The Five Best Concerts in OC This Weekend

Friday, March 1

Super Diamond
House of Blues Anaheim

Remember the movie Saving Silverman with Steve Zahn and Jack Black? It was about a couple of lovable loser musicians whose idol was none other than Neil Diamond, the psuedo-rock crooner from your parent's generation. Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction as evidenced by Super Diamond, a tribute band out of San Fran whose muse is none other than the Jewish Elvis himself. Fronted by the “Surreal Neil,” this band will play all your favorites, “Sweet Caroline,” “Stagger Lee,” and many more to make you remember those long interstate trips where mom blasted “We're Coming to America,” and you quietly sang along. –Brandon Ferguson

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Saturday, March 2

Fu Manchu
Detroit Bar
It's easy to dismiss Fu Manchu as San Clemente's answer to That 70's Show, since the music they make is a sound seemingly designed to fire up a zillion bongs. Brand them “stoner rock” if you must, but they're really just a great, honest, blue-collar metal band–graduates of the Sabbath school of eardrum bleeding, with songs about pool skating, surfing, El Caminos, Mongoose BMX bikes, the beach, driving around, Dogtown, UFOs and vans (both the Chevy and slip-on shoe variety). This year, the band announced that they've begun work on a new album–looks like these guys are firing one up for another round. But right now, they're just trying to give you a free show, a blessing that definitely warrants your attention. —Nate Jackson

Ryan Bigham
House of Blues Anaheim
Ryan Bingham isn't a country singer. While he's dabbled in the tones of roots and country, he's a rock star at this point in his career. Sure, many people know the Los Angeles-based former rodeo cowboy from his celebrity-making, Oscar-winning tune “The Weary Kind” from the movie Crazy Heart, in which Jeff Bridges also won an Oscar for portraying an old-school country singer looking for a new start. It's a mistake to confuse Bridges' Bad Blake for Bingham's artistic state.His recent self-released LP Tomorrowland is an earth-rattling record that keeps his cowboy-song past in the rear view mirror. This week, Bignham rolls into the Mouse House with support from indie darlings HoneyHoney.–Kelly Dearmore

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A Silent Film
Constellation Room
A Silent Film is an alternative band who hails from the other side of the pond and have been at it since 2005. Why they're only playing the tiny Constellation Room (inside the larger Observatory) is anybody's guess and we'll leave it to you to figure out. Their sound is a piano-heavy rock not unlike Coldplay, but without so much sappy lethargic sentiment. Singer Robert Stevenson's voice hearkens to a simpler time (the '80s) and calls to mind the greats of New Wave, or perhaps just Brandon Flowers of the Killers. Check 'em out. —Brandon Ferguson

Sunday, March 3

Method Man
The Observatory
Wu Tang are gonna play Coachella, so maybe this comparatively intimate evening with the M.E.T.H.O.D. Man is your last chance for months to see the Wu's first breakout artist somewhere sunscreen isn't required. His debut album Tical and a burst of guest appearances got him noticed worldwide, and he hustled that into an acting career that eventually led to the high highs–pun mandatory–of The Wire and How High, and the how-does-this-exist? sit-com Method and Red. Most recently he popped up sharing a song with the ferocious Freddie Gibbs in RZA's kung-fu fever dream film The Man With The Iron Fists, and even more recently he's been assuring interviewers that his long-long-long awaited new solo album Crystal Meth is really coming: “I'm doing it at my own pace,” he told one interviewer. “Which is slow as shit!” —Chris Ziegler

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