Thalia Zedek will be at the Knit on May 29
Knitting Factory
361 Metropolitan Ave.
Saturday, May 29, $10-$12, 9:00
347-529-6696
www.myspace.com/thaliazedek
www.bk.knittingfactory.com
Boston-based singer and guitarist Thalia Zedek, who previously was part of such bands as Dangerous Birds, Live Skull, and Come before branching out on her own a decade ago, is back in New York City touring behind her most recent album, 2008’s brash, brawling LIARS AND PRAYERS. A former heroine addict who evokes the sounds of Marianne Faithfull, Patti Smith, P. J. Harvey, and Kim Gordon, Zedek holds nothing back as she examines the wreckage left behind by eight years of the Bush administration. “Does the fear make you stay inside?” she asks on “lower allston.” A searing guitar solo drives the eight-minute epic “Next Exit,” in which Zedek declares in her raspy, worn voice, “There is now way out but out.” She has expanded the size of her band, adding David Curry on viola and Mel Lederman on piano to her regular rhythm section of Winston Braman on bass and Daniel Coughlin on drums, resulting in a richer, more emotional landscape, particularly on such songs as “We Don’t Go,” which features a beautifully haunting piano line, and “Body Memory,” which includes a long, stirring instrumental break. Zedek will be at the Knitting Factory on May 29, on a bill with the Chrome Cranks and Clockwork Mercury.