Summer concerts in L.A., including free shows

After years on the Central Coast, the annual event has more recently made a move significantly closer to L.A., at Bakersfield’s Buena Vista Aquatic Recreational Area. Sure, it’s still a bit of a trek, but where else can you find a sustainable, vegetarian festival dedicated to equal parts music, food, art, yoga and wellness? Skrillex, Labrinth, Lane 8, James Blake and M.I.A. top the 2024 lineup.

This weekend-long concert will once again return to West Hollywood Park as part of WeHo Pride. Kylie Minogue, Janelle Monáe and Diplo headline this year’s fest with additional sets from Doechii, Ashnikko, Noah Cyrus, Trixie Mattel, Keke Palmer, Channel Tres, Yaeji, Big Freedia, Sophie Ellis-Bextor, VINCINT and more.

The long-running L.A. Pride has left West Hollywood for destinations farther east, including for this music festival on the edge of Chinatown. There’s no lineup yet for this year’s edition (Megan Thee Stallion and Mariah Carey headlined last year’s) but the Christopher Street West-produced concert will once again set up at L.A. State Historic Park on June 8, with all sorts of other LGBTQ+ programming between sets.

As Coachella has become increasingly pop-friendly, promoter Goldenvoice has made it up to aging locals with more and more genre-focused music festivals with stellar lineups. The latest such case: No Values, a fest filled with punk legends you’re almost sure to find in Gen X’ers T-shirt drawer. The Original Misfits, Social Distortion, Iggy Pop, Turnstile, Bad Religion and Sublime top the lineup for the June 8 show at Fairplax in Pomona, with additional sets from the Dillinger Escape Plan, Power Trip, the Damned, Joyce Manor, Suicidal Tendencies, the Vandals, Black Flag, the Jesus Lizard, L7, the Dead Milkmen and more.

House music hits the Queen Mary waterfront during this two-day fest. Though the 2024 lineup is still to come, last year’s edition of the multi-stage event featured the likes of Dombresky, Duke Dumont and Dom Dolla.

Though it’s a seated, single-stage concert, we think the deep lineup and alfresco, BYO setting of this show merit its inclusion here: The Roots headline this hip-hop fest at the Hollywood Bowl, which boasts the likes of Queen Latifah, Common, Digable Planets, Arrested Development, the Pharcyde and Black Sheep.

EDM juggernaut HARD Summer has hopped around Southern California in recent years, and last year returned to L.A. proper—and for 2024 now heads to the grounds of Hollywood Park, next to SoFi Stadium. No matter the location, its dedication to bringing the biggest names in the hip-hop and electronic scene has stayed the course. This year’s lineup includes Disclosure, FISHER + Chris Lake: Under Construction, Nelly Furtado, REZZMAU5, Major Lazer, Jamie xx, Subtronics, Zeds Dead and more.

Say goodbye to dusty thoroughfares and violent porta-potties: Splash House takes the music festival concept off of sweltering desert land and places it poolside. Movers and shakers at this multi-location getdown are shuttled between the Saguaro, the Margaritaville and the Renaissance (with after-hours programming at the Palm Springs Air Museum) to lap up big-name dance acts and DJ sets. With the added comforts of AC rooms and critically acclaimed restaurant fare just steps away from the party scenes, the experience will make you question whether to bother with more punishing locales come next year’s festival season.

Lionel Richie and Diana Ross top this inaugural fest filled with soul and R&B legends. Held on the Hollywood Park grounds, next to SoFi Stadium, the August 31 event also includes the likes of Santana, Al Green, Nile Rodgers & Chic, Gladys Knight, Chaka Khan, the Isley Brothers, Charlie Wilson, Eric Burdon & the Animals, the O’Jays, and the Jacksons.

Radio-friendly, sort-of-hard, sort-of-soft, sometimes-Christan rock is back with a vengeance. Creed is embarking on a reunion tour, and here in SoCal we’ve been blessed(?) with the Creed-iest date of them all: a mini festival at San Bernardino’s Glen Helen Amphitheater that also features 3 Doors Down, Daughtry, Finger Eleven, Fuel, Vertical Horizon and the Verve Pipe.

Eddie Vedder’s Ohana Festival once again lands at Doheny State Beach in Dana Point, and though we don’t yet know the lineup, there’s a pretty good chance the Pearl Jam frontman will once again be on it. Last year’s fest included the Killers, HAIM, the Chicks, Foo Fighters and Pretenders—we’ll have to wait and see who tops this year’s edition from September 27 to 29.

Desert Daze is your antidote to the typical desert gathering (think a noisier, more indie lineup than Coachella and less dirt than Burning Man). Though it’s close enough to L.A. to go just for the day, the Lake Perris fest caters to campers with easy access to hiking trails and a bazaar of mystics and wanderers.

Well, I’m not okay after seeing the lineup for When We Were Young: My Chemical Romance and Fall Out Boy top the now-annual Las Vegas festival that features just about every emo-pop act from the early 2000s. Seriously, we’re not kidding: A Day to Remember, Jimmy Eat World, Dashboard Confessional, Taking Back Sunday, Simple Plan, Coheed and Cambria, the All-American Rejects, New Found Glory, Motion City Soundtrack, Silverstein and more are all set to take over the Las Vegas Festival Grounds on October 19 and 20, 2024, with a special focus on each band’s most beloved album.