Need plans? Check out any of these 10 shows around the city this week. 
Mariah Carey will bring the #beautiful to Central Park on Friday morning
When word started getting around about Portugal. the Man's next record, singer John Gourley put it out there that they'd be working with Brian Joseph Burton, aka Danger Mouse--of Gnarls Barkley, Gorillaz and The Grey Album fame--and that the band was toying with the idea of writing "their" Dark Side of the Moon. I couldn't help myself: I pictured these guys getting completely stoned and holing up in the studio projecting The Wizard of Oz on one of the walls while blasting the Pink Floyd classic and dashing off to the booth and boards as soon as the credits rolled with the intent to reinvent sound as we know it, so I asked Gourley, verbatim, if that's what happened.
Portugal. the Man perform tonight at Irving Plaza.
In true finale fashion, Saturday Night Live didn't mess around with the season's closing episode--and the musical guest successfully (and rightfully) upstaged not only the host and the cast and every single performer that hit the stage before him in recent memory, but the departure of STEFON, and that's saying something.
Friday, Kanye used the fronts of 66 buildings as the collective canvas for debuting "New Slaves," the first single off his forthcoming Yeezus. Saturday night, imagery played a huge part not only with "New Slaves" but "Black Skinhead" on SNL, the first time this season that visuals were incorporated into the musical guest's performance. Though the snapping jaws of a pack of wolves and "NOT FOR SALE" graphics served as brazen and impossible to ignore backdrops for Kanye, the rapper d e c i m a t e d SNL and any expectations viewers could've possibly had for his new material and how that'd play out in such a controlled setting. That stage transformed into the floor of an arena last night, one that broadcast the beats and drops that'll serve as the blueprint for countless playlists and copycats in the coming months.
See also: Kanye West's New Workout Plan For The Creative Class: DONDA
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Statik Selektah and crew
Editor's note: In "Tweets Is Watching," Phillip Mlynar asks local artists questions based solely on the contents of their Twitter timeline.
Statik Selaktah promises his upcoming album, Extended Play, will "remind you of the hip-hop you grew up on, but it's like the new fresh version of that." To hit his goal, the Brooklyn-based producer has called on vocal favors from a royal rap line-up: Raekwon, Bun B, Talib Kweli, Joey Bada$$, Black Thought, Action Bronson and Sean Price all grace the project. Ahead of the album's June release date, we talked to Statik about the trolling consequences of pairing Mac Miller with Sean Price on a track, Black Thought's four-minute recording session, and the so-very-important Trader Joe's versus Whole Foods debate.
See also: Sean Price: "Cornell West Is the Devil"
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Dance music's least likely purist, Pasquale Rotella, head of Insomniac Events and the brain's behind this weekend's Electric Daisy Carnival, has been making people dance for the last twenty years, throwing parties everywhere from L.A. warehouses to New York stadiums. Yesterday, we spent an hour talking about how that experience sets him apart from other promoters, and when the EDM bubble will inevitably burst.
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| Photo: Ian Collins |
Better Than: Anything J.J. Abrams has done in 2013
Before seeing Paramore tonight, I went to the movies with my best friend. We're both huge sci-fi/fantasy dweebs, so we, of course, had seen the new Star Trek movie on its opening day. The movie was decent, not great, but of course, we loved it anyway; I suspect most audiences will feel the same. At dinner afterwards, we got to talking about all these superhero/sci-fi reboot flicks, the ones that keep making a bazillion dollars despite so many blatantly cornball situations that would've never flown a few years ago. The reason movies like the Star Trek reboots (as well as other over-the-top adaptations like Watchmen, The Avengers and even the ludicrous Thor) are doing so well, I suggested, is that outside the theatres, everything is shit: for women and their bodies, for immigrants and their families, for gays and their partners, for the 99% and their savings -- the list goes on, and on, and on. People are miserable, and when the world feels at its most hopeless, we are at our most willing to suspend our disbelief (and open our wallets) for a few hours of saccharine, studio-slick entertainment. This, in my opinion, is a bittersweet blessing.
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Kurt Vile 
Kurt Vile
Bowery Ballroom
5/16/13
Kurt Vile is a golden god. We already knew he was a king, at least, but once he took the Bowery Ballroom stage last night in head-to-toe white denim as Violator Jesse Trbovich triumphantly pumped his guitar in the air, it was an absolute. The venue's house music swelled, like the school band playing as their star football players run onto the field, as the band took its position in front of a giant Kurt Vile and the Violators banner. The illusion shifted a little, not when Vile took off his jacket to reveal a totally rock star leopard-print lining, but when he actually tried to take it off. In one of the musician's many endearingly awkward moments onstage, he struggled to shrug his arms out of the sleeves as his guitar man waited patiently, holding one of Vile's six guitars.
Like any genius, musical or otherwise, there were times last night when Vile seemed to exist in his own world. After about five songs, he suddenly dropped his guitar and ran offstage with no warning or explanation ("Bathroom break," someone in the audience said). He even took a very long 30 seconds to check his iPhone while the rest of his bandmates were setting up, leaving his guitar man hanging yet again. But those moments revealed the human behind the hero, the husband and father of two who goes to band practice only after his kids are in bed.
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Charles Bradley 
Apollo Theater
5/16/13
Better Than: A pipe dream come true, and on The Apollo's storied stage, no less.
When Charles Bradley and I met up at Daptone Records to discuss the release of his sophomore album Victim of Love back in April, his headlining show at The Apollo was a prominent topic of conversation, though much of the Apollo talk never made it to print. Was his mom coming to the show? You bet. Was it completely and totally insane to him that he'd be playing a sold-out show on the same stage he saw James Brown shake and scream all over half a century ago, a moment directly responsible for Bradley's life-long musical pursuit? Uh, yes. What was he planning on wearing? "I gotta get somethin' jazzy, home-y, spiritual, loving--I want everything in that outfit."
He did a few times over. Bradley rocked not one but three sequined and set-for-dancing jumpsuits over the course of the night.
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The Killers walk into an Electric Daisy Carnival with known Liars ... these are the 10 best concerts of the weekend.
Missed them at MSG earlier in the week? Good thing the Killers have a weekend show at Barclays!
"The last interview I did on mushrooms, I said something about the Beatles, and then I'm like, 'Sorry, I can't do this.'" 
The day after his first show with his new band, Andy Animal's Cannibal Tribe, Andy Animal is driving me to the Bronx Zoo to eat mushrooms and commune with his non-human brethren. (We were supposed to take his motorcycle, but it's in the shop.) An anti-hippie song by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons is playing on the stereo. It's Mother's Day and the weather is beautiful. The generally happy-go-lucky rock and roll mascot is nervous; I assure him he won't have to answer any actual questions while tripping.
See also: We Smoked Weed With Total Slacker at the Olive Garden in Times Square
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