Free your Selves, and the rest will follow: Cotati indie-rock outfit The Rum Diary — which was known for employing two drum sets and two basses to create its soundscapes — never had the following that its music deserved, but Daniel Mckenzie and Jon Fee discovered that the upshot of existing under the radar is that it was easy to evolve into a new group. Enter Shuteye Unison. "The irony about the Rum Diary is that we stopped playing together the same way we started playing together: It just naturally happened," Mckenzie says. "Everything was always very loose with the Rum Diary, and less about the band and more about four friends losing themselves in swells of noise."

Now based in Oakland, Mckenzie (vocals, guitar) and Fee (bass, vocals), along with Jake Krohn (drums, vocals) and Remco Vanderheide (guitar, drums, vocals), are playing an equally dynamic brand of indie rock as Shuteye Unison, which recently completed its debut full-length, Our Future Selves. "We did most of the engineering ourselves, with some big help from Robert Cheek [at the Hangar in Sacramento]," Mckenzie says. "It can't be easy working with three engineers in a band, but he is a total badass, and I highly recommend him to any bands looking to record."

Our Future Selves isn't officially out until Nov. 16, but the curious and cheap are in luck: At Wednesday's (Oct. 13) Parks and Records label showcase at the Rickshaw Stop — which also includes Carcrashlander and Silian Rail — Shuteye Unison is giving away copies of its new CD for free. "We love this album, and we just want people to hear it," Mckenzie says.

Memorial lane: Talk about staying friends after the breakup: The members of '90s alt-rock outfit Remy Zero have continued to collaborate since splitting in 2003, and now they've put the band back together following the death of drummer Gregory Slay. The limited-time-only reunion is a tribute to their fallen comrade — who died of complications from cystic fibrosis on New Year's Day — and the money raised will go to Slay's widow and daughter, who live near Petaluma. The four-city tour of the West Coast — which was preceded by a gig in May in Slay's hometown of New Orleans, and hits Café Du Nord on Monday, Oct. 11 — finds Chip Kilpatrick, formerly of Wild Sweet Orange and now with the Great Book of John, sitting in on drums. "Of course it is very strange playing without Gregory," says bassist Cedric LeMoyne, whose O+S project with Azure Ray's Orenda Fink included Slay on drums. "We miss him personally and musically always. But it also feels good to be together and playing this music that means so much to us and meant so much to Gregory. We feel like he's smiling on the proceedings."

The night will also include portions of a work-in-progress Remy Zero documentary by Nina Parikh. "We had strange lives and a strange career, and she thought it might make an interesting film one day," LeMoyne says. "Gregory was a natural exhibitionist and always ended up being the person to speak the most when she was filming. As a result, she has an incredible amount of footage of him sharing his thoughts on his life, us, music, the music business — everything."

As for these shows turning into something bigger for Remy Zero, LeMoyne admits anything’s possible, "but for right now we’re just concentrating on enjoying these shows, hoping that the people who come enjoy them as well, and communicating with Gregory on whatever realm he’s inhabiting right now," he says. "Our biggest hope is that the signal we’re sending is strong enough to reach him there."

Don't mess with the Wannabe Texans: It seems safe to assume that San Francisco is one of the only places in the world that could produce a musical outfit that considered itself a "bike-messenger band." That's how vocalist Mary O'Neil describes the Wannabe Texans, her late-'80s twang-friendly rock band that has re-formed for a show at Bottom of the Hill on Sunday, Oct. 10, around Bike Messenger Appreciation Day.

"The folks putting on the bike-messenger reunion convinced us to play for old time's sake," says O'Neil, who notes that the band had such disparate influences as the Carter Family and Gang Of Four. "It's not likely to happen again." During its short existence, the Wannabes put out one full-length in the UK on the Mekons' Sin label as well as lots of unofficial cassettes. ("That's right, cassettes," she confirms.)

O'Neil and bassist Brad Johnson went on to form alt-country outfit Virginia Dare, and the other members have also developed impressive résumés, including guitarist Wally McClellan, who runs his Wally Sound studio out in Oakland, and guitarist Matt Sullivan, who did time in Tarnation. Expect to see all original members onstage on Sunday, and make sure to head down to Bottom early: The all-ages show begins at 3 p.m.

