The 12th Annual Non-COMMvention begins today and will be going on through Saturday. The AAA Music Convention is hosting a sold out show tonight at World Café Live featuring Philly’s Grateful Dead-lovin’ favorite sons The War on Drugs who are sharing a bill with Polica, Beth Orton and Father John Misty (the solo project from former Fleet Foxes drummer Josh Tillman). You can check out the rest of the schedule for the music haps at Non-COMM HERE. World Cafe Live, 3025 Walnut St., 8pm, Sold Out, All Ages (Photo by Maryanne Louise) – H.M. Kauffman

R5 Productions host a SERIOUS RAGER at Union Transfer today when legendary 70’s London punks Cock Sparrer play their first Philly show in 40 years. And they’ll be joined by Mike McColgan’s first post-Dropkick Murphy’s project Street Dogs. But if that’s not enough craziness, they’ll also be joined by one of Philly’s own premiere hardcore bands Paint it Black, who will be playing their first hometown show since they tearing shit up at the First Unitarian Church with Screaming Females last year. (Wow – that’s a lot of firsts in just a few sentences!) Having an impressive tenure with Lifetime and Kid Dynamite on his resume, Dan Yemin has been an impactful presence in the local punk scene for the past 15 years. And since Paint It Black closed out their 2011 by working on some rough demos for new songs, I am hoping that there will be more contributions to come from the beloved band that doesn’t perform out nearly enough.  Union Transfer, 1026 Spring Garden St., 8pm, $30, All Ages (Photo by Shane McCauley) – Bill McThrill

Below is a new music video from Market East for the Simon & Garfunkel-esque track “Elena” off their self-titled debut EP. You can catch them live next Thursday, May 24 at North Star Bar when they open for Henry Wolfe. (Photo by Colin Kerrigan)

Check out below the May Episode of Weathervane Music & WXPN’s Shaking Through with bluesy, psychedelic ROCKERS Purling Hiss as well as an interview with this month’s curator The War on Drugs’s Adam Granduciel, who also helped out with engineering/producing duties alongside Jon Low at Miner Street Recordings. You can take a listen to and download the fruits of their labor “Lolita” for free HERE. Enjoy! (Photo by Peter English)

True Widow from Texas returns to Kung Fu Necktie tonight with locals Psychic Teens and Dreambook. Dreambook is a new arrival to the Philly indie music scene. This will be their first show, and it’s a good one to be on. Dreambook has an airy quality to their music with ominous undertones that may seem a bit more nightmarish than dreamy as fuzzy guitar sounds sprinkled with bits of angst stand forefront in their demo tracks. “Stay Inside” could easily fit in the soundtrack of a ‘90s TV Show (for fans of the Adventures of Pete and Pete think Polaris). And there is no doubt Deli faves Psychic Teens will bring the horror to your REM cycle. If you didn’t hear any of Tuesday’s thunderstorms, Psychic Teens will make up for that with thunderous deep bass lines and distorted, wailing guitar riffs. Both should prove to be fitting predecessors to this evening’s headliner. Kung Fu Necktie, 1250 N. Front St., 8pm, $10, 21+ – Maura Filoromo

Below is a floaty new space adventure music video for the track “Balloon in the City” from Cheers Elephant. It takes advantage of YouTube’s 3D setting. You didn’t know that YouTube had a 3D setting – did ya? Yeah, neither did we. So throw on those cardboard glasses or the fancier plastic ones from your junk drawer that you stole from the movie theater. (BTW: Is it just us? This 3D function doesn’t seem to provide the pop that we are used to.) The video was directed, edited and effected by Ryan Suits.

