Sam Champion is noted for trying different styles.
EXPECT the unexpected from Sam Champion, a New York rock foursome named after the WABC weatherman and the lead character in a 1974 TV movie “Murder or Mercy.”
On the band’s upcoming disc, “Slow Rewind,” you’ll be enjoying tales sung in the Southern-syruped, Neil Young-country croon of lead singer Noah Chernon.
Suddenly they throw a thrash of noisy punk-rock into the mix. That’s on the last track, “Too Broke,” which all about being too broke to get drunk – the college student’s woe. Then Chernon takes a little Pavement turn.
The group performs at the Bowery Ballroom (6 Delancey St.; [212] 533-2111) tomorrow, opening for the Hold Steady. Also appearing is Love As Laughter.
TOMORROW: John Wesley Harding’s Love Hall Tryst, with Kelly Hogan, Nora O’Connor and Brian Lohmann, recorded “Songs of Misfortune” to accompany “Misfortune,” Harding’s first novel (published under his real name Wesley Stace). The novel, by the way, was based on one of the British troubadour’s earlier songs. It’s very circular.
The Love Hall Tryst sings traditional songs and Harding originals without accompaniment at Joe’s Pub (425 Lafayette St.; [212] 539-8770). The four will also bring in some guitars to perform their own tunes alone and with each other.
TUESDAY: Too hot to rock? Chill to the timeless ambient sounds of Colleen (nee Cecile Schott) at Joe’s Pub.
Colleen’s first disc was full of samples and loops, but Schott recorded and played all the instruments on the sophomore disc, “The Golden Morning Breaks,” herself.
She was inspired by a wide array of music going back in time And around the world, from 16th-century lute songs to Indonesian folk and that music was too pure to sample or copy.
WEDNESDAY: Take the ferry to Staten Island’s Mahoney Park for a free show by Kurtis Blow, the first rapper to get signed to a major label and have a gold record – way back in 1980, with “The Breaks.” For more info: cityparksfoundation.org.
Surf’s up when Los Straitjackets, an L.A. act whose members sport Mexican wrestling masks, brings its guitar-crazy surf music to Rocks Off Concert Cruise aboard the Half Moon, which leaves from the Skyport Marina (23rd Street & FDR Drive; rocksoff.com)
THURSDAY: You may have heard Leif Arntzen sing and blow his Chet Baker trumpet around town, but this show is extra special when three generations of the Arntzen Family present “Bad Lake Comes to New York: The Music and Stories of Lloyd Arntzen” at the Living Room (154 Ludlow St.; [212] 533-7237).
It’s a family affair as Lloyd, the grandfather, performs with his son, Leif and Tom, and grandsons Evan and Miles.
As a boy Lloyd, now 77, was a soprano singer at community hall concerts around Bad Lake, Saskatchewan. He became a folk singer, moving from the beat-era ’50s to the coffee-house ’60s and ’70s, performing endlessly on his guitar and sax. The group will also perform a free outdoors concert on Cornelia Street on Tuesday.
MORE THURSDAY: Juliana Hatfield, the indie rock guy’s goddess, is still an indie rock goddess. She wrote and produced her new disc, “Made In China,” and released it on her own label. The one-time Blake Baby really brings on the guitar on the latest and puts out a rock album you would have thought Liz Phair would have released. Not that we don’t’ like Liz, but . . .
She performs at Maxwell’s (1039 Washington St., Hoboken; [201] 798-0406).