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Dan DeLuca’s Mix Picks: Nina Simone, PJ Harvey, and Bob Dylan’s birthday bash

What our music critic is listening to this week.

Nina Simone. Undated.  - Photo by Jack T. Franklin.
Nina Simone. Undated. - Photo by Jack T. Franklin.Read moreJack T. Franklin

Singing Nina. A celebration of the legacy of the late, great Nina Simone presented by Germantown Arts. Starting at 1 p.m. with a screening of the 2015 documentary What Happened, Miss Simone?, the all-day event includes a panel discussion about the singer and civil rights activist born Eunice Waymon who first sang under her stage name at the Midtown Bar & Grill in Atlantic City in 1954, plus live performances by M’Balia Singley and Drea D’Nur with Rootstock Republic, and DJ set by Rich Medina. Sunday at various locales in Germantown.

PJ Harvey, “The Crowded Cell.” PJ Harvey hasn’t released an album since 2016’s The Hope Six Demolition Project, but the British rocker has been busy writing music for other media. She scored a London stage adaptation of All About Eve starring Gillian Anderson and Lily James, and the characteristically grim “The Crowded Cell” is a new song written for The Virtues, a four-part British TV drama directed by English filmmaker Shane Meadows, which Harvey also scored.

17th Annual Bob Dylan Birthday Bash. Bob Dylan is turning 78, but Jon Houlon and Kenn Kweder have only been hosting this 40 Dylan songs/40 Philadelphia songwriters party since he was 62. It’s always an excellent way to sample the local scene. This year there will be worthy newbies like Hayden Sammak (who records as Deadfellow) singing “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue,” as well as regulars such as Peter Stone Brown, Hannah Taylor and the Rekardo Lee Trio, Philadelphia Ukulele Orchestra, and former Dylan bass player Kenny Aaronson with Kweder. Free. Wednesday at Ardmore Music Hall.

Lady Lamb. Aly Spaltro used to be known as Lady Lamb the Beekeeper, a moniker that the songwriter used when she moved from Brunswick, Maine, to Brooklyn. On the new Even The Tremor, Spaltro displays a keen eye for detail on a set of self-examining, soulfully sung songs that clarify her place in the upper echelon of indie songwriters. Katie Von Schleicher opens. Thursday at the Foundry at the Fillmore.

Shame. Straight out of Brixton, Shame are a barely-out-of-their-teens, five-piece alt-rock outfit from London that the Guardian called “Britain’s most exciting new band” last year. Their debut Songs of Praise comes on with impudent aggressiveness, but sneering singer Charlie Steen also brandishes a humanizing, self-deflating sense of humor. Thursday at Boot & Saddle.