Patti Smith

As usual, it's a pretty good time for a visit from Patti Smith, the punk poetess with a song for every cultural and geopolitical shake-up the world can throw at itself. Trampin', her ninth album, finds Smith musing on war and peace and its avatars; if it gets a little bogged down in well-meaning hippie-punk platitudes--the 12-minute "Radio Baghdad" kinda turns into a Middle Eastern tourism spot--its fabric should tighten onstage in front of the singer's active faithful. Even if it doesn't, we can stand to put up with it.