This Week's Best Concerts

Gipsy Kings aside, it’s the queens who dominate this week’s Concert Watch. Stevie Nicks will play her rescheduled show at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion tonight, and then it’s a crosstown smackdown between Carrie Underwood and Demi Lovato tomorrow. May the best lady win!

What hath “American Idol” wrought? A short list might include Kelly Clarkson, Adam Lambert and Carrie Underwood. After winning the “Idol” competition during the show’s fourth season in 2005, Underwood’s hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart with “Inside Your Heaven,” and she hasn’t looked back since. Touring on the heels of her latest country smash, Denim and Rhinestones (which she has called a “sing into your hairbrush kind of album”), Underwood will be in Houston on Thursday at Toyota Center.

Demi Lovato has returned to a more hard-rocking sound on her most recent album, Holy Fvck (I guess the Roman spelling is how she gets Walmart to sell this record). Indicative of her recommitment to her metal influences, Lovato staged a mock funeral to bid farewell to her previous pop-leaning persona. Lovato has also added noted shredder Nita Strauss (formerly with Alice Cooper) to her touring band to toughen up the sound. It’s been a long road, from Barney and the Disney Channel (hey, you gotta start somewhere) to rock star for Lovato, who will be kicking out the jams at the 713 Music Hall on Thursday.

Bonnie Raitt, and Houston go way back. How far back? According setlist.fm, she played her first Houston gig in March of 1973, opening for her pals in Little Feat at Liberty Hall. She played a bunch of times at Rockefeller’s during the ‘80s, and since then she has hit most of the city’s main venues at one time or another. Raitt will perform at the Smart Financial Centre on Friday, showcasing tunes from her latest album, Just Like That… And speaking of Little Feat, there is a story about Raitt smashing a bottle of tequila over Lowell George’s head during an argument in the studio (creative differences, one would imagine), but we will save that one for another time.

When the Gipsy Kings play, it’s impossible for even the fuddiest of duddies to sit still. Fun fact: though the band sings primarily in Spanish, the members are all from France, raised by parents who emigrated there from Spain when things started to get weird during the ‘30s. The Kings will be at the House of Blues on Monday, and it is my fervent hope that someone will show up in a purple jump suit and hair net, ready to bust a move when the band whips out its killer version of “Hotel California,” as featured in The Big Lebowski. And if you accept this challenge, don’t worry about people making fun of you, because, as we all know, “Nobody fucks with the Jesus!”