Dead Beat Dad and Music Is a Weapon

Joey Tiger doesn't mince words. He shoves them into your ears in raw chunks. "We get the best crowd response out of all the bands we play with," brags Tiger, lead guitarist of Hialeah-based hard rock act Dead Beat Dad. Together for a year, the bandmates have been writing songs and recording demos for their debut self-released album. Meanwhile they have been winning over area audiences with an old-school mosaic of influences, among them Van Halen, Jimi Hendrix, and Steve Vai.

At Churchill's on Friday, Tiger and his homies will face off against Music Is a Weapon, a local punk-metal quintet that just returned from a tour of Europe. In Amsterdam the dudes brought their set of Ramones/Rancid-like tuneage to life in front of 40,000 people at the annual Dance Valley festival. MIAW's singer, Kala Droid, cobbled the group out of the remains of Al's Not Well, which toured with Duran Duran in 1997.

What does Droid think of Tiger's call-out? "They haven't played with us yet," he warns with a chuckle. "We're the old dogs in this neighborhood."