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Shiny entertainment or challenging experimentalism: Tonight’s live music options give us the whole spectrum. If you’re the kind of person who sips straight Campari and likes your bedtime reading Slavic and turn-of-the-century, try out Sonic Circuits’ program tonight at Pyramid Atlantic. Prefer to tap the Rockies? Like your flakes frosted, your reading glossy? Form a line at Verizon Center. Live music options follow, in order of difficulty.
Sound experiments galore, courtesy of Sonic Circuits: Eli Keszler, Benjamin Nelson, Ben Miller, Berührung, David Pate, and Yolt perform at Pyramid Atlantic. 8:30 p.m. $8.
Prog, revisited: Nektar, Brainticket, and Huw Lloyd-Langton (from Hawkwind) get noodly and long-winded at Jaxx. 8 p.m. $25.
The band’s origins are dark, but North Carolina’s The Love Language knows how to write a pop song. 9 p.m. at Rock & Roll Hotel. $12.
Producer/songwriter Dntel is also one-half of The Postal Service. He makes clicky, acoustic-flecked electronic music for emo kids. 9:30 p.m. at Red Palace. $10-$12.
These days, German duo Digitalism traffics in big, gooey electropop songs. 8 p.m. at 9:30 Club. $30.
Gipsy Kings: The soundtrack to your produce-buying experience in Takoma Park. Or, Toy Story 3. Tonight and tomorrow at 8 p.m. at Wolf Trap. $25-$42.
American Idols Live!: Exactly what it sounds like. 7 p.m. at Verizon Center. $45-$65.
Fourplay and Marcus Johnson Project: It does not get any smoother than this. 7:30 p.m. at Carter Barron. $24.50.
FILM
City Paper film writer Tricia Olszewski recommends The Names of Love, which opens tonight at Bethesda Row. Sara Forestier is Baya, a liberal who sleeps with right-wingers in order to convert them; Jacques Gamblin is Arthur, a conservative who just can’t get enough of her. “Their ensuing relationship is rocky for them,” says Olszewski, “but delightful for the viewer.”
THEATER
Tonight and this weekend, catch reprisals of four Fringe shows at Warehouse: Flyboy, The Bird, But Love Is My Middle Name, and Cabaret XXX: Les Femmes Fatales. Tickets are $15 per show at City Artistic Partnerships.
ALCOHOL
Beer week wraps up this weekend. Check out our list of the remaining events.