Roadtrips

From a little regional event they used to call "Localbazooka," Worcester's annual heavy-metal shindig Locobazooka has turned into a kingmaking festival of national stature. This year's main-stage line-up reads like Ozzfest minus Sabbath -- Primus, Coal Chamber, Drain STH, System of a Down, Static-X, Dovetail Joint, Verbena, Machine Head, Puya, Slipknot (the metal band, of course, not the New England jam band), Staind, and Tree. Seeing as Kid Rock, Limp Bizkit, and Godsmack all graced Loco's stages before they became huge national draws, you can bet all of the above are just hoping a little bit of the festival's magic rubs off on them. There's also some 20 bands on a locals' stage and, in what's become a metal-festival staple, an underground pro-wrestling troupe along as well. It all goes down this Sunday, September 19, at Green Hill Park (617-423-NEXT) in Worcester. You might also note that Primus's buddy Tom Waits is in Boston a couple days later (September 21 through 23) at the Orpheum Theatre (401-331-2211), so be on the lookout for cross-pollination. An offshoot of the 'bazooka show hits Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel (401-272-LUPO) in Providence on September 25 with Coal Chamber and Slipknot.

The huge Western Mass state-fair thingee the Big E (413-787-0271) kicks off this week in West Springfield, and alongside all the 4-H exhibits and the circus and the auto-stunt shows and the architectural replicas and the recipe contests and the ox-haul challenges and the Shriners, they also got the pop. Friend-of-Garth Chris LeDoux opens things up on September 17; enemy-of-Brandy Monica shows up on September 18; locally bred Nashville gal Jo Dee Messina stops by on September 19; and the Nelson Brothers -- the duo formerly known as Nelson -- are in September 20 through 24. The fair runs through October 3.

Cheap Trick and Guided by Voices headline Avalon (617-423-NEXT) in Boston tonight, September 16; that same night in Cambridge, Those Bastard Souls -- featuring one Grifter and two Dambuilders -- open for solo Buffalo Tom dude Bill Janovitz at the Brattle Theatre (617-876-6837). After going head to head, on September 19 GBV and TBS tag-team for a gig at Lupo's.
-- Carly Carioli