Music Picks: The Dickies, Rufus Wainwright, Jack DeJohnette

COBALT CAFÉ

This Anaheim outfit's organic, borderline-crude, Spanish-language skacore is all the more effective and endearing for being so under-produced and unadorned. The tempos are often frantic, with a hardcore-ish kick-snare snap rendered skank-able by burbling bass lines and shimmering guitars. Omar's impassioned, gabbled vocals are decidedly street-level and mildly menacing in tone, but there's a pervading sense that (so long as no one fucks with them) this band just wants to party — and probably in your garage or backyard. —Paul Rogers

Andre Nickatina: See Thursday.

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• Shooter Jennings
• Stanley Clarke
• Rufus Wainwright
• Hip-Hop and Rap
• Arts, Entertainment, and Media

Also playing:

TERRY TROTTER TRIO at Vitello's; KRISTEN CHENOWETH at Greek Theatre; NIKKA COSTA at Luckman Fine Arts Center.

sun 5/13

Calle 13

NOKIA THEATER

With more Latin Grammys to their name than any group ever, Calle 13 should be a household name by now. Just make sure you say it right ("KAH-yay TREH-say"). The Puerto Rican rappers will be rounding out a three-night concert series, following a Friday show with pop diva Gloria Trevi and Saturday night with legendary norteño outfit Los Tigres del Norte. But the stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar and Eduardo José Cabra Martínez's genre-bending, politically charged hip-hop truly is the crowning jewel of the series, and the theater is sure to be packed and hot. Opening the Sunday show is Argentine funk band Illya Kuryaki and the Valderramas. —Erica Phillips

Also playing:

JOHN PROULX at Vibrato.

mon 5/14

The Drums, Part Time

EL REY THEATRE

"I believe that when we die, we die," sings Johnny Pierce in a kind coo. "So let me love you tonight, let me love you tonight." The Drums seem intent on convincing us that, as Drake preaches, you only live once. If that's true, we could do worse than to play the Brooklyn band's latest LP, Portamento, on repeat until death comes a-knocking. By melding Joy Division–style post-punk to tambourine-smacking '50s pop, these guys make morbidity seem like something to swoon over. Though co-founder Jacob Graham has been friends with Pierce since they were tweens in summer camp, he's told interviewers that — fittingly enough — the band is always on the verge of quitting. So see 'em now before they (or you!) kick the bucket. Arrive in time to see Part Time, whose goopy, synth-spackled funk should set the stage just fine. —Chris Martins

Also playing:

SIGNALS, BATWINGS CATWINGS at Pehrspace; HANDS OF THE MARTYR at Cobalt Cafe.

tue 5/15

Light Asylum, Chelsea Wolfe, Tearist, Violet Tremors

THE ECHOPLEX

For just two people, the Brooklyn duo Light Asylum sure does construct a mighty sound. Electronics wizard Bruno Coviello pumps out foreboding sheets of synthesizer and militant, clattering rhythms, while Shannon Funchess chants such post-punk epics as "Skull Fuct" and relatively vulnerable and romantic pleas like "Angel Tongue." With her intense stage presence and dramatic, almost androgynous low vocals, Funchess is an especially compelling performer. So is Chelsea Wolfe, whose eerie, funereal ballads sometimes lurch into full-blown dark-goth psychedelia. The Los Angeles duo Tearist disembowel themselves with such provocative, electronics-laced amputations as "Break Bone," "Headless" and "Cold Eye." Violet Tremors are more trippy and cerebral, with Jessica White coolly declaiming robotic codes like "In Mid Transmission" and "Spirals Inside" over Lorene Simpson's pulsing (yet oddly poignant) synth waves. —Falling James

Jack DeJohnette, Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke

CATALINA BAR & GRILL

Jack is turning 70, so why not celebrate a milestone by doing something you've never done before with friends with whom you could do anything? These three bona fide legends really have done everything, just not all together. Corea and DeJohnette played on Miles Davis' hallowed Bitches Brew, followed by Corea and Clarke cementing their legacies in the keyboardist's epic band Return to Forever. Clarke and DeJohnette played together on albums by saxophonist Joe Farrell and pianist McCoy Tyner, but there's not a lot of documented history between the two. As a trio, there's barely anything out there, but if you can find a track of all three of them playing together on John McLaughlin's album Electric Guitarist, you will know why this birthday party is going to be so exciting. —Gary Fukushima

Ane Brun, Gemma Ray

TROUBADOUR

Two rule-breakers chart new worlds of pop sound. Cold on the edges but warm inside is Norwegian singer Ane Brun, whose new It All Starts With One is a subtly surprising salve from one of the most complex and compelling musicians in the new "folk." With painful precision, Brun writes darkly alluring songs of strife and strength. Her finely carved vocal inflections are set amid beautifully uncliched orchestral and percussive strokes that ring through the head and heart, perhaps unlocking her secrets. In thrillingly rude contrast is Brit-soul blaster Gemma Ray's enthralling hodgepodge of girl group–type vintage pop and rather creepy noir-soundtrack shtick, heard to lustrous effect on her new Island Fire record, out this week. —John Payne

Also playing:

BLACK DICE at Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock; EMILY WELLS, PORTLAND CELLO PROJECT at Largo.

wed 5/16

BERN

FEDERAL BAR

Drummer Bernie Dresel first made his mark as the enthusiastic backbone of the Brian Setzer Orchestra's hugely popular run in the 1980s. Dresel has gone on to work with Chaka Khan, Andy Summers, David Byrne and last year's Grammy Award-winning Gordon Goodwin, among many others, while becoming one of the most in-demand studio drummers in Los Angeles. Dresel also fronts two bands of his own, one a traditional big band, the second BERN, a cover band loaded with world-class players and the dynamic vocal team of Jenny and Rudy Cardenas. If you're a fan of Tower of Power, Earth Wind & Fire, Prince and Steely Dan, BERN is right up your alley. North Hollywood's Federal Bar has promised a dance floor for this one, and there's no doubt it will be full for the entire night. —Tom Meek