Tonight: Sequoia, The Set, and more at Martyrs'

By Sasha Geffen

The Set

Oh, hey there, snow. It's been a while. Good to see you could make it in time for the holidays. Personally I'm a fan of the seasonal frost (at least in December, while it's still clean and white and cheery and not slushy and awful) but if the shorter daylight hours are getting to you and you'd like to hide away somewhere warm and dry tonight while pleasantly battering away at your eardums, you might want to scope out the loud lineup at Martyrs'.

Chicago's own rock quartet Sequoia will come out to play their first show since releasing their third LP, Couple Two Tree, at the end of the summer. Their upbeat, thunderous guitar rock reaches the scope and density of Hum but carries a far lighter, janglier mood. Like Hum, Sequoia is definitely a band for the tone freaks, those of us who can't get enough of the electric guitar and the way it sounds when treated properly. And swinging in on their way back to their hometown of Minneapolis, The Set will drop by to play our own windy city. After dropping a 5-track EP, they went on to bring their sunny electro-acoustic rock to SXSW 2011. Not bad for a young Midwestern outfit.

We'll also see openers Hot Hot Robot (like Hot Hot Heat, but with robots instead, I guess) lay down tracks from their new self-titled EP. They're a punky bunch, with just enough alt-country slide tones woven in to keep things interesting. We'll also see Persistence of Memory in slot two with their metal-influenced, lady-voxed alt rock.

Tickets are $8, doors are at 9, and the show is 21+.