Will Call Winner: Talib Kweli

With the Christmas holidays in full swing, it's been a pretty quiet week for concert promoters and their minions. There are a few reasons not Grinch out over the results though.

Ska fans will be delighted to note that the Toasters will play the Knitting Factory on Jan. 25 (on sale now). P-Funk fans will be pleased to hear that George Clinton has two local shows lined up: Feb 10 at the Vault 350 in Long Beach; and Feb. 15 at the Malibu Inn (both shows on sale now). And hip-hop fans should be thrilled with the latest news from Crash Mansion. The new downtown venue has Bone Thugs-n-Harmony slated for Feb. 22, the Coup on Feb. 23 and Tech N9ne and E-40 tentatively scheduled for April 15 (all tickets on sale now).

So who's the winner? Well, the Coup deserves some press after putting out one of the best albums of 2006 and one of my favorite tracks of the year. But I've got to go with Brooklyn's foremost "conscious" rapper, Talib Kweli, who announced two big shows (for which tickets haven't yet gone on sale so it's doubly newsworthy): Jan 24 at the Grove of Anaheim (on sale Saturday); and Jan. 25 at the West Hollywood House of Blues (on sale Thursday).

If you can't wait till January, of course, Kweli will be headlining the Roosevelt Hotel's New Year's Eve Masquerade Ball in Hollywood. Thanks to my associate Charlie Amter, you can read all about it in next week's Guide.

--Liam Gowing