Between them, Dave Alvin and Jimmie Dale Gilmore have released over 25 albums — and that’s not counting the eight albums Alvin made as a member of the roots rock band The Blasters.

And these two roots music veterans, who have a Grammy award and a number of Grammy nominations between them, are also a combined — wait for it — 145 years old, so they’ve accumulated a few road stories and general musical savvy along the way.

Now the two singers and songwriters are bringing their guitars and their backing band, The Guilty Ones, to Northampton’s Academy of Music on Aug. 27 at 8 p.m.

They’ve been friends for years and had previously played together on occasion — they recorded an album, “Downey to Lubbock,” in 2018 — but over the last few years they’ve stepped up their collaboration. Alvin, in a recent interview, said that despite the different paths their careers have taken, he and Gilmore discovered they had similar roots in old blues and folk music.

“It’s like whatever we feel like doing, we’re gonna do it,” Alvin said, discussing the diverse music, mostly covers, that the two recorded on “Downey to Lubbock.”

Alvin, who’s 67, got his start in music in the 1970s and 1980s with The Blasters, a band he formed with brother Phil in Downey, California that mixed rockabilly, country, early rock and roll, and blues. The group had considerable success, but Alvin also worked with other groups, including X, the Los Angeles punk band, and he earned strong reviews for his 1994 acoustic-based album, “King of California.”

Gilmore, who’s 78, is a lifelong Texan whose music has been shaped by Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, and the honky-tonk sounds he heard growing up, as well as by Bob Dylan and the folk music revival of the 1960s. He’s a highly respected songwriter who’s been nominated for three Grammy awards, for Best Contemporary Folk Album and Best Traditional Folk Album.

At their Academy of Music show, he and Alvin are expected to swap stories along with their songs, with the music coming from their separate catalogs as well as their album (they also have a new single out, “Borderland”).

Dead Rock West, a California band that plays what’s described as a “kind of jangly west coast alt country that slides into pop and punk territory at times,” will open the evening.

Aug. 25 is blues night at the Bombyx Center for Arts & Equity in Florence, where veteran axman and Connecticut native Jeff Pitchell and his band Texas Flood will take the stage at 7 p.m., sharing it with some blues royalty descendants.

Pitchell, a member of the Connecticut Blues Hall of Fame — he and Texas Flood have also been voted best blues band in New England — has won much acclaim over the years for his fretwork, drawing comparisons to both Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughn. He was voted best guitarist in Connecticut when he was just 15.

Indeed, publicity notes from Bombyx say Pitchell has been “blistering the paint off nightclub walls around the New England area for decades” — probably not welcome news to a few neighbors of the Florence arts center who have complained about noise levels.

Pitchell has also long shared stages with other blues players, including the late Charles Neville, and at the Aug. 25 show he’ll be joined by Claudette King, the youngest daughter of B.B. King, a successful blues singer who’s known as “The Bluz Queen.”

Joining King will be Tyrone Vaughan, the nephew of Stevie Ray Vaughn; Tyrone got his first two guitars from his celebrated uncle. His father, Jimmie Vaughan, founder and guitarist of the Fabulous Thunderbirds, is no musical slouch, either.

That kind of musical heritage, with Pitchell’s band providing ace backup, makes for a great show, according to Blues Quarterly: “Charmaine Neville, Claudette King, & Tyrone Vaughan all have their own thing going on with the added gravitas and talent of their bloodlines.” (Charmaine Neville, daughter of Charles Neville, was to be part of the Bombyx show but was forced to cancel this week.)

For a more relaxed musical evening, consider heading to Holyoke Media tonight at 7:30 p.m., which is hosting a showcase for four up-and-coming New England singer-songwriters called “Men With a Jam.”

The show is produced by the New Music Alliance, the nonprofit group that promotes music in western Massachusetts, with Holyoke Media, which earlier this year opened an intimate listening room at its offices that can seat 100.

Mark Sherry, a co-founder of New Music Alliance, calls the room a “state-of-the-art facility that is just a great place to hear acoustic music.”

The performers on the bill for tonight’s show are Charlie Diamond and Sean Lemkey, from Hartford, Connecticut; Jared Fiske, from Ware; and Dylan Patrick Ward, from Bellows Falls, Vermont.

Diamond, who released his second album earlier this year, has a Dylanesque approach to his songs, while Fiske’s music has received good marks from Worcester Magazine.

Lemkey is a drummer and guitarist who has played with a number of other bands, and Ward has drawn comparisons to John Prine and Randy Newman for his candor and humor.

Holyoke Media is located at 1 Court Plaza (23 Suffolk St.) near Holyoke City Hall. Tickets can be purchased at the door and via New Music Alliance at facebook.com/NewMusicAlliance.

More music on tap

Hawks & Reed Performing Arts Center in Greenfield is also featuring a trio of singer-songwriters Aug. 25 at 7 p.m. with Derek Sensale, Elliot Lee Friesen, and headliner Tobey Sol LaRoche, a guitarist and percussionist who was first drawn to the djembe, a West African drum.

Trombone Shorty brings his mix of rock, pop, jazz, funk and hip hop — he calls it “Supafunkrock” — to Tree House Brewing in Deerfield Aug. 28 at 7 p.m. Local favorite Kimaya Diggs opens.

The Mariold Theater in Easthampton hosts a “Josh Hirst Birthday Party” Aug. 31 at 7 p.m. that will feature the bass player of that name jamming with guitarist Luke DeRoy, keyboardist Khalif Neville, and drummer Will Carroll on a mix of jazz, blues and more.

The Afro-Semitic Experience brings its eclectic mix of jazz, blues, and traditional Jewish music to The Drake in Amherst Aug. 31 at 8 p.m.

Local faves Lonesome Brothers play the Florence Civic Center Aug. 31 at 6:30 p.m.

Corner House, an acoustic quartet that met at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, combines on violin, cello, guitar and mandolin to play a mix of old time American and Scottish tunes, progressive bluegrass, and modern folk. They’ll be at The Divine Theater at Gateway City Arts in Holyoke Sept. 1 at 8 p.m.

Steve Pfarrer can be reached at spfarrer@gazettenet.com.

]]>