BUZZ BANDS

Ditties to keep ‘em bopping

Fans showing up for Tori Amos’ Summer of Sin tour, which culminates Saturday at the Greek Theatre, are getting a tasteful tease from the Ditty Bops, who have been out on the road with Amos since early August. The sweetly anachronistic L.A. duo of Amanda Barrett (vocals and mandolin) and Abby DeWald (vocals and guitar) blends bits of ragtime, folk, swing and Depression-era color with a zestful spirit that’s anything but stale.

“We haven’t played the same show twice,” says Barrett, talking from their van in the midst of some East Coast dates. “Tori has a lot of fans that come to multiple shows, and we want to give them a different set each time.”

It’s also a way to test out new material for a follow-up to last year’s debut CD. “We’re hoping that pretty much the day after the Greek we’ll start recording our next record,” she says.

They will partner again with producer Mitchell Froom. Barrett said it’s been a kick to find people knowing their music from TV shows (including “Grey’s Anatomy”), the clever video for “Wishful Thinking,” scattered radio play or even their January stint on “Late Night With Conan O’Brien.”

As for the step-up to playing these big venues? Says Barrett: “It’s a joy to go into places that don’t smell like cigarettes, vomit and yesterday’s alcohol.”

Bouquets of emotion

To cop a line, Lauri Kranz is getting by with a little help from her friends. They all emerged, instruments handy, to help with her latest project, Snow & Voices. Its debut album was released July 12 on Bird Song, a new label launched by Velvet Crush founder/Tyde drummer Ric Menck. (His other release: local psych-poppers the Quarter After; more on them next week.)

On “Snow & Voices,” Kranz’s music is elevated from her often-frail solo recordings, her brittle vocals buoyed by co-writer Jebin Bruni’s arrangements and contributions from Buddy Judge, Greg Leisz and Menck, among others. Not sacrificed, however, is the tenderness in her wistful bouquets to basic emotions.

“The sounds represent a new direction we were going to explore,” Kranz says of the production, mostly the work of Bruni and Darrell Thorp. Kranz, with multi-instrumentalist Josh Grange and Menck, performs Tuesday at Tangier.

Fast

forward

Shoegazer quartet Run Run Run, holding forth every Monday this month at Spaceland, has reached an album deal with a Universal-affiliated label in Australia, and front man Xander Smith says the group is close to a European deal.... Astra Heights plays tonight at the Lava Lounge, and it might be the quartet’s last local show for a while. The band, which moved to L.A. from Houston two years ago, has signed with a Universal imprint and aims to record its album in February.... Not only is Go Betty Go toasting the release of its album “Nothing Is More” on Side One Dummy Records tonight at the Troubadour, but opening act American Eyes is partying too, for its EP “Never Trust Anything That Bleeds.” ... The Slow Signal Fade is headed to Chicago later this year to record with noted producer Steve Albini.

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--Kevin Bronson, Frank Farrar