Weekly Agenda: European tours and summer standbys

Sometimes it’s easy for The A.V. Club to forget about some of the most spectacular music in Madison until it up and heads to Europe for the summer. In this case, we’re speaking about the riotous hip-hop blasters in Youngblood Brass Band, who play the High Noon Saloon on Saturday before stamping their passports and touring in support of their new album, Is That A Riot? Mixing drums, horns, and rhymes, the nine-piece ensemble has worked with Talib Kweli and is almost single-handedly lobbying for the Sousaphone’s street cred. Of course this isn’t the first time the band has crossed the pond (and probably won’t be the last), but when such an active part of the Madison music and cultural scene leaves town, you feel the absence. (YB founded the Layered Arts Collective, a group focused on supporting the local arts community through education, publishing, promoting, and most recently, recording.)

Until YB returns to drop more of its marching band and jazz-influenced hip-hop, another hybrid of sorts in the form of The Shtetlblasters’ electronic Klezmer jams will fill in nicely. The Madison band released the thoroughly original Tantz Mit… earlier this year and will play at the Glass Nickel Pizza on Atwood Thursday. Slightly scaled down from the larger bands making the rounds this weekend, Icarus Himself (a side project of Nick Whetro from National Beekeeper’s Society) manages to make just the right amount of noise by combining guitar, drums, light electronic noise, and horns. The band will celebrate the release of its new EP, Mexico, at the Frequency on Friday, as well as engage in a round-robin set battle with Sleeping In The Aviary, which it promises won’t stop until one of the bands dies.

If the thought of a Madison band just picking up and leaving in the middle of summer stirs abandonment issues, comfort can be found in the regular-as-clockwork WORT Block Party on Sunday. Hitting the 13-year mark and showing no signs of stopping, the annual event always represents a good start to the drinking and listening to bands outside season, and will probably stick around as long the party people keep showing up.