The best live music venues in Los Angeles

Feeling like you’ve outgrown Coachella and sleepaway camp vibes? Then how about something closer to home with the Strokes, LCD Soundsystem and a reunited Le Tigre? This Ain’t No Picnic takes its name from one of promoter Goldenvoice’s first festivals, held in Irvine in 1999, but for a more recent comparison, the lineup has very strong FYF vibes. Like that now-defunct fest, you’ll find a genre-spanning mix of on-the-horizon acts and familiar names, including Beach House, Phoebe Bridgers, Earl Sweatshirt, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Four Tet and Floating Points, some longtime local faves like the Descendents and Sparks, and ASMR trailblazers the Ying Yang Twins. The fest is set for the pleasant grounds of Brookside at the Rose Bowl on August 27 and 28, a not-quite-as-pleasant period in Pasadena’s often blistering summertime. Presale starts Thursday, December 9 at 10am, with any remaining tickets available later that day at 2pm. Courtesy Goldenvoice

Though the 420-friendly part of this music fest’s name is likely to grab your attention, the “groove” part is what’ll hold it, with an R&B-heavy lineup that includes Erykah Badu, Nas, the Roots, Jhené Aiko, Miguel, Kamasi Washington, Thundercat and more.

After an intimate show in Agoura Hills and then an arena-sized one at the Forum, Dave Grohl and co. are playing for an even bigger crowd with a pair of dates at the Banc of California Stadium. Expect a pretty fantastic show; we caught the band at Vax Live, where they tackled about a half-dozen fan-favorite songs, and found them to be an energetic highlight. 

The age of Ye and Drake détente is here with this one-night-only benefit show at the L.A. Coliseum. The two are coming together on December 9 for the Free Larry Hoover Benefit Concert, a show to support prison reform and raise awareness for the cofounder of the Chicago gang Gangster Disciples, who’s currently serving six life sentences for a 1973 murder as well as charges of conspiracy, extortion and money laundering in 1997. Tickets for the show go on sale Monday, November 22 at 10am; just a heads up that Kanye West is listed as the headliner, with Drake as a special guest.

UPDATE: Well, unvaccinated teenagers, you win this round: Both Coachella and Stagecoach announced on Tuesday that they’ve reversed their decision that all attendees be fully vaccinated and will instead allow a negative Covid-19 test result as an alternative. That’s according to an update posted to both of the festivals’ Instagram accounts: “After seeing first-hand the low transmission data and successful implementation of safety protocols at our other festivals this past month, we feel confident that we can update our health policy to allow for: negative Covid-19 test taken within 72 hours of the event; or proof of full vaccination.” The news comes after an August announcement from promoter AEG Presents said all of its clubs and festivals would require proof of vaccination by October 1. The revised policy for Coachella and Stagecoach now puts them in line with neighbor L.A. County’s vax-or-test policy for major events. Our original story from August 12, 2021 appears below. -- If you plan on ingesting all the things at Coachella, then you’re going to need a jab in the arm first. Concert promoter AEG Presents, which most notably produces Coachella and Stagecoach via its Goldenvoice offshoot, announced that by October 1 it will require proof of Covid-19 vaccination for entry into its owned and operated clubs, theaters and festivals. The policy applies to venues around the county, but here in L.A. specifically that means the El Rey, the Fonda, the Shrine Auditorium, the Roxy and

Ever since its initial postponement last spring, Coachella has stayed awfully quiet about its eventual lineup. Frank Ocean, Rage Against the Machine and Travis Scott were initially announced for the April 2020 event, but festival promoter Goldenvoice never publicly commented about the status of the lineup after the Indio fest’s numerous postponements (it’s since been rescheduled to April 2022). Now, though, we finally have some updates thanks to a profile on cofounder Paul Tollett in the L.A. Times. Rage Against the Machine, Travis Scott and a third unannounced headliner will top the 2022 lineup. Megan Thee Stallion and Doja Cat will also carry over from the never-staged 2020 lineup, though they’ll be higher up on the bill for this upcoming edition of the fest. But the biggest news by far is that Frank Ocean won’t be available for the 2022 festival and will instead perform in 2023. “I’m just trying to be as fair as I can to artists and to the fans to make sure that eventually they get to see everyone that we talked about,” Tollett told the L.A. Times. Coachella typically stays pretty tight-lipped about its lineup until about three months before the April event. But Tollett wanted to offer some reassurance given all of the changes and uncertainty since last spring. Ocean joins one other very notable exception among early Coachella teases: When Beyoncé announced her pregnancy in 2017, and the subsequent cancelation of her Coachella slot that year, she also announced that she’d

As live music gets back in full swing, so too do budget-breaking ticket prices (seriously, music festival passes cost about as much as a month of car payments right now). Thankfully, Live Nation has decided to give all of us a temporary reprieve with “$20 all-in tickets” to concerts around the country, including about 40 near Los Angeles. And unlike most tickets from major platforms (like, oh, we don’t know, Live Nation?) these limited-time $20 tickets won’t have any extra taxes or fees on top of them. The deal doesn’t apply to every sought-after show this summer, but there are $20 tickets up for grabs to some pretty noteworthy shows: Burna Boy and the Jonas Brothers at the Hollywood Bowl, Black Pumas and Devo at the new theater next to SoFi Stadium, Mt. Joy and Sylvan Esso at the Greek Theatre, and the Jimmy Eat World and Taking Back Sunday show at the FivePoint Amphitheatre. The $20 all-in tickets go on sale Wednesday, July 28 at 9am. If you happen to be a T-Mobile or Sprint subscriber, you can nab them a day early on Tuesday, July 27 at 9am. Check out the full list of L.A.-area shows below. Greek Theatre (Griffith Park) Mt. Joy (Aug 15) Rufus Wainwright (Sept 9) Sylvan Esso (Sept 10) Needtobreathe (Sept 16) Smokey Robinson (Sept 18) The Monkees (Nov 14) Hollywood Bowl (Hollywood) Burna Boy (Oct 8) The Neighbourhood (Oct 9) Jonas Brothers (Oct 27) Hollywood Palladium (Hollywood) Angels & Airwaves (Nov 6) YouTube Theater at Hollywood Park (Inglewood) Bronco (Sept 17)

Ready to sweat it out with 99,000 of your closest friends again? Not to worry if you’re not quite there yet: Coachella just announced its next festival dates, and it turns out you’ll still have another year to prep. Coachella will make its return over two weekends in 2022, from April 15 to 17 and April 22 to 24. Stagecoach typically follows the weekend after, but as of publication, promoter Goldenvoice has yet to announce 2022 dates for the country fest. See you in the desert 🌵 Coachella returns April 15-17 & 22-24, 2022. Register now to access the 2022 advance sale beginning Friday, June 4 at 10am PT.https://t.co/qujCsdCWkp pic.twitter.com/0PzCZYrbB6 — Coachella (@coachella) June 1, 2021 It’s usually around this time each year that Coachella announces dates and presale info for the next year’s edition, and though this April’s event was canceled we’ve already settled back into that timing groove: Registration is open now for presale, which opens June 4 at 10am. Tickets start at $449 before fees, a notable increase over previous years; after presale, that base price ticks up as high as $499. VIP, meanwhile, will set you back upwards of $929 before fees. Coachella’s April 2020 edition was initially postponed to October of that year. Eventually, though, those dates were scrapped, too, as well as the fest’s April 2021 dates. Frank Ocean, Rage Against the Machine and Travis Scott were the original 2020 headliners, but who knows who we’ll see on the lineup in 2022. Until today