Lou Barlow is a direct guy. The 45-year-old founder and main frontman for lo-fi Indie Rock stalwarts Sebadoh doesn’t mince words or waste time — a fact easily discerned when listening to his band’s concise, emotionally direct songs. It makes sense, then, that Barlow would be similarly to the point when discussing Sebadoh’s return via the “Bakesale/Harmacy Remembering Time Tour,” which stops at the Southgate House Thursday.  

Jeff Pezzati's intensely melodic vocals were one of Naked Raygun's signature attributes and, in 1999, Pezzati (also the early bassist for another Windy City institution, Big Black) decided to lend his voice to a new project, the fiery, heavy Post Punk/Post Hardcore crew The Bomb, alongside guitarist Jeff Dean. Working with underground icons like Steve Albini (a longtime friend of Pezzati's) and Jawbox's J Robbins on production, The Bomb has sporadically released EPs and long-players over the past decade-plus  

If you’re walking around Newport on Thursday and run into adults with horror-flick make-up or awesomely spiked hair, don’t fret — you haven’t missed out on an early Halloween party. Misfits are playing at Southgate House and the band’s fans like to turn out in style.   

Since the early ’90s, Tokyo’s Melt-Banana has been the squalling gold standard when it comes to the blistering belligerence of Noise Rock. The band’s core influences have remained intact over 10 albums, while its eclectic experiences have broadened its inspirations.  

Man Man isn’t just a band doing a gig on a tour for a new album, it’s avant garde theatre and Chinese new year and Tom Waits’ skid row barbeque all rolled into one exquisite musical clusterhump.   

Over the past three decades, They Might Be Giants has worn so many unique hats — Indie Rock nobodies, alt.press darlings, phone-to-internet pioneers, commercial successes, TV/film contributors, kids music heroes, Grammy winners, documentary subjects — it seems as though they’ve had to grow a new head to accommodate each successive chapeau.  

Ultimately, the singer/songwriter game is about life experience and incorporating that into one’s art. Eilen Jewell has life experience to spare; a rural Idaho childhood where she learned to play piano, college in Santa Fe, N.M., where she busked and learned to perform, and then to Boston where she prospered in one of the country’s most competitive Folk scenes.  

If Phish had been wordlessly inspired by Mama Africa, rural Mississippi, Haight Ashbury and Malibu pier parties and jammed with passion, precision, wild abandon and a sense of the music’s heritage, they might have come close to the ethereal delight of Toubab Krewe.  

A sense of Yin/Yang between the two is what makes Shiny and the Spoon’s music so clever. Like Johnny and June Carter Cash, they have a natural chemistry that makes their Folk/Pop sound an easily blended creation, with smooth harmonies, catchy melodies and a subtle style that’s their own unique merry-go-round.  

Heavy, progressive Hard Rock trio Valley of the Sun celebrates the birth of its new EP, The Sayings of the Seers, at the Southgate House’s Parlour room this Thursday. Cincy Art/Prog/Metal ensemble Atlantic Becoming and Columbus’ heavies Lo-Pan open the 9 p.m. show.