Tonight’s Picks: Animal Collective at 9:30 Club; Mike Sager at Olsson’s Books & Records

On Animal Collective’s latest album, Strawberry Jam, it sounds as if the members of the band have swapped their Incredible String Band LPs for ­minimal-house singles and their acoustic guitars for samplers. But just because the band has gone electronic doesn’t mean that it’s given up on the major earmarks of its folky past—particularly, ­jamming. Animal Collective has never been big on meticulously reconstructing its hit songs on stage; instead, the band’s shows have a tendency toward tangents and improvisation. Not that the band will be pictured on the cover of Relix any time soon: Animal Collective’s explorations are more about delay pedals, yodeling, and tribal rhythms than mandolin-fueled grandstanding. Sure, the same could be said about Rusted Root, but in that case it wouldn’t be a compliment. Animal Collective performs at 10 p.m. at the 9:30 Club, 815 V St. NW. $12. (202) 393-0930. —Aaron Leitko

When long-form journalist and de facto pop anthropologist Mike Sager writes about Mike Sager, he’ll usually mention how he ditched Georgetown law to work his way up from Washington Post night copy boy to Esquire writer-at-large. Sager’s career trajectory is equal parts journalistic dues paid and badass book jacket bio. Along the way, he received a thorough education in the journalistic tradition of New Journalist founder Tom Wolfe and gonzo king Hunter S. Thompson. Now, Sager’s the one schooling aspiring muckrakers. “Treat everyone the same,” he tells them. “Get an imagination.” “Items you buy for work are tax deductible.” Sager’s allowed: He’s the only journalist around who can manage to write a full 1,000 words about erstwhile Playmate Brooke Burke before even mentioning her name. In fact, he might be the only journalist who can get you to read 1,000 words about Brooke Burke ­period. In his second collection of essays gleaned from his magazine work, Revenge of the Donut Boys: True Stories of Lust, Fame, Survival, and Multiple Personality, Sager turns his signature journalistic eye on Rosanne Barr’s dissociative identity disorder, Mike Ditka’s gambling debts, and the pants-pissing love life of an average nonagenarian Arizonan. Sager is equally at home contextualizing celebrities as he is exposing small-time personalities—including his own. In the book’s capping essay, “Mike Sager by Mike Sager,” the writer gives his treatment to 39 other guys named Mike Sager, breaking one of his own rules: “Don’t put yourself in your story unless absolutely necessary.” Sager discusses and signs copies of his work at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 28, at Olsson’s Books & Records, 1307 19th St. NW. Free. (202) 785-1133. —Amanda Hess

This entry was posted on Friday, September 28th, 2007 at 1:49 pm and is filed under Arts, Books, Music, Today's Pick. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.