Concert season is upon us in Fresno. Here's who's set to play
There's a Vallejo-based rapper and your favorite chainsaw-wielding rock band. Plus, Vina Robles fills out its 2025 concert series.
In the past few weeks, the number of concert announcements (and over all concert news) has been coming hot in heavy (‘tis the season).
Aftershock (arguably, the largest, closest thing we have to a Central Valley music festival these days) announced its lineup earlier this month.
It’s a massive and kinda weird mix if you’re just scrolling through the band names. You have Mom Jeans and Turnstile, listed alongside Yngwie Malmsteen and Carcass and Powerwolf and … Bowling for Soup.
This is ignoring the headliners (Blink-182, Deftones, Korn and Bring Me the Horizon).
The festival makes a little more sense broken down day to day and you can probably tell a lot about a person by which day gets them most excited. I’m a Friday kind of guy, FYI.
Here is some more Fresno specific concert news you may have missed.
Morrissey will be at Warnors Theatre in April. Think what you will of the guy, this seemed like big news when it was announced last month. Tickets have moved accordingly. The show is not sold out, but if you don’t have a ticket, you’ll wanna get on that. It looks like there are only a few seats left (like, less than a half dozen, unless you want to go to the resell market).
English punk icons Buzzcocks are coming to Strummer’s May 15, which seems like an almost unimaginably insane place to see that band play (in a good way).
Tycho announced an April 29 date at the Tower Theatre. That’s the day after the Morrissey show, so … good week for music fans. The band played the theater in 2017 and it was amazing (from reviews I’ve heard from people who were there).
Sparta’s Porcelain tour is going to be in Fresno April 19 at the Tower Theater Lounge (the old Daily Planet space). Sparta. Which, again … seems like an insane place to see that band play.
This one’s not until the end of June, but is worth flagging early. LaRussell is a rapper from Vallejo who feels like he’s gonna be the next cool thing. Which just means, I’m probably