Concerts
Page: 19
Since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, most of the country’s musical acts have taken sides, either supporting or condemning the war – but not Picnic.
The aging Russian rock band notably refrained from making any statements about the invasion of Ukraine. Many of their fellow musicians faced touring bans or exile for voicing their opposition, while others performed on the frontlines in solidarity with the Kremlin or in occupied Ukrainian territories.
Now, 46 years after its formation, Picnic has grabbed more global attention than ever for tragic reasons: Its planned concert at the Crocus City Hall in Moscow became the site of a mass shooting last Friday (March 22), with at least 137 lives lost in the terrorist attack. ISIS-K, an offshoot of the terrorist group ISIS, claimed responsibility for the March 22 attack.
Since then, some Russian media outlets have claimed that the band supported Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, suggesting this was one of the reasons that terrorist gunmen targeted the show.
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The band did not comment on these reports. In fact, the band’s current frontman, Edmund Shklyarsky, who joined in 1981 as a guitarist and soon became Picnic’s main songwriter, has remained steadfastly apolitical since the terrorist attack. In his only public comments in the wake of the tragedy, he released a video address expressing “condolences to everyone who, involuntarily and naturally, found themselves involved in this terrible tragedy, utterly senseless. It is clear that there are no words that can resurrect or console people. But, of course, we offer our condolences to all relatives.”
Picnic will brave the stage again on Wednesday (March 27) at St. Petersburg’s Oktyabrsky concert hall. The concert will be dedicated to the victims of the Crocus City Hall attack, with the band announcing on social media that proceeds will be donated to the families of those who lost their lives or were injured in the attack.
The band’s manager, Yuri Chernyshevsky, wouldn’t comment on Picnic’s views on the war with Ukraine, and told Billboard that “you would need to ask the terrorists why they targeted Picnic’s show or why they targeted Crocus City Hall. I hope law enforcement will determine that.”
In the early 1980s, Picnic became part of the Leningrad Rock Club, an organization, allegedly controlled by the KGB, that facilitated underground and semi-underground rock bands to perform at a time when rock music in the Soviet Union faced scrutiny, if not outright bans. Later, Picnic’s songs drew criticism from Communist authorities for lyrics referencing illegal drug use.
In the latter half of the 1980s, Picnic, like other bands, benefited from the perestroika and glasnost reforms in the Soviet Union, which allowed formerly underground rock bands to officially tour and record. However, unlike some prominent bands of the period, Picnic largely avoided social and political issues, focusing more on esoteric and mystical themes in their lyrics.
Currently, the band includes the 68-year-old Shklyarsky, his son Stas on keyboards, bassist Marat Korchemny and drummer Leonid Kirnos. The band’s fan base is diverse, ranging from older listeners who have followed Picnic since the 1980s to younger fans introduced to the band through social media.
At the time of the March 22 attack, musicians from Picnic and a 65-piece orchestra set to accompany the rock band were in their respective dressing rooms and were promptly evacuated. However, Ekaterina Kushner, a member of Picnic’s administrative staff manning the merchandise table, died in the attack.
Another concert by Picnic and the symphonic orchestra was scheduled at the same venue on March 23. Almost all tickets for both performances at the 6,200-seat Crocus City Hall had been sold.
Willie Nelson’s famed 4th of July Picnic is moving to the City of Brotherly Love for the first time.
The concert, which he started in 1973, will be held at Freedom Mortgage Pavilion in Camden, N.J., just outside Philadelphia, the birthplace of America.
In addition to Nelson, the lineup will include Bob Dylan, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Maren Morris, Mavis Staples and Celisse.
“I am thrilled to bring the 4th of July Picnic to Philadelphia for the first time in our storied history,” Nelson said in a statement. “It’s an honor to host such an extraordinary lineup of talent in the birthplace of our country. We can’t wait to celebrate Independence Day with you.”
Courtesy Photo
Nelson, 91, first held the 4th of July Picnic more than 50 years ago in 1973 at Hurlbut Ranch in Dripping Springs, Texas. Over the decades, artists on the bill have included Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, The Charlie Daniels Band, Rita Coolidge and Leon Russell. Last year’s event was held at Q2 Stadium in Austin, Texas, and featured Tyler Childers, Dwight Yoakam, Shakey Graves and Sierra Ferrell, among others. Though this is the first stop in the Philly area, the picnic has been held outside Texas before, including at The Gorge in Quincy, Washington, in 2007 and Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1978.
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Tickets go on sale to the public Friday (March 29) at 10 a.m. via Ticketmaster. Citi cardmembers can access presale tickets from Tuesday (March 26) at 10 a.m. local time until Thursday (March 28) at 10 p.m. local time through the Citi Entertainment program. The event is presented by Blackbird Presents and Live Nation Entertainment.
