Hot days and loud nights, friends.

The Modern Lovers' playful poet Jonathan Richman once sang out his love for "those hot nights, when a T-shirt feels right / You stay up later when everything's outside." 

Venues will keep their doors open beyond the 10 p.m. mark and let the marvelous rock-splattered, melody-sweetened thrums of local instrumentalists air out into the muggy night, soundtracking these smiling evenings.  

Embrace it. Stay up later. 

And ya know, it's good bike-riding weather; why not pedal a couple miles north into Berkley and check out some Ferndale friends who host a monthly residency up there in preservation of their record label-collective, Axis Mundi.

--June 29, at the Berkley Front

Axis Mundi (a collaborative cluster of local labels featuring experimental songwriters and recording-mad-scientists) hosts another round of their monthly music nights, this time featuring a band on the Communist Day Care Center label, Dandylyon Whine. You can find many allies and satellites to this Axis Mundi-collective dotting Ferndale, should you ever want to pick their musical brains while they're on break from day-job shifts at joints like The Natural Food Patch or The Record Collector.

The psychedelic-folk drifts of DandyLyon Whine will be supplemented by two opening acts that night, including a still-new-ish quartet called Heartbreak Dallas & the Unfaithfuls. HD&U are heavy on harmony and hazy-twangs, charmed with sweet, shushing jangles and punched along by steady toe-tapping rhythms, it's a refreshingly quirked angle on Americana. 

Listen: Heartbreak Dallas & The Unfaithfuls - "Michigan Song" 

Also at the Front that evening is a solo-set from singer/songwriter Keith Bedore, who splits his shred-and-groove contributions respectively between The Ashleys and Sound & Fury, (the latter of which just changed their name, though, more on that soon). 

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--June 28 at PJ's Lager House

Three weeks ago, west-siders the Thornbills did their best to sweep in their characteristic eerily-beautiful, candlelit-claret aesthetic, a gristly-acoustic strummed folk storm twirled and teased with a stark-yet-jaunty jab of gypsy and disarming swoons of breathy harmonies, into the inherently-cacophonous big-screen-TV-flanked bustle of One-Eyed Betty’s.

The five-piece, fronted by cousin-pairing Tamara Finlay and Jim Weigand, had to up their otherwise quieter balladry just a few clicks to break the rabble of weekend revelers, but, recently bolstered by the electric guitar of James Anthony, they were able to turn more than a few heads. (Their new EP is up on their bandcamp now and this writer would highly suggest this sinewy jam, "Shallow Fields.")

The new beer joint on Troy has had a fine opening here in town these last six months and its musical side will be flourished by the recent instatement of Ferndale-based blues-rock sextet Dutch Pink as its resident monthly house band.

But now you’ll have the chance to hear the Thornbills inside a more traditional venue, downtown at P.J.’s Lager House on June 28.

The Thornbills are a curious duo, altogether relatable with their strange, unassuming charm, their frankness for flaring their dark sides and their musical pasts that stir together a blend of classical, opera, Ukranian folk, grunge, and '60s psychedelia. All that, and their voices meld together so strikingly, like the point where blue fuses to orange at the onset of twilight, perfect soundtracks for wary night-walks, their voices are the soothing-yet-uneasy breeze through the gnarly branches above... “We’re blood,” as Finlay puts it, “we sound like blood…”

And what an intriguing back-story too: Their debut single was produced by Detroit-bred rock-superstar Jack White and their voices were brought together by a professional opera singing / Wayne State music instructor (i.e., Finlays’ father).

Meet the Thornbills – at P.J.’s Lager House this Thursday evening. Opening the show is B.A.M. the Barefoot Girls, Anthony Retka, CN Pratt and the Rose Cult, and Julian Paaige.

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Looking ahead to future episodes of Milo’s Trip:

(July 13) - Detroit-electronica-duo Phantasmagoria have their second full-length album coming out during the pre-party of Ferndale’s grill-smoke-swathed festivities known as the Pig & Whiskey. Christopher Jarvis and Lianna Vanicelli, a pair of short-ish, young-ish, shy-ish, but otherwise affable and quite inventive composers of ambient, synth-swirled dream-pop, will celebrate the release of their second full-length album titled Currents (Five Three Dial Tone Records). 

This Metro Times event goes down at Troy and Woodward around the WAB and Emory, inhabiting the parking lots and side street; think of it as a barbecue and bourbon-soaked take upon the DIY Street Fair, only instead of local crafters and microbrewers, we have samples of local BBQ-restaurants and specialty scotch and whiskies.

Watch: Phantasmagoria - "Currents" -official music video

Phantasmagoria are releasing Currents on vinyl and CD. Joining them for their release show at the Loving Touch (July 13) is Ann Arbor-bred/NY-based electronica producer Shigeto and Michigan-based hip/hop-tinged electronica artist Charles Trees.

Check out the Metro Times for more information, vendors and musical line-ups (including sets by the Electric Six, Passalacqua, Illy Mack and many more).

Thanks for reading...

Say, remember how that indie/punk-culture boutique Hybrid Moments used to host live shows inside their store? Those haven't gone away, so to speak.

More on that, next time. Plus, Duenseday does 4th of July!