Finally, the start of Chicago’s summer festival season is upon us as the Do-Division Street Fest kicks off tomorrow! Lets just hope the rain doesn’t spoil the fun.

What’s that? You’re one of those poor souls who works during the weekend? I feel for you, brother! Luckily, there are quite a few more awesome shows around town this weekend including CAVE at the Hideout, Yakuza at the Beat Kitchen, Toro y Moi at the Empty Bottle and much more!

Lets get to it, shall we?

Friday

CAVE
By now you’ve surely read my review of Cave’s latest, Pure Moods. Too lazy? In brief, Pure Moods is good, really good. So there you go. This is their official release party show country throw down so get out there and hear the raging “Teenager” live and in person. Columbia, Missouri’s Jerusalem and the Starbaskets are Cave-like weird but in a more traditionally weird way. Something is happening in Columbia, Missouri, something trippy. Heads up, opener Daniel Lutz isn’t a dude but she does play some hauntingly beautiful music. That she does. (Ross Meyerson)

10:00 p.m. Friday, 6/4. The Hideout. 21+. $8.

THE GOOD LIFE
The Good Life started out as a side project for Cursive frontman Tim Kasher and it ballooned into a full-fledged band with four full-length albums and two EPs under its belt. The Good Life gives Kasher a chance to indulge in his softer, more acoustic pop side. The Good Life is supporting its latest release Help Wanted Nights with a show at Subterranean and an appearance at Do Division Fest’s Leavitt stage on Saturday. (Audrey Leon)

9:00 p.m. Friday, 6/4. Subterranean. 17+. $12.

Saturday

DO-DIVISION STREET FEST
The summer street fest season officially kicks off this weekend (don’t even try and tell me the Belmont-Sheffield fest is real) with the always-awesome Do Division, and we’ve got two days of bands lined up to get your dancing shoes a-moving. On Saturday, be sure not to miss Chicago’s own CoCoComa at 4pm (also playing the Empty Bottle Friday!) for their sing-alongable garage punk that would do the Ramones proud. Right after that, at 5:20, things get a little bluesier and a little sludgier but stay just as rad with locals Bailiff, who will get you to bang your head slowly. BUT THERE’S MORE! Stick around til the end on Saturday to check out The Night Marchers, John Reis’ newest project. If you’ll recall, two of Reis’ bands made my top ten of the decade , and though The Night Marchers don’t pack the same raw energy of Reis’ previous projects, the band shreds live. Plus, a chance to see Reis’s frontman showmanship is never to be missed. And if you’re lucky, the band will play their non-album track “Fisting the Fanbase,” which is one of the best songs not committed to wax in the past few years.

And that’s only Saturday! On Sunday, see the now-not-on-hiatus Chicago institution The Ponys at 7pm, who have come back to rock your faces. I was lucky enough to catch them at Pritzker Pavilion last week, and I know that you don’t want to miss these garage rockers bring their feedback to the stage. Then stick around for the 8:30 act, YACHT, to end your festival day with some DFA-style dancing that’ll leave you with a smile on your face. And if that wasn’t enough, comedy legend Neil Hamburger is hosting the Damen stage both days. So get your ass out to Division this weekend. It’s gonna be epic. Also, check out the complete lineup right here. (Andy Kondrat)

1:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m. Saturday, June 5, and Sunday, June 6. Division Street from Ashland to Leavitt. All Ages. $5 Suggested Donation.

YAKUZA
Chicago’s Yakuza have been around for awhile now but I still think they are the future of metal. Their ability to go from gut wrenching noise to epic beauty to free jazz freak outs is pretty impressive no doubt. This show is their record release party for June 22nd’s “Of Seismic Consequence” and rumor has it you might be able to pick up the album at the show early like. If “Stones and Bones” – listenable on their Myspace page now – is any indication of the scope of this record it might be safe to say Yakuza are ready to be the future that they should have been already. Fellow Chicagoans Alaya Conscious and The Swan King open. Heavy and epic indeed. (Ross Meyerson)

Doors 9:00 p.m./Show 10:00 p.m. Saturday, 6/5. Beat Kitchen. 21+. $10.

