featuring Mando Saenz.

Rivanna River Chiggers promise to “scratch your old-time itch.” And if you didn’t know you had one, then hey, surprise!

The Rivanna River Chiggers - Over The Waterfall
The Rivanna River Chiggers - June Apple
The Rivanna River Chiggers - Abe’s Retreat

“Forward With Scotland’s Past” is the battle cry of the the Battlefield Band as they wage war against soulless contemporary pop schlock with bagpipes and bouzoukis. Billboard probably said it best: “What the internationally renowned Irish band The Chieftains has. done for Irish music, Battlefield Band is doing for the music of Scotland.”

The Battlefield Band - Gathering Storm
The Battlefield Band - Dookin’ For Beetroot/The Head Roaster

Dan Snaith’s music, now published under the name Caribou after he threw up his hands in frustration a few years back over the legal wrangling attached to Manitoba, his previous band name, takes a few steps away from the realm of the four-chord songwriter and then dribbles a wash of electronics over everything without ever really sounding even remotely techno. He’s been here before, and Ballroom big cheese Danny Shea has dubbed him “a Satellite favorite.”

Caribou - Melody Day

Also featuring noisy rock duo F*ck Buttons, who clearly have the best sense of humor of anyone performing this week.

F-ck Buttons - Bright Tomorrow

The acclaimed songwriter and local favorite lends her talents to a benefit show for the Charlottesville Montessori School.

Shannon Worrell - Drivin’ In The Dark

Tiger Saw is an ill-defined musical consortium which plays minimalist rock — or rather, as close to minimalist as one can reasonably expect from a band that includes a dancer, a magician, and an eight-piece horn section.

Also featuring rapper Cathy Catholic, who drops pious rhymes on your sorry ass.

Tiger Saw - Distance

Danny Schmidt, a once-local singer-songwriter now transplanted to Austin, TX, returns to his old stomping grounds for a show in the Hamner Theater’s Cabaret series.

Danny Schmidt - Adios To Tejasito