Here we help you connect more deeply with your community and/or waste time at work. All the stories from the past 7 days on AltDaily, for your enjoyment.

A Tool show is so much more of a visual experience than a Sonic one. I thought they sounded better on their albums but couldn’t take my eyes off the stage.

Happy Groundhog’s Day. Feel like your life is the same, boring day over and over again? Change it.

To paraphrase Samuel L. Jackson, “I’m tired of all these mother(loving) DJs arguing over who is a mother(loving) real DJ or not.” Hmm. Maybe that’s not exactly how he put it, but I think we all get the point.

Warm and fuzzies. Let the sky never be just blue again. Winter be damned forever. Gratitude and grace abound.

Art, concerts, clubs, activism, love, fear, sex, destruction, and a cash bar. Get yourself in some really uncomfortable situations and live your damn life.

Only ask for what you need. This isn’t a teenage negotiation with your parents for movie money. Don’t ask for $50 in secret hopes of only getting $20.

If you don’t get out and enjoy yourself this weekend then we can’t help you. We just… can’t.

A local jewelery business gave us these two sweet pieces to raffle off. They’re rad and so is Luna Rosa.

AltDaily is a lighthouse in Norfolk’s sea of journalism, and a major seaport without a lighthouse is very dangerous proposition.

After listening to his band’s newest album (fresh after mastering), he took off his headphones, looked to the sky and said “This is the one, motherfucker. This is the one.”

A look back on the year in busk. From the first Art|Everywhere, which kicked it into motion, to the second, which kicks it into law.

That’s 3 great shows. 6 tickets total. For as little as $10. Plus, you’re helping AltDaily. Dig it.

Thinking about it now still shatters my brain. Things make so much less sense when you watch real live people spin like violent cyclones one minute and then suddenly they’re gliding through the air like a wind-plucked dandelion tuft.

The show will take place one night at The Attucks and then the next night at The NorVa. We’re into this.

Jeff McLaughlin spills about where the band name came from, their local musical role models, and what they’re doing to support the local Red Bull and smokeless tobacco economy.

A black hole has been created in local history today as the tombstone of the Boathouse is in the process of being bulldozed, leaving no evidence that the 90′s antiestablishmentarianismesque zeitgeist slouched it’s way through town.

Get out before everyone else is out shoving their Christmas spirit down your throat.

Our run-on sentence review: Appropriate and fun for the whole family with a magical set that conjures a world at turns wondrous and terrifying, Hansel and Gretel is an evening where a timeless fairy tale comes alive through the enchanting vehicle of narrative and emotion that is opera.

Lola’s, Venue on 35th, Great American Trailer Park Musical, Hansel and Gretel do opera, Fighting Jamesons, Sharx!, Belmont, JewMa, Freedom Marathon, MONSTER JAM, Plan B Comedy, Ramp Jam, B-boying, CRUSH…

If you’re into Japanese Punk Rock, cake, puppies, women, anime, the 1960s, art, guns, easy money, festivals, bikes, photography, pottery, women, movies, drinks, great food, dancing, or even fairy tales, then there’s a good chance the perfect activity awaits you this weekend.

In my opinion it’s the perfect weekend. You can be whoever you want, whatever you want, and however you want to be. You make the rules.

Call ‘em blue-collar sorcerers or working-class soothsayers or nine-to-five witch doctors. Either way the Lips have staked out their own territory, straddling the fence between humanity and divinity, and their performance Thursday night at the NorVa is surely to be an experience unlike any other.

Please abide by the laws of the land, but ignoring ignorant moral laws “society” has put on us is encouraged.

Alas, here we are, a good 13 years after Hanson’s song, “Mmmbop,” hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, and guess who’s still not laughin’!? THIS GAL!

They say it’s going to rain this weekend, but I refuse to be locked inside. No t-storm or puddle is going to keep me from having fun. And it shouldn’t stop you either.

The music is unarguably good. It balances expectation and surprise in clever ways with fun lyrics that tell stories of gambling, traveling (yes, flannel loving musicians have no fear – there are train songs), alcohol, love, and crime.

There is close to literally no night in the Hampton Roads area that you can’t find an electronic music night.

