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The Show(case) Must Go On!

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This patchwork approach is all over the group's eponymous full-length disc, released this year on Ohio's Action Driver imprint. Guitars and keyboards surge and recede as waves of dark melody rob oxygen from DeVoss's lungs. It's a dynamic yet lulling sound that subliminally hints at Radiohead, Blonde Redhead and probably a lot of other bands with "head" in their names. Its intellectual brawn, however, never overpowers its flesh-and-blood vulnerability, and the songs morph fluidly from a crashing roar to the splash of a drop.

The VU roster is also about to take a huge leap in evolution: Howard and Menchaca are both moving away at the end of the summer. "We're very sad. The band is a huge friendship thing for us," says DeVoss. "Chris and I will do some repair work. There'll be some remixing of the lineup." After an appearance at South by Southwest in Austin earlier this year, Voices Underwater is building a swift momentum; hopefully, its next incarnation will be just as hypnotic and evocative. -- Heller

THE WITCHING HOUR
NOMINATED IN ECLECTIC
Truth be told, über-drummer Kenny James hasn't played for every band in town over the past dozen years, but it's not for want of trying. Among the combos on his resumé are the Samples, Carolyn's Mother, Judge Roughneck, God Rifle, Rorschach Test and Chaos Theory -- and if Metallica and the Backstreet Boys hailed from Denver, he would have kept time for them, too. Nonetheless, the project to which he's been most consistently devoted is the Witching Hour, in part because "it isn't actually a band," says James, who plays guitar and sings in this particular configuration. "It's me and a bunch of people I hire - normally, two guitarists, a bass player, a drummer and two background vocalists."

Given James's wide-ranging track record, it's no surprise that the Witching Hour's sound is tough to pigeonhole. "Here's a description: hard-ambient-trip-hop rock," he offers, laughing. "Seriously, it's hard rock, but since I'm not a hollerer, it's not your typical hard rock. It's melodic. There are a lot of industrial things, a lot of percussive looping going on, and some sampling, but there are some ambient moments, too, which brings up the ambient and trip-hop side of things."

The Hour hasn't put out a disc since 2001's Angels in Shadow Blue, but James is about halfway through a followup that he expects will find its way to stores next year. Until then, he'll continue to take the occasional stage ("I'm trying to make our shows events, as opposed to playing every weekend at so-and-so bar and grill") while honing his Witching approach.

"I don't want to compromise the vision I have," James says. "I have these ideas, and I want to get them out there and see what happens." -- Roberts

HALDEN WOFFORD & THE HI BEAMS
NOMINATED IN COUNTRY/BLUEGRASS/ROOTS
The Skylark Lounge on South Broadway is home to a great, rootsy jukebox, scores of vintage photographs and a folksy clientele that's trickles in from the surrounding Baker neighborhood. It is also now home to Halden Wofford & the Hi Beams, who play there once a month.

"We decided to make it our exclusive place to play in Denver," says Wofford, the group's lead vocalist, acoustic guitarist and namesake. "It's totally fun to play there, and we love Scotty [Heron, the owner]. Now if you want to see us, you have to come down to the Skylark."

The vintage-style juke joint has already played a significant role in the Hi Beams' life: In 1999, the band released Live at the Skylark, a collection of covers culled from the realms of traditional country, Western swing and honky-tonk. On Halden Wofford & the Hi Beams, released this spring, the band pays dutiful homage to the same genres, this time showcasing the songwriting abilities of Wofford, guitarist Bret Billings and mandolinist/guitarist Kevin Yost. (Bassist Ben O'Conner, founder of the www.denverbarndance.com Web site, and drummer Justin Greville complete the roster.) Flecked with the warbling wail of pedal-steel guitars and played as tight as a drum, the recording is anchored around Wofford, who just might be one of the most likable personalities in Denver music.

Sunny-voiced and bespectacled, Wofford radiates an easy charm whether channeling Hank Williams or Bob Wills or simply being himself. And when he isn't manning the microphone, he reads to kids as part of his job at the Tattered Cover Book Store and is illustrating a children's book about the history of country music; the volume is due in 2005 from Little Brown publishing company. He's a cheery guy, all right, even if some of the high-lonesome tunes he delivers are doused with misery and malcontents.

"I have a deep, dark nasty side," he says, laughing. "Just ask my wife."

