Go For The Opener: No Age and Jay Reatard before Pixies at Aragon

Welcome to Go For the Opener, in which we at The A.V. Club plead that if you’re getting ready to see a big concert, be sure to get there early and pay attention to the opening acts. 

The big show: Pixies at Aragon Ballroom on Nov. 19-21, 7:30 p.m.

The openers: No Age (Nov. 20), and Jay Reatard (Nov. 21)

Why you should listen: A steady build-up for any Pixies tour is inevitable, but this one has been especially salacious for diehard fans: First they annoucned plans to celebrate capstone 1989 album Doolittle by playing it in its entirety. Then they hinted at coming to Chicago before finally setting up a whopping three shows. But the kicker was the announcement of a long list of amazing openers for the tour (including appearances in other cities by Mew, Rain Machine, and a special show featuring Weird Al Yankovic). On each night at the Aragon, a different band kicks things off.

The Nov. 20 show starts off with L.A. punk duo No Age. Guitarist Randy Randall and drummer Dean Allen Spunt exert enough noise and power to put Jack and Meg White to shame while still managing to fall tidily into the shoegaze category of atmospheric experimentalism. The band has been holding its own lately in a round-robin style tour with Dan Deacon and Deerhunter and playing Lollapalooza despite Randall dislocating his shoulder in a dance contest with Deacon the night before. Now No Age is back in the city without having to sit down throughout the entire show, forced to look like The Eagles playing "Hole in the World."

Nov. 21, Memphis garage-punk hero Jay Reatard (whose previous openers merited coverage of their own) takes the stage. Reatard came up as a member of Lost Sounds and The Reatards but has made his reputation as a prolific solo garage rocker. Since 2006, he's made two albums, a bunch of EPs, and enough singles to fill two full-length compilations. His latest album, Watch Me Fall, is considerably more polished than his earlier work, but his punk reputation still holds. During last month's tour, his band quit on him (followed by a vague, incendiary tweet from Reatard), and before that, his most enduring quality was a propensity for punching people in the face. He hasn't done that in awhile, but we're keeping our fingers crossed.