tUnE-yArDs

Tue., April 13, 8 p.m., $12, with Xiu Xiu, First Unitarian Church, 2125 Chestnut St., 877-435-9849, r5productions.com.

by K. Ross Hoffman

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Published: Apr 7, 2010

indie/art-pop

tUnE-yArDs, the one-woman deconstructionist pop project of Oakland's Merrill Garbus, has gotta be the oddest inclusion in this year's Roots Picnic lineup. Then again, she'd be an odd bird in just about any company — uncommonly-of-a-feather current tourmate Xiu Xiu excepted. Her viscerally intimate creations filter homemade art-funk, freak-folk ukulele warbles, punkish clatter, primitivist wailing and dangerously slinky R&B through a dirt-simple recording setup, folding together violence and sweetness in a manner that's hard to fathom even after multiple spins of her striking, surprisingly captivating debut BiRd-BrAiNs (4AD).

Over the Wall
Univox
Rocky Votolato/ Brooke Waggoner
Jotto
Aloha
Paper Bird
Philly Gumbo
Baby Dee/David E. Williams