Lizard Lounge Club

Club d’Elf with special guests Duke Levine and Kevin Barry late show
2023-07-14 22:00 - 2023-07-15 01:30 (America/New_York) | Lizard Lounge, 1667 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA, 02138, United States
Club d’Elf returns to the Lizard Lounge for a double header with special guest Duke Levine!!!

MUST BE 21+

Club d’Elf returns to The Lizard for another stop on its ongoing 25th Anniversary tour, with a line up that is a fan favorite: Duke Levine, Kevin Barry, Paul Schultheis, Mister Rourke, Mike Rivard & Dean Johnston.

Club d’Elf has been helping audiences lose track of time for almost twenty five years with its mesmerizing synthesis of Moroccan traditional music and electronic, dubbed-out funk. Circling about bassist/composer Mike Rivard and drummer Dean Johnston, each Club d’Elf performance features a different line-up, drawn from a constellation of some of the most creative improvisers from the jazz, DJ, rock & world music scenes of Boston, NYC and beyond. The band’s music draws from a startlingly wide spectrum of styles, including jazz, hip hop, electronica, avant garde, prog-rock and dub. Under the tutelage of member Brahim Fribgane (who hails from Casablanca) the band has absorbed Moroccan trance music, which is now an essential part of the mix. Diverse audiences are drawn to Fribgane’s mesmerizing oud stylings, and Rivard’s commanding playing of the Moroccan sintir. Trance forms the central core of the Club d’Elf aesthetic, weavingtogether the band’s various influences.
In April 2022 the band released its latest album, ‘You Never Know’,which rose to #2 on the Relix chart. The record unfurls upon kaleidoscopic clouds of spiced smoke, shifting from chopped dub-jazz through trance epics that reimagine Boston as a city of bazaars. Club d’Elf pay tribute to the music and musicians who have been primary influences, with half the album being covers of gnawa, Miles Davis, Joe Zawinul, Moroccan band Nass el-Ghiwane, and Frank Zappa. The other half consists of original music inspired by Rivard’s personal journey into darkness following a near death experience in the remote jungle of the Peruvian Amazon.

“You Never Know is a wide ranging romp, full of serenity, chaos, longing, improvisation and peerless musicianship inspired by music from India and Morocco as well as the maverick jazz of Miles Davis and Frank Zappa.” – Banning Eyre, Afropop Worldwide

“Crushed between the borders of Morocco, jam band land and the kingdomof avant-garde jazz lies Club d’Elf…James Brown-meets-Sun-Ra.” – JedGottlieb, Boston Herald

“Sounds like the lovechild of Pink Floyd and George Clinton, dropped in Marrakesh…some deeply psychedelic music.” – Marlon Bishop, WNYC

Club d’Elf with special guests Duke Levine and Kevin Barry early show
2023-07-14 19:30 - 22:30
Club d’Elf returns to the Lizard Lounge for a double header with special guest Duke Levine!!!

MUST BE 21+

Club d’Elf returns to The Lizard for another stop on its ongoing 25th Anniversary tour, with a line up that is a fan favorite: Duke Levine, Kevin Barry, Paul Schultheis, Mister Rourke, Mike Rivard & Dean Johnston.
Club d’Elf has been helping audiences lose track of time for almost twenty five years with its mesmerizing synthesis of Moroccan traditional music and electronic, dubbed-out funk. Circling about bassist/composer Mike Rivard and drummer Dean Johnston, each Club d’Elf performance features a different line-up, drawn from a constellation of some of the most creative improvisers from the jazz, DJ, rock & world music scenes of Boston, NYC and beyond. The band’s music draws from a startlingly wide spectrum of styles, including jazz, hip hop, electronica, avant garde, prog-rock and dub. Under the tutelage of member Brahim Fribgane (who hails from Casablanca) the band has absorbed Moroccan trance music, which is now an essential part of the mix. Diverse audiences are drawn to Fribgane’s mesmerizing oud stylings, and Rivard’s commanding playing of the Moroccan sintir. Trance forms the central core of the Club d’Elf aesthetic, weavingtogether the band’s various influences.

