An organization calling itself Make a Scene San Jose recently formed with the intention of promoting an all-ages music scene in San Jose.

The idea behind the group is to get bands and music fans to work together more for the overall benefit of everybody in San Jose that loves live music. Though, they are still working out the details of how they want to do that, they are starting with the release of a free compilation of San Jose bands.

The compilation features 10 San Jose bands, providing a nice reference point for people unfamiliar with the diverse talent that San Jose has to offer. Some of the bands on the compilation include Curious Quail, San Francesca, the Trims and Corpus Callosum.

“The compilation we put together is a quick resource we can point people to if they’re in the dark about what goes on here musically, and hopefully it will influence them to come out with us to see some of these bands play live,” says Kendall Sallay, who plays in Cartoon Bar Fight and is a member of Make a Scene San Jose. Sallay is one of several other local musicians that are members of the group. There is no established leader.

To help bring more people to the all-ages shows already being booked in San Jose, “Make a Scene San Jose” lists several upcoming all-ages shows on its Facebook page. They hope for starters to get more bands to support each other by passing out flyers for each other’s shows, promoting each other online and making an effort to go to more shows here in San Jose. View the page HERE.

San Francesca’s sophomore LP, We Live In Public, released earlier this year on Side With Us Records, marks a dramatic shift for the band. To put it simply, they added a drummer. That may not sound like much, but in the case of San Francesa it is.

When the band first started it was a weird two-piece band called Le Verita, performing what can be best described as post-rock meets synth-pop, a band unlike any other in the South Bay. With Harrison Russell on guitars/lead vocals and Star Quach on keyboards/drums machines, they were an odd addition to any bill. They wrote ambitious songs, with incomplete arrangements, which was part of their charm.

The addition of Cody Rhodes put an end to that charm, as well as the synth pop element, but that’s not a bad thing. San Francesa have continued to grow steadily as musicians and We Live in Public is their best recording to date.

What has emerged is a heartfelt indie rock album with depth and complex texturing. The songs build slowly with drama and passion. In the wrong hands these songs would be filtered through the lens of irony, but Russell tempers his emotionality and honesty with artistic restraint, yet never obscures his vulnerability.

The opening three tracks, “Monolith,” “Compression” and “Outside” are the darkest tracks on the LP. While aggressive isn’t the right word exactly, they are heavier and grittier than any of San Francesca’s previous efforts. They’ve never toyed with this much dissonance before. They give the songs an extra layer of distance by drenching Russell’s vocals in distortion.

But by the fourth track, “Entitled,” the vocal-distortion is gone and the songs mellow out a bit. They mix gorgeous, momentous keyboards with a rock edge and pop-sensibilities. Track number five, “Statues” is a bitter-sweet ballad that sounds like something from the Le Verita days, albeit a much fuller, thoughtful version. This song, as a three-piece, reveals their interest in slow-burning, post-rock bands like Sigur Rós. It’s the audio equivalent of sun rising in the morning.

The album stays mostly mellow from then out, “Criminal,” while a darker song, is perhaps the most quiet track on the record, with only guitar, vocals and some subtle textures. It leaves the listener with an unsettling feeling.

San Francesca has undergone a lot of changes lately. First there was that whole name switch—remember when they were called Le Verita? Now they’ve added a drummer to their lineup, which has evolved their sound.

They used to be a synth-pop band with a dark indie rock edge. They couldn’t decide if they were a dance or rock band, just like early New Order. Well, the new San Francesca are not a dance band, not that it makes them any easier to classify.

They bring their new album, We Live In Public, to X Bar this Saturday, showcasing their matured sound. With a drummer, the synth-pop elements have been tempered significantly, exposing some of their less obvious influences like Sigur Rós and other slow burning, experimental post-rock bands. Yet they still mix in some straight-forward pop sounds and heart-felt indie rock influences—bands like the National come to mind.

The production on the new record is fuller than any prior recording. The first few tracks start out darker and heavier with Harrison Russell’s vocals bathed in distortion, giving it an eerie distance. Deeper in, the album mellows out a bit. There’s even a few pretty synth ballads; played with drums, of course.

Headlining the show is East Bay metal-string band Judgment Day, who are truly unlike any other band out there. They play instrumental heavy metal, but without guitars. The trio includes a cellist, a violinist and drummer. The stringed-instruments are run through a distortion pedal and the drums are what you might expect from a metal band.

Riffing out on chamber instruments isn’t as weird as it may sound. In fact, it sounds a lot closer to standard metal than you’d expect. Still the differences are noticeable. The tone and timber of the instruments are just off enough to grab your attention. And when they slide up and down on their fretless stringed instruments, let’s just say that’s outside of Kirk Hammett abilities. The end result lands a little closer to math rock than Metallica.

Also on the bill are two lighter, easier-to-digest bands, both steeped in folk. LA’s “Hello, the Future” is a weird one-woman geeky folk act, while Cartoon Bar Fight are a local upbeat indie-folk outfit. The show will open with a dark short horror film called Green by local filmmaker Jonathan Sontag, about fungus-infected undead insects feeding on people’s blood.

Judgment Day and San Francesca play Saturday, July 7 at X Bar in Cupertino, 8pm; $8.