One of the more compelling narratives mewithoutYou’s career has lent itself to is the band’s quest to find solace in its faith. At first, they seemed utterly lost in it; their first two records, [A–>B] Life and Catch for us the Foxes, are feverish, frantic post-hardcore albums characterized by heavily distorted guitars and Aaron Weiss’s panicked poetry on the conflict of faith in a secular world. They revisited this conflict on Brother, Sister, but with a sense of triumph deftly characterized in its final lyric: “I do not exist, only You exist.” Still, this surrender that made Brother, Sister a record of cathartic victory swallowed It’s All Crazy! It’s All False! It’s All a Dream! It’s Alright. The very title of their fourth LP suggests the born-again zealotry that defines it. Drawing inspiration not from conflict but from joy and folk tales, the post-hardcore sound totally eschewed in favor of Jeff Mangum-esque storytelling and vocalizing. It’s All Crazy! was a hugely divisive record, and more importantly, one that seemed to mark the end of an arc – mewithoutYou were no longer mewithoutYou as we knew them.

Which brings us to Ten Stories, and also begs the question: What will mewithoutYou do having now escaped this narrative that has defined the band for their entire career? Nothing too crazy – Ten Stories finds them as they always have been, playing upon their past without bowing to it, the result being a record that sounds both distinctly theirs and unlike anything they’ve done before. The opener, “February 1878,” is a riff on one of the classics in the band’s back catalog, “January 1979,” but though mewithoutYou have given specific songs sequels before, “February 1878” isn’t a sequel. It has verses with Weiss’s once-prominent wild-sermon delivery, but its riff is lighter; its chorus more demure. “January 1979” details a car crash Weiss witnessed, and the apathy he couldn’t escape from feeling. “February 1878” is about an elephant in a circus train. The link between them is analogous to how Ten Stories fits into mewithoutYou’s catalog. The sound on Ten Stories bears traces of mewithoutYou’s more aggressive roots but is too light to truly align with that phase in their career. At the same time, it’s also nowhere near as insistently folksy as It’s All Crazy! What we have is a wedding between the two eras, a little rugged, but also a little inspiring as Weiss’s intricate lyricism is brought out not over chugging rock or campfire songs but gentle, mostly straightforward indie rock.

And about those lyrics: Ten Stories is what it says it is, a collection of fables populated by animals and Weiss avatars, and though the stories themselves are confusing to make sense of without the aid of liner notes, they’re too well-orchestrated and articulated to glaze over. There’s a dense record here you can make sense of with a little extracurricular effort, but there’s also a powerful one you can simply hear and get. Exemplified in the cyclical closer “All Circles,” Ten Stories is a record whose strength lies in its catchiness. Weiss sings of many things on Ten Stories, but he signs off with one triumphant realization: “All circles presuppose they’ll end where they begin, and only in their leaving can they ever come back round.” It’s a simple message that resounds over the preceding record and is almost too explicit to not apply to the band itself. As mewithoutYou have entered a new phase in their career, “All Circles” reminds us that though they may have arrived at one answer in their journey, they aren’t done searching. And though Ten Stories is packed with worthy additions to mewithoutYou’s catalog (particularly on its wilder second half), Ten Stories is defined by the future it promises. Itmay not be as drop-your-jaw stunning as Brother, Sister or [A– >B] Life, but it is good – very good, actually. Enough to make you believe that with this new sound, they can create something of that caliber again. Until then, enjoy Ten Stories for what it is. It will reward you. The album is available for purchase HERE. – Adam Downer

You might be familiar with Dave Hartley’s work from The War on Drugs, Buried Beds, Sondre Lerche, The Lindsey Buckingham Appreciation Society, or whatever rad music project needs the assistance of his sweet low end. Well, in between his time on tour and writing about/tweeting/breathing NBA hoops, he works on his solo project Nightlands, which is also part of the Secretly Canadian family. Hartley will be bringing his multilayered soundscapes to Kung Fu Necktie tonight when he opens for the second installation of The Spinto Band’s residency. It’s his birthday, and War on Drugs bandmate Adam Granduciel will be shredding next to him on stage this evening so there will be a lot to celebrate! Expect a new album coming out from Nightlands soon too. Also on the bill is Brooklyn four-piece Via Audio. Kung Fu Necktie, 1250 N. Front St., 8pm, $8, 21+ – Q.D Tran

Last week Sunny Ali & the Kid introduced their new track “Chai” to the Internet. Well, the duo is back with its music video, which premiered earlier today via Stereogum. The black & white rooftop/hallway sessions were directed and edited by Jan Reiser and Imran Ali Malik (The Kominas).