Make a video of yourself performing an Avett Brothers song. Any instrument, or none at all. Winner gets 4 tickets, 2nd pace 2.

The floor vibrates. The skin tingles. A thousand people move as one to the beat. The perfect transitions from song to song leave you wondering what Tiësto did with the last 90 minutes of your life.

Despite these successes, at their core The Avett Brothers remain a humble pair of siblings from nearby North Carolina just happy to be making music.

The crowd that braved the storm was energized by the downpouring rain. So were the bands.

Dig out your plaid and give the camera your best and sex-bombiest Blue Steel look. Win tickets. Life is good.

And what they can teach you about how to make it in the music business.

A view from inside the culture and community of the greater Norfolk metro, with AltDaily editor-in-chief Jesse Scaccia.

He makes things cool that have no right being cool, like being lost and listless and soulful and artful and all of those things that do not lead to lucrative careers.

Shanti and Buck Curran of Arborea remember local acts like the Waxing Poetics, Rare Daze and Gibb Droll, and venues like Ramblin’ Conrads, Friar Tucks, and hidden Downtown cafes.

But first you have to tape yourself and/or others listening to “First Day of My Life.”

Grace Potter and The Nocturnals prove that amazing showmanship and substance go hand in hand. The woman powerhouse that is Grace Potter lacks neither with eight years of touring experience under her mini-skirt.

This is the fourth solo album from the artist who has also worked with Azure Ray, Now It’s Overhead and Bright Eyes. In writing about finding a new direction, she has found one.

As a friend who grew up in the early 80′s in the Bronx says, “We did hiphop for need, not the greed–it made us stronger people back then.”

“I want people to see our videos and say. ‘Yo, I know that dude who is dancing. He goes to my school in Chesapeake!’ or hear an out-of-towner say, ‘Yo seriously, the 757 region they got their scene rockin’!'”
-Johnny Breaker of RadioActive Cardboard

He’ll be performing on Colley tonight before Back to the Future @ The Naro. Look for a full feature on him next week.

And they’re only $15. (We just passed out with happiness.)

It’s kinda Beach Boys, kinda movie theater theme song. Like Radiohead albums, you’re going to have to listen to this song 20 times or so before you know for sure if you like it.

It’s that point during the summer when you have two options: make this summer the best one of your life, or let it just quietly fade into fall. You decide what you want to do. (I vote for the first option.)

Remembering Relative Theory, CiCi’s Pizza, and The No Talent Show, and hoping for a better musical tomorrow for the 757, from YourMusicShow.net.

Paul Shugrue names George Thorogood & the Destroyers’ “2120 South Michigan Ave” the CD of the Week.

Forget staying in. This weekend is packed full of music, barbeques, and great local art shows.

Circuital’s ten tracks provide an incredibly diverse and complete effort from a band firing on all cylinders

I can tell you two things. One: get it, you won’t regret it. Two: Once you do, prepare to abandon whatever else you were into for a few days.

Looking to share your love of music? Let us know! Looking for some bands to see this week? Look no further.

Roots, rock, reggae hits us up hard this week. Plus major electronica and new summer show announcements.

Norfolk’s new busking ordinance in its entirety.

This week’s music news and to-do’s.

James Delisco was a foster child who didn’t speak until his was five years old. Then he saw Michael perform.

All the best local music blogs, all the best concerts, all the best the Norfolk/Virginia Beach music scene has to offer.

On taking my 90-year-old piano teacher to see the symphony.

You see, back then (which was really not that long ago), people could phone in a request to a radio station and DJ’s would often play what you, the listener, wanted to hear.

Lots of free goodness this week, as well as a pretty killer music festival.

Feminist punk, misogynist rap, the end of LCD Soundsystem, the beginning of The Mirrors. We’re kind of all over the place this week, and we kind of love it.

Rock, Country, Hip-hop. We got it covered this week. Plus, a sic act coming out of VA.

They’re like Norfolk’s Sid and Nancy, without the heroin and adding two extra (more talented) ladies.

Festival time is upon us. What are your favorite festivals (local and non)?

if we support local music and art at all of its levels of development, we will feed and fuel the music scene as a whole.