ENTOMBED
You’ve got to at least give props to late 80’s/early 90’s metal bands that stuck around through the shit storm of bad mid-90’s metal and are at least getting the recognition they deserve now. Entombed deserves your props for not abandoning their metal-ness during the dark days of neu metal. Maybe not the death metal band they were early on, Entombed have twisted their sound without ever looking towards the mainstream and that’s metal enough for me. Kenosha’s Jungle Rot Ohio’s Woe of Tyrants, and Chicago’s kind of radder than most Sweet Cobra open. (Ross Meyerson)

7:00 p.m. Saturday, 6/5. Reggie’s. All Ages. $18.

TORO Y MOI
Toro y Moi, the chillwave, elctro-pop product of Chaz Bundick, mixes samples and laptops with live musicians. Bundick and Co. create dreamy layers of sonic goodness that envelop you like a warm summer breeze. Hailing from South Carolina there’s some Southern softness that flavors the overall electronic sound. It’s basically the perfect soundtrack to an early June night. Locals Save the Watchtower and Glitter Bones get the live-tronica night started. (Andrew Kahn)

10:00 p.m. Saturday, 6/5. Empty Bottle. $12. 21+.

Sunday

DO-DIVISION STREET FEST
See above.

1:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m. Saturday, June 5, and Sunday, June 6. Division Street from Ashland to Leavitt. All Ages. $5 Suggested Donation.

This year’s fest, held Saturday and Sunday, June 5th & 6th on Division between Ashland and Levitt, will have two stages booked by Empty Bottle Presents and Subterranean / House Call Entertainment chock full of great Chicago bands.

Among those recruited to perform are heavy hitters Pelican and The Ponys, mash-up driven Hood Internet, Local H’s Scott Lucas and The Married Men, and one of our 10 Chicago Bands to Watch in 2010, Bailiff.

Here’s the full list with stage location and set times:

Damen Stage programmed by Empty Bottle Presents

Saturday, June 5th

1:00pm             Jeremy Messersmith

2:30pm             Maritime

4:00pm             CoCoComas

5:30pm             Headlights

7:00pm             Pelican

8:30pm             Hood Internet

*Stage Hosted by “America’s Funnyman” Neil Hamburger

Sunday, June 6th

1:00pm             The Mynabirds

2:30pm             Earl Greyhound

4:00pm             Warpaint

5:30pm             El Ten Eleven

7:00pm             Ponys

8:30pm             YACHT

*Stage Hosted by “America’s Funnyman” Neil Hamburger

Leavitt Stage programmed by Subterranean  / House Call Entertainment

Saturday, June 5th

1:00 pm             Days Off

2:05 pm             The Gunshy

3:10 pm             The Poison Arrows

4:15 pm             Vacations

5:20 pm             Bailiff

6:30 pm             Sybris

7:40 pm             The Good Life

9:00 pm             The Night Marchers

Sunday, June 6th

1:00 pm             John Drake & The Shakes

2:05 pm             Cameron McGill & What Army

3:10 pm             Tim Larson & The Owner Operators

4:15 pm             Rego

5:20 pm             Soft Speaker

6:25 pm             Scott Lucas And The Married Men

7:35 pm             Cory Chisel & the Wandering Sons

9:00 pm             Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit

Tickets for the 5th annual Pygmalion Music Festival set for September 16 – 19 in Champaign-Urbana are going fast. Festival passes are sold out as is the headlining performance from Iron and Wine.

If you still want to catch a few of the acts such as RJD2, Lucero, YACHT, The Antlers, Japandroids, Headlights, Wavves, Autolux and Low in some of Champaign-Urbana’s more intimate venues, then act now. Only a small number of single show tickets are still available.

You can find an updated schedule – changes include addition of Saturday’s day parties and adjustments due to cancellation of Solid Gold – after the jump:

Complete Pygmalion Music Festival 2009 Schedule:

WEDNESDAY

Canopy Club:
8:30 PM — Common Loon
9:30 PM — Mt. St. Helen’s Vietnam Band
10:00 PM — Owen
11:00 PM — Japandroids
12:00 AM — Headlights
1:00 AM — Physical Challenge DJs

THURSDAY

Blues:
11:45 AM — Liesel Booth
12:30 PM — Pamela Machala

Sandella’s:
12:45 PM — Tracey and Tricia
1:30 PM — Stanton McConnell
2:15 PM — Cara Maurizi

Red Herring:
6:00 PM — Morgan Orion and The Constellations
7:00 PM — My Dear Alan Andrews
8:00 PM — Post Historic
9:00 PM — Early Day Miners
10:00 PM — World’s First Flying Machine

