Eight bucks can’t buy a whole lot these days.  Two gallons of gas.  A couple packs of smokes.  A beer or two, depending on your tastes.  But if you happen to be on the Downtown Mall this evening and looking for some live music, eight bucks sure will go a long way.  That’s exactly how much it will cost you to see 19 bands at five different venues in Charlottesville tonight and all of them are seperated by only a few blocks.  I swear I am not making this up. 

The wealth of musical talent on display tonight is such that in some ways it’s almost going to feel like a musical festival in that you can literally move from show to show as you would from stage to stage, and you’ll have to be ever mindful of who’s playing where so that you don’t miss some of your personal favorites.  And here’s the real clincher, every act on every stage has at least one connection to Charlottesville.  The details on a jam-packed night of music after the break.

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It all begins before the sun goes down.  Actually before some of you even get off work.  At 3pm the Charlottesville Music Showcase celebrates its two-year anniversary with a special marathon show at R2 inside Rapture.  13 artists, 12 performances (all with ties to Charlottesville), 11 hours of music, spread out on two stages, and all under one roof.  This one alone feels like a music festival in and of itself.  And it’s free!  For more details check out yesterday’s post:  Charlottesville Music Showcase Celebrates Two Years of Local Music Mojo.

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For a few hours the Charlottesville Music Showcase will be the only venue rockin’ and rollin’.  That all changes at 7:30pm when the Gravity Lounge opens its door for an evening of 80’s music done with a hillbilly bang and bluegrass twang as the bands Love Cannon and Hillbilly Joel take the Gravity stage.  Here’s the press on this one:

Hillbilly Joel:  For almost three decades a crack team of scientists, ethnomusicologists, and teamsters have tried to combine the raw twang of hillbilly music with the smooth sophisticated song-writing of pop icon Billy Joel.  Finally, their results will be made public. Don’t go changing to try to please us. It’s a matter of trust. Come be a big shot with Hillbilly Joel!

Love Cannon:  Joining Hillbilly Joel for their Gravity Lounge debut is smalltime supergroup Love Cannon!  Love Cannon takes the hard rocking hits and monster ballads from music’s greatest decade -the 80’s-and does ‘em up good ‘n righteous with purty pickin in the tradition of Earl Scruggs and Bill Monroe.  It’s like your senior prom and the Breakfast Club gift-wrapped and given to you by Whitesnake with Van Halen’s blessing.  Did I mention costumes?

Love Cannon is led by Adam Larrabee and Jesse Harper (of Old School Freight Train) and features Darrell Muller (also of OSFT).  Hillbilly Joel is the same ensemble led singer/clarinetist John Winn.  Sam Wilson and Brian Chenault open.  $8.

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From here on out you’ve got some decisions to make as three more shows begin at 10 or 10:30pm at three different venues.  At Miller’s you’ve got the hard bop and post bop jazz sounds of Mike Rosensky and Jeff Decker.  Throwing in a little jazz serves to make the evening all that more eclectic.  Eclecticism is the mark of any good music festival.  10pm.  No cover.

Or you could head down to The Box and check out the double bill of Panter Burn (who I heard for the first time a couple weeks ago and I left highly impressed) and Mister Baby.  Panther Burn features Phillip St. Ours on vocals and guitar and Aaron Farrington on bass as they head up this five piece rock emsemble.  Mister Baby is a side project band for a couple of Hackensaw Boys (Jesse Fiske and Ferd Moyse.)  Another five piece band that should be a hell of a lot of fun.  10pm.  No cover.

Last but surely not least, the last stop on our downtown C’ville music festival tour concludes at Fellini’s with the Nelson County quartet Junior Moment.  They continue their Wednesday night residency on the Downtown Mall at 10:30pm.  No cover.

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There you have it.  A huge night of live music in Charlottesville indeed.  Now you could play it a couple different ways.  You could plant yourself at Rapture and stay there all night long and still make out like a bandit.  Or you could jump around all evening long and take it all in.  (I’m at least going to try and make it to Rapture, the Gravity, and The Box)  It will take some serious stamina but it can be done.  And to think you can do it all for under $10 is pretty damn amazing.  (Of course the cost of libations not included).  And don’t let the rain slow you down because I have been to very few music festivals where it didn’t rain at least once.  I’ll see you out there.

Where are you going to be this Wednesday night?

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