In April 2022 the band released its latest album, ‘You Never Know’, which rose to #2 on the Relix chart. The record unfurls uponkaleidoscopic clouds of spiced smoke, shifting from chopped dub-jazz
through trance epics that reimagine Boston as a city of bazaars. Club d’Elf pay tribute to the music and musicians who have been primary
influences, with half the album being covers of gnawa, Miles Davis,Joe Zawinul, Moroccan band Nass el-Ghiwane, and Frank Zappa. The other
half consists of original music inspired by Rivard’s personal journeyinto darkness following a near death experience in the remote jungleof the Peruvian Amazon.

“You Never Know is a wide ranging romp, full of serenity, chaos,longing, improvisation and peerless musicianship inspired by music
from India and Morocco as well as the maverick jazz of Miles Davis andFrank Zappa.” – Banning Eyre, Afropop Worldwide

“Crushed between the borders of Morocco, jam band land and the kingdomof avant-garde jazz lies Club d’Elf…James Brown-meets-Sun-Ra.” – Jed Gottlieb, Boston Herald

“Sounds like the lovechild of Pink Floyd and George Clinton, droppedin Marrakesh…some deeply psychedelic music.” – Marlon Bishop, WNYC

Rachel Sumner and Traveling Light with Kyle Morgan
2023-07-13 19:00 - 22:00
Rachel Sumner and Traveling Light return to the Lizard Lounge with Kyle Morgan

M﻿UST BE 21+

ith songs as sweet and biting as the nectar and venom in her voice, Rachel Sumner has been captivating audiences throughout the northeast with her exciting new band Traveling Light. While their instrumentation and textures show roots deep in bluegrass and traditional folk music, Sumner’s lyric-forward writing and penchant for snaking chord progressions demand something beyond folk conventions, highlighting the acrobatic range of her brilliant bandmates Kat Wallace (fiddle/harmonies) and Mike Siegel (upright bass).

Sumner is no stranger to the stage. She spent her early career on the bluegrass circuit, singing and writing with the genre-bending Boston group Twisted Pine. Since setting out on her own, Sumner’s songs have been critically acclaimed, winning the Lennon Award in the folk category of the 2021 John Lennon Songwriting Contest for her song “Radium Girls (Curie Eleison);” earning her a spot in the Kerrville New Folk Competition; and being chosen two consecutive years by WBUR/NPR as one of the top Massachusetts entries in the Tiny Desk Competition.

Originally a classical flutist from the dusty Mojave desert, Sumner relocated from California to Boston a decade ago intending to study Composition and Film Scoring at Berklee College of Music. While at school, she found herself in the orbit of roots musicians like Molly Tuttle, Bronwyn Keith-Hynes, and John Mailander who introduced her to a trove of traditional music, started her off with a few chords on the guitar, and encouraged her to write her own songs. In the short time since, Rachel has become one of the most vital voices in Boston’s thriving roots music scene. Rachel Sumner & Traveling Light will release their debut LP in the summer of 2022.

Rachel Sumner and Traveling Light

Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Kyle Morgan grew up in central Pennsylvania, where he spent countless Sunday mornings amidst the broken strains and coffee breath of his church congregation. His first record, Starcrossed Losers, became the alias under which he would go on to release two more, Bind Us Anew and Strange Hesitations, each featuring his distinctive conglomeration of Americana styles, from stripped-down acoustic ballads and love-lorn parlor laments to roaring alt-country and throwback 60’s rock’n’roll. His latest record and label debut, Younger At Most Everything, was released by Team Love Records in February, 2022. “Morgan’s acoustic folk songs are universally appealing for fans of the genre: sometimes sparse, sometimes lush, and often descended from the Paul Simon-to-Fleet Foxes family tree.”
Kyle Morgan

Poetry Jam-Poets vs Rappers
2023-07-09 19:00 - 22:00
Poetry Jam- Poets vs Rappers

MUST BE 21+

One of the Lizard Lounge Poetry Jam’s most popular yearly events is back for the first time since restarting post-shutdown!! A night of friendly competition between cousins: poets and rappers. Some of our finest poets will meet some of our finest MC’s for a showdown not to be missed. We will have a special guest hosting the event and an open mic will follow the slam.

