On the weekend preceding Halloween, a tie-dye-colored witches’ brew of imaginative seasonal costumes worn by attendees and musicians, vibrant autumn hues, and a couple of dozen improvisational bands of psychedelic rock, progressive bluegrass, funk, and more defined the 2017 version of the Hangtown Music Festival in Placerville, California.

Some of the biggest names in Heavy Metal music brought 50,000 people to the sixth annual Aftershock Music Festival in Sacramento. A cold front moved through the region days before the event began, blowing away the smokey skies that had engulfed Sacramento from the devastating fires in the nearby wine country. The cold front gave way to nearly perfect weather for the two-day festival, with warm sunny days and cool nights prevailing.

Roots & Branches Conservancy is pleased to announce a 2017 grant of $75,000 to Mount Tamalpais State Park in the wake of Sound Summit, its annual music festival to help support the mountain. The grant represents a 25% increase over its 2016 gift of $60,000, resulting in a three-year total of $175,000 from the Bay Area non-profit.

The 14th annual Emerald Cup proudly announces its phase one artist announcement.  The Emerald Cup will take place at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds in Santa Rosa, CA from December 9-10, 2017.  This year’s impressive lineup already brings the legendary Roots, Gramatik, Hieroglyphics, Pimps of Joytime, Chali 2NA with another wave of artists to be announced. 
 

Old Settler’s Music Festival is so excited about moving to its new permanent home in Tilmon, Texas, southeast of Lockhart, it is kicking off discounted “All-Aboard” super-early-bird camping and non-camping package sales in October — and rolling back prices to pre-2014 levels — while adding a special rate for teens. Tickets go on sale Wednesday, Oct. 25, for the 31st annual festival, which once again will bring the finest roots music acts from North America and beyond to Central Texas over four idyllic spring days. Newly purchased property gives the festival a 145-acre site all its own just 20 minutes from Lockhart and less than an hour from downtown Austin, with ample (and shuttle-free!) camping, parking and performing spaces.

SPRING AWAKENING MUSIC FESTIVAL (SAMF) is thrilled to announce the 2018 dates and location for its seventh annual installment, taking place June 8, 9 & 10. In 2018, the largest all-electronic music festival in the Midwest will return to the beautiful Addams/Medill Park in Chicago.

It’s 10:27 pm at The 8th Annual Festy Experience and I am sitting under the stage, directly beneath Mike Cooley’s feet (of Drive-By Truckers), hacking away at my typewriter. The rain is falling, not strong but steady, and I need somewhere dry to write. The music is flowing through me, his boot bottoms stomping out a beat inches from my head.

Today, Electric Forest (EF) announced the return of the 8th annual music and camping festival to the legendary Double JJ Ranch in Rothbury, Michigan - hosting two distinct weekends for the second year in a row, on June 21-24 and June 28-July 1, 2018. In conjunction with the announcement, Electric Forest unveiled a new fan participation initiative - The EF Wish Machine – encouraging the Forest Family to spread positivity, and offering the greatest evidence yet that Forest dreams really do come true.

Until 1995, back when The Grateful Dead roamed the Earth, Bob Weir developed some engaging onstage phrases that he’d utter from time to time, including “tuned just like a Swiss watch” when he muffed a lyric, or introduce “the family fun game, Take A Step Back,” when urging fans to back away from the stage. He also sometimes stated, “We’re trying to get everything Just Exactly Perfect,” when fans got a little antsy during particularly long between-song tune-ups.

A few weekends ago, the inaugural Bourbon and Beyond Festival rocked Champions Park on the banks of the Ohio River in downtown Louisville, Kentucky. Even though the calendar indicated it was the first weekend of Fall it was very hot and humid in bourbon country, the park was geared up and ready to host what ended up being approximately 50,000 people for two days of music, food, and drink. The two main stages had alternating sets of the biggest names in blues, rock and a little bit of country music.