ALAN EDWARDS If pressed for a Best Charlotte Songwriters’ list, the former Lou Ford and current Loudermilks co-leader would be at or near the top of mine (younger bro Chad would make it as well, but he’s apparently taking this night off). The elder Edwards’ strength has always been avoiding country rock’s clichés while remaining true to its tenets and slipping in a punk-inspired defiance; no surprise Lou Ford called it rural pop instead. Whatever you want to call them, his songs feel lived in, rather than put on, the sadness and anger genuinely cathartic. When he asked, lo all these years ago now, “How does it feel, to have something real?/To have something true, to know it belongs to you?” the longing was palpable enough in the music to give listeners the sense that this was their lot as well. Those songs don’t roll off the line as frequently as they used to, but the new ones suggest those qualities still exist. We’ll find out soon enough as the Loudermilks prepare their debut. Late show with Dirt Heavy. $5. 10:30 p.m. The Evening Muse.

SUMMERLAND TOUR Friends and colleagues have referred to this collection as the “Nights of the Living Dead” tour, “The Evil that MTV Wrought” tour, and “The ’90s One-Hit Wonder Parade.” And there’s fodder here aplenty for viewing this assembly with a jaundiced eye, because in the ’90s, thanks to the excesses of the idiots in charge, mediocrity was the music industry sin qua non and all these acts rode that to glory. Everclear had junkie-punk MTV hits from their sophomore record, Sparkle & Fade, prop them up for years and Marcy Playground just had “Sex & Candy” (turned out a lot of folks like those things, too). Sugar Ray turned “Fly” into an anchor job for Mark McGrath at Extra and the one guy in the Gin Blossoms who could apparently pen a hit was fired and then suicided, otherwise they’d have been the Goo Goo Dolls. Lit probably outsold them all, but I can’t remember a thing about ’em. There’s nothing here of critical historical import, in other words, just a few songs formulaic enough to earn heavy FM/MTV rotation. But should all that even matter? Some folks simply want to remember the good times they had listening to this harmless piffle when they were young and the future was still an unwritten book. Why begrudge them — or the artists cashing in on it? Lighten up, Frances! $25-$45. 7 p.m. Time Warner Cable Uptown Amphitheatre.

SARA WATKINS On her second solo album, Sun Midnight Sun, Watkins expands her sunny West Coast folk and Americana into a moodier mix of country, Celtic, bluegrass and pop. The outing may not be as straight roots-leaning as her work with her former band Nickel Creek, but she continues her adept explorations on guitar and fiddle, caressing the strings or spewing toe-tapping energy as the song beckons. Watkins’ versatility, honed over the past decade of writing and performing with a diverse crowd of music makers, and lifted by her sweetly haunting voice, clearly gives her staying power. Opening for Jackson Browne. $49.50-$84.50. 8 p.m. Belk Theater.

OLD SOUTHERN MOONSHINE REVIVAL Old Southern Moonshine Revival is pop-country and nothing but, yet there’s not all that much Nashville to the band’s sound. It’s like the difference between Rascal Flatts’ inhumanly slick cover of “Life is a Highway” and the dusty jangle of Tom Cochrane’s original. While each version was a massive hit in its time, there’s more dignity — and longevity — in the second approach. And like Cochrane — as well as other early-’90s rock-country hybrids — Old Southern Moonshine Revival’s instrumentation is spacious and welcoming, an appropriate complement for alternatingly bittersweet and celebratory explorations of southern life. Though lyrical clichés may be endemic to pop-country — okay, so they are — they don’t seem so bad in the hands of a capable band. $8. 10:30 p.m. The Evening Muse.

BALSA GLIDERS What’s the big deal about a group of wannabe indie rockers who moonlight as, you know, doctors, lawyers, bankers, priests, academics — lowlife like that? They’re a dime a dozen, right? But the Balsa Gliders are different. These dudes could jangle the socks off my primary physician any day of the week. Seriously, music may be a sideline for this band of well-paid professionals from Charlotte, Raleigh and other N.C. hotspots, but they’re not just fratboys who made good and now crank out covers of “Free Bird” in a south Charlotte mega-garage. The Gliders — who formed in 1998 when future lawyer Charles Marshall and future PhD Russ Tisinger were still college boys — rock the indie spirit of Guided By Voices under the influence of the Silos. Best of all are the song titles: “In Defense of Air Conditioning” is an acoustic-based ditty that sounds like GBV unplugged with Michael Stipe-esque articulation, and the delicate “Cable Comes to Kinston” is a favorite among, well... Kinston natives. But this is no joke, folk. The Gliders have been dropping albums and EPs since 2009, their latest being last year’s Photographic Friends, all available on iTunes. $7-$10. 8:30 p.m. Visulite Theatre.

TORCH RUNNER From the outset, Greensboro’s Torch Runner seems like a high-test crust-metal band. Yet the pummeling assaults, which lay the groundwork for a rusty-nails vocal approach, give way to slow, noisy breaks. Some of these inhabit sludgy, down-tuned riff-worship, while others wield sharp industrial angles or follow the solemn march of plodding deep-forest doom. Yet with these, there’s room to breathe and, ultimately, to appreciate the sheer frenzy of the fast parts. Rather than draw from a single heavy style, Torch Runner’s expanded palette makes for a fascinating journey through punk, metal, and hardcore — one that gives and gives. With Full of Hell, Nailbiter, Towering Pyre, and Veda Woolf. $6-$9. 9 p.m. The Milestone.

JOHNNY WINTER Albino blues brothers Johnny and Edgar Winter made a lot of noise in the 1970s. Edgar is still remembered for boomer radio staples “Free Ride” and “Frankenstein,” but his guitar-slinging sibling Johnny has had the staying power. In his roller-coaster career, he’s played with his idols Willie Dixon and Muddy Waters, while having songs penned for him by luminaries like John Lennon and Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Once pegged to pick up Jimi Hendrix’s psych-blues mantle, Winter’s never been as acid infused as the Voodoo Chile. Instead, his spirit stays close to the boozy brawling Texas barrooms where he honed his chops, and his high, exquisite slide is still raw, ragged and funky — more bonded bourbon than, say, the sweet tea of Derek Trucks. The big miracle is that this living legend is, well, living. Fucked up on drugs and fucked over by a Machiavellian manager, Winter is clean today but frail. When Johnny Guitar hobbles onstage, broken in body, to play seated, the music still soars, but it reminds us that even indestructible rockers like Johnny Winter have a due date. Or as Dee Dee Ramone’s headstone says: “O.K... I gotta go now.” With Sonny Moorman. $26. July 13, 8 p.m. Neighborhood Theatre.