Critic's Pick: Justin and the Cosmics Album Release Show

You know things are all the way fucked when Justin Collins is real effin’ pissed. As chill and heady a homie as you are likely to meet, Collins is not the dude you would expect to record a protest record — but here we have it, folks. ENERGY, the latest LP from Justin and the Cosmics, finds the spaced-out rock ’n’ roller diving into the dread and joy of contemporary life, cannonballing earworms into the discourse like Rodney Dangerfield in Back to School. Collins conscripts former Diamond Rugs bandmate T. Hardy Morris and Scene advice columnist Chris Crofton, co-writing reverb-tanked rockers that balance the horrors and the happiness that make this mess of an epoch a little tough to handle. Jams like “Gig Economy,” “No War” and “Really Scary, Man” make the malaise a little more manageable, which is really all we can ask for amid this parade of assclownery. T. Hardy Morris and poet Ben Burr open, along with a standup set from Crofton.

7 p.m. at Fran’s Eastside

919 Gallatin Ave., No. 14