Krannert Art Museum:
6:40 PM — Liz Janes
7:20 PM — Brooke Wagonner
8:00 PM — Denison Witmer
8:45 PM — My Brightest Diamond
9:45 PM — William Fitzsimmons
10:45 PM — Bob Nanna

Courtyard Cafe:
7:30 PM — Butterfly Assassins
8:30 PM — Deelay Ceelay
9:30 PM — Starfucker

Canopy Club:
6:20 PM — Ohtis
7:00 PM — Santa
7:40 PM — Mason Proper
8:20 PM — Company of Thieves
9:00 PM — Elsinore
9:40 PM — Joe Pug
10:30 PM — Decibully
11:10 PM — Maserati
12:10 AM — Margot and The Nuclear So and So’s
1:00 AM — Lucero

The Highdive:
9:00 PM — Geist
10:00 PM — DJ Belly
11:00 PM — DJ Mertz
12:00 AM — Skream

FRIDAY

Blues:
11:30 AM — Girls Next Door
12:00 PM — Ryan Groff
12:45 PM — William Fitzsimmons
7:00 PM — The Jips
8:00 PM — Empires
9:00 PM — jigGsaw
10:00 PM — So Many Dynamos
11:00 PM — So Long Forgotten

Sandella’s:
12:45 PM — Final Pygmalion Effect
1:30 PM — Matt Wagemann
2:15 PM — Kilroy et al

Channing-Murray:
6:30 PM — You and Yourn
7:15 PM — Hathaways
8:00 PM — Good Night and Good Morning
9:00 PM — Low

Red Herring:
10:30 PM — Oceans
11:30 PM — Pet Lions
12:30 AM — TBD

Canopy Club:
6:20 PM — Zach May and The Maps
7:00 PM — Ganglians
7:40 PM — Phantogram
8:20 PM — BLK JKS
9:00 PM — Jookabox
9:40 PM — Maps & Atlases
10:30 PM — Pomegranates
11:10 PM — The Antlers
12:10 AM — Autolux
1:00 AM — Wavves

Cowboy Monkey:
10:00 PM — Angie Heaton
11:00 PM — Mazes
12:00 AM — Cameron McGill and What Army
1:00 AM — The 1900s

Mike N’ Molly’s:
5:15 PM — The Delta Kings
6:15 PM — The Duke of Uke
7:15 PM — The Number One Sons
8:15 PM — Tina Sparkle
9:15 PM — Gentleman Auction House
10:15 PM — Light Pollution
11:15 PM — Neoga Blacksmith

Bentley’s:
9:30 PM — Village
10:30 PM — The Horns of Happiness
11:30 PM — Alpha Mile
12:30 AM — Golden Quality

SATURDAY

Parasol Records:
12:00 PM — Tim Stephens
12:40 PM — Morgan Orion and The Constellations
1:10 PM — Cameron McGill and What Army
1:40 PM — Peninsula
2:10 PM — Boston Fleener (of The Jips)
2:40 PM — Drew Danburry (acoustic)
3:10 PM — You and Yourn
3:40 PM — New Ruins (acoustic)
4:40 PM — The Horse’s Ha (acoustic)

Exile on Main St.:
1:30 PM — Elsinore
2:30 PM — Zach May and The Maps
3:30 PM — Santa
4:30 PM — The Curses

Courtyard Cafe:
5:00 PM — The Daredevil Christopher Wright
6:00 PM — Lymbyc Systym
7:00 PM — Brighton, MA

Krannert Center:
7:30 PM — The Books
8:45 PM — Iron and Wine
10:00 PM — Princeton
11:00 PM — Ra Ra Riot

Canopy Club:
9:00 PM — Physical Challenge DJs
9:45 PM — Porno Galactica
10:45 PM — YACHT
11:45 PM — The Hood Internet
12:45 AM — RJD2

Red Herring:
10:00 PM — On Again Off Again
11:00 PM — Now Now Every Children
12:00 AM — Drew Danburry
1:00 AM — Sunset Stallion

Cowboy Monkey:
10:00 PM — Lonely Trailer
11:00 PM — The Horse’s Ha
12:00 AM — Gazelle
1:00 AM — New Ruins

Mike N’ Molly’s:
8:15 PM — Tyson and The Friction
9:15 PM — Steel Eater
10:15 PM — Scurvine
11:15 PM — The Life and Times

Bentley’s:
10:30 PM — Take Care
11:30 PM — Marmoset
12:30 AM — Mordechai in the Mirror