“September mornings still can make me feel that way.” So said Neil Diamond, and so say I. But let’s not panic yet; summer is still here and my flip-flops aren’t going anywhere. Still, it’s getting to be crunch time for the Red Sox (who I’ve barely written about all season), and it’s back to school for the masses. Best of luck to them all.

Meanwhile, the shows go on, even as the first flickers of “now where did I put that tote of sweaters?” enter the slipstream of my mind. Here are two shows for Labor Day weekend, and one for next week.

I simply must quote Fatboy Slim when I say to you, “Right about now, the funk soul brother. Check it out now, the funk soul brother.” Of course, I’m also including all you funk soul sisters out there. Head to The Big Easy for the Friday Night Soul Shakedown and watch two of Portland’s funkiest bands go head to head. That’s right people, Adam & the Waxmen and the Kenya Hall Band will be bringing it, and Frank “Hot Wheels” Hopkins will act as referee. Wear footwear appropriate for getting down, and be prepared to sweat, sway and shake it up, down and sideways.

Friday Night Soul Shakedown. 9 p.m. Friday. The Big Easy, 55 Market St., Portland. $7. Ages 21 and older. bigeasyportland.com

The band Husband & Wife is anything but what its name describes. The group is actually four guys from Bloomington, Ind., who last visited us in April. My love for the band grew upon hearing the morose yet terrific “Haven’t Got a Friend” at myspace.com/husbandwife. I gladly stuck around for “Red Cross Fever.” Both songs are from the CD “Dark Dark Woods,” but the band’s got a bunch of other stuff out there for aural exploration.

Good Kids Sprouting Horns is a Portland “Casio folk” trio. If and It is a Portland trio of the slow, acoustic, Americana-esque, right-up-my-alley persuasion. Listen to “The Wolf” on the group’s Facebook page. Love that song. All three bands will team for a Sunday night show. Good thing the Red Sox game is in the afternoon.

Husband & Wife with Metavari, Good Kids Sprouting Horns and If and It. 8 p.m. Sunday. The Oak and The Ax, 140 Main St., Biddeford. $8. All ages. theoakandtheax.blogspot.com

I listened to the song “Horsemen of the Invisible” by the instrumental band Secret Chiefs 3, and it was all I could do to not get up and do some sort of tribal dance of the seven veils on a pogo stick while eating Pop Rocks and waving glow sticks.

The band is led by composer and producer Trey Spruance, former guitarist of Mr. Bungle and Faith No More. Secret Chiefs 3 has a sound of trance-inducing electronica with fire, brimstone, keyboards, a whirling dervish of effects with world music sensibilities, and experimental orchestral and even heavy metal overtones. I couldn’t get enough. “Vajra” was another sojourn into the group’s underworld of secret sounds soaked in ancient influences. So there’s that.

But wait for it, wait for it. The opening act is French drum-and-synth duo FAT32, who play breakcore-jazz polka madness. I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried. What a perfect duo of bands to christen Space’s newly renovated well, space.

Secret Chiefs 3 with FAT32. 9 p.m. Wednesday. Space Gallery, 538 Congress St., Portland. $13, $15; space538.org 

Staff Writer Aimsel Ponti can be contacted at 791-6455 or at:

aponti@pressherald.com

 

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