Roadtrips

Thanks to Urge Overkill, it looked for a time -- way back when Quentin Tarantino was making good movies -- as if Neil Diamond might actually connect with a new generation of listeners. Whatever, Neil's got his faithful followers who still pack the Worcester Centrum (401-331-2211) at least once every couple years. This year's an extra special treat for those who have a soft spot for this Jewish songwriter's way-over-the-top Christmas album, which he has reason to draw upon this Tuesday, December 21, since there are only three more shopping days left.

Last week, B.B. King's daughter Shirley -- who'd put in 20 years as an exotic dancer before deciding to take up the family business -- came through Worcester with a band. This week the Beale Street Blues Boy himself makes one last victory lap at the end of a century whose musical legacy would be unthinkable without him. B.B.'s at the Lowell Memorial Auditorium (978-454-2299) tonight, December 16, and at the State Theatre (207-775-3331) in Portland, Maine, tomorrow, December 17.

As extreme metal has retreated to increasingly arcane corners of the underground, it's become as art-damaged as any University of Chicago post-rock symposium -- defined not by wank but by wonk. Just check out the mathematical labyrinths that grace Calculating Infinity (Relapse), the new disc by Dillinger Escape Plan that's being heralded as the new standard for depth-plumbing conceptual terror. The Dillinger gang set up shop with Cattlepress, Pig Destroyer, As the Sun Sets, and Daybreak at the Met Café (401-861-2142) in Providence on December 17. A less cerebral brand of metal -- the muckraking, low-end, elephant-gun-toting type -- is in store when Clutch hit the Living Room (401-521-5200) in Providence tonight, December 16. Shed and Eastcide make up the middle of the bill, but show up early and catch Clutch -- minus the singer -- in effect opening for themselves as the Bakerton Group, their instrumental alter ego.

At any gutter-punk show within spitting distance of Christmas, it's always worth lobbing a request toward the stage for anything by the Yobs, the alter ego formed by class-of-'77 Britpunks the Boys in order to roast a few Yuletide chestnuts. That might go over well with any of the bands on the bill at the Middle East (617-864-EAST) in Cambridge with the Showcase Showdown, the Explosion, the Loiters, and Cops and Robbers.
-- Carly Carioli