The picnic comes during a particularly busy time for Nelson, who will release his new album The Border on May 31 and will, once again, headline his annual Outlaw Music Festival Tour, which kicks off June 21 in Alpharetta, Georgia, and features many of the same artists as will appear at the July 4 event.
On Monday (March 24), Jazz at Lincoln Center revealed the host for its upcoming all-star tribute to late legend Tony Bennett, which doubles as the center’s annual gala fundraiser. Tony-nominated, Billboard 200-topping singer and actor Josh Groban is set to host the April 17 even at the Frederick P. Rose Hall in Manhattan’s Lincoln Center. […]
One of summer’s biggest blowouts, Milwaukee’s annual multi-weekend Summerfest festival, announced the full lineup for the 2024 edition on Thursday (March 21). As always, it is packed with some of the best, biggest and brightest pop, rock, country, hip-hop and EDM acts, including headliners Kane Brown (with Kameron Marlowe and Nightly) and Mötley Crüe (with Seether and Buckcherry) on the first weekend (June 20-22).
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That inaugural weekend will also feature performances from: Goo Goo Dolls, Toosi, Black Pumas, Chelsea Cutler, Taking Back Sunday, David Kushner, Brittany Howard, O.A.R., Umphreys McGee, En Vogue, Gin Blossoms,Dawes, The War & Treaty, Allen Stone and many more.
The second weekend (July 27-29) will be topped by Illenium, Tyler Childers (with S.G. Goodman and Adeem the Artist) and Keith Urban (with NEEDTOBREATHE and Alana Springsteen), with additional sets from Muna, Jessie Murph, Allison Wonderland, Key Glock, Hippo Campus, Fletcher, REO Speedwagon, Sleater-Kinney, the Hold Steady, Mario, Metric, Briston Maroney, The Church, Ethel Cain, Brent Cobb, the Dandy Warhols and more.
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The final weekend (July 4-6) will feature AJR (with Carly Rae Jepsen and mxmton) as headliner, along with Maroon 5 and Lil Uzi Vert (with Lil Yachty, JID, Rico Nasty and LIHTZ), as well as Ivan Cornejo, Bryson Tiller, Mt. Joy, Lil Tecca, Chase Rice, Local Natives, Cold War Kids, Mariah the Scientist, JXDN, Coin, Extreme, Del Water Gap, Nikki Lane and Cimafunk, among others.
“Our 2024 lineup embodies the essence of what makes Summerfest so special. With a curated selection of artists spanning genres and styles, the festival reflects the vibrancy of today’s music scene,” said Milwaukee World Festival Inc. president/CEO Sarah Pancheri in a statement. “With 600 artists at a 75-acre permanent festival park, Summerfest creates a one-of-a-kind environment that our fans look forward to every summer.”
Tickets for Summerfest are on sale now here, with single-day GA starting at $28; a UScellular Power Pass is available for $65 for a limited time (now through March 28 at 11:59 p.m. ET), which includes admission to all 9 days of the festival.
See the full 2024 Milwaukee Summerfest lineup poster below.
Maren Morris is hitting the road this summer on the RSVP Redux tour. The “Circles Around This Town” singer announced the dates for her 11-show Live Nation-promoted North American outing on Thursday morning (March 21), with the shows slated to kick off on May 29 with a gig at the Masonic in San Francisco.
Betty Who will accompany Morris on select dates, which will also include stops in Seattle, Vancouver, Boise, Salt Lake City, Phoenix and Dillon, Colorado, with the run scheduled to wind down on July 31 at the Festival at Sandpoint in Sandpoint, Idaho.
According to a release announcing the dates, the name of the tour announced in the midst of Women’s History Month is meant as a call-back to Morris’ 2020 RSVP tour, as well as a celebration of the fifth anniversary of the singer’s Girl album. It is also meant as a “true celebration of the fans, featuring a different set list each night curated by the fans themselves.”
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Morris performed at the 2024 Billboard Women in Music event earlier this month, where she was also awarded the Visionary Award for her commitment to speak out against injustices during her career. Tickets for the upcoming tour will be available through an artist presale beginning on March 26 at 10 a.m. local time, with additional presales running throughout the week ahead of the general onsale beginning on March 29 at 10 a.m. local time; information on tickets can be found here. Morris has teamed up with the Ally Coalition to donate $1 from every ticket to LGBTQ+ organizations serving youth.
Morris released her Grammy-nominated third studio album, Humble Quest, in March 2022.
Check out the dates for Morris’ 2024 RSVP Redux tour below.
