Julie Byrne to play grief-centered new album

It has been six years since Buffalo folk singer Julie Byrne released her much acclaimed sophomore album “Not Even Happiness,” which earned her rave reviews from many notable music publications. A lot has happened during that time, including the death of her producer, which she channeled into her newest album “The Greater Wings.” She will be performing at Felton Music Hall Saturday.

Byrne began playing guitar when she was 17 and released her first two EPs on cassette before they were compiled into her 2014 debut “Rooms with Walls and Windows.” Her follow-up, “Not Even Happiness,” was universally acclaimed by music critics and named one of the best albums of the year by Stereogum, Pitchfork, Spin, Mojo and more. She began work on her next album not long after and commenced recording in 2020 with producer Eric Littmann, who had worked with Byrne on her previous album. However, Littmann died in June 2021, and Byrne began writing new songs and recruited Alex Sommers, best known for his work with Sigur Ros, to complete the recordings. The result is a haunting record centered around loss and grief, all recorded over different seasons.

Opening will be Los Angeles harpist and composer Nailah Hunter.

The show will begin at 8 p.m. Saturday at Felton Music Hall, 6275 Highway 9. Doors open at 7. Tickets are $20 for general admission. This is a 21-and-older concert. For more information, go to FeltonMusicHall.com.

King Dream support new album at Moe’s Alley

Northern California’s very own King Dream are on tour to support their first full-length album in five years, and they have designated Moe’s Alley as one of their stops.

Fronted by Oakland native Jeremy Lyon, King Dream are a band whose influences span a wide variety of genres ranging from ’60s psychedelia to singer/songwriters such as Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen to modern indie bands such as My Morning Jacket and the War on Drugs. That variety is reflected on their newest album, “Glory Daze,” consisting of 24 songs divided into three parts that run the gamut from power pop to acoustic ballads to psychedelic rock. Audiences can see some of that variety at Moe’s Alley. Opening will be Ethiopian jazz-inspired band Sun Hop Fat.

The concert begins at 8 p.m. Thursday at Moe’s Alley, 1535 Commercial Way. Doors open at 7. Tickets are $20 the day of the show. This is a 21-and-older concert. For more information, go to MoesAlley.com.

Tony Camin to close out Laughternoon

After three Saturdays of bringing jokes to London Nelson Park, DNA’s Comedy Lab’s Laughternoon series will come to a close for the year Saturday. The comedian who will have the last laugh will be Tony Camin.

Born in Mountain View and getting his start on the Foothill-De Anza Community College District station KFJC in the ’90s, Camin was featured on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” “Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn” and “Real Time with Bill Maher” and performed at the HBO US Comedy Arts Festival. He also co-created the off-Broadway comedy show “The Marijuana-Logues” with fellow comedians Arj Barker and Doug Benson.

The show is 4:30 p.m. Saturday at London Nelson Park, 301 Center St. Regional and local comics will precede Camin’s set, and jazz trio The Tree Swings will also perform. Tickets are $20 in advance and $25 at the gate and can be purchased online at DNAsComedyLab.com.

Author promotes Hawaiian story collection

A native Hawaiian herself, Megan Kamalei Kakimoto has always felt a tight connection to the islands she grew up on. Now that sense of identity is the subject of her new story collection “Every Drop is a Man’s Nightmare,” which she will be promoting in a free event at Bookshop Santa Cruz Monday.

Having already had fiction published in magazines such as Granta, Conjunctions and Joyland, Kakimoto’s debut anthology follows a cast of mixed native Hawaiian and Japanese women living on the islands still haunted by the ghosts of colonization. Stories include an elderly widow who sees her dead lover in a giant flower, a young woman’s fraught relationship with her pregnant body and her connection to a wild pig she encountered on the haunted Pali Highway in her youth, and a writer who feels her pages moving around in her briefcase while she is in the middle of a manuscript.

The book is “a fierce love letter to Hawaiian identity and mythology, and a searing dispatch from an occupied territory threatening to erupt with violent secrets,” according to publisher Bloomsbury Publishing.

The event is at 7 p.m. Monday at Bookshop Santa Cruz, 1520 Pacific Ave. To register, go to BookshopSantaCruz.com.

Catalyst to get a little country with Easton Corbin

In 2019, singer Easton Corbin declared “Somebody’s Gotta Be Country.” He would certainly fit the bill. Having grown up on his grandparents’ farm in the small town of Trenton, Florida, and then having a very successful career in Nashville, Corbin embodies the classic journey of a famous country singer. He has performed all over the road, to borrow a title from one of his biggest hits, and now that road has brought him to the Catalyst Club where he will be playing Wednesday.

Corbin’s success dates back to 2009 when his first two singles, “A Little More Country Than That” and “Roll with It,” hit No. 1 on both of Billboard’s country charts and were designated platinum and gold respectively. He then charted four other top 10 singles, supported Carrie Underwood on much of her $54.6 million grossing Storyteller Tour and released his latest album, “Let’s Do Country Right,” in January. Opening will be Silicon Valley singer/songwriter Mike Annuzzi.

The concert begins at 8 p.m. Wednesday at the Catalyst, 1101 Pacific Ave. Tickets are $37 in advance and $42 at the door. This is a 16-and-older concert. For more information, go to CatalystClub.com.

This week’s calendar was compiled by Nick Sestanovich.