LOS ANGELES — Former Concrete Blonde singer Johnette Napolitano said there's something spiritually significant about a holiday that invites you to a "once a year party with your dead relatives."

That's why she will celebrate the Mexican Day of the Dead in her own way in Los Angeles later this month, with the opening of her debut art exhibit and her first stage performance in more than a year.

"I really identify with this holiday, so metaphorically, to get up and play a show and get everybody together and have a blow-out just seems like the right thing to do," Napolitano said from her Los Angeles home Friday. "And it's the end of the millennium, so no one knows what's gonna happen after that."

Once a year, Mexican families pay tribute to their deceased loved ones by placing the departeds' favorite possessions and foods under home altars; then at midnight, the families go to the cemetery to visit their relatives' graves. The holiday falls on Nov. 1.

"It's an amazing way to deal with that part of life, which is death," said Napolitano, who lives part of the year in Bali, Mexico, without a television or phone. "It's a very warm and healthy way to do it."

Napolitano will open her debut art exhibit Oct. 28 at Zero One Gallery in Los Angeles. The artwork consists of a series of mixed-media free-standing crosses inspired by roadside memorial markers in the Mexican desert.

Two nights later, she will perform a concert featuring Holly Vincent and Berlin singer Terri Nunn as her backup vocalists and the rock en Español group Maria Fatal as her band. She also will incorporate her artwork into her stage set, using an installation that echoes the Zero One exhibit.

The 40-year-old singer said she will perform songs by her previous bands — Concrete Blonde and Pretty and Twisted — and songs from her unreleased solo album, Sound of a Woman. She'll also perform material she is compiling for a new LP. New numbers likely to turn up in the show include "Cut," a song she wrote about female circumcision, and a cover of Marianne Faithfull's "Broken English."

Napolitano hopes to release some of the songs from Sound of a Woman — which was never issued, due to what she termed label problems — on the Internet. She said she also may re-record some of that album's material for the new LP.

The 17 months since Napolitano last performed marks the singer's longest hiatus from the stage in her career. But if the show and exhibit both turn out well, she will consider a sequel of sorts for the spring, she said.

Concrete Blonde, featuring Napolitano on vocals and bass, found their greatest commercial success with their dark 1990 album, Bloodletting, featuring the single "Joey" (RealAudio excerpt). After the group disbanded in 1993, Napolitano released an album under the name Vowel Movement with Vincent, followed by the self-titled release of Pretty and Twisted, whose intense, artsy sound reflected their name.

Napolitano recently recorded vocals on two tracks, "Dream Piece" and "Alive," for Nine Inch Nails guitarist Danny Lohner's forthcoming solo album. "He kicked my ass so hard creatively; it just inspired the hell out of me," she said. "He's probably solely responsible for me getting out and wanting to do more [music]."

Napolitano, whose first artistic love as a child was visual art, previously ran her own gallery, the Lucky Nun, and has sold her art over the Internet. But she's never done a full exhibit of her work until now. "I want people to like the stuff because I do put a lot into it, not just because, 'Gee, she plays guitar and has made a couple records,' " she said. "This is, in fact, what I did first."