May 29 – San Francisco, CA @ The Masonic
May 31 – Bend, OR @ Hayden Homes Amphitheater ^
June 1 – Seattle, WA @ Chateau Ste. Michelle +
June 3 – Vancouver, BC @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre
June 5 – Boise, ID @ Revolution Concert House and Event Center
June 6 – Salt Lake City, UT @ The Complex
June 8 – Phoenix, AZ @ Arizona Financial Theatre
June 11 – Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre ^
June 12 – Dillon, CO @ Dillon Amphitheater
June 14 – Lincoln, CA @ Thunder Valley Casino +*
July 31 – Sandpoint, ID @ Festival at Sandpoint *
^ With Betty Who
+ Previously announced
* Non-Live Nation Date
Next month’s Rabbit Eats Lettuce festival will etch its name in the history books as the first event in an Australian state to offer pill-testing services.
Set for the Easter long weekend, from March 28-April 1, the electronic and dance-specialist fest is at home near Warwick in the south-east corridor of Queensland — the first Australian state or territory to commit to supporting pill testing on an ongoing basis.
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Partygoers will have access to free, voluntary, and confidential pill testing by an “appropriately qualified chemist,” reads a statement from state government, which is tipping in nearly A$1 million ($660,000) in investment over two years.
“I am thrilled to be supporting new and innovative services to help reduce harms from illicit drug use,” comments minister for health, mental health and ambulance service Shannon Fentiman.
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These services, Fentiman continues, “are all about harm minimization; we don’t want people ending up in our emergency departments – or worse losing their life.”
According to figures published by Queensland government, 2,231 drug-induced deaths were reported in Australia in 2021– the equivalent of five deaths each day.
“That’s 2,231 deaths too many,” Fentiman continues, “and we know this number will continue to grow if we don’t act now.”
In 2019, two people died after consuming drugs at Rabbit Eats Lettuce.
Harm Reduction Australia is contracted to deliver “several” festival-based services in 2024 and 2025 following an open market tender process. The state government has also engaged the University of Queensland to conduct an evaluation of the services and to develop a statewide monitoring process.
Also, through a healthcare partnership, fixed-site services will operate at two locations in south-east Queensland, including one in Bowen Hills, central Brisbane, and “at least one festival-based service” in 2024.
It’s a “step in the right direction in reducing drug-related harm,” Rabbits Eat Lettuce festival organizer Eric Lamir tells the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and, through the process, police have been “extremely supportive” in preparing for the gathering. Data captured from chemical tests will be shared with the festival’s medical staff, which “means our paramedics and doctors will be able to have up-to-date data on what drugs might be circulating at the event.”
The public debate on pill testing in Australia has rumbled on for years, and entered a trial phase for the first time at the Groovin the Moo festival in the Australian Capital Territory in April 2018, where two potentially deadly samples were identified and half the drugs tested were found to contain no psychoactive substances.
Off the back of that trial and others in Canberra, Queensland developed testing protocols, and gave the green light for chemically-checking drugs in February 2023.
With pill testing services rolling out proper at the 15th edition of Rabbits Eat Lettuce, an “important milestone” is notched “in the ongoing efforts of Queensland to reduce drug related harms,” comments a spokesperson for Pill Testing Australia, “and we know the patrons of the festival and their families and friends will greatly appreciate the availability of this vital public health service.”
Read more here.
Bruce is back.
If there was any doubt that Bruce Springsteen hadn’t fully recovered from the peptic ulcer disease that caused him to postpone 29 dates on his world tour with the E Street Band last fall, he dispensed of that notion within minutes of taking the stage Tuesday (March 19) at Phoenix’s Footprint Center for the first time in six months.
The Boss was in top form from show opener “Lonesome Day” and fully had his sea legs back by third song, “No Surrender,” when he gave his first trademark shout out, “C’mon, Steve!” beckoning for his brother-in-music for over half a century, Steven Van Zandt, to join him on the mic.
For more than 50 years, Springsteen’s live shows have been about two things above and beyond the superb musical performance: Feeling alive and trusting in the communion between the Boss and his fans.
For longtime fans such as myself (I’ve seen more than 50 shows over more than 30 years), a Springsteen concert is one of the places where we feel most vibrant. There’s the unbridled joy of hearing the music that has given meaning and voice to our life experiences in the company of likeminded souls. For many of us, Springsteen has been the best traveling companion through life imaginable. Part of that also comes from the trusting communion at any show: there’s the implicit understanding that Springsteen is going to take care of us and entertain us during that concert the best way he can—by pouring everything he has into the performance— and, in return, we’re going to send that energy back to the stage by being as present as we can be.