Grammy recap and local shoutouts and Bonaroooo!

So 757, any local bands you’re dying to meld together for one night only?

The Unabombers, The Congress, The 757. Oh the possibilities.

If you haven’t experienced a cherubic 9 year old belt out the lyrics to Jimi Hendrix’s “Hey Joe” then put simply you have not lived.

They don’t use jelly, folks, they jam! That goes for a lot of local and touring bands hitting the 757 up this week.

Eric Brace, front man for Last Train Home, Peter Cooper, a couple of their boyhood heroes–Lloyd Green and Mike Auldridge–create “Master Sessions.”

We’ve got small tours hitting us up from Chicago, Nashville, Richmond…We’ve got killer local shows. We’ve got fundraisers. We’ve got men who are blue.

Go on, get your post-holidays groove on. And, lucky for you, there are plenty of opportunities to do just that this week and start 2011 off right.

Reminder, if you are interested in being included in our end of year music round up, send in your top 5 favorite shows, local or otherwise, including a sentence or two of why you chose each, to music@altdaily.com. If you remember them, please include the venue and date as well. Thanks!

If you can come up with your top shows, local or otherwise, of 2010 and include a sentence or two about each and why it makes your list, email music@altdaily.com to be included in our end of the year music round up.

Together we will build and bring recognition to this amazing music scene we are fortunate enough to enjoy in Norfolk/Virginia Beach.

Virgnia Beach’s K Scott reps VA to the fullest. Just listen to the amazing “Central VA” – her love song about coming up in Farmville – and just try to fight the urge to throw two up, two down.

How to make a local music scene in just one easy step. Plus, a Rise Up playlist to whet your appetite for this Saturday’s show.

Musicians and fans alike, this is YOUR chance for to kick start something big. Together, we can make great things happen for the local music scene. It just takes that first step. Your move kids

Rockabilly raging raucous ruckus. Say that five times fast. Go!

Have a chill evening exploring the corners of your mind instead… which could be hard since it’s round, but you’ll get there. Or find yourself back where you start. Either way, you’ll have gone on a journey.

Jewish Mother Backstage down on Granby Street! Have I mentioned lately how psyched I am to be getting shows that I used to have to drive to the beach to see now happening within walking distance of me! WELL I AM! AND YOU SHOULD BE TOO! WHY AM I YELLING?!

Second on the six-band bill is 1888.

I caught part of a recent set at 37th & Zen, and I’m still stumped as to how to describe them. I suspect the band likes it that way.

Crows (more than one kind), Humanoids, Tweedies, Trash, Ghosts, …what’s up with the band names this week?

Little shows. Big shows. Fundraising shows. Free shows.

Quick rundown, there’s a lot happening this week, something every night actually, so let’s just jump right in.

Jo Henley, Joe Pug, The Bridge, The Congress and much, much more.

Loads of reggae, Music at the Museum, Jackass Flats, more good hip hop, and we all say farewell to Jewish Mother.

Even on his busy schedule reppin’ the greatest rap crew of all time, Cappadonna will be performing at Norfolk’s own 37th and Zen this Friday, September 24th. That’s right, I didn’t say The NorVa, I said 37th and Zen.

Virgins, Utters, Octopuses, Pietasters, and Zombies! Oh my!

Our motto has become: “One day of peace accomplished, 364 to go.”

We’re making Norfolk a music town, one venue at a time. And that makes this music freak incredibly happy.

We want the funk! We gotta have that funk! Plus Public Enemy is back, Tigercity, The Black Keys, The Whigs, and even more funk.

It’s all about mutant fish coming on land to kill the men and mate with the women to perpetuate their species, and who can’t relate to that?

More good music happening this week than could possibly fit in this space.

[There is an advantage to national acts touring here on weekdays]. It leaves the weekends for us to build support for local and regional live music acts.

“If you want to be a successful musician, you also have to play the game and be business savvy and have an entrepreneurial spirit. I suck at all that.”

More good music in the local scene than you could shake a trombone at.

“One good thing about music, when it hits, you feel no pain.” – Bob Marley

Kevin Welch, Peter Wolf, Blue Rodeo, and Graham Parker.