Preview: Wild Nothing at 9:30 Club

“Never miss a Sunday show” is a familiar mantra among the diehard, and we couldn’t agree more. Yes, we know it is the Sunday before Thanksgiving and some of us already have family showing up. Start a new tradition: start the week with fun! And what a better place to start a new tradition than in D.C.’s iconic 9:30 Club? Be a part of the Hall of Records with Sunday night’s Wild Nothing show. This dance-worthy-new-wave-indie rock pop is a sound even your Aunt Sheila will enjoy dancing to.

Wild Nothing

“I don’t write songs because I have super specific things to say. I write songs because I really care about the way instruments work together, and I really care about being able to think about things as a whole, sonically. I write songs for the whole package.”

This is how Jack Tatum describes himself artistically, and that kind of thoughtful and deliberate artistry is most evident on Wild Nothing’s latest album “Indigo”. If the previous album, “Life of Pause” was about holding up a key and following the lightning to the limit, then Indigo is about channeling that electricity through the wires to illuminate a room. Put another way, like great wordsmiths pondering the motivation of every word, Tatum deliberately chooses each note, every rhythm and every dreamy syllable to create an aural metaphor for the human experience. In the album Indigo’s namesake tune, Tatum reveals that he was “thinking about the way we’ve merged ourselves with AI, seeing that subtle blue iPhone glow on everyone’s faces, and envisioning that color being representative of our efforts to change this humanity.” “Indigo,” the song, and the album is a celebration of what makes us human and the technology that we have created as an extension of ourselves.

“Indigo” merges the best of what technology offers today into indie synth pop that isn’t afraid to feel a little retro and incorporate an 80’s new wave vibe. Emotionally rich, critics hail this as Tatum’s best album to date. Even though Tatum creates the music largely on his own, he does travel with a band.

Men I Trust

Kicking off the Night is Men I Trust, a band even Grandma will delight in tapping her foot along to. (Keep an ear open, in my experience this will kind of thing will have Grandma talking about her youthful fun all week and you won’t want to miss it.) Formed in 2014, this Montreal-based band is on the rise and it won’t take you long to hear why. They’ve taken their electro-indie pop across their native Canada, toured China, and have been touring the US this year to much acclaim. In NPR’s “The Austin 100” this March, Stephen Thompson writes, “Men I Trust's effervescent pop splits the difference between ornate classic pop and chilled-out dance-floor fodder, for a sound that sands down every possible rough edge. In this case, that's a good thing: The band's slippery-smoothness is a big part of its slyly bouncy, easygoing, stress-free appeal.” This is a band you’ll be talking about at many Thanksgivings to come, so bundle up cousin Fred and head on over to the 930 Club Sunday night.

Get your tickets to the show here before it’s too late. Kick things off early with the Food Food window’s FWB special: The Wrap of Grace (and oh yes, it is Turkey).