The essential gig guide

Ash

London Koko 3-6 July

Trimmed to a trio again after guitarist Charlotte Hatherly's 2006 departure, Ash recently announced that their Pixies and Muse-flavoured Twilight Of The Innocents album will be their last full length release, the Downpatrick boys opting to focus on digital singles from here on in. This four night residency will see them air current single "Polaris", a mini-epic that front man Tim Wheeler wrote on his pal Bono's piano.

Economy Wolf

London Vibe Bar 3 July; London Whitechapel Gallery 6 July

Citing computer game music, French pop and the great outdoors as influences, London/Paris's Economy Wolf deal in enigmatic, beguiling songs that remind this writer of Midlake and Grandaddy. Current single "Theme For Yellow Kudra" is a droning guitars and analogue synthesiser-imbued gem whose eponymous hero is half-ghost, half human. On the B-side, folk songwriter Findlay Brown's reinvents the tune as a ballad, its melodic strength laid bare.

Sarah Nixey

London Luminaire 4 July

From 1998-2003 Sarah Nixey was one-third of indie noir outfit Black Box Recorder, her quintessentially English annunciation refined as that of Julie Andrews, yet somehow freighted with unspoken sexual deviance. Now back on radar as a solo artist, Nixey sounds as though she has morphed into an alluring cyborg, pop/electronica nuggets such as "The Black Hit Of Space" clearly aware of Alison Goldfrapp's demographic, yet icily fresh. Expect an evening of bone-dry, slightly kinky sophistication.

Marnie Stern

On tour 9-20 July

Nothing quite readies you for your first blast of Marnie Stern. Indeed the New York Times has already declared the petite blonde Brooklynite's In Advance Of The Broken Arm the year's most exciting rock 'n' roll album. Released on the Kill Rock Stars imprint back in February, the record joins the dots between Yoko Ono, Deerhoof and Van Halen, Stern unleashing a chaotic guitar onslaught of rare joy and beauty.

Bella Union's 10th Anniversary

London Royal Festival Hall 10 & 11 July

Cake and candles time for the label that brought us Midlake, The Dears and Explosions In The Sky, all of whom play this weekend event alongside more recent Bella signings such as Danish dreamscape painters The Kissaway Trail, and US folkie Stephanie Dosen, who makes music "for weary sailors and tangled mermaids." The Bella imprint was founded by erstwhile Cocteau Twins members Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie, and remains an important beacon for indie talent.

Vessels

On tour 10-30 July

Had late period Talk Talk incorporated subtle electronica tropes and become more introspective, still, they might have sounded something like Vessels. Utilising exotica such as zither and psaltry alongside laptops and guitars, this experimental post-rock quartet make evocative music that can rage like a tempest or induce Zen-like calm.

Mavis Staples

London Indigo 17 July

Few singers have the gravitas of Chicago-born veteran Mavis Staples (pictured, left), the familiar of Martin Luther King that Bob Dylan dubbed "the epitome of soul." This one-off UK show, in support of her Ry Cooder-produced album We'll Never Turn Back, is your chance to commune with a bona fide legend as she airs updates on the freedom songs that helped empower the US civil rights movement of the Fifties and Sixties. Timely stuff in the wake of the Bush administration's failures post-Katrina.

Rickie Lee Jones

Birmingham Glee Club 18 July; London QEH 19 July; Milton Keynes The Stables 20 July.

Though still best known as the sampled narrator on The Orb's "Little Fluffy Clouds" and for her own 1979 smash "Chuck E's In Love", Jones has already released three acclaimed solo albums in the Noughties. Expect oldies performed at the piano, plus band versions of standout tracks from current album The Sermon On Exposition Boulevard.

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