Jack Grace with The Weisstronauts and The Buttercups
2023-07-08 20:00 - 23:00
Jack Grace at the Lizard Lounge with the Weisstronauts and the Buttercups!!!

MUST BE 21+

Jack Grace has spent decades on the road in the US, Canada and Europe, playing his “Country Rock with a Bossa Nova Twist”.

He has performed with a wide variety of artists, from Gordon Lightfoot to Jerry Lee Lewis to Norah Jones, Doc Watson to Fishbone, Merle Haggard to The Meters and his original songbook of many genres blends with them all. He is an accomplished finger-picking solo performer that could make you laugh or have you shed a tear, as well as a storied band leader, comfortably riding his well worn power trio into a dance frenzy or leading his decadent 7 piece outfit (complete with The Broken Mariachi horn section) deep into his sometimes humorous, yet often heartbreaking repertoire.
Jack Grace
The Weisstronauts are instrumental Twang Surf Psych Spy Rock for the 22nd Century founded by guitarist Pete Weiss. No one sounds like them, nobody could.
The Weisstronauts
Chandler Travis has had a long and checkered career in the world of show biz, beginning in the seventies bringing comedy and music all over the U.S. and to the nationwide television audience on such programs as the Tonight Show, the Midnight Special, and Dick Cavett. Along the way, they released an album and appeared on stage with everyone from Bonnie Raitt to Bruce Springsteen to especially good pals NRBQ and George Carlin (with whom they toured for many years) to Elvis Costello to– well, you get the idea.

The Buttercups is a duo Chandler and his longtime drummer/collaborator, Rikki Bates on drums.
Chandler Travis

Dwayne Haggins w/ special guest James Burke
2023-07-07 21:00 - 2023-07-08 00:00
Dwayne Haggins at the Lizard Lounge!

M﻿UST BE 21+

He’s been described as “the love child of Hank Williams and Otis Redding.” “The John Legend of rockabilly.” And even, “the ‘what-took-you-so-long?’ fusion of Elvis Presley and Marvin Gaye.” At every performance, whether in a venerable metropolitan concert hall or a grimy dive in an anonymous strip mall, Dwayne Haggins is always at work. Adding new subtleties to an obvious melody line. Reinterpreting a time-worn lyrical cliché to imbue it anew with genuine feeling. Unleashing a gentle cascade of vocal acrobatics when least expected (and hence most effective) — never for show alone, but always to express a likewise unanticipated nuance of feeling: a whisper of love, a curse of anger, a groan of pain, a whoop of joy that feels, paradoxically, both surprising and inevitable at the same moment.
Dwayne Haggins grew up in many places, but when he talks of “home” these days, he means Framingham, Massachusetts.
Since early 2017, Dwayne has been on a quest to make a living playing music, leaving his mark on dozens of bars, restaurants and clubs scattered across eastern and central Massachusetts. His distinctive sound, which delivers a brand new take on the traditional country-blues and soul that he loves, has generated a rare sense of excitement and possibility throughout the area’s musical community.
Likewise, the exponential growth of his devoted audience likely signals that a move to larger venues is inevitable, and perhaps imminent. Which is no doubt one reason why Dwayne’s recent shows in local venues have taken on a new intensity, a sense of immense potential chafing at the limits of its current constraints. These days, each performance feels like a special occasion, a chance perhaps to experience the end of the beginning, the last page of prologue to a brand new story that already has the makings of a modern classic.
Though always a lover of music and an appreciative listener, Dwayne himself didn’t pick up a guitar until age 18. One evening he happened to turn on the Conan O’Brien show just in time to see Sturgill Simpson, a beacon of integrity in modern country music, perform his song “Living The Dream.” Thanks to that well-timed moment of inspiration, the guitar soon became Dwayne’s constant companion. By age 20 he was writing his own songs, and was well on the way to finding his own voice to sing them.

Notably, Haggins has shared the stage with acts such as Keb Mo, Joe Bonamassa, Ronnie Earl, George Thorogood, Eric Gales, Samantha Fish, and Suzanne Santo.
Dwayne Haggins

Four Piece Suit
2023-07-06 20:00 - 23:00
Description of event goes here.
