Heavy Dates

WORCESTER

Heavy dates

On Thursday night, the Wenderlens (featuring members of Dimwit and Villain) join Musclecah, the Syphalloids, and Krank Squad at the Lucky Dog Music Hall, former Grateful Dead keyboardist Tom Constanten teams up with Slipknot at Partner's Pub in Fitchburg, and Shakey Steve and the BlueCats begin their Thursday night blues jam residency at Ralph's. On Friday, Huck are joined by Bastards of Melody and the Marlowes at Ralph's, the revamped Hunter Orange Overdose share the spotlight with Medium, Strawhorse, and Cola at the Lucky Dog; also on Friday, Clutch Grabwell get ready for their upcoming NEMO appearance at the Plantation Club, and Joe Rockhead is King at Partner's Pub. On Saturday, Troy Gonyea returns to Gilrein's, Time Capsule perform selections from their just released No Man's Land CD at Greendale's Pub, Tomo Fujita and Blue Funk and Go! are at the Lucky Dog with Groove Selector and Counter Culture, while former Boston frontman Brad Delp brings his Fab Four tribute Beatlejuice to the Plantation Club.

-- Brian Goslow

BOSTON/PROVIDENCE

The Pennsylvania jam band the Disco Biscuits pioneered a fusion of hippie-prog rock, dub textures, house and techno beats, and psych-jazz fluidity: the rock band as organic dance-floor space oddity. Their latest, They Missed the Perfume (Megaforce), was recorded in an abandoned electrical plant; they'll bring some of that potential energy to record-release parties at Pearl Street, (413) 584-0610, in Northampton tonight (April 12), and at the Lowell Memorial Auditorium, (978) 454-2299, on Friday.

St. Germain is the nom de techno of electronic-music auteur Ludovic Navarre, a French bedroom composer whose ambient, housified mix of dance grooves and jazz/blues loops is blue-noted enough to have landed him a deal with the seminal jazz label Blue Note. And his latest, Tourist, is jazzy enough to have hit #1 on the Billboard Contemporary Jazz charts. The nice thing, though, is that you can actually dance to it, and that's the idea when Ludovic performs live, as he will at his only New England appearance on Saturday at the Paradise, (617) 423-6398, in Boston.

There are few more evil days on the calendar than a Friday the 13th that falls on Good Friday. And there are few more evil ways to spend a particularly evil day than taking in the opening night of the New England Metal and Hardcore Festival, which comprises a few dozen bands at the Palladium, (508) 797-9696, in Worcester on Friday and Saturday. Among the attractions tonight: Norwegian black-metal titans Dimmu Borgir, who are getting ready to release a slab called Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia (Nuclear Blast); gore-metal grandaddies Cannibal Corpse; and buzzed-about Swedes the Haunted. Tomorrow's headliners include Meshuggah, Amorphis, Opeth, and Shadows Fall. If you're looking for further punishment, nü-metal dudes Papa Roach hit the Orpheum Theatre, (617) 931-2000, in Boston on Friday, and NYHC rowdies Sick of It All top a bill with Boy Sets Fire, Death by Stereo, and local standouts the Hope Conspiracy at Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel, (401) 272-5876, in Providence on Monday.

In oldies: old fat rock guy Leslie West, formerly of Mountain, is at Harpers Ferry, (617) 254-9743, in Allston on Friday. The balladeer Engelbert Humperdinck -- who has a new album in stores already this year, and two more on the way this month -- kicks off the season of the North Shore Music Theatre, (978) 232-7200, in Beverly on Tuesday. And the legendary English roots-punk group the Mekons are at the Middle East, (617) 864-EAST, in Cambridge on Wednesday.

-- Carly Carioli