Alejandro Escovedo photo courtesy Concord Records

Alejandro Escovedo returns to Roanoke to play the first-ever Kirk Fest, Kirk Avenue Music Hall and 101.5 The Music Place’s four-day celebration of the best acts to play that venue over the past year. Among the highlights, Escovedo and other headliners will mentor the young, local acts playing in front of them on Friday and Saturday. Read more, get show details.

We talk to Escovedo about his mentors, including Ian Hunter and Iggy Pop, not to mention most of his own musical family, and we stream songs from his next album, “Big Station” (Concord), due out June 5. Streaming — “Sally Was A Cop” and “Can’t Make Me Run.”