Thursday: Oneohtrix Point Never at Howard Theatre
Don’t forget this show highlighted in last week’s City Lights: “Daniel Lopatin, who performs and creates under the moniker Oneohtrix Point Never, constructs sample-heavy, synthesizer-forward compositions that conjure a sense of tuneful existential dread.”
Friday: Mariah Stovall at Lost City Books
As a literary agent, Mariah Stovall is no stranger to bookstores. But as a debut novelist, Stovall’s visits to these stores have looked a bit different recently. Rather than perusing the shelves for her clients’ books or her next read, Stovall herself is now the center of author talks and book signings. This Friday night will find her in D.C.’s own Lost City Books to discuss her debut novel, I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both, with D.C.-based author Chantal James. I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both follows Khaki Oliver’s attachments to the anchors around her whether that’s the local punk scene, the music that consumes her, or the people who do. When her former best friend Fiona reaches out to her for the first time in a decade, Khaki can’t resist revisiting their past. She begins crafting a mixtape that transports her to the time of that friendship. By pairing 41 songs with 41 key moments in her friendship with Fiona, Khaki allows the reader to understand her life through song. Stovall created a playlist of songs for Largehearted Boy Book Notes that soundtracked the years she worked on the book. I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both reminds the reader of the constant interplay between friendship, music, and art, forcing the reader to return to their own sonic and platonic past. Mariah Stovall talks about I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both with Chantal James at 7 p.m. on April 26 at Lost City Books, 2467 18th St. NW. lostcitybookstore.com. Free. —Serena Zets
Saturday: DC Chocolate Festival at La Maison Française
The DMV’s own makeshift chocolate factory comes to town one day of the year, which happens to be this weekend. Stationed at the La Maison Française on Reservoir Road, the DC Chocolate Festival invites attendees to gorge and slurp and crunch through heaps of chocolate samples on display from more than 30 vendors, many of which are based around the region. It’s just one ingredient the festival will offer: There’s a full day of seminars and workshops happening as well that are meant to educate festival goers on all things chocolate. Topics range from the world of cacao cultivation production to making of the commodified chocolate you see in stores. The chocolate confectionery market is worth billions in the United States, and Marisol Slater, the festival’s key organizer and owner of the Chocolate House DC, says it’s a worthwhile opportunity to learn from local chocolatiers that built their businesses from the ground up and have made a livelihood. In its seventh year, the festival has attracted thousands during past installments. “People really loved being able to meet different makers who are in the country and have their own trees and their own farms,” Slater says. The second ingredient melding the festival together—beyond chocolate—is that innate power of connection. The festival features chocolate sommeliers hosting in-person tasting events and opportunities to network with vendors and makers. Christina Youngi Kim, who founded the Secret Cacao Garden, a D.C.-based cacao wellness company that focuses on using the ingredient as sacred ceremonial plant medicine, will walk attendees through some of the various ways Indigenous and modern societies have used it as a form of meditation, right before the festival wraps up in the afternoon. It’ll leave plenty of time for your blood sugar level to recover, or maybe even second and third spoonfuls. Bring a sweet tooth. The DC Chocolate Festival starts at 10:30 a.m. on April 27 at La Maison Française at the Embassy of France, 4101 Reservoir Rd. NW. dcchocolatefestival.com. $25. —Heidi Pérez-Moreno
Saturday: Bodega at Comet Ping Pong
We are getting diminishing marginal returns from post-punk bands. There are simply too many acts out there who opt for clean guitars, snarky lyrics, and dance-adjacent percussion. If a band sounds a little bit like Gang of Four or Talking Heads, they are practically guaranteed a positive write-up in one of the last few music blogs. Bodega, another post-punk band from Brooklyn, have sidestepped this trend by becoming successful the old-fashioned way: a steady output, and earning new fans from relentless touring. Their latest album, Our Brand Could Be Yr Life, was released a couple weeks ago and includes the band’s hallmarks: dueling vocals, layers of melody, and cheeky lyrics about how modern life is closer to a dystopia than not. What makes Our Brand unique and interesting is how, amid all that, they’ve made an album with clearer pop influence. You can hear Superchunk-style power-pop, swirling shoegaze riffs, catchy harmonies, and melodies that would fit into R.E.M.’s back catalog. This is evidence of a band evolving, not selling out, and all that tension will be on display when they play Comet Ping Pong this Saturday. Bodega play at 10 p.m. on April 27 at Comet Ping Pong, 5037 Connecticut Ave. NW. dice.fm. $18.54. —Alan Zilberman
Sunday: Anna Deavere Smith Presents the 73rd A. W. Mellon Lectures at NGA
Sure, the actor and playwright Anna Deavere Smith is best known for appearing in The West Wing—a show whose influence can somehow still be felt among driven D.C. millennials—but her career in film and theater is her true legacy. She practically invented a new kind of dramatic stage performance with “documentary theater,” an approach to storytelling that requires impressive imitation on her part. Her method sounds simple, it’s anything but: She records and interviews her subjects, then recreates their dialogue and mannerisms on stage in one woman shows. Her subjects are always difficult—whether it’s our discomfort with mortality or U.S. race relations—and to watch her perform is to get an uncanny impression that she captures the essence of these people in an ephemeral way. It is fitting Smith gets an entire lecture series at the National Gallery of Art, since she has so much to say about her history as a singular performer, and more importantly, about us. Anna Deavere Smith’s lecture series starts at 2 p.m. every Sunday from April 28 through May 19 at the National Gallery of Art East Building, 4th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. nga.gov. Free, registration required, a virtual option is also available. —Alan Zilberman
Next Thursday: Belle & Sebastian at the Anthem
After Belle & Sebastian’s Sarah Martin graduated from university, she took a job in a local bookshop, something that drew concern from her parents. “My mum was like, ‘Yeah, but what are you really going to do?’” Martin tells City Paper. “I was like, ‘No, this is fine because I’m joining this band and I want to do something that won’t be too difficult to give up.’ She was like, ‘That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.’” Her mum needn’t have worried. That band became Belle & Sebastian, and nearly 30 years into their career, the Scottish indie-pop darlings show absolutely no signs of deceleration. If anything, the band have increased their typical output, releasing back-to-back albums—2022’s A Bit of Previous and 2023’s Late Developers—and currently touring, which includes a stop at the Anthem on May 2. Belle & Sebastian have the pandemic to thank for the uptick in product; a scheduled recording session in Los Angeles was tabled due to the shutdown but it also gave the band members extra time to write. “We did shift completely,” Martin says. “The first song we recorded for the two albums was a song that none of us had heard before. [Singer-songwriter] Stuart [Murdoch] brought it in and it was ‘Working Boy in New York City,’ which we started recording with and that was absolutely brand new. If we had gone to L.A., that song wouldn’t have existed.” The ability to shift and trust her gut has served Martin well, especially as she looks back on her bookshop-working, post-uni days. “I think I’m kind of pleased with my instincts at the time,” recalls Martin. “It wasn’t as if I thought the band was the most sensible career choice. It was just a feeling. It was just a thing that I felt strongly was the right thing to do at that time and I’m glad I had the confidence in that feeling.” Belle & Sebastian play at 8 p.m. on May 2 at the Anthem, 901 Wharf St. SW. theanthemdc.com. $45–$75. —Christina Smart