Friday: Ninth Realm Record Release at the Runaway

Death by metal awaits you this Friday the 13th. Looking to let out appropriate amounts of aggression masquerading in a cacophony of dark sounds and reverberating bass lines? Then make your way to the record release show for Ninth Realm. The Maryland band take death metal to a whole new level, eager to douse you in sounds so smolderingly dark you’ll send your Black Sabbath-loving uncle running. Ninth Realm’s release show also features D.C. grindcore group Deliriant Nerve. Grindcore is described as an extreme fusion genre of heavy metal and hardcore punk. But these all encapsulate the subgenres of thrashcore, crust punk, and extreme industrial. Grindcore, however, is differentiated by a more noise-filled style, featuring the likes of distortion-driven guitars and growling. What you need to know is that it’s punk and metal, and maybe someday we’ll stop splitting music genres into micro-groups and labeling minute differences. Don’t feel overwhelmed by the label, this is heavy music. Crash and mosh and launch yourself against others wearing combat boots and you’ll have a great time, which is what Ninth Realm’s record release party is for. We can’t forget other bands on the roster, such as Cavern Womb, who describe themselves as “Philly Esoteric Death.” Death isn’t really esoteric, as it happens to us all eventually, but perhaps this music is, though I’m inclined to think they have more fans than the select few that esoteric proposes. Likely lovers of their gelatinous, interdimensional slime sound and twisting labyrinths of riffs. Finally, Maryland’s Morbideity (clever name) end the night. So if you’re looking to get beamed up to heaven or straight down to hell in the clutches of dark fiery metal that will provoke the senses, ensnare the need for sanity, and make you swell with primal fear driven by an arcane menace hidden deep in musical mysteries, this is the show for you! Ninth Realm’s record release show starts at 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 13 at the Runaway, 3523 12th St. NE. therunawaydc.com. $15–$20. —Simone Goldstone 

Saturday: Larry & Joe at Joe’s Movement Emporium

So a Venezuelan guy named Larry, carrying a harp, walks into a North Carolina bar. He meets a banjo player named Joe. No, this is not the beginning of a dad joke, but instead the origin story of the formation of musical duo Larry & Joe. North Carolina musician Joe Troop, who moved to Argentina in 2010 where he founded Grammy nominated Latingrass group Che Apalache, was left stranded in his hometown during the pandemic. In December 2021, Troop was hosting a weekly residency series where he showcased local musicians. A friend told Troop about Larry Bellorín, a Raleigh construction worker and acclaimed musician in his native Venezuela for playing the country’s llanera folk music and other traditional styles. Troop called Bellorín, a multi-instrumentalist, and invited him to come play. Bellorin came to the U.S. years earlier to seek asylum after he, his family, and his music school had been threatened with political persecution. Now Larry and Joe are touring together as Larry & Joe and are set to release their first album of bilingual, Venezuelan meets Appalachian folk music this spring. On songs currently available via YouTube and other streaming platforms, the two play some instrumental cuts that show off Bellorin’s shimmering harp notes and Troop’s speedy, high-pitched banjo twanging. They have others designed for dancing that also add passionate, multi-octave vocals. The duo have some folk ballads, covers by the late Venezuelan folk music legend Simon Diaz, and add Latino percussion to bluegrass standards. Bellorín, who once entertained customers as a 6-year-old singing shoe shiner, imbues his vocals with a particular emotional intensity that should impress live no matter your familiarity with the genres employed. Larry & Joe play at 8 p.m. on Jan. 14 at Joe’s Movement Emporium, 3309 Bunker Hill Rd., Mount Rainier. educarteinc.org. $25. —Steve Kiviat

