The sun shone bright Saturday at this year's Virgin FreeFest at Merriweather Post Pavilion, and while the grounds were a bit muddier than last year, at least the Dance Forest wasn't as dusty. It was the first nice afternoon in weeks—as well as the day before the 10th anniversary of 9/11, and the start of Ethiopian New Year, as we learned from Patti Smith—so this year's lineup, heavier on the synth and electronica acts than years past, provided an upbeat soundtrack to a beautiful day.

Grace Potter & the Nocturnals

Cut Copy

!!!

Patti Smith

Cee Lo

TV on the Radio

The Black Keys

Deadmau5

Additional photos from Virgin FreeFest sets and people can be found here.

After attending Sebadoh's show at the Black Cat on Saturday, I think that of South by Southwest should book the band for a panel or worhshop next year. The topic? "How to obtain a hardcore fanbase of kids under 21." Based on the many black x's scrawled on hands, it seems children by the millions are making Sebadoh their brand new love. Sebadoh is playing dates through the beginning of April in support of the reissued Bakesale (1994) and Harmacy (1996).

See the rest of the photos from the set here

See, the Egyptian Ambassador’s residence signed up as part of the "Embassy Series: Uniting People through Musical Diplomacy" to play host to a recital of violinist Caroline Chéhadé, a musician who has won, amongst other accolades, the Prix d’Europe. For $150 each, music lovers were invited to a black-tie reception and concert at the Egyptian Ambassador’s residence, home to “a rare museum of ancient Egyptian artifacts.”

But now with the conflict going on in Egypt, there’s some who question whether or not the March 4 concert will still go on—or at least be forced to move to a residence whose ambassador’s government isn’t embroiled in massive protests.

Checking on this, Washington City Paper contacted the Embassy Series both yesterday and today. Though they say everything is still up in the air and could change at any time, at the moment the concert is scheduled to go on as planned. They’re planning to meet with the ambassador later this month, and we’ll keep you updated on whether or not the concert’s moving locations, or being cancelled altogether.

"Jazz Ruins Everything," read the sticker on bassist Devin Hoff's electric instrument, but if anything the Nels Cline Singers have gotten more jazzy, or at least less noisy, over the past couple of years. That didn't make last night's packed-house show (there may well have been more folks crammed into the Black Cat backstage than there were at the Singers' previous area performance at the cavernous 1,000-seat Paramount Theater in Charlottesville) any less engrossing, as the trio, augmented for a few songs by Yuka Honda on keys, made their happily uncategorizable music come alive. Jazz ruins everything? Not Nels Cline's music.

More photos after the jump.

"Thanks again. We're gone."

Those are the last sounds that atmospheric metal band Isis left in their fans' ears as they exited the stage at the 9:30 Club last night. Having announced the end of the band in May, Isis are currently on a "farewell tour" with the Melvins, and while listening to Isis live is a lot like just listening to one of their records at insanely high volumes, that's not really a bad thing at all. It didn't hurt that they played a number of cuts off of Oceanic and Panopticon, widely considered their best efforts.

More photos after the jump.

The Melvins, though a bigger draw than Isis, actually insisted on opening for them after Isis' announcement that this would be their final tour:

Full gallery here.

Last weekend, literally thousands of metalheads from around the world descended on Baltimore for the annual Maryland Deathfest, which just seems to keep getting bigger each year. For the 2010 version, there were two outdoor stages in addition to the main inside stage. While I was only able to make Friday of this year's three-day festival, that meant that I had the privilege of seeing the newest incarnation of Gorguts, the legendary Canadian death metal group whose music makes a lot of modern technical metal look like child's play.

Many more photos from last Friday after the jump and at the full gallery.

Tombs (Brooklyn):

Jesus Crost (The Netherlands):

Malignancy (New York):

Birds of Prey (Richmond):

Nazxul (Australia):

Watain (Sweden):

Gorguts (Quebec):

Gride (Czech Republic):

Coffins (Japan):

D.R.I. (San Francisco):

Full gallery here.

Six months had passed since Jucifer's last performance in the D.C. area, so it was time for another: last night's show at the Black Cat was the duo's second in the states since it wrapped up a lengthy European tour (the first being a brief set last Saturday at Maryland Deathfest). Drummer Edgar Livengood was less than enthralled by his performance, which is perhaps why the band played only 25 minutes—a short set even by its standards—but to those of us in the audience they sounded as lively, powerful, and just plain loud as ever.

More photos after the jump and at the full gallery.

The Gloominous Doom opened with a hilarious set of thrash metal mixed with the occasional ska guitar part, which worked much better than one might expect:

Full gallery here.

Yesterday was the first night of Taylor Swift's sold-out two-night stand at the Verizon Center. Swift played all of her hits with some crowd-pleasing gimmicks thrown in—namely, playing a few songs in the middle of one of the lower-level concourses, surrounded by fans, then making her way down to the floor and playing to the folks in the back of the stadium, and finally walking up the floor to the stage, hugging and kissing and slapping hands all along the way. This was all well and good, except that combined with several overly lengthy interludes, the flow of the set was all too frequently interrupted.

Many more photos after the jump.

Kellie Pickler opened:

Alt-rock/metal group Flyleaf played to a substantial crowd on Tuesday night at the 9:30 Club. Check out the photos after the jump and more at the full gallery.

10 Years provided an opening set...:

...as did Fair to Midland:

Full gallery here.

Holly Miranda’s debut album, The Magician's Private Library, is full of slow, atmospheric tunes, sort of like singer-songwriter material with a heavy dose of Pink Floyd. But at the Black Cat backstage last night, her songs came alive with a surprisingly aggressive rhythmic base; Miranda’s vocals, almost wispy on record, proved soulful and remarkably powerful in person. She even casually name-dropped Diamanda Galas, and while she doesn't plumb the depths of hell with her voice like the notorious Greek vocalist, she certainly displayed an impressive vocal range that was matched well by her compositions.

More photos from the show after the jump; also see the photos from Miranda's February performance at the Warner Theatre opening for Tegan & Sara.

Brooklyn's Grooms opened: