Heavy Dates

Well, the Green Rooster Coffeehouse is back in action for another season, and this weekend has two pretty-good offerings. Actually anytime "Jambalaya" isn't played, we consider it a pretty-good offering, but this is even more pretty good. Friday, it's local heavy Don White, who, while Loomers-less this time around, did bring Leroy White with him, and we reckon that's a fair exchange. Saturday brings Red House Records recording artist Dave Moore, who's had the local folk community in a mild frenzy since the date was announced. Also playing is one of our faves Mike Duffy, a man at home singing about lost love and changing diapers. Elsewhere on Friday, it's a CD-release party at Ralph's for the space-rockin' Krakow. Downchild headline the Lucky Dog, but get there early to see the Jethro Tullified Yoke Shire. We were actually convinced they only existed in advertisements in Metronome, but at last, these local phantoms play a gig in front of our very eyes. Boy's Attic and GrooveWorks also appear. At the Sit 'N Bull, it's the freewheeling Memphis/New Orleans/Motown dance music of Trailer Park, while Slipknot (the real Slipknot!) return to the Tammany Club. If pop is the jag you're riding, you won't do much better than the Lucky Dog this Saturday when Huck lead an impressive pack of bands into battle. Runaway Brain and Puddle open, and the Pills are the must-see live act who just may steal the evening. The last time they played the Dog, the next band up didn't want to go on, and the headliners commented on how drafty the room had gotten after the ceiling had been blown off. Yikes! World Class comes to Worcester via Northampton twice when bluegrass biggies Salamander Crossing play Cafe Fantastique, and the Java Hut features Pioneer Valley-legend Ray Mason. Elsewhere, Fatwall Jack swing the crap out of Gilrein's, and Vinegar Tom return to their unofficial stomping ground at Jack's Saloon. On Monday, the Arthur Dent Foundation celebrate the release of their newest disc, We Own Your Mind (but your ass still belongs to Uncle Sam, or at the very least your pesky ex), and Jason James goes acoustic this Tuesday at the Lucky Dog.

-- John O'Neill

BOSTON/PROVIDENCE

It'll be interesting to see what fans of the Indigo Girls make of their opening band the Butchies, a trio led by Kaia Wilson, whose old band Team Dresch were, before Sleater-Kinney came along, widely considered the finest post-riot-grrl punk band in the land. Wilson's big on dyke activism -- witness her Mr. Lady video-and-record label -- but will Indigos lovers have the stomach for the Butchies, whose loud and snarling rock mostly hews closer to Dresch's aggression than to the folkie side of things? Find out at the Tsongas Arena (931-2000) in Lowell this Wednesday, October 6. And while we're on the subject of women's voices, that's what's in store at Veteran's Memorial Auditorium (800-233-3123) in Providence on October 2, when Judy Collins, Holly Near and Ronnie Gilbert, Linda Tillery, and Dar Williams gather for a benefit concert in celebration of the Women's Center of Rhode Island's 25th anniversary. Williams finds her way back to Cambridge on October 17, when she plays a similar benefit concert -- celebrating the 15th anniversary of the MIT Women's Studies Program -- at MIT's Kresge Auditorium (931-2000) along with the Nield Sisters.

Eighties revivalism continues with Aussies the Church returning for gigs at Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel (401-272-5876) in Providence on October 2 and at the Paradise (423-NEXT) in Boston, with locals Baby Ray, on October 3. Lupo's also hosts a 25th-anniversary concert by the Talking Heads spinoff Tom Tom Club on October 1. And though Ozzy Osbourne's been enjoying a revival, his post-Randy Rhodes axman, Zakk Wylde, is still playing venues like the Station (401-823-4660) in West Warwick, Rhode Island, where he's booked on October 7.

Philadelphia underground hip-hop abstractionists Jedi Mind Tricks, whose "Heavenly Divine" 12-inch has been rocking our turntable, show up for an all-ages gig at the Ocean Mist (401-782-3740) in Matunuck, Rhode Island, on October 1. Rahzel, the Godfather of Noyze, until recently known simply as one of the Roots, continues his one-man beatbox crusade with gigs at Pearl Street (413-584-0610) in Northampton on September 30 and at Lupo's on October 3.

After a spat of bad weather during a few key weekends was followed by pink slips courtesy of the local zoning board, it looked as if 1998's edition of Spooky World (978-838-0200) might be its last. But the horror theme park, an annual tradition in Halloween camp, has been revived with a scaled-back schedule at a new location "deep in the woods" adjacent to Foxboro Stadium in on Route 1 in Foxboro. On tap is the usual assortment of teenage ghouls, haunted hayrides, plywood funhouses, and memorabilia museums, plus visits from Z-grade starlets. Spooky World is open from 6 to 11 p.m. Fridays through Sundays in October. The three-year-old Factory of Terror (www.factoryofterror.com) in Fall River can't compete for size -- it's a single, 30-room haunted house in a converted factory -- but it's open every night from now through Halloween starting at 6 p.m.

-- Carly Carioli