Over the past decade, I can't tell you how many shows I've been at where a band was playing for an audience consisting of Molly Flynn, Alex Howard and not too many more people than that. They're two of the most loyal members of the roots-rock end of the local-music flock, and they've also been regulars on Guitartown going back to the pre-Facebook era. For most of those years, they'd show up at clubs separately. At a certain point, they started showing up together. This past Saturday, they got married.

It was a lovely affair on the deck overlooking Lake Johnson, and of course there was music before, during and after. Tres Chicas, Small Ponds and Kenny Roby sang at they ceremony, and they were all part of the nightcap show at the Pour House. The whole thing was great, but the highlights for me were Roby's quietly soulful version of Magnetic Fields' "The Book of Love" during the ceremony; and Mic Harrison's karaoke-style bar-band takedown of "Forever and Ever, Amen" as the happy couple beamed (Howard felt compelled to correct Harrison's identification of it as a Randy Travis song, pointing out that Durham native Don Schlitz actually wrote it).

They also had about the coolest wedding party favor I've ever seen, a 21-song mix CD titled Best Song Ever: Molly and Alex -- September 24, 2011. Listening to it brings back a lot of those nights out in clubs, and it's an excellent sampler of the roots-oriented end of the local scene with songs by Small Ponds, Backsliders, The Old Ceremony, Love Language, Goner, Mayflies USA, Max Indian and more. It's not for sale, of course; but if you see Molly or Alex out at a show, you might be able to talk them into sending you a copy or at least a track list.

God bless 'em.

Today's paper has a story about a proposed multi-story building on Raleigh's Hillsborough Street strip, to be anchored by a Kerr Drug and include offices, residential space and perhaps a restaurant. As for what the project might displace, the people pushing it don't seem overly concerned. The story quotes Karen Rindge (identified as "a neighbor and director of the advocacy group WakeUp Wake County") saying this:

"What's there right now is abysmal. That side of Hillsborough Street is desperate for redevelopment."

Well...one person's "abysmal" and "desperate for redevelopment" block is another person's irreplaceable historical landmark. That particular block houses The Brewery, which is one of the most fabled nightclubs in local-music history. It's not just the soon-to-be-famous acts that played the Brewery on their way up (Cranberries and Sheryl Crow among them), but the place's landmark status in local-music history. Whiskeytown played countless shows there back in the day, and local supergroup Tres Chicas formed in the Brewery's bathroom. Countless other local acts played their earliest public performances on its stage, too.

Even after Raleigh's live-music epicenter gravitated downtown, the Brewery kept on. It's the first place I ever saw a show here and if this really is the end, I'll miss knowing it's there.

ADDENDUM (8/3/11): Down it comes.

Incoming governor Bev Perdue has a most impressive lineup of North Carolina acts set to play at her inaugural ball in Raleigh next month. The festivities kick off Jan. 8 at the Lincoln Theatre with pop bands old and new, Dillon Fence and Pico vs. Island Trees. Then on Jan. 9, the formal ball at the Raleigh Convention Center will have musicians including Durham jazzman Branford Marsalis, Granite Falls-born country singer Eric Church and two of the Triangle's best alternative-country acts, Tres Chicas and Chatham County Line.

For complete lineup and ticket details, check here.

The latest on the Tres Chicas' DVD project (which they filmed last November at the Pour House) is that it has mutated a bit in the post-production stage. The tentative plan now is for it to be more of a live record with "video extras" rather than a full-on DVD.

"Once we sort out how to make it happen, it actually will make itself because what happened that night was pretty great and we know the audio won't require a lot of tweaking," reports Caitlin Cary. "Lynn (Blakey) and I are arguing about vinyl versus CD. I'm for the vinyl, but she brings up a good point about the inconvenience of hauling records around the country in a van. It's our hope that our fans, who are probably getting impatient, will feel this was worth the wait."

The Chicas play Friday night at Raleigh's Pour House -- an acoustic set followed by a rock set.

"We'll hit all those 'guilty pleasure' covers people have been missing while we were in our serious phase," Cary promises.