“Defies categorization” is usually a press-release shrug. Once in a while it’s a warning.
The first Saturday of September is strange real estate — summer technically over, foothill heat unconvinced, Labor Day plans already spent. The night wants something other than another patio.
Enter Non Credo, playing the Folly Bowl on September 5.
Kira Vollman and Joseph Berardi have been at this since the 1980s, when they worked as a voice-and-percussion duo called HumDrum. Berardi was a member of the Fibonaccis. Their debut, Reluctant Hosts, arrived in 1988 on No Man’s Land, the German affiliate of Recommended Records. Marc Doten guests — a composer, producer, bassist, and multi-instrumentalist who, by his own account, plays in Double Naught Spy Car and the Atomic Sherpas.
The room is half the pitch. Susanna Dadd and James Griffith bought the Loma Alta property in 1999 and spent roughly four years terracing the ravine beside the house out of fill dirt, rock, and urbanite — concrete salvaged from local roadwork. It seats about 120. By Dadd’s account, the first concert went to the Philobosians in 2005.
Doors at 6, music at 7, and the hour between is the point: a hillside, a packed dinner, the light going long over the San Gabriels. This is the fourth of five dates this season, with the North Star Festival closing things out September 19.
Twenty dollars at the door. Bring the friend who claims to have heard everything.
NEED TO KNOW: Non Credo, with guest musician Marc Doten, performs Saturday, Sept. 5, at the Folly Bowl, 1601 E. Loma Alta Drive, in Altadena. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the music starts at 7 p.m. Admission is $20 at the door. Seating is provided, and attendees are advised to bring their own refreshments. For more, visit noncredo.com.
