Y La Bamba return home with fresh self-knowledge on the new Lucha

Concert Previews Saturday20

Y La Bamba See Pick of the Week at le . Daniel Villareal opens. 9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $20. 21+

Pinksqueeze Abject Horror and Cloud Houses open. 7 PM, Cobra Lounge, 235 N. Ashland, $18.54. b

Chicago four-piece Pinksqueeze should be in the rotation of any local indie-rock connoisseur, and not just because of their skill with their instruments. Sure, these twentysomethings play with the confidence of seasoned veterans who’ve been gigging since before they were born. And sure, their musical chemistry gives an affable warmth to everything they play, whether it’s a quiet, tender passage or a big, reach-for-the-stars chorus. (Full disclosure: Bassist Anna White is a pal and an occasional Reader contributor.) But more than anything else, I like Pinksqueeze because of their blunt, playful irreverence, which they use to poke fun at a style of music with a reputation for self-seriousness. The punky, gnashing “WTF Is Bubblegrunge” mocks the sexist structures of canonization that have warped pop history, which would have the public believe that only white men make important music. The band also catalog the sexism they’ve faced in the male-dominated ecosystem of live music, skewering this depressingly routine buffoonery with thoughtful, thorough lyrics delivered in clipped but often exasperated talk-singing. “WTF Is Bubblegrunge” appears on the group’s new self-released debut album, Be Gay Have Fun , and their wry humor makes their criticism of gender norms (and the vision of contemporary young queerness it implies) even more effective. Pinksqueeze prove that defying the indie-rock status quo won’t keep you from making joyous, irresistible music—in fact, it might be a prerequisite.

—LEOR GALIL

Sunday21

THE FIRST SONG I heard from Y La Bamba was the title track from 2016’s tender and expansive Ojos del Sol . The music had a transformative quality that made it feel at once like the nostalgia of returning home and an imagined comfort yet to come. Singer-songwriter and guitarist Luz Elena Mendoza Ramos, the leader of Y La Bamba, continues that wondrous world making on the new album Lucha, which came out last month via Oregon label Tender Loving Empire. The album’s title— an endearing nickname for the artist that also translates to “fight” or “struggle”—encapsulates the dichotomy of ease and hardship in its songs.

Written and recorded during a fraught time in Mendoza Ramos’s life, Lucha is a brave and electric endeavor that hurtles across time and space, chronicling loneliness, ancestral trauma, and grief as well as honoring the enduring power of self-healing and familial bonds. “Eight” opens the album with gently strummed guitar, piano, woodwinds, and Mendoza Ramos’s signature compressed vocal, which is layered over itself in hushed, heartbreaking, dreamlike harmonies. On “Collapse,” sunny, rhythmic guitar meshes with a catchy vocal hook and a smooth bass line for an undeniably danceable and confident tune.

Mendoza Ramos imbues Lucha with pride for their Chicanx heritage and an unyielding reserve of self-protection, in the process shining a light on a lifetime’s worth of personal growth and understanding. They close the album with the sweet, psychedelic “Walk Along,” the first song they’ve written about a romantic relationship with a woman. They repeat the line “Something tells me that I’m falling for you” in loping echoes over sweeping saxophone into a slow fade-out—a finale that sounds like a celebratory ode to vulnerability and the shimmering swell of new queer love. —TASHA VIETS-VANLEAR

Kayo Khaliyah X headlines; Senite and Kayo open. 8 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport. 21+ F

If you like hip-hop that foregrounds reflective lyrics, sumptuous production, and a heady mix of youthful optimism and ambition, Kayo may be your new favorite emerging rapper. On his debut full-length, January’s It Was Fun While It Lasted (released via Kayo’s label and streetwear company, Southside Blue Hearts), he raps over relaxed beats built from dulcet keyboard melodies and spacious percussion. The music’s magnetic pull begins even before his rapping does—any one of these songs can hook me in just a few seconds. The arrangements are lush but not overbearing, and they feel carefully constructed to focus attention on Kayo’s understated, nimble performances. Kayo delivers his verses with nurturing warmth, as if he’s wrapping them in blankets, but every word still comes through clearly, so that the details can stick to your brain. Kayo’s friend- ly, easygoing demeanor also makes it easy to follow along with him when his lyrics take a big swing with an eye on the bleachers. On “Still Running,” he details his past challenges and big dreams, frequently leaping in time by more than a decade, and his storytelling is so vivid that you’ll feel like you’ve experienced his lifelong journey to the mike with him. Once you finish It Was Fun While It Lasted , you’ll want to know where that journey takes Kayo next.

—LEOR GALIL

Tuesday23

Mareux Cold Gawd opens. 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, 2424 N. Lincoln, $20, $18 in advance. 18+

Mareux is the project of Los Angeles producer and vocalist Aryan Ashtiani, whose music incorporates postpunk, goth, and the European electronic styles he heard via Polish MTV during his summers in Iran as a youth. Mareux’s 2013 debut, the foursong EP Decade , is full of sun-flecked synth-pop that mixes bouncy moods with its wistfulness, but he’s since drifted away from colors toward a palette of whites and grays. His beat-driven 2015 take on the Cure’s “The Perfect Girl” earned him buzz in the international darkwave scene, and his 2020 EP Predestiny trades much of Decade’s nostalgic imagery for atmospheres more suited to subterranean dance floors, with warped coldwave melodies, gritty industrial beats, and occasional vampiric vocals. By then, Ashtiani told VoyageLA in a 2020 interview, he was working as an EMT, with a dream of becoming a physician assistant focusing on underserved communities. I don’t know whether Ashtiani ever reached that goal, but his creative life has blossomed. “The Perfect Girl” found new fans via TikTok, and Ashtiana capitalized on that virality with a 2022 music video for the track that stars RuPaul’s Drag Race winner Violet Chachki. Last year he collaborated with LA guitarist and songwriter Zzzahara on cinematic pop gem “Bulletproof.” Despite the sadness in Mareux’s music, 2023 has been brighter still: a er introducing mainstream audiences to his gloomy romanticism at this year’s Coachella, Ashanti has kicked off a U.S. tour in support of his first fulllength, Lovers From the Past (Revolution/Warner). The compact record mixes tried-and-true coldwave (notably its title track) with a couple of idiosyncratic stunners, including the ethereal “Glass” (a collaboration with King Woman singer and producer Kristina Esfandiari) and the lush, melodic “Hurt.” This Lincoln Hall show should leave the crowd yearning for love and connection—and perhaps for one more gothic a erparty at the legendary Neo, which was once just blocks away. —JAMIE

LUDWIG

Thursday25

Giant Swan Fetter and RXM Reality open. 9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $15. 21+

Since the 2010s, a crop of artists have shi ed and contorted electronic dance music into new levels of aggression and experimentation, challenging as well as rewarding their listeners. Bristol duo Giant Swan, who create raw and pummeling indus-