Legend has it that George Clinton, then a semi-employed songwriter and member of an unsuccessful vocal group called the Parliaments, copped his first hit of LSD from some Harvard students in Cambridge. Funk has never been the same. The current incarnation of Clinton's Parliament-Funkadelic mob includes many who have been with him since the mid '70s -- and they play as if they remembered the Mother Ship. "The bigger the headache, the bigger the pill," Clinton once sang, a prescription that tells us a visit from P-Funk is just what the doctor ordered this September 11, when the group hit Toad's Place (203-562-5589) in New Haven. Next Thursday, September 12, they're at the Roxy (617-931-2000) in Boston.

Kay Hanley is ready to grow up. The question is, will her fans let her? Typecast as a bubblegum-pop singer since Letters to Cleo's "Here and Now," she's gotten progressively younger roles as she's grown older, from the voice of Josie on the fantastic Josie and the Pussycats soundtrack to the voice of the eight-year-old animated rock star Molly O from the cartoon Generation O. Although its title conjures a lollipop she might have wrapped her lips around in the middle of a Cleos song, Cherry Marmalade (Zoë/Rounder), her solo debut, is less sugar, more fruit juice. Or something. On Saturday, she plays the Redhook Music Festival (603-430-8600) at the Redhook Brewery in Portsmouth -- with Soulive, DJ Logic, and others -- before embarking on her first proper solo tour at the Paradise (617-423-NEXT) in Boston next Thursday, September 12, and the Skinny (207-871-8983) in Portland on September 14.

Ska-punk's not dead! (Yet!) There's another album coming by the Suicide Machines, Steal This Record (Hollywood), which includes a version of R.E.M.'s "It's the End of the World As We Know It." They're at the El-N-Gee (860-437-3800) in New London on Friday. And from listening to the new Mighty Mighty Bosstones album, A Jackknife to a Swan (SideOneDummy), you'd think 1997 had never ended. Fresh off the Warped Tour, the Bosstones are in the midst of a quick tour that's got bassist Joe Gittleman's straight-no-chaser punk band Avoid One Thing on the undercard. They're at Pearl Street (413-584-0610) in Northampton on Sunday.

Phantom Planet (ex-Rushmore, ex-Donnie Darko, ex-Gap/Levis commercials) are still better known for their members' filmography than for their discography. But they're at least as good at generic power pop as the bands they're touring with. On Sunday they headline Toad's with the insufferably clever OKGO and the only Cy Young Award-winning grunge band on the planet, the Jack McDowell-fronted Stickfigure. Next Thursday, September 12, they're at the Met Café (401-861-2142) in Providence with OKGO and Superdrag. McDowell also plays a gig at the Middle East (617-864-EAST) in Cambridge on Saturday.

Last but not least: Worcester gets its jam-bandage on for the fourth annual Wormtown Music Fest (www.wormtown.com), a three-day hootenanny held on a golf course with performances by Max Creek, Entrain, the Recipe, Moon Boot Lover, Ulu, and the Aaron Katz Band; it runs Friday through Sunday at the Whippernon Country Club.