Club Beat: Chop Suey looks like a tasty addition to the club scene

Seattle is adding a new club to its menu. On Wednesday, Chop Suey, on Capitol Hill at 1325 E. Madison St. in the building that until January housed the Breakroom, opens for business. Given the buzz around town, the live music depot should give the neighborhood, not to mention the city, a much-needed shot in the arm.

After Wednesday's grand opening spectacular with British electronica duo Fila Brazillia, Chop Suey will operate six nights a week, Tuesday through Sunday. Live and DJ music will be the club's thrust. Acts of local, national and international repute will rock the sound system with everything from rock 'n' roll to hip-hop four nights a week, while DJs will preside over the other two, which include Sunday's hip-hop night "Yo Son" and Wednesday's Brit-pop shindig "Park Life."

The movers and shakers behind Chop Suey, Linda Derschang, Wade Weigel and Jeff Ofelt, are also proprietors of such havens of hip as the Baltic Room, Linda's Tavern, the Cha Cha Lounge, Bimbo's Bitchin Burrito Kitchen, Rudy's Barbershop and the Ace Hotel. Chop Suey's booking agent, Kerri Harrop, is a familiar face on the scene, thanks to her long involvement with Sub Pop and club appearances as DJ Cherry Canoe.

In the three months since it was purchased, Chop Suey's space has undergone a series of renovations. The most striking improvement is the showroom, which has been expanded, and the booths that once inhibited a view of the stage from the bar are gone. The stage is bigger and, in keeping with the club's motif, "looks like a pagoda," says Harrop. What's more, the rooms bordering the entrance have found a purpose: They've been transformed into hip little dugouts replete with a coat check, beer station and leopard-print carpet.

"I've been going to rock clubs for 20 years, since the age of 14, and I gotta say this is one of the top three places I've ever seen," said Harrop, who's other two favorites are Emo's in Austin, Texas, and the 930 Club in Washington, D.C.

Wednesday's opener with Fila Brazillia starts at 9 p.m. Advance tickets are $13 at Fastixx.com and at all Rudy's and Sonic Boom locations. They're $15 at the door.

New Year's day

When guitar-playing brothers Matt and Bubba Kadane put their monumental slow-core combo Bedhead to rest in 1998, fans were disappointed but not surprised. No one plumbed the aching depths of existential lethargy as beautifully and expressively as Bedhead, but their Nytol moodscapes transported listeners off to slumberland.

Having wilted in the Texas sun for seven years as Bedhead, the brothers Kadane began a new era in the wide-eyed hustle and bustle of Chicago, forming an aptly named group called the New Year. Rounded out by drummer Chris Brokaw (Come, Codeine), bassist Mike Donofrio and guitarist Peter Schmidt, the band makes its first Seattle appearance Saturday at Graceland (10 p.m.; $10).

Ever since the New Year unfurled the inspired and textured wonder of last year's "The Newness Ends" (Touch and Go), Bedhead has hardly been missed. "The Newness Ends" is simply that good. While the band clings to the tried-and-true Bedhead-isms of quiet dynamics, deceptively subdued vocals and somber moods, the combo plies life's stormy waters at faster clip and with heightened urgency, as it's powered by subtly heavy (but not hard) guitars and velvet-smooth chord structures.

Rockers in the Rye

Rye Coalition, which plays the all-ages Paradox Theater tonight (8 p.m.; $9), started out in New Jersey seven years ago as a band of earnest kids trying to express their clumsy emotions through the meticulous precision of emocore. While they meant well, their sound was too calculated, too influenced.

Perhaps sensing this, Rye Coalition ditched emo and transformed itself into a mighty visceral roar with the 1997 album "He Saw Dah Khat." And now, seven years in, Rye Coalition continues to refine itself. Or, revert. No longer fussing with difficult song structures and ambiguous lyrics, RC is going right for the throat of AC/DC, laying into its childhood hero with all the guts, attitude and pyrotechnics the aged Aussie band once possessed. RC's latest album "On Top" is a raunchy and boisterous send-up in the tradition of "High Voltage" and "Highway to Hell."

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