The best concerts in L.A. this May

Treat your ears to a vibrant concert on a spring or summer night this year, by attending MUSE/IQUE’s annual program. This monthly series of performances, held venues (largely outdoors) across L.A., features a mix of performances inspired by landmark albums and public figures, including tributes to Ed Sullivan, Bob Dylan, Abraham Lincoln, Oklahoma! and more. In order to attend, you’ll need to become a MUSE/IQUE member; you could make a $75 donation for a single event, but if you’re interested in more than just one, it’s cheaper per event to become a full-fludged member.

This surf-inflected music fest will once again take over the Redondo Beach coastline for three days in May. Sting, Incubus, My Morning Jacket, Dirty Heads, Seal, Devo, Local Natives, Santigold, Fleet Foxes, Courtney Barnett and Trey Anastasio top this year’s lineup.

This chill fest—quite literally compared to the scorching desert outings—brings a few dozen acts to San Luis Obispo. This year’s lineup includes Peach Pit, Thundercat, Noizu and Sidepiece, plus a silent disco, at Dairy Creek Golf Course.

If you grew up around the turn of the millennium, this hip-hop–focused music fest in Las Vegas is like your middle school dance playlist come to life. Lovers & Friends features seemingly every hip-hop and R&B star from the late ’90s and early aughts, including Janet Jackson, Alicia Keys, Mary J. Blige, Lil Wayne, Snoop Dogg, Nas, Usher, Ludacris, Nelly, Ciara, M.I.A., Ja Rule, Ashanti, TLC, Akon and Ne-Yo. Also, like last year’s edition (which featured Missy Elliott, Mariah Carey and Christina Aguilera, among others) you’ll find a few turn-of-the-millennium boy bands and pop performers like the Backstreet Boys, 98 Degrees, Gwen Stefani and Nelly Furtado. The fest is set to arrive at the Las Vegas Festival Grounds on May 4, 2024.  

Hot off his coheadlining tour with Drake, inventive Southern rap star 21 Savage returns to L.A. for a show at the Forum.

Staged along the convention center side of San Diego’s downtown waterfront, the appropriately named Wonderfront includes sets from Kaytranada, JID, Weezer, Dominic Fike, Beck, Mt. Joy, the Roots, Carly Rae Jepsen, T-Pain, Polo & Pan and more. You’ll find Wonderfront from May 10 to 12 at Embarcadero Marina Park North, Seaport Village and Ruocco Park.

Cake on the eyeliner, cry it off and then dance away the tears at the return of this 1980s-to-aughts goth, new wave and punk fest with Duran Duran, Interpol, Blondie, Simple Minds, Placebo, Soft Cell, Adam Ant, Gary Numan and more. The one-day-only event features dozens of alt obsessions on the golf course next to the Rose Bowl, where it once again returns.

It’s been nearly a decade since, Divers, onetime “freak-folk” icon Joanna Newsom’s singular opus full of artfully swooping vocals, deft harp skills, world-building lyrics and meticulous, knotty arrangements. Catch her pull from that and the rest of her remarkable catalog at this string of solo shows at the Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever. Newsom will play but piano and harp, and she’s even scheduled a matinee specifically for kids.

Make your way to the desert for the Joshua Tree Music Festival, a gathering of like-minded indie musicians who will be rocking out to a dance-world-electro-funk’n groove. The biannual festival is a four-day party with over 30 bands in a unique lineup of artists who aren’t necessarily household names. There’s free water to all patrons, minimal service charges on tickets and yoga classes aplenty.

On the outskirts of town at the Motor Speedway, Electric Daisy Carnival is pure, condensed Vegas. There is a VIP Ferris wheel. Helicopters shuttle in high rollers. The 135,000-strong crowd is soaked in ecstasy and spray tan. Every millionaire DJ that plays the laser-riddled nightclubs on the Strip is here. EDC introduced EDM as a Day-Glo spectacle for the masses in America, and its lineups in recent years have certainly lived up to the hype (Tiësto, David Guetta, John Summit, FISHER, Kaskade, Diplo, Deadmau5 and Peggy Gou perform this year). Once you let the neon and bass wash over you, it is the time of your life.