When you’re wrong, you’re wrong: blissed out on advances of bleeding-edge pop discs by Annie and M.I.A., we shortchanged Gwen Stefani’s solo debut, Love. Angel. Music. Baby., and pegged "Hollaback Girl" as all shit, no bananas. On the first dozen listens, there’s nothing to it — a marching band, a repetitive chant, the faintest shadow of a memory of a hook — but somewhere around the 13th time you hear it, the chant becomes a mantra, and then it’s unshakable. The Neptunes are like Seinfeld: they’re the kings of nothing. And their blank-slate production keeps paying dividends, since DJs find filling in the open spaces irresistible: the wily official "Hollatronix" remix by M.I.A. DJ/producer Diplo jerks toward grime, but on white-label blends you can hear Gwen mashed with everyone from N.E.R.D. to Cameo. Stefani plays the officially sold-out KISS FM concert on Saturday at the Tweeter Center (617-931-2000) in Mansfield, alongside fellow alt-rocker-turned-pop-star Rob Thomas and Top 40 luminaries from Will Smith and the Backstreet Boys to Bowling for Soup and Good Charlotte.

In the midst of his once-a-decade reversion to Nebraska mode, Bruce Springsteen leaves the E Street Band at home to play songs from his stripped-down Devils & Dust on an officially sold-out solo tour that hits the Orpheum (617-931-2000) in Boston on Friday. In Providence that same night, Bright Eyes’ Conor Oberst, a child of both Nebraska and Nebraska, brings a line-up that includes members of label mates (and current opening act) the Faint to Lupo’s at the Strand (401-331-LUPO) for an officially sold-out gig behind his electronic folk album Digital Ash in a Digital Urn. Oberst’s prodigy, the young Cape-bred singer-songwriter Willy Mason, was to have been the opening act for the Decemberists’ current tour, but as he details in a rambling mea culpa at www.willy-mason.com, he lost a battle with the bottle. Instead, former Spinane Rebecca Gates will open when Colin Meloy brings his Victorian retinue of adventurous roués, ill-fated waifs, bus-station hustlers, tragic tramps, rootless ghosts, and chimbley sweeps to Higher Ground (802-654-8888) in Burlington on Tuesday and Avalon (617-262-2424) in Boston on Wednesday.

Also this week, U2 kick off an officially sold-out three-show stand at the FleetCenter/TD BankNorth Garden (617-931-2000) on Tuesday. Saddle Creek alums Rilo Kiley play at Higher Ground on Saturday, at Avalon on Sunday, and at Pearl Street (413-584-7810) in Northampton on Monday. And Hot Hot Heat and Robbers on High Street team up at Avalon on Monday and Pearl Street on Tuesday.