Ain't no party like a Fulton Street Party. Especially when it comes to live music.

Plus, Cypress Hill headlines Taco Truck Throwdown.

Fulton Street has been a coalescing point for live music since back when the bulk of it was still a pedestrian mall.

Aside from being the address for a number of music venues (including the original Club Fulton and the Patterson Hall, Star Palace and later Frank’s Place and Peeve’s Public House and Tioga Sequoia, Full Circle Brewing, etc.) the street has long been used to host large-scale events.

For years, there were annual Mexican Independence Day celebrations at Mariposa Plaza. The street was a major thoughoughfare for the Fresno Urban Sound Experience (F.U.S.E. Fest) and ground zero for three years of the Catacomb Party.

More recently, the southern end has become home to the FresYes Fest.

And now the Fulton Street Party, which happens Aug. 26 and looks to rank just below Tower Porchfest in terms of participating bands/musicians.

More than 50 bands are slated to play at one of 13 indoor and outdoor venues along the strip from Mono to Merced streets.

A short list of venues includes Los Panchos, Lune Wine Bar, The Fulton, Hashtag Balance, Emergence Studios, Sun Stero Warehouse, Tioga Sequoia and Full Circle Brewing Company.

There will be a main stage at Mariposa Plaza that will feature headlining sets from Fashawn and The Morning Drive (along with Nate, Sahab, Danza Azteca Xipe Totec, Teocalli Cultural Academy, Belmont Sound System, Jacq Maliq, Carl Armada and the Homies and Zee Will).

Other venues have put together their own lineups and schedules.

The Fulton, for example is running two stages (one indoor and one outside) with two headliners (Differences and Shawshank) and a dozen openers (Hour 13, Scoundrel, Beyond California, True Bearing, The Uncorrupted, Dear Distance, Out of the Ring, Slip Lip, Narylhead, End of Season, Dave Hate Machine, Perception and Rotten Apple).

Tioga-Sequoia will have music from Isaac Michaels, Smuding Ceremony, The Ragged Jubilee, North by North and Brother Luke and the Comrades.

There’s a “Tower Porchfest” stage at the Sun Stereo Warehouse with Jonathan Lofi, Ken Pipkin, Matthew Embry, ShapHill Jazz, Subale and John Clifton.

The restaurant Los Panchos has a lineup with Bigfoot and the Moon, Soulito, Starline Arcade, Macondo and Brian Cade.

The full-slate of lineups cane be found all over social media if you’re looking.

Of course, this is officially a street party (not a music festival) so expect vendors, food tucks and several beer gardens. There will also be a fashion show (curated by FTK Construction), a car show and kids zone and a half-block dedicated to cannabis culture (sponsored by the Artist Tree dispensary).

The pre-party happens at Chukchansi Park, where the Fresno Grizzles host a home game (playing as the Lowriders de Fresno). The whole thing kicks off at 4 p.m. and is free and open to all ages.

The first Fulton Street Party happened in 2017 as sort of high-level proof of concept of what the newly reimagined Fulton Mall could become. It has since become a vehicle to highlight the businesses and organizations that keep the revitalization.

Cypress Hill to headline Taco Truck Throwdown 12

Fresno’s Taco Truck Throwdown announced this week that weed-rap pioneers (I’m just making that up, but …) Cypress Hill will headline this year’s event.

Cypress Hill made a name for themselves in the 1990s rap scene with songs like “Insane in the Brain,” and “How I Could Just Kill a Man” (of the ones that were big amongst people I knew.

It’s a good get for the throwdown.

Without checking the archives, I’d like to say there was a year or two, early on, when the Taco Truck Throwdown didn’t have music; when it was just a dozen or so trucks and thousands people in lines snaking through the concourse at Chukchansi Park.

The event has grown since then, obviously. Its’ no longer tied specifically to a Fresno Grizzlies game day and while the taco trucks are front and center, organizers have found a way to celebrate not just the trucks themselves, but all the whole of taco-truck culture in the Valley.

That has been well reflected in it choice of entertainment. See: e Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, playing alongside Fresno’s Carlos Montano Band, or Patrick Contreras’ duet with Genuwine or that year they had DJ Quik open for Ramon Ayala.

“Cypress Hill is a bucket-list type act for this event,” Taco Truck Throwdown co-founder Mike Osegueda said. “Adding them to our already great lineup of taco trucks is a going to make for an unforgettable night in Central California.”

That’s it for this week. Remember you can now hear me on the Homegrown Show Sundays at 8 p.m. on New Rock 104.1 FM. If you have anything you think I need to be looking at or listening to, feel free to let me know: jtehee@gmail.com