Record Hop, The Great Tyrant, Red Monroe

While all three of these acts would appeal to a crowd that likes its rock loud, this still seems like a strangely mismatched lineup. The Great Tyrant's Daron Beck plays ominous synth and keyboard parts and bellows and growls theatrically over the most brutal rhythm section in North Texas, making the guitar-free trio one of the most exciting bands in the area. Their goth-influenced prog-meets-metal has nothing in common with Red Monroe's slick, culture-vulture pop-rock or Record Hop's straight-from-the-'90s melodic noise. Record Hop, by the way, should roll out plenty of new material as they gear up for next month, in which they'll finally release the follow-up to 2004's Pareidolia and perform at South by Southwest. Two new tracks recently posted on their MySpace, "End of Line" and "Clique," don't reveal any drastic change to their sound, and that's a good thing.

All three acts will perform at the Melodica Festival in Exposition Park beginning the next day, so attendance would be a decent consolation prize for Funkytown folk who can't make it to Dallas for the block party.