SATURDAY, JULY 11

Bill Noonan and His Fallen Gentlemen The Man That I Can't Be, Bill Noonan's latest, still has that whiff of the Rank Outsiders, his former band, but he (in collaboration with producer Mark Lynch) has now hit upon a sound that suits him, featuring a soupcon of '60s soul, two-car garage rock and classic country. Always one of the more underrated local rockers, Noonan has brought along many of his friends for the party, including David Childers, drummer David Kim, keyboardist Jason Atkins, the horn section of Ray Mitchell and Tom Kuhn, and silky chantreuse Beth Chorneau. The result is some seriously satisfying country soul, a genre that's been relegated to the sidelines in recent years. Noonan's impassioned take sounds like the msusical equivalent of a late-round pick who's finally getting the chance to shine, calling audibles at the line (a cover of Gene Clark's "Tried So Hard"), and taking over the huddle and making it his own. To further a bad analogy, The Man That I Can't Be is a touchdown all the way around. Snug Harbor (Davis)

Grids Not for the faint-of-heart or delicate-eared, this CLT quartet just released its explosive 7" PGCOBUIBQTAUWTCS through Lunchbox Records (yes, that Lunchbox Records). The three Flipper-meets-Big Black tracks are loud and sludgy, but don't sacrifice song-craft for screamo tropes or the all-too-common metal faux-angst posturing that make the genre so flat-out laughable at times. To paraphrase a colleague, Grids is a fully extended middle finger to Charlotte's button-down banker's world, but one that sounds good doing it. With Cult Ritual and Just Die! Lunchbox Records (Schacht)