That’s why when he postponed nearly 30 shows after his Sept. 3 dates at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. because of his illness, fans feared that this could be the end. Even though he has long prided himself on being in superhuman physical condition (and proved he still is in Phoenix by ripping his shirt open to show his toned chest), at 74, it’s clear that the road will end eventually for Springsteen. But as Tuesday night showed, he’s returned at the top of his game and the end feels far into the future if he wants it to be (though for longtime fans, it hasn’t gone unnoticed that on this tour Springsteen does not end the shows with his former trademark line, “We’ll be seein’ you.”)
When this world tour started in February 2023, Springsteen was working a theme built around “Last Man Standing,” an emotional song featured on his underrated 2020 album, Letter to You. Like on the earlier shows on the tour, Springsteen addressed the Phoenix audience (in this case, for the first time all night more than an hour in), giving a beautiful speech about playing in his first band, The Castiles, when he was 15 in the mid-‘60s, and how more than 50 years later, he stood by the bedside of his friend and bandmate George Theiss, as he lay dying, leaving Springsteen the last member of the band alive. It’s a reflection on mortality, but also on resilience and joy. Though he’s never spoken of death and the gift it brings the living from stage so eloquently before, it’s understood by fans. For example, after my mother died, I consoled myself by going to as many shows as I could on the consecutive Magic and Working on a Dream tours because standing in the pit of a Springsteen show was where I felt most alive.
Unlike the setlists from earlier shows that seemed slightly more reflective and wide-ranging, Tuesday’s show was a high-octane freight train of a rock show. The message is that life is to be savored and, more than anything, celebrated and met head on at full-speed. Springsteen and the band barreled through 29 songs, most of them full-on rockers, in 2 hours and 45 minutes. The show felt nothing if not efficient. There was no fat. The only break between songs was the few seconds it took for Springsteen to change guitars and, other than a few asides, he only addressed the audience for the speech before “Last Man Standing” and after “Backstreets.” He never brought up his illness until right before the closing song when he apologized to anyone inconvenienced by the Phoenix date shifting from Nov. 30 to March 19, adding, “I had a mother**ker of a bellyache.”
Below are five of the highlights from the Phoenix show, which had former N.J. governor Chris Christie and rocker Alice Cooper in attendance, in an evening filled with nothing but stellar moments.
One-Two Punch of “Last Man Standing” and “Backstreets”
Fans were delayed but not denied their visit from The Boss Tuesday night (March 19) in Phoenix as Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band resumed their world tour after a six-month break. Springsteen was originally slated to play the Arizona date on Nov. 30 last year, but it was one of 29 shows postponed after […]
Lady Gaga is headed back to Las Vegas for a summer run of more Jazz & Piano shows. The singer announced the news on Tuesday morning (March 19), revealing that she will be back on the stage at the Dolby Live theater at Park MGM for eight shows between June 19 and July 6. Explore […]
SZA, Tyler, The Creator, blink-182, The Killers, Future X Metro Boomin will headline this summer’s Lollapalooza festival in Chicago. The August 1-4 throwdown in the Windy City will also feature headline sets from Hozier, Stray Kids, Melanie Martinez and Skrillex among the 170 bands that will perform on eight stages over four days.
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Among the other acts on the lineup announced on Tuesday (March 19) are: Deftones, Tate McRae, Laufey with the Chicago Philharmonic, Reneé Rapp, Lizzy McAlpine, Zedd, Fisher, Zeds Dead, Dominic Fike, Labrinth, Pierce the Veil, Victoria Monét, Sexyy Red, Teddy Swims, Faye Webster, Benson Boone, Jungle, Two Door Cinema Club, Killer Mike, Ive, Vince Staples, Kesha, Galantis, Kevin Abstract, Ethel Cain, Chappell Roan, Megan Mornoey, Teezo Touchdown and many more.
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Fans can sign up now for the 2024 presale, which will kick off on Thursday (March 21) from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. ET; the presale is the only way to guarantee the lowest price on 4-day general admission, GA+, VIP and Platinum tickets. Ticket prices will increase at 1 p.m ET when the public onsale begins; click here for ticketing information. One-day tickets and the lineup-by-day rundown will be available at a later date.
This year will mark Skrillex’s first show in a decade and K-pop boyband Stray Kids will be making their Lolla Chicago debut.
Last summer’s event featured headlining sets from Billie Eilish, Lana Del Rey, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Kendrick Lamar, Odesza, Karol G, TOMORROW X TOGETHER and The 1975. The four-day extravaganza that sets up in Grant Park in downtown Chicago draws more than 400,000 fans to the massive party near Lake Michigan.
Check out the full lineup poster below.