Later this year, Wofford plans to release a solo record; while it may not be dark or nasty, it will be a bit more introspective than his work with the Hi Beams. "It's moody," he says. "It's kind of traditional and a little more folky -- closer to avant-country. It's my Lou Reed and Iggy Pop record." -- Bond

WENDY WOO
NOMINATED IN SINGER/SONGWRITER
8 P.M., DAZZLE, WITH NINA STOREY
Meet Colorado's Ani DiFranco. Since establishing herself as a headliner during the '90s, talented singer/songwriter Wendy Woo has handled all of the marketing and promotional aspects that most musicians either ignore or foist upon others. "I do my booking," she notes, "and I know exactly what's going on with my business and how to pitch my price. I don't have a middleman. People call and deal directly with me."

Fortunately, Woo has grown adept at compartmentalizing, and when she's done with dollars-and-cents duties, she's able to focus on artistic concerns. Gonna Wear Red, a CD she issued in 2002, was the first disc she's made that she didn't engineer, "which was kind of nice," she admits. The album is representative of her work, she believes, in that "it's a mix of listening music and dance music. Each song represents a different emotion that goes from loss to sadness to rebirth to reliving." The high quality of the disc has been beneficial in more ways than one: "People really like it, so it's easy to sell."

Woo encounters potential customers all the time, since, by her estimate, she performs approximately 250 shows every year. She's grown successful enough to fly, rather than drive, to concerts that take her to jumbo communities, but she also appreciates the audiences in smaller burgs. "The big cities have so much music that you sometimes only get a little shot at playing," she says. "Whereas in the small towns, people want to hear you play for hours. You start pulling up songs you don't play all the time, which is great.

"I really like doing things for myself," she adds. "You get more done that way." -- Roberts

WOVENHAND
NOMINATED IN ECLECTIC
10:30 P.M., ACOMA CENTER
According to 16 Horsepower's David Eugene Edwards, Wovenhand, his solo project, wasn't launched out of creative frustration with his primary project. Bread and butter had a lot more to do with it.

"Jean-Yves [Tola] and Pascal [Humbert] have income outside of music," Edwards points out about two key Horsepower mates. "Jean-Yves and his wife have a horse farm where they raise jumping horses, and that keeps them quite busy -- and Pascal's wife is a teacher in Grand Junction. But I don't really have any other choice than to play, and when we decided to take a break because we'd been on the road too long, I had time on my hands."

Edwards made the most of it. "I kept writing and kept recording, and it turned into something I wasn't expecting," he says. In 2002, Glitterhouse, the imprint that issues 16 Horsepower platters in Europe, placed Edwards's creations on a CD dubbed Wovenhand, and he went on the road to support it. Today, Edwards gets plenty of help reproducing the Wovenhand sound from bassist Shane Trost, mandolinist/pump organist Daniel McMahon and drummer Ordy Garrison, who's also pounded the skins for Tarantella and Slim Cessna's Auto Club.

More recently, Wovenhand whipped up Blush, a CD already available in Europe that compiles music Edwards wrote for Ultima Vez, a Belgian dance company. The offering will eventually make its way to the States, joining Olden, a roundup of 16 Horsepower's earliest material that is presently earmarked for a September release on Jetset Records.

Hearing the Horsepower demos for the first time in ages was an odd experience for Edwards. "It was interesting how much my voice has changed, how much younger I sounded, and how much quicker we played everything," he says. "But I'm much happier now, and hopefully just better at what I do." -- Roberts

YO, FLACO!
NOMINATED IN HIP-HOP
During the past several years, Yo, Flaco! has gotten so much attention for winning or placing highly in several best-unsigned-band contests that its music has sometimes gotten lost in the shuffle. As a result, some people who think they know what the band sounds like from turning an ear to Goin' At It and Bring the Battle On, a pair of discs unleashed in late 2001, may be very wrong.

"We were listening to a lot of jazz at that time, so when I listen to those albums, I hear a lot of Wes Montgomery, a lot of Thelonious Monk," says Yo guitarist Brandon Martin. "We're still listening to a ton of jazz now, but I think we're listening more to hip-hop -- and the band fuses a lot of other genres, depending on what different bandmembers bring in. The scale is always fluctuating back and forth."

That's as it should be, considering the number of folks in the Yo, Flaco! Team: Martin is joined by bassist Wes Coplen, keyboardist Matt Piazza, drummer Seth Murphy, trombonist/conch-shell player Adam Bartczak, saxophonist Ethan Raczka, and Neil McIntyre on the microphone. Despite the size of this on-stage contingent, Martin feels that the act's disparate elements mesh in a cohesive way whether they're playing for hometown dwellers who've supported Yo, Flaco! since the '90s or out-of-towners who've discovered the band during one of its frequent tours.

"With as many hours as we've spent in a van together, all of our influences have melded together," he says. "Now they all come from the same place." -- Roberts

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