NOMO

Sat., March 28, 9 p.m., $12-$13, with Andy of the Future, World Café Live, 3025 Walnut St., 215-222-1400, worldcafelive.com.

by K. Ross Hoffman

ROCK/POP

They may be bunch of card-carrying intellectuals (formed at the University of Michigan; new album title's an Italo Calvino reference; most of the members have master's degrees) playing African-inspired music — but NOMO ain't no Vampire Weekend. Chalk it up to Ivy League starch vs. Midwestern earthiness, or, more to the point, the fact that Elliott Bergman and his eight-strong cohort take their cues from Fela and Funkadelic (not to mention Miles and Moondog) instead of Gabriel and Simon, but there's no mistaking the vitality and integrity of their indelible instrumental grooves, which swirl Afrobeat, free jazz and forward-thinking funk. With each album they've upped the avant-garde ante, tinkering with homemade electronics and junk-salvaged soundmakers (last year's phenomenal Ghost Rock opened with the otherworldly thrum of a brainwave monitor), but their forthcoming fourth, Invisible Cities (due in May from Ubiquity), jams just as hard as its predecessors, rife with dense, squawking horn lines and powerhouse polyrhythms that make it a heady, hearty party.

Sat., March 28, 9 p.m., $12-$13, with Andy of the Future, World Café Live, 3025 Walnut St., 215-222-1400, worldcafelive.com.