HEAVY PETS HOLIDAY BALL
The Heavy Pets
The Fort Lauderdale groove-rock chameleons known as The Heavy Pets will been trotting out different guises in 2016. They’ve spent the past year touring relentlessly with funky righteousness, marking their 10th anniversary by adding a handful of Beatles tribute concerts over the summer (their “Day Tripper” and “A Hard Day’s Night” pulsates with jangly drum beats). The jam-band kings are also, at the moment, pivoting back to the studio for their first full-length album since 2011’s “Swim Out Past the Sun.” But first, guitarists Jeff Lloyd and Mike Garulli, keyboardist Jim Wuest, bassist Tony D’Amato and drummer Jamie Newitt will carry that weight into the inaugural Heavy Pets Holiday Ball, a night of virtuosic guitar solos to benefit Toys for Tots, with a little help from Palm Beach subtropical pop-rocker Mike Mineo and electronica jam-band Guavatron.
That concert at Old School Square continues a season of joyful noise and stimulating talks at the Delray Beach complex, distinguished by the March 3 performance “Rhythmic Circus: Feet Don’t Fail Me Now!” the high-energy Minneapolis group of tap dancers and musicians who laying down funk, blues and salsa grooves. Before that, the Tony-winning “Avenue Q” (Dec. 16-18), the puppet-powered coming-of-age musical, will bring nights of raunchy political incorrectness to the Crest Theatre. Meanwhile, Leslie Odom, Jr. (March 13-14), who played Aaron Burr in the hit Broadway hip-hop musical “Hamilton,” leads the season’s bill of speakers. Old School has also tripled its programming by adding more concerts to its Pavilion Amphitheater, including performances by Occidental Gypsy (Jan. 13), the New England quintet who blends uptempo gypsy swing and jazz, and Shotgun Wedding (March 5), the Brooklyn alt-country quintet whose members have played for Shania Twain and Billy Joelís touring bands.
“We’re really trying to stop being the best-kept secret around here and finally put Old School Square on the map,” Melissa Carter, Old School Square’s marketing director, says. “We’re expanding with so many offerings, adding a bunch of contemporary art, and it’s important for us to give the community world-class entertainment.”
The Heavy Pets Holiday Ball with Heavy Pets, Mike Mineo and Guavatron runs Dec. 10 at the Crest Theatre at Old School Square, 51 N. Swinton Ave., in Delray Beach. Doors 8 pm. $20-$25. OldSchoolSquare.org and TheHeavyPets.com.
~ Phillip Valys
