Bobby Long, Braveyoung, Gifts from Enola tonight (3/30/11)

Bobby Long The 24-year-old British singer-songwriter had his debut album engineered by Grammy-Award winner Liam Watson, most famous for his work with the White Stripes, and has been road tested doing 160 shows over seven months in seven countries a few years back. Long has built a following with a distinct soulfulness and personal lyrics. Don’t be shocked if screaming girls show up; he did co-write a song that was later sang by pal Robert Pattinson of Twilight fame. $10. Visulite Theatre. www.visulite.com. (Mike McCray)

Braveyoung In a week bloated with instrumental rock options for your pocketbook, this Greensboro collective offers the best vocals-free (largely) bang for your buck. Formerly operating under the tag Giant, the rechristened Braveyoung recently released a strikingly rich and beautiful paean to solitude — We Are Lonely Animals — that tilts the band’s axis from Mogwai-flavored drama toward the potent minimalism of Mono. Rather than relying on guitar pedal-effects and unrelenting crescendo tsunamis (too soon?), these songs burn inexorably toward incandescent epiphanies via elegiac piano, deeply resonant bowed-double bass, and thundering timpani. Spine-tingling stuff. With Thomas Giles (ex-Between the Buried and Me), Stephen Brodsky and The Bear Romantic. $12-$14. Tremont Music Hall. www.tremontmusichall.com. (John Schacht)

Gifts from Enola This Harrisburg, VA outfit solders together familiar instrumental rock elements (metal/post-rock/psychedelia) and careers between EITS-like crescendo flurries and Converge’s aural assaults (minus the scream-o shite), but rarely develops a distinct sound of its own. The band’s 2009 release, Found Fathoms, had some intriguing moments, but they were too often overshadowed by the swell-and-release school of post-rock clichés. With The Farewell Monument and Little Tybee. $6-$8. The Milestone. www.milestoneclub.com. (Schacht)

This article appears in Mar 29 – Apr 4, 2011.