Diamond in the rough: Chi Cheng's life isn't the only thing that was turned upside down when a car accident in Santa Clara in late 2008 left him in a coma. He and his Deftones bandmates had just completed a dark record called Eros that suddenly didn't feel appropriate to release under the circumstances. So the Sacramento alt-metal outfit decided to return to the drawing board with former Quicksand bassist Sergio Vega and made Diamond Eyes.

"We've put [Eros] in the vault and will release it when the time is right—hopefully when Chi is back on his feet," singer Chino Moreno told Spin.com in February. "But when the accident happened, we just didn't want to be in that time anymore. We had to start looking to the future. We needed to create something more optimistic." Produced by Nick Raskulinecz, Diamond Eyes doesn't lose its edge amidst that optimism, and its textured heaviness should translate as well to the stage as Deftones' past triumphs.

The band is finishing a month-long tour with Alice in Chains, another alt-metal outfit that's no stranger to overcoming adversity. The Seattle grunge band returned to action several years ago following original lead singer Layne Staley's drug-induced death in 2002. The tour, which is dubbed Blackdiamondskye and also includes Mastodon — the name comes from Diamond Eyes, Alice In Chain's Black Gives Way to Blue, and Mastodon's Crack the Skye — makes its way to the San Jose State Event Center Arena on Monday, Oct. 11.

Five Twitter Picks

1. Third Eye Blind to play free show in SF this week: about 1 hour ago

2. What if band was more like bio class? That's the idea behind the internet instrument Seaquence: about 8 hours ago

3. Free download: Listen to Jaswho? and his alleged San Francisco sound: 2:53 PM Oct 4th

4. Holy crap, we covered a lot of shows this weekend. To start: Arcade Fire and The Flaming Lips 10:00 AM Oct 4th

5. Is '90s rave music making a revival? Listen to this @_Lone_ mix and tell us: 3:57 PM Oct 1st

1. K.Flay makes the most of Grizzly Bear song in free download: Read more >

2. Too legit to quit: Pirate Cat Radio needs your money: Read more >

3. Eprom's new EP for his Bay heads: Read more >

4. Watch musicians acting a fool: Read more >

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> THIS WEEKEND

Fool's Gold, The Bitter Honeys, The Soft White Sixties
Fri., October 8, 8:30pm An amusing phenomenon has been recurring during Fool's Gold's sets, and Lewis Pesacov can't figure out its origin. With increasing regularity, ... Read more >

Tankcrimes Brainsqueeze Weekend
Daily from Fri., October 8 until Sun., October 10 The adjectives that come to mind when describing bands on Oakland's Tankcrimes label make them sound like a wound gone wrong: ... Read more >

Cowboy Junkies
Sat., October 9, 9:00pm The recent Hope Sandoval show renewed our desire to rehear the epic, off-kilter women's voices that emerged in the early 1990s. Sandoval ... Read more >

Tankcrimes Brainsqueeze Weekend
Daily from Fri., October 8 until Sun., October 10 The adjectives that come to mind when describing bands on Oakland's Tankcrimes label make them sound like a wound gone wrong: ... Read more >

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> PLAN AHEAD

Corin Tucker Band, The Golden Bears
Mon., October 11, 8:00pm Read more >

James, Ed Harcourt
Mon., October 11, 8:00pm Read more >

Teenage Fanclub, Radar Brothers
Tue., October 12, 8:00pm Rock bands tend to begin in secret. They are formed in the daydreams of adolescent boys and girls turned on by a ... Read more >

Macy Gray
Wed., October 13, 8:00pm Read more >

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> THIS JUST IN

1. Marco Benevento Trio at the Independent. Saturday, Dec. 4. 9 p.m., $20; 21+.

2. Leonard Cohen at the Paramount Theatre. Sunday, Dec. 5, and Monday, Dec. 6. 8 p.m., $45.50-$250; all ages.

3. Needtobreathe at the Fillmore. Thursday, Dec. 9. 8 p.m., $20; all ages.

4. Badly Drawn Boy at the Swedish American Hall. Tuesday, Dec. 14. 8 p.m., $25; all ages.

More Concert Listings >