Since Scalzi kind of teed it up for me in his “Meet the Guest Bloggers” post by mentioning (and saying kind words about) the monthly-ish email he gets from me that’s filled with music recommendations, I have chosen to interpret that as encouragement to share one such missive with all of you.  And since I just sent out a new “edition” a few minutes ago, what better time than the present, right?

By way of providing a little background, I’ve been sending the Rumpus out to friends (and, over time, to friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends, etc.) for, jeez, I don’t know, well over ten years now.  It started out as an informal means of giving like-minded friends a heads up about upcoming (mostly rock) shows of note, and as the distro grew over time, I realized I couldn’t cater to the individual tastes of specific friends who I knew were already into a given band, and I started adding links and song recommendations, along with some editorial commentary in the hopes that the Rumpus would serve as a means for folks to discover some rockin’ new sounds.

Over the years, many Rumpus readers have encouraged me to turn it into a blog but, for a variety of reasons, I’ve been resistant.  Perhaps by posting the latest edition here will serve as the kick in the pants I’ve needed to finally get over myself and turn it into a blog of its own.  In fact, one friend was so insistent that I turn it into a blog that he created a Posterous account for me/it last year.  So it’s entirely possible that this post will end up serving as the impetus for the Rumpus to, at long last, begin appearing regularly in a blog  of its own.

If you’ll permit me just a few final notes, I promise I’ll get out of the way:  As you’ll see, I shamelessly quoted myself from past Whatever entries in the Moneybrother and Gentleman Jesse and His Men entries.  If you’re wondering if that was done out of sheer laziness, I congratulate you on your perspicacity.  If you’re wondering what’s up with the asterisks that appear next to some of the events, they denote new entries which have been added since the last edition (this one features a lot more new entries than is typical, hence the “busting at its seams” title).  The only other item of note is that while the vast majority of the events listed (all of which are in D.C. or its ‘burbs unless otherwise noted) are bands, there are a couple of author readings in the mix as well, and this is not at all uncommon.  (No SF authors, at least not in this edition, but if William Gibson comes to town on his book tour this fall, he’ll almost certainly be the next SF author to make an appearance.)

OK, enough with the prelude.  Let’s get to the goods, shall we?

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