Critics' Picks: Mac Lethal and more

Hexagon

After a lengthy hiatus, the God Damn Doo Wop Band return to the Hexagon like Arthur from Avalon (or would Col. Bowie from the Alamo be a more fitting analogy?). After a perfect storm of vehicular misfortunes and the untimely departure of vocalist Carissa Coudray, the God Damn Doo Wop Band emerge from hibernation with Annie Holoien (Soviettes, Awesome Snakes) before the mic and their long-awaited vinyl 7-inch under their arms. There are few acts that incite more genteel behavior from such a roughneck crowd, and that's the Doo Wop Band's charm. Through odes to misspent youth and the foolishness of love, the Doo Wop Band proves that beneath every Black Label vest lies the bashful prom wallflower who clung to the gymnasium risers, dimly hoping for a slow dance before the night ran out. With the God Damn Doo Wop Band, we all get a second chance. 21+. 9 p.m. 2600 27th Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612.722.3454. —David Hansen

SATURDAY 5.10

Nancy Drew Crew

Mac Lethal just ate a whole pig and he's ready to throw down

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More About

• The Kills (Musical Group)
• DeVotchKa
• Jonathan Garrett
• Bluegrass
• Hip-Hop and Rap

Triple Rock Social Club

It's sometimes hard to understand how Nancy Drew Crew, a three-piece hip-hop troupe that evokes the Shaggs on a 909, can manage to be so dry and yet so exuberant and gleeful, all in the same rhyme. MC Smells, Mayhem, and Skullbuster may be winking at their audiences along the way, but their hooks keep fans busy shaking ass and sweating through their Descendents shirts. Theirs is a style of benevolent forthrightness, and in songs like "Feminist Anthem" and "College Incorporated," they manage an act of smirking dissent that is efficiently infectious. Tonight at the Triple Rock, they further flex their altruistic biceps, as money raised will go to the Coalition for Immokalee Workers, an advocacy group that sticks up for the rights of field workers victimized by fast-food plutocrats. Opposing fast food may be a breach of the hip-hop manifesto, but let's not be essentialists. With Single Speed, Guerrilla Blue, and Las Palabristas. 18+. $8. 9 p.m. 629 Cedar Ave., Minneapolis; 612.333.7499. —David Hansen

SUNDAY 5.11

The Kills

Triple Rock Social Club

If love really is just a dialogue, as the Kills claim on their latest single "Cheap and Cheerful," it's a good thing that they don't have much use for it. Instead, VV and Hotel, with their sleazy, staccato riffs and tar-stained vocals, articulate pure animal lust. Midnight Boom, their third full-length album, remains splendidly untamed, the pheromones still too powerful to ignore. Though the Armani XXXchange-assisted beats (Alex Epton of Spank Rock), which draw inspiration from schoolyard chants, do misjudge the line between sinister and creepy at times, they rarely distract from VV and Hotel. And the duo's command extends to the stage, where their predatory vignettes are brought to life with sidelong glances and suggestive poses. The tension is palpable, but love's got nothing to do with it. With Telepathe. 18+. $8. 9 p.m. 629 Cedar Ave., Minneapolis; 612.333.7499. —Jonathan Garrett