Matthew Dear’s subversive dancefloor antics

Sure, Germans can be some meticulous, industrious motherfuckers. But too many people don't grasp that Germans also have a sense of humor, or the fact that they like to get high and fly just like the rest of us. But if you grew up within cities that were 30 to 70 percent bombed and rebuilt, you might inject a fractured, throbbing swing in your step, too. And deep dub/ambient beat producer Thomas Fehlmann (Kompakt recording artist and Orb collaborator) and Gudrun Gut (Monika Enterprise labelhead) exhibit all these aforementioned kraut personality quirks through mechanist tangos of celebratory desolation and cheeky techno-logic. Asphodel and Recombinant Media Labs present Fehlmann live and Gut on the turntables on Friday, Jan. 5, at 9 p.m. Admission is $16; visit www.recombinantmedia.net for more info. — Tony Ware

Brian Salazar, a local disc jockey/producer signed to Los Angeles dance label Undefeated, created the DJ collective the Housemen to celebrate the more serious, soulful output of the house music scene. The crew helps to improve the genre's clichéd stereotypes by playing songs heavy on lyrical and vocal quality and steering away from cheap shots. Local percussionist Ahmed Azzam, better known as "the Funky Pharoah," will help — or challenge — Housemen DJs Salazar and Paolo Dava in keeping the beat steady on Friday, Jan. 5, at DNA Lounge at 10 p.m. Admission is $10-20; call 626-1409 or visit www.dnalounge.com for more info. — Tamara Palmer

No matter how Johnny Depp spins it, Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie was a perv. There's something a bit bent about imagining kids in nightgowns who never want to grow up. And, not to say he dresses in tights, but there's also something a bit bent about the music of microhouse maestro Matthew Dear (who records most notably as Audion). Dear's music starts out innocent enough, all crisp and skeletal, proper like good British children. But pretty soon it becomes all unctuous bass and pneumatic percussion. Dear's command of striated rhythms and pared-down progressions is so expert it maximizes emotions, making you wonder if the things that go bump in the night aren't pirates but them nasties, equal parts taut and flushed. Lost Boys and Tinkerbells alike can rinse in the emissions on Dear's dance floor when he's joined by the buttoned-down, dub-flecked tech-house of Daniel Bell on Saturday, Jan. 6, at the End Up. Call 646-0999 or visit www.theendup.com for more info. — T.W.