The three San Diego concerts you positively don’t want to miss this week

Ani DiFranco, with Tune Yards

Ani DiFranco wears many hats — singer, songwriter, guitarist, mother, wife, band leader, activist, Broadway musical actress, best-selling author, record label owner, talent scout.

Ani DiFranco sings and marches on

She is also the only artist I know of who has collaborated with both Pearl Jam’s Stone Gossard and the late Prince, Cyndi Lauper and former James Brown saxophonist Maceo Parker, Pete Seeger and Ivan Neville, the Indigo Girls and Tune Yards, the left-of-center Oakland duo that will open DiFranco’s Sunday concert here at Humphreys.

Asked in a 1997 Sacramento Bee interview what he would do if he was just then starting his career, Prince said: “I would be like Ani DiFranco, whose strength of character I cherish.”

In 1999, Prince contributed backing vocals to her slow-burning song “Providence.” The same year saw her play guitar on his poignant ballad, “Eye Love U, But Eye Don’t Trust U Anymore.”

A key influence on everyone from Alanis Morissette to Phoebe Bridgers, DiFranco is a tireless feminist and political firebrand who has sustained her zeal over her four-decade recording and touring career.

Last year saw her release the 11-song “Unprecedented Sh!t.” It is the 23rd album she has released on her Righteous Babe label since her self-titled 1990 debut. Her subsequent success saw major labels court DiFranco with big-money contract offers.  She rejected them all.

Or, as DiFranco told me in a 1997 Union-Tribune interview: “The whole reason I’ve remained independent is to thwart the business community from art. Everybody who signs a deal with a record company has to play along with businessmen to have a career. But I wanted to fight that dynamic of commerce in music, so I just stayed independent. The fact that people started coming to my shows and buying my records is not a plan.”

While she is equally at home with folk, funk, rock, jazz and pop, what makes “Unprecedented Sh!t” especially notable is its experimental edge. It is the first album she has made with producer, keyboardist and sonic manipulator BJ Burton, whose other production include everyone from Bon Iver, Taylor Swift and Alicia Keys to Lizzo, Trampled By Turtles and Miley Cyrus.

For the most part, the album features DiFranco’s vocals and guitar work, with one major caveat. Burton has sampled, filtered, reconfigured and looped her singing and guitar parts to simulate the sounds of keyboards, cellos, percussion instruments and more.

It remains to be seen how she and her three-piece band — which includes the esteemed jazz bassist Todd Sickafoose — adapt these songs to a concert stage. But if anyone should be up for the challenge, it’s DiFranco, who is the subject of the 2024 film documentary, “1-800-ON-HER-OWN.”

7:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 14. Humphreys Concerts by the Bay, 2241 Shelter Island Drive, Shelter Island. ticketmaster.com

Samia, with Hank Heaven

Give Samia credit for musical craft and lyrical imagination.

One of the standout songs on her third and newest album, “Bloodless,” takes its unusual title — “Bovine Excision” — from a subject rarely addressed by indie-pop artists (or performers in any other genre, for that matter). Bovine excision refers to a phenomenon that appears to be more urban legend than reality: farmers finding their cattle mutilated and drained of blood.

Samia uses bovine excision as a metaphor for physical absence and emotional distance on a lilting folk-pop ballad. It’s a neat trick that showcases the increasingly accomplished songwriting chops of this 28-year-old troubadour, who is the daughter of San Diego-bred actress Kathy Najimy and actor and The Dan Band leader Dan Finnerty.

Samia cites Clairo, Father John Misty, Lana Del Rey, The National and Stephen Sondheim as some of her musical inspirations. Her often understated but lovingly crafted songs suggest an artist who is coming into her own with an equal knack for melancholic reveries and tart insights.

On “Sacred,” a song from her new album, Samia declares: “Ooh, you never loved me like you hate me now.”

On her 2018 breakthrough song, “Someone Tell The Boys,” she dryly intones: “Couldn’t hear what he said / Probably something prolific just like my ex-boyfriend.”

Samia also has a sly sense of humor, describing herself to an interviewer in 2023 thusly: “I sound almost exactly like Robert Plant and I dress like a scarecrow.”

If she wants to push the envelope more — and, perhaps, do a sequel to her “Bovine Excision” — Samia might consider teaming up with the veteran San Diego death-metal/grindcore band Cattle Decapitation, whose 1999 song, “Bovine, Swine, And Human-Rinds,” is ripe for a mash-up.

8 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 17. Music Box, 1337 India Street, downtown. $31.55-$76.55 (must be 18 or older to attend). ticketweb.com

Sara Petite’s Americana Roundup “Bringin’ Down The Neighborhood Party”

Multiple-San Diego Music Award-winner Sara Petite launched her monthly Americana Roundup series in March 2024.

San Diego Music Awards: Top winners Sara Petite, Jonny Tarr each score two victories

It was created as a showcase for established and rising singer-songwriters to perform their own material and country-music classics.

This month’s edition teams Petite with Chloe Lou, Shawn Rohlf, David Serby, Ryan Blue, Jonny Wagon and Jenny Petite, who is Sara’s identical twin.

For added color, attendees can enter “The Mullet Contest,” regardless of whether there mullets are real or faux.

8 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 13. The Ken Club, 4079 Adams Avenue, Kensington. $15-$25 (must be 21 or older). eventbrite.com