Omar Rodriguez Lopez

"Woke to find out I'm in a new supergroup," tweets Red Hot Chilli Peppers bassist Flea. Meanwhile, longtime fans of the aggressively challenging punk outfit At the Drive-In and the thinky hard rock of Mars Volta woke to the news that principles of both acts, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala, are once again collaborating, this time in a new project with Flea. Antemasque is the name of the act, and "4AM" is the act's first single. It's three minutes of heavy, contradictory guitar parts that stop, start and sound alarms. Bixler-Zavala's vocals are always on the verge of a freakout, and Flea's bass is the constant that holds the upper-register riffing and howls together.  There aren't too many details on the act for now. Flea downplayed the attention the group was getting, tweeting that he "played on some tracks a few weeks ago with my friends Omar and Cedric for love.

Two years ago during a performance at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, Teri “Gender Bender” Suaréz climbed to the top of a lighting rig , locked her legs around a rung and then hung upside and sang. Standing between her skull and a stage was little more than gravity, and while the move was certainly of the don't-try-this-ever variety, Suaréz and her trio Le Butcherettes are committed, aggressively, to the visceral.  But the reckless antics would be just that if the music wasn't also incendiary, where every rant or tear shed is amplified for its maximum emotional venom.

It took seven years for singer Cedric Bixler Zavala and guitarist Omar Rodriguez-Lopez to process the self-destructive life and ultimate suicide of a close friend into art, but they did so in remarkable fashion with "De-loused in the Comatorium," the new debut album from their band the Mars Volta. The Rick Rubin-produced record is a complex, ambitious portrayal of a nightmarish world between life and death, as far-reaching, fully realized and distinctive an effort as anything in recent rock.

"Woke to find out I'm in a new supergroup," tweets Red Hot Chilli Peppers bassist Flea. Meanwhile, longtime fans of the aggressively challenging punk outfit At the Drive-In and the thinky hard rock of Mars Volta woke to the news that principles of both acts, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala, are once again collaborating, this time in a new project with Flea. Antemasque is the name of the act, and "4AM" is the act's first single. It's three minutes of heavy, contradictory guitar parts that stop, start and sound alarms. Bixler-Zavala's vocals are always on the verge of a freakout, and Flea's bass is the constant that holds the upper-register riffing and howls together.  There aren't too many details on the act for now. Flea downplayed the attention the group was getting, tweeting that he "played on some tracks a few weeks ago with my friends Omar and Cedric for love.

Los Angeles-born producer DJ Nobody is anything but, as a quick run through his resume confirms. One of the resident DJs of the influential weekly beat club the Low End Theory, the producer born Elvin Estela has been dropping essential tracks since the mid-'00s.  As DJ Nobody, he's responsible for the foundational, influential 2005 full L.A. beat album “And Everything Else” and countless productions and residencies since. As half of the bass-heavy hip-hop killers Bomb Zombies with the rapper Nocando, he's produced some of truly thick L.A. beats.

With the boulder bearing the image of an eagle in flight lording over it, the annual Eagle Rock Music Festival celebrates 15 years on Saturday by taking over the neighborhood's business district. Featuring multiple stages, the day-long party will echo through the hills of Northeast Los Angeles with experimental electronic and ambient music, Americana, rock, global bass, jazz, blues and punk, as well as food and family-centered action. It's an impressive and adventurous roster, featuring artists Bosnian Rainbows, Poolside, Boardwalk, Nguzunguzu, Dub Club and a few dozen others, and presents evidence of the vibrant music community that has blossomed in the area.  Over the span of the festival's life, Eagle Rock and its sister neighborhoods Highland Park and Atwater Village have become independent music havens, home to labels including Friends of Friends, Innovative Leisure, Stones Throw, Now-Again, Alpha Pup, Brainfeeder and others.

Two years ago during a performance at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, Teri “Gender Bender” Suaréz climbed to the top of a lighting rig , locked her legs around a rung and then hung upside and sang. Standing between her skull and a stage was little more than gravity, and while the move was certainly of the don't-try-this-ever variety, Suaréz and her trio Le Butcherettes are committed, aggressively, to the visceral.  But the reckless antics would be just that if the music wasn't also incendiary, where every rant or tear shed is amplified for its maximum emotional venom.

During a technical-difficulties-induced break after the band Mars Volta's first song at the Greek Theatre on Saturday, singer Cedric Bixler-Zavala quipped, "I think this is God's way of telling us to write regular songs." Well, that first song, "Drunkship of Lanterns," spanned more than 20 minutes, covered musical ground from free-jazz squonk to salsa-influenced jams to Zeppelin-hard rock -- often all at once -- and featured emotions colored in various shades of intense.

They're known for abstract lyrical themes, epic song structures and feral performances, but the Mars Volta's new album, "The Bedlam in Goliath" (due Tuesday), takes the band's eccentric, neo-prog rock to realms that are downright bizarre, even for them. It all began when songwriter-guitarist Omar Rodriguez-Lopez purchased an antique Ouija board at a flea market while visiting Jerusalem.

Sounds takes its time in studio If the sophomore album from the Swedish quintet the Sounds displays a bit more range and dynamic than its debut, credit hard work. After all, 2003's "Living in America," which has sold 80,000 copies, "was recorded in 10 days," keyboardist Jesper Anderberg says. "For the new album we had two months -- and it turned out to take three." "Dying to Say This to You," the band's second, stronger dose of Blondie-esque punkst, isn't out until March 21. But L.A.

With the boulder bearing the image of an eagle in flight lording over it, the annual Eagle Rock Music Festival celebrates 15 years on Saturday by taking over the neighborhood's business district. Featuring multiple stages, the day-long party will echo through the hills of Northeast Los Angeles with experimental electronic and ambient music, Americana, rock, global bass, jazz, blues and punk, as well as food and family-centered action. It's an impressive and adventurous roster, featuring artists Bosnian Rainbows, Poolside, Boardwalk, Nguzunguzu, Dub Club and a few dozen others, and presents evidence of the vibrant music community that has blossomed in the area.  Over the span of the festival's life, Eagle Rock and its sister neighborhoods Highland Park and Atwater Village have become independent music havens, home to labels including Friends of Friends, Innovative Leisure, Stones Throw, Now-Again, Alpha Pup, Brainfeeder and others.

Los Angeles-born producer DJ Nobody is anything but, as a quick run through his resume confirms. One of the resident DJs of the influential weekly beat club the Low End Theory, the producer born Elvin Estela has been dropping essential tracks since the mid-'00s.  As DJ Nobody, he's responsible for the foundational, influential 2005 full L.A. beat album “And Everything Else” and countless productions and residencies since. As half of the bass-heavy hip-hop killers Bomb Zombies with the rapper Nocando, he's produced some of truly thick L.A. beats.

It took seven years for singer Cedric Bixler Zavala and guitarist Omar Rodriguez-Lopez to process the self-destructive life and ultimate suicide of a close friend into art, but they did so in remarkable fashion with "De-loused in the Comatorium," the new debut album from their band the Mars Volta. The Rick Rubin-produced record is a complex, ambitious portrayal of a nightmarish world between life and death, as far-reaching, fully realized and distinctive an effort as anything in recent rock.

Given the Dodgers, USC and UCLA games, a Neil Diamond concert at Staples Center, a fundraiser for Barack Obama featuring Hillary Clinton at the Edison, and the third annual L.A. Weekly Detour Festival, the traffic advisory for downtown on Saturday was somewhere between "suicidal" and "apocalyptic." One was probably better off at home stocking up on canned goods and waiting for "Mad Max" to seem like a documentary. The market for music festivals of late feels a bit like that too.