Sunday: La La Land Brunch at the Alamo Drafthouse

Writer-director Damien Chazelle’s critically divisive opus Babylon has struggled to find an audience this season, but his 2016 musical fantasy La La Land was a crowd-pleasing hit that became briefly mired in unnecessary controversy when presenter Faye Dunaway mistakenly named it Best Picture at the Academy Awards. In fact, Barry Jenkins’ astonishing coming-of-age drama Moonlight had taken the top prize. It fell to Chazelle himself, incredibly, to issue the correction from the podium. Both Chazelle and Jenkins handled the moment with grace, which somehow didn’t prevent others from trying to generate a sense of adversarial tension between their two films. And while the Academy was correct to award Moonlight Best Picture, La La Land is a superb cinematic achievement, as well. Those who dismissed it as a White Guy Teaches Jazz farce missed the point entirely: Chazelle shows us at every turn that Ryan Gosling’s Well, Actually-ing piano player character is thoroughly mediocre, a fact only somewhat obscured by the palpable chemistry he and Emma Stone generate in their third, and best, onscreen pairing. Stone’s character, an aspiring actor, has more talent and humility than Gosling’s does, but the ultimate failure of their romance is no less tragic for that. Another crowd that missed the point were those who moaned that Gosling and Stone’s roles would have been better filled by Broadway performers more practiced in the singing and dancing at which our two movie stars are more game than great. Objection overruled! This is a movie about yearning for greatness, in love and in art, and falling short. Show me a pair of Tony winners who could sell that as winningly as Gosling and Stone do and your mimosas and Eggs Benedict at the Alamo Drafthouse’s La La Land Brunch are on me. The brunch screening starts at 11 a.m. on Jan. 15 at Alamo Drafthouse, 630 Rhode Island Ave. NE. (Also at the Crystal City location). drafthouse.com. $11, food and drink not included. — Chris Klimek

Tuesday: A Clockwork Orange at E Street Cinema

Go backward—or forward—in time to a dystopian future brought to film in 1971 by director Stanley Kubrick. The infamous classic is so fearsomely strange, so metamorphic, so mind-blowingly ludicrous, it feels meant for movie theater viewing and, as luck would have it, Landmark’s E Street Cinema is showing this hauntingly iconic film. A Clockwork Orange follows a gang of teenage thugs on a horrific crime spree, only to be stopped by a controlling government and subjected to experimental psychological conditioning. Narrated by the British iconoclast and subjective antihero Alex DeLarge (Malcolm McDowell), the visual style, set design, and costumes create a world that is sordidly caustic, full of soft-core nudity, innocence lost, and Beethoven melodies. Alex’s redemption is in his love for life. His twisted joie de vivre and subsequent forced (and unorthodox) rehabilitation speaks volumes on society’s ideas of right and wrong. An expose of the seldom surfaced underbelly of human nature, the film sits in the Library of Congress, selected for preservation by the National Film Registry. It’s a time capsule of dystopian crime, disturbing violence, and a fallacy of censorship that is perhaps saved to see if the future does amount to the Orwellian outrage of Kubrick’s scandalous adaptation of Anthony Burgess’ novel. When it was released, A Clockwork Orange swept away the notions of the swinging peace and love ’60s and cloaked the zeitgeist with degradation, dreariness, anger, and paranoid ideology. Few films evoke such visceral reactions. It’s a masterpiece of cinema, and a cult film so tantalizingly obscene that once you watch it, you’re forever changed. A Clockwork Orange plays at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Jan. 17 at E Street Cinema, 555 11th St. NW. landmarktheatres.com. $7. —Simone Goldstone

Now Open: The Virtual American Girl Doll Museum

What if your childhood dollhouse doubled as a museum? That’s what American Girl is hoping to achieve with its new virtual museum experience, launched alongside its 2023 Girl of the Year doll Kavi Sharma. The museum includes a bookshop complete with e-books to read, a “lounge” with games and trivia questions, and a gift shop with—you’ll never guess—American Girl products perfect for upcoming wish lists. Most relevant for Washingtonians is the museum’s walkthrough of each doll’s bedroom, as well as a virtual experience for American Girl’s World by Us dolls. The company introduced three characters, Makena Williams, Evette Peeters, and Maritza Ochoa, in 2021, creating a backstory for the trio of 13-year-olds that includes a shared D.C. middle school and interests in racial equality, immigration, and environmentalism. For example, Evette’s passion lies in protecting the Anacostia River for generations to come. Virtual fans can dive into the trio’s lives through the museum experience, visiting a community center where Makena, Evette, and Maritza hang out. There you can get to know about each of the dolls—and the main World by Us mission. Then you can go to the bookshop to check out books like Lead With Your Heart by Angela Cervantes, a story that follows soccer-loving Maritza. Whether you’re an American Girl super fan or simply looking to indulge in nostalgia, take some time to escape the cold and dive into this 21st-century dollhouse. Explore the virtual museum anytime. museum.americangirl.com. Free. —Sarah Smith