A tasty new interview with Darren Keen a.k.a. The Show Is the Rainbow went online this morning (read it here). Darren talks about ending his feud with Saddle Creek (old news) and his Homosexual Mohawk band (new news) and rethinking his life as an arena rocker. I got most of the pertinent stuff in the story (The Reader's version will be a couple hundred words lighter), except some comments about doing his own booking. Keen did what a lot of local bands refuse to (or are afraid of or are too lazy to do) -- for the last couple years he booked his own tours. And no, it wasn't easy. "I've spent hundreds of hours doing it, it could be thousands of hours. I can't tell you how many tours I've booked at this point. I started by playing within eight hours of here (Lincoln) and then building another rung around that and then another. You play a lot of the wrong places. Right when I get to the point where I can really do it all myself, I get a booking agent."

Keen also compared the Lincoln and Omaha scenes. The biggest difference: "In Omaha, you have a lot of people really concerned about 'making it' and how they're going to find booking agents and sell records. For Lincoln bands, it's all about the music." He also talked about getting his car broken into in New Orleans June 25 and having 150 TSITR CDs stolen along with joggers, t-shirts and other merch. "It was a kicker," he said. "It was the first time I had money to pay a year and a half of rent. Instead I had to buy a year and a half of merch. It was devastating at first." You can help out poor Darren when he plays at Sokol Underground tomorrow with Beans and a couple other bands.

Tonight, however, is Richard Buckner at Mick's with Anders Parker in a show that'll probably sell out. $10, 9 p.m. Meanwhile, down at O'Leaver's, it's The Plus Ones (ex-members of Mr. T Experience and Pansy Division) with The Goddamn Rights. $5, 9:30.

Jane Francis -- Skeletons for Tea (Eskimo Kiss) -- From Saxapahaw, N.C., by way of Lucinda Williams. I haven't heard this kind of hippy folk since Cindy Lee Barryhill. Whatever happened to her? Rating: No.