Tag: Arts Guide

Summer lingers as fall pop music season gets underway, with outdoor shows still happening in Camden, South Philly, and Fairmount Park into early October. And then the calendar quickly fills up with indoor nights in arenas, theaters, and small clubs in Philadelphia and throughout the region.

Besides the Phoebe Bridgers, Johnny Blue Skies, Olivia Rodrigo, and Dojo Cat tours highlighted below, there are still more big names coming to Xfinity Mobile Arena: Jonas Brothers on Oct. 2, Teddy Swims on Oct. 10, and Sombr on Nov. 19.

The Met has Beck on Oct. 18, Rawayana on Nov. 1, and Orville Peck on Nov. 11, and the Fillmore has Chief Keef on Oct. 6, Horsegirl on Oct. 23, Yebba on Oct. 30, and the Menzingers on Nov. 20. Penn Live Arts shows at the Annenberg Center include TM Krishna on Oct. 15 and Bela Fleck on Nov. 15.

There are lots of choice dates in cozier venues. Laura Veirs and Karl Blau are at Nikki Lopez on Oct. 9; Mirah, Evan Greer, and Sad13 play PhilaMoca on Oct. 10; and Mannequin Pussy plays First Unitarian Church Oct. 28.

Laura Cantrell and Amy Rigby do Elkton Music Hall on Nov. 12, Marshall Crenshaw is with Sarah Borges and Eric Ambel at Sellersville Theater on Nov. 18, Strand of Oaks plays Johnny Brenda’s on Dec. 12 and 13, and Musiq Soulchild kicks off a four-night stand at City Winery on Dec. 17.

That aside, here’s your list of 30 shows not to miss.

Gorillaz

Sept. 27, Freedom Mortgage Pavilion

Gorillaz co-creators Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett’s plan to make an album shaped by experiences visiting India took grief-stricken shape when both men’s fathers died within a week of each other. On The Mountain, the virtual band as usual employs many guests, including Anoushka Shankar, Black Thought, Asha Puthli, and Johnny Marr. It also features collaborations from Dennis Hopper and Bobby Womack who collaborated with the Gorillaz before their deaths. freedomortgagepavilion.com

Phoebe Bridgers

Sept. 28, Xfinity Mobile Arena

Three years after she sold out the Mann Center with her boygenius bandmates Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers is bigger than ever. She stoked the ardor of her fan base with pop-up shows around the U.S. in the lead-up to the release of the moody, compelling, and intensely personal Lost Weekend, whose many guests include Havertown’s own Alex G. xfinitymobilearena.com

AC/DC

Sept. 29, Lincoln Financial Field

The last big blowout at the Linc this year — other than the Eagles putting a hurting on opponents — will be the final date on the Australian hard rock band’s “Power Up Tour.” The “Back in Black” band will be powering down after two and a half years on the road. Taylor Momsen’s the Pretty Reckless opens. lincolnfinancialfield.com

Public Image Ltd

Oct. 2, Union Transfer

The Sex Pistols is touring with Frank Carter cosplaying as Johnny Rotten, so John Lydon couldn’t resist hitting the road again with his other band, whose “This Is Not the Final Tour” arrives a week after the Pistols play the Fillmore. utphilly.com

beabadoobee

Oct. 2, Liacouras Center

Filipino and British songwriter Beatrice Lau’s “Powerlines Tour” is in support of her fourth album, Pylon, a bracing follow-up to 2024’s Rick Rubin-produced This Is How Tomorrow Moves. liacourascenter.com

Phish

Oct. 2-4, Boardwalk Hall

Phish comes in threes. Last year, the jam band’s troika of shows were at the Mann; the year before the Trey Anastasio-fronted quartet’s Mondegreen fest was in Dover, Del. This year, the band returns for indoor shows in Atlantic City, where it was last seen on the beach in 2022. boardwalkhall.com

Shaboozey

Oct. 6, Skyline Stage at Highmark Mann

Shaboozey played the Mann at the Roots Picnic in 2024, just as “Tipsy (A Bar Song)” was turning him onto a star. Now he’s back, behind The Outlaw Cherie Lee & Other West Tales, his ambitious concept album that is also a comic book. highmarkmann.org

The Chicks

Oct. 7, Met Philly

Texas country trio the Chicks — singer Natalie Maines and sisters Emily Strayer and Martie Maguire — is celebrating the 20th anniversary of Taking the Long Way. That 2006 album was the band’s first after it was essentially banned from country radio after Maines criticized then-President George W. Bush’s war in Iraq. themetphilly.com

Sugar

Oct. 12-13, Union Transfer

Hüsker Dü cofounder Bob Mould has carried on a relentlessly rocking career with 14 uncompromising albums under his own name. But he hasn’t worked with Sugar, his power trio featuring bassist David Barber and drummer Malcolm Travis, since the mid-1990s. utphilly.com

Philly Music Fest

Oct. 12-18, various venues

The genre-spanning all-Philly showcase at independent venues kicks off with two nights of Gregory Alan Isakov at Ardmore Music Hall and concludes with Upper Darby-raised jazz sax star Immanuel Wilkins at Solar Myth. In between, attractions during the 10th anniversary of the fest include Sweet Pill, Owen Stewart, RJD2, Sug Daniels, Roberta Faceplant, and Mo Lowda & the Humble. phillymusicfest.com

Brennan Wedl

Oct. 13, Johnny Brenda’s

Minnesota-born singer Brennan Wedl — a former leader of queercore band Dazey & the Scouts — impressed as the opening act of the Waxahatchee and MJ Lenderman tour that played the Met this year. Now she’s playing her first Philly headlining gig, behind her self-titled debut album, which was produced by Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield and Brad Cook. johnnybrendas.com

Johnny Blue Skies & the Dark Clouds

Oct. 15, Xfinity Mobile Center

“I want to make America not suck again,” Sturgill Simpson sings on the frisky lead track of Mutiny For the Masses, the always-unpredictable maverick songwriter’s second album as Johnny Blue Skies that makes rebellious rock and roll, country-soul, and funk fun again. xfinitymobilearena.com

Pinhead Gunpowder

Oct. 16, First Unitarian Church

Big-name rock star in a tiny space: Pinhead Gunpowder is a Green Day side project of sorts. Along with Billie Joe Armstrong, the current version of the band includes Green Day touring guitarist Jason White. r5productions.com

Sienna Spiro

Oct. 17, the Fillmore

Powerhouse vocalist Sienna Spiro’s name rhymes with “pyro.” Sam Smith has called her “the voice of a generation.” The stylish 20-year-old “Die on the Hill” singer, who displays the influence of fellow throwback soul Brits like Amy Winehouse and Duffy, played the Foundry in March. She has since won raves at Coachella and Lollapalooza. She’s back at the Fillmore in October, but in the big room this time. thefillmorephilly.com

Mike D 5D

Oct. 19, Union Transfer

Beastie Boys’ Adam Horowitz and Mike Diamond have been largely inactive since the death of bandmate Adam Yauch in 2012. Now Diamond — aka Mike D — has returned with Thank You, a solo album of hip-hop electro punk. He’s touring backed by a band that includes his sons Skyler and Davis Diamond. utphilly.com

L7

Oct. 22, Brooklyn Bowl

L7 was a key player in the alt-rock late 1980s and early 1990s, and the grunge-adjacent all-female band was also a precursor to the riot-grrrl movement. The “Pretend We’re Dead” and “S— list” band fronted by Donita Sparks and Suzi Gardner is carrying on with its “Last Hurrah Tour” despite the loss of bassist Jennifer Finch, who died of brain cancer this year. Finch’s memoir, Shooting Up and Making Out, is due in January. brooklynbowl.com/philadelphia

Jesse Welles

Oct. 23, the Met

Jesse Welles’ resistance songs like “Join ICE” and “United Health” — along with whimsical ones such as “At the Zoo” — have fueled a steady growth in popularity. The self-styled Dylanesque folk singer has collaborated with Joan Baez and Philly’s Mt. Joy, with whom he did a pop-up show in June at Race Street Pier. themetphilly.com.

Ashley McBryde

Oct. 24, Lansdowne Theater

Arkansas country songwriter Ashley McBryde has always leaned into rock and roll going back to her 2018 debut Girl Going Nowhere. But she really turns up the volume on the new Wild, which is a song cycle about a journey toward sobriety. thelansdownetheater.com

Allison Russell

Oct. 28, Colonial Theatre

Canadian-born and Nashville-based songwriter Allison Russell says her new album In The Hour Of Chaos, is about “connecting our hearts and voices in the same space in real time.” Its many guests include Brittany Spencer, Norah Jones, and Delco soul singer Devon Gilfillian. thecolonialtheatre.com

Afro Cuban All Stars

Oct. 30, Miller Theater

Juan de Marcos Gonzalez is a vocalist, impresario, and musician whose specialty is the Spanish tres guitar. He has been a key player in the Buena Vista Social Club. This tour continues the ongoing work of bringing Cuban music to the world. ensembleartsphilly.org

Vince Staples

Oct. 30, Franklin Music Hall

Long Beach, Calif., rapper Vince Staples is back on top of this game on Cry Baby, his pointedly political album that blends rock riffage and soulful funk into the mix. franklinmusichall.com

Built to Spill & Quasi

Oct. 30-31, Ardmore Music Hall

Doug Martsch is an indie rock guitar hero stretching back to Built to Spill’s 1993 debut Ultimate Alternative Wavers. These days, Martsch is joined by bassist Melanie Radford and drummer Teresa Esguera. Also on the bill is Quasi, the rollicking band of ex-spouses Sam Coomes and Janet Weiss, formerly the drummer of Sleater-Kinney. ardmoremusichall.com

Geese

Nov. 8-9, Fillmore

Incredibly brilliant indie art-pop band or nefarious industry plant that owes its success to TikTok payola? The debate around Geese’s breakthrough as (almost) universally praised critics’ darlings is silly. After the band led by Cameron Winter — the subject of a forthcoming Paul Thomas Anderson concert film — played a super sold-out Union Transfer last year, it’s back with two shows in a larger space. thefillmorephilly.com

Ami Taf Ra & Kamasi Washington

Nov. 5, City Winery Philadelphia

Moroccan vocalist Ami Taf Ra collaborated with maximalist jazzman Washington on The Prophet and The Madman, her 2025 spiritual jazz debut that bears the influence of Sun Ra and mixes Arabic music with gospel and jazz. citywinery.com/philadelphia

The Hooters

Nov. 5-6, Keswick Theatre

Last year, the Hooters’ annual Keswick shows were introduced, as always, by Pierre Robert, the WMMR-FM (93.3) radio legend who died a few days later. This will be an emotional weekend for the longstanding Philly rock band and its fans. keswicktheatre.com

Daniel Villarreal

Nov. 6-7, Solar Myth

Panama-born drummer Daniel Villarreal made his name on the Chicago music scene with a mixture of jazz and funk and a range of Latin music styles. The now-Philly-based synthesist will lead a five-piece band in a two-night residency. arsnovaworkshop.com

Olivia Rodrigo

Nov. 7, Xfinity Mobile Arena

On “The Cure,” the second single from her third album You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love, Olivia Rodrigo repeats the words “I’m unraveled,” as she reels from a breakup. That lyric leads us to “The Unraveled Tour,” the second arena trek from the former Disney star who hosted her own all-woman Daisy Chain Fields festival in August. xfinitymobilearena.com

Low Cut Connie & Ben Vaughn

Nov. 20, Union Transfer

Two generations of Philly rock and rollers team up on this bill, which finishes off a leg of the tour for Low Cut Connie’s party plus protest album Livin In the USA. LCC’s Adam Weiner is a sweaty, over the top showman, while radio host-producer Vaughn — who has a new album, Magnetic East: The Deer Tick Sessions due in October — prefers an understated, semi-ironic approach. WXPN-FM 24 Hour Song Challenge winners the Flying Vees open. utphilly.com

Doja Cat

Nov. 29, Xfinity Mobile Arena

Rapper and singer Amala Ratna Zandile Dlamini — otherwise known as Doja Cat — plays the penultimate show of a world tour that began in New Zealand last year in support of her disco-pop fifth album, Ma Vie. “Big Energy” Atlanta rapper Latto opens. xfinitymobilearena.com

Goosemas

Dec. 12-13, Boardwalk Hall

Every holiday season, the Connecticut-born yacht rock jam band throws a Christmas party. This year, it’s in Atlantic City. The show in support of the band’s new Big Modern! is a benefit for Western Sun Foundation, which supports grassroots nonprofit organizations. boardwalkhall.com

George Nakashima never intended to move his family to New Hope.

The famous furniture maker became one of the most sought-after artists in modern American design, considered so impactful that his home and studio in Bucks County were named a National Historic Landmark.

It was a significant recognition from the government that had previously incarcerated Nakashima, his wife, Marion, and their then newborn daughter, Mira, forcing them to relocate from their home in Seattle to the Minidoka concentration camp in Idaho in 1942.

The family was among some 120,000 Japanese Americans — including about 80,000 U.S. citizens — imprisoned during World War II due to the unsubstantiated fear that they could be foreign spies.

By that point in his late 30s, Nakashima was already a successful architect and woodworker who had earned a master’s degree from MIT and traveled the world. Incarceration shaped his artistic practice and changed his trajectory significantly. At the camp, he met a skilled carpenter who taught him traditional Japanese carpentry techniques that greatly influenced his burgeoning signature style.

New Hope became a new home to the Nakashimas in 1943 when the War Relocation Authority released them under supervision, thanks to Nakashima’s old boss Antonin Raymond, who sponsored their freedom.

(Ironically, the government respected the authority of the Czech immigrant Raymond, who was a naturalized citizen, over that of the Spokane-born Nakashima.)

The conditions of the release prevented Nakashima from pursuing architecture projects with Raymond, so he worked as a farmhand by day while continuing to craft furniture by night. He transformed the farm’s milk house into a workshop and found inspiration in the woodlands surrounding him, where he would eventually establish himself as a giant of American design for decades to come.

One of his earliest pieces after incarceration served as a poetic callback to the home he was compelled to leave behind: a coffee table made of teak wood from Washington a friend shipped to him.

Milk House Table (1944) is one of 10 Nakashima artworks on view at the Barnes Foundation this fall as part of its American art programming marking the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding. The exhibit “Noguchi to Asawa: Designing Postwar America” examines six renowned Japanese American artists whose work defined modern American art and design in the mid to late 20th century — all of whom were severely impacted by mass incarceration.

“This project is focused on six pretty iconic Japanese American artists who very much collectively shaped the look and the feel of mid-century America. The idea was to really look at the collective impact of this pivotal moment of Japanese incarceration during World War II, not only in the lives and careers of these artists, but by extension, in American art and design,” said Barnes curator Cindy Kang, who spearheaded the exhibit. “The roots of American modernism actually do extend into the Japanese incarceration camps. Some of these artists received their first really important artistic experiences there because they were incarcerated with professional artists, and that very much shaped the direction of their future careers.”

Two generations are represented in the show — those who were older, established artists before incarceration (Nakashima, sculptor/designer Isamu Noguchi, and sculptor Leo Amino) and a younger generation who had formative experiences learning from artists while incarcerated (graphic designer S. Neil Fujita, fiber artist Kay Sekimachi, and sculptor Ruth Asawa).

Their works span media, from wood furniture to copper wire sculptures to jazz album covers. (Fujita got his start at a Philadelphia ad agency and taught at the Philadelphia Museum College of Art, which was later named University of the Arts, before becoming the design director at Columbia Records.) The final room in the exhibit evokes a typical postwar American living room with everything made by Japanese American artists that underscores how essential their artwork became to the aesthetics of modern design.

“You may not have a Noguchi Akari lamp, but you may have the knockoffs from Target and Ikea,” said Kang.

In her research, Kang explored how wartime incarceration contributed to the complicated formation of an Asian American political identity following decades of anti-immigration policies and discrimination. She found that these artists’ assimilation into the legacy of American design often sidelined or erased their connections to these historic injustices.

“Especially with Nakashima and Noguchi, their work has been so fully assimilated into American design that the fact that they have these histories is so buried … you don’t even connect American design with these histories,” Kang said.

“That’s what I was trying to bring out [in this show]… You see a Noguchi or Nakashima chair or lamp or table and think, ‘Oh yeah that’s American design,’ and then not have any idea that it’s connected to Asian American history.”

Who gets to be an “American”? That question weighed heavily on Kang as she developed the exhibit and studied the historic period when the U.S. government imprisoned thousands of immigrants, including American citizens and children. She had no idea just how timely her project would feel opening this year, as the U.S. government continues to imprison tens of thousands of immigrants under President Donald Trump’s second administration.

“It really was not in our minds that this would be as relevant, or as on the nose as it is today, that’s really unfortunate,” said Kang. “We need to keep remembering we’ve been through this and we already know this is not a good direction. We need to learn this lesson again.”

For many of the featured artists, life after incarceration provided an opportunity to move past that traumatic time — they often did not discuss or share details about their imprisonment with their families or others. However, younger generations of Asian Americans, including the artists’ descendants, want to interrogate these histories further to understand how that trauma lingered on in the lives of these beloved artists.

For his part, Nakashima told his daughter that “his wounds healed over and left no scars.”

Still, he kept pieces of wood he collected from the Minidoka camp, which he used to create case furniture for their family home. In the exhibit, one of these remnants will be on display: a branch of dried bitterbrush.

“Noguchi to Asawa: Designing Postwar America,” runs through Jan. 10, 2027 at The Barnes Foundation, 2025 Benjamin Franklin Pkwy., Philadelphia, 215-278-7000 or barnesfoundation.org