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For the last decade or more, the Chicago club scene has embraced Halloween with the unique tradition of local bands transmogrifying onstage into some of their musical heroes, donning the costumes and playing some of the songs that they grew up loving, or which inspired them to make music of their own in the first place.

It’s a fine chance to see groups that we think we know showing us another, sometimes unexpected side of themselves, and I’m a bit disappointed to see that fewer clubs are upholding the tradition this holiday weekend. Here is a look at the best of those who are, as well as a few other frighteningly festive picks.

 Schubas is kicking things off early with its Halloween show starting at 8 tonight. After the international premiere screening of the independent film “Life by Numbers,” Victorian Halls will take the stage as Brand New, Republic of Lights and Kevin Thomas will become the Strokes, and Suns will channel Black Sabbath.

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No one ever will be able to fault that underrated local treasure Scott Lucas for a lack of ambition. Last year, during a bit of downtime with Local H, his long-running, melodic hard-rock duo with drummer Brian St.

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Los Angeles really seems to agree with Stuart Murdoch and the Belle and Sebastian gang. Long champions of the musical evocation of a sad, gray, and rainy Tuesday afternoon spent staring out a tear-stained window in their native Glasgow, the indie-favorite Scots took an unexpected turn on their last album “The Life Pursuit” (2006), heading to sunny California to work with Tony Hoffer (whose production credits include Beck, Air, Phoenix, and Supergrass), shedding quite a bit of the twee that previously had been so off-putting to some, and unexpectedly beefing things up with stronger glam-rock and funkier disco rhythms.

Although the band once again recorded with Hoffer in L.A., it dials back the dance quotient a bit on its eighth studio album, its first in five years. Instead, Murdoch and his cohorts return to the more familiar mod-inflected pre-Beatles café pop of earlier favorites such as “The Boy with the Arab Strap” (1998).

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It's a busy weekend on the club scene, but my best bet from the bounty of offerings is the reversed-roles, new-millennial update on that legendary pairing of Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood: Belle and Sebastian ork-pop veteran Isobel Campbell (who steers and controls the project) and former Screaming Tress and Queens of the Stone Age vocalist Mark Lanegan (the pretty voice). Touring in support of their third album Hawk, the duo performs tonight at Lincoln Hall after an opening set by Willy Mason at 10 p.m. Tickets are $17 (and be sure to check out Greg Kot's illuminating chat with Campbell in the Chicago Tribune.)

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Let’s get this straight right up top: Moe Tucker is one of the coolest women who’ve ever lived, as well as one of the greatest drummers in the history of rock ’n’ roll—pioneering for her role as a serious instrumentalist in one of the most influential bands ever, sure, but more importantly, the perfect mix of furious primitive and sensitive percussionist who gave the Velvet Underground the exact rhythms it needed at every turn, on stage and on its first three legendary albums.

But geez, does she seem to be a bonehead when it comes to politics.

Earlier this month, the Internet started buzzing about a local TV news clip of a conservative anti-tax rally near Albany, Georgia, in the spring of 2009 that featured, 2:40 in, a woman identified as “Maureen Tucker, Tea Party Supporter” saying, “I’m furious about the way we’re being led toward socialism. I’m furious about the incredible waste of money, when things that we really need and are important get dropped, because there’s no money left.”

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A decade into the new millennium, could there possibly be a hoarier concept in all of popular music than the rafters-rattling, lighters-inspiring arena-rock band?

Though Bono, Mick Jagger, and their $350-a-ticket ilk will be the last ones in the tar pit to admit it, the music world has become a more intimate place, with any hero or heroine worth following a mere Tweet or Facebook update away. The idea of tunes crafted to be heard from the furthest heights of the stadium a city block away from the stage is a bizarre curiosity at best. Yet on their fifth album, the nepotistic Tennessee-bred former Pentecostals who comprise the Kings of Leon are more determined than ever to rock the enormodome like it’s 1972.

Sad to say, the group’s devotion to bigger-is-better bombast has paid off.

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The reputation of Crain's Chicago Business blogger Greg Hinz precedes him: He's an arrogant, surly bulldog and dedicated contrarian, and he seemed to be gunning for me, eager to challenge my reporting on Lollapalooza's unprecedented, long-term, tax-exempt, competition-free sweetheart deal with the city.

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