Get sucked into the howling vortex that is Archie Powell & The Exports tonight.

Tonight Archie Powell & The Exports (who for some reason in my head I always call Dirty Mike and the boys, not because they do questionable things in people's cars, but because they are so tight knit ... and funny) play The Empty Bottle. They're opening for the rowdy and genuinely unclassifiable Juiceboxxx—who should be pretty entertaining—but Archie and the gang are the reason I'm heading out tonight.

The Exports put on one of those shows where you're sure the band is telepathic, mostly to keep Archie from flying off the stage. Every time he seems about to lose it and spin out of control, something about the keys or the drums seems to reel him back in and there's a sort of a mental acrobatics in play that really makes you appreciate how a band band functions.

(My old band was similar. Maybe that's why I'm so enamored with these boys.)

Their earlier albums more accessible, but it's their last album that really won me over. When I wrote about it for Chicagoist I said:

Archie Powell & The Exports' new album, Back In Black, is aptly named. It's the sound of a howling vortex sucking naked emotion down its funnel and sharpening it into screaming songs. The first time we listened to the album, we pictured it as being inside someone's head who was in the midst of a blackout. The thoughts race unconstrained and with no vision of what's coming in the future. It's the sound of what happens when you abandon your boundaries without realizing the price you'll pay the next day.

So you can see why I immediately related to it. Listen to the album below and then get tickets to see them tonight if you're in Chicago!