THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE:

...with THE LEMONHEADS!  Evan Dando's songbook has always struck me as autmnal, though not all of it really is.  For example, a very young Dando released his take on Suzanne Vega's hit "Luka" in May '89.  He dissolved the band after releasing the Lovey LP, but returned with a new lineup on "It's A Shame About Ray" in July '92. Despite Johnny Depp's appearance in that video, the album lingered in the lower reaches of the charts, despite being filled with grunge-pop goodness like "Confetti."  But that November, Atlantic released the band's take on Simon & Garfunkel's "Mrs. Robinson," which shot to No. 19 on the UK charts and landed Dando unlikely US gigs like "Live with Regis and Kathie Lee."  The flip side of that single was the goofy "Being Around," which becomes a singalong live.  The followup LP, C'mon, Feel the Lemonheads, hit the Top 5 in the UK, but only No. 56 in the US, with the single "Into Your Arms," which would later turn up on the soundtrack to Before Sunrise and in an FTD commercial.  The other two videos from the LP, like "Ray," sport celeb cameos -- Angelina Jolie turns up in "It's About Time" and a young Chloë Sevigny can be seen in "Big Gay Heart" (which Dando makes safe-for-broadcat with a funny spoonerism).  Unfortunately, Dando would soon slide into heavy drugs and the next album, Car Button Cloth was not nearly as successful -- commercially or artistically.  An unremarkable solo album and sporadic gigs would follow, until Dando got his personal life together and revived The Lemonheads brand witha self-titled LP in 2005, from which "Black Gown" was the lead track.  BONUS:  Dando and Mudhoney's Mark Arm fromted the DKT-MC5 on a ripping version (is there any other kind) of the classic "Kick Out the Jams" of The Late Late Show.

OTTER -- a band including longtime Friend of Pate Scott Jasper -- will be playing the Octagon Center for the Arts (427 Douglas Ave in Ames) S-a-tur-day... night!  The party is BYOB, with free pop & munchies. Kids 14 and under get in free.  The show should run from 8-10:30; Doors @ 7:30.  You can stream a few songs from OtterSpace, as well as a few songs from opening band Snafu.

THE DECEMBERISTS:  Colin Meloy tells The List that he planned to do something different from the more traditional guitar quartet from the outset: "I thought the songs I was writing were straight pop songs, you see, which drew from the tradition of XTC and Robyn Hitchcock. So with just two guitars, a bass and drums I reckoned we'd be doing it a disservice, that it would be a whole lot weirder to play straight pop music with a folk band. As far as the lyrics go, they're just a channel for my weird fascinations, an opportunity to get it all out there."  (Thx, LHB.)

ROBYN HITCHCOCK:  Speaking of which, Berkeley Place has a two-parter of a July benefit concert where he did the full Sgt Pepper's album, plus a few more from the Beatles, Kinks, Hendrix and the Soft Boys.  You can stream some -- but not all -- of them via the ol' HM.

ARCADE FIRE has a big announcement Saturday, Oct 6.

PHIL SPECTOR will be retried for murder, but his current lawyers are fleeing the scene.

BARRY McGUIRE's immortal "Eve of Destruction!"  Remember those fabulous Sixties?

SUZANNE VEGA stopped by The Current for a chat and mini-set you can stream on demand via MPR.

1977:  The new issue of SPIN is devoted to "The Year Punk Exploded," with interviews of Johnny Rotten, The Clash's Mick Jones, and more.  Slacker internet radio currently has a SPIN Punk station set up in its "Spotlight" folder.  RELATED: London's Telegraph has an in-depth piece on Malcolm McLaren, who managed the Sex Pistols (and later Bow Wow Wow), then reinvented himself as a pioneer of scratch and hip-hop.  ALSO:  Johnny Rotten says bass player Glen Matlock has insisted the Pistols not swear during their upcoming reunion tour, because his son will be at some of the concerts.  Oh, that's likely.  EVEN STRANGER:  Pre-Schoolers interview Blondie's Deborah Harry; don't miss the kid who goes all Iggy Pop with the peanut butter!

3x3: From NYC, you can see performances from TV on the Radio, the Hold Steady, and the Rapture via AOL.

RICHARD HAWLEY talks songwriting and Sheffield with Allmusic. (Thx, Chromewaves.)

THE CUTOUT BIN:  This Friday's fortuitous finds from the ol' HM are:  NFL Films (John Facenda) - The Autumn Wind; The Apples in Stereo - Signal in the Sky (Let's Go);  Katrina & The Waves - Walking On Sunshine; R.E.M. - Radio Free Europe (Original Hib-Tone Single Version); Pixies - Here Comes Your Man; The Bongos - In The Congo; The Plimsouls - A Million Miles Away; Dramarama - Anything, Anything; Redd Kross - Mess Around; Pavement - Cut Your Hair; Vanity Fare - Hitchin' A Ride; The Replacements - Little Mascara; The Rolling Stones - Mother's Little Helper; Question Mark and The Mysterians - 96 Tears; CCR - I Put A Spell On You (Screamin' Jay Hawkins); 10,000 Maniacs - Because the Night (B. Springsteen/P. Smith); Manfred Mann - Blinded by the Light (B. Springsteen); Van Halen - You Really Got Me (The Kinks); Slade - C*m On Feel The Noize; The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Fire; Ike & Tina Turner - Whole Lotta Love (Zeppelin); Joe Cocker - The Letter (live); KT Tunstall - I Want You Back (Jackson 5); Smashing Pumpkins - 1979; and Joe Jackson - Got The Time.

BRITNEY SPEARS:  The court's latest order may give Fed-Ex custody of their kids for at least three weeks, with supervised visitation, the pop tart looked like she was in a really good mood checking into the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills.  The Spears camp is also denying that she is going back into rehab.

NOW SHOWING:  This weekend's wide releases are Ben Stiller's remake of The Heartbreak Kid, currently scoring 44 percent on the ol' Tomatometer; The Seeker, which is scoring 25 percent; The expansion of The Jane Austen Book Club, scoring 73 percent; and the Reggaeton drama Feel the Noise, which has not been screened much for critics.

LINDSAY LOHAN:  The paparazzi at X17 claim she's out of rehab, while other reports claim she has no immediate intentions of leaving Cirque Lodge and may be considering college while Hollywood frets over her insurability.

JENNIFER ANISTON is the No. 1 covergirl, according to a Forbes.com ranking of the top-selling faces on celebrity magazines.  At the bottom of the list?  Britney Spears and the French Hotel.  Heh.

BRADGELINA:  Photos of Jolie in a midriff-baring tank top would have ruined InTouch Weekly's plans for this week's cover: "Is Angelina Jolie pregnant?"  So the glossy bought exclusive rights to the shots to prevent other mags from running them.  Now that's journalism!  A shame, too -- those pics would have gone well with the ever-reliable National Enquirer tale of a boozed-up Jolie collapsing into Pitt's arms.

DENISE RICHARDS & CHARLIE SHEEN:  More excerpts from Sheen's e-mail to Richards over the course of their custody dispute, with Sheen telling his ex, "Go cry to your bald mom, you (bleeping) loser" -- a reference to the fact that her mother was undergoing chemotherapy treatments for cancer.

JESSICA BIEL has joined JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE in Toronto, where he is shooting a role in The Love Guru, with Mike Myers and Jessica Alba.  Yet it is Myers who is playing the guru. Go figure.  (There's actually a better punchline at the link.)

NATALIE PORTMAN addressed a packed auditorium at Stanford on fighting poverty worldwide through microfinance.

KIM & KOURTNEY KARDASHIAN, who will star in E!'s  series Keeping Up With the Kardashians this fall, are letting it be known that a criminal investigation is being launched over sexually explicit pictures of them taken while they were underage.

INDIANA JONES has recovered computers and photographs taken from the set of his latest movie.  They were then crated up and stored in a ginormous warehouse.

DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES caused an international flap after Teri Hatcher's character joked about the quality of medical school in the Philippines.  Let's go to the video.

WALL-E:  Pixar's next movie, to be released in June 2008, has a new trailer online this week.  Director Andrew Stanton (Finding Nemo) says, "It occurred to me that I'm basically making R2-D2, The Movie," and gave some general plot points to the crowd at Comic-Con.

MR. POTATO HEAD had enough ecstasy in him for an entire rave.  The ginormous grin gave him away to Aussie customs cops.

AYAAN HIRSI ALI, an outspoken Dutch critic of Islam who moved to the US to escape death threats in the Netherlands, has returned there to fight a Dutch government plan to cut off financing for her bodyguards.

IRAQ:  The Iraqi government has thwarted investigations into corruption at the top levels of Prime Minister al-Maliki's administration, including probes of his relatives, while nearly four dozen anti-corruption employees or their family members have been brutally murdered, according to the former top Iraqi corruption investigator.  A member of Iraq's parliament is in US custody and being questioned after an Iraqi special forces raid on a suspected AQI meeting; he's a member of the main Sunni Arab bloc, which pulled out of al-Maliki's fractured Shia-led coalition government last month.  Sheikh Muawiya Jebara, a senior member of the Salahuddin Awakening Council, was killed in a roadside bomb attack north of Baghdad.  The US military says that American and Iraqi forces have arrested an alleged financier for AQ who had received 100 million  dollars from donors outside Iraq to fund insurgent operations.  Hamas in Iraq has publicly accused AQI of fanatacism, torture and murder of Iraqis, adding that AQ "has actually made people here think that the occupation forces are merciful and humane by comparison."

IRAQ and the MEDIA:  A Marine Corps official has recommended that murder charges be dismissed against Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich, the Camp Pendleton squad leader accused in the deaths of 17 civilians killed in the Iraqi city of Haditha two years ago.  Lt. Col. Paul Ware recommends that Wuretich be tried for the lesser offense of negligent homicide.  It is now likely that no one involved in the Haditha case will face murder charges.  Time magazine made the shootings a cover story and wrote many pieces on it, calling the incident a "symbol of a war gone bad," not to mention claiming that the soldiers involved seemingly killed 24 civilians "in cold blood."  However, if you search Time's website, you will find that Time did no report when charges were dropped against Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt and Capt. Randy Stone.  And it did no report when Lt. Col. Ware recommended dismissing charges agaisnt Lance Cpl. Stephen B. Tatum.  And as I write this, there is noy mention of the recommendation to dismiss murder charges as to Wuretich at Time's site -- though by the time you read this there may be an AP story that will vanish in a few days.  So it may turn out that, while tragic, Haditha will not turn out to be Iraq's version of the my Lai massacre.  Just don't expect to find that out from the magazine that broke the story.

THE WORLDS MOST SPOILT BlTCH is a tiny chihuahua... but she doesn't belong to the French Hotel.

LIZARD LOVE TRIANGLES:  A three-way sex struggle resembling the game rock-paper-scissors may have existed for 175 million years or more in lizards, research now suggests.  Cue New Order.

ORANGUNTAN PREFERS BLONDES, even more so with tattoos.

THE RUSSIAN BEAR threatens our cranberry supply.

A$$ CHEWING STARTS FIGHT:  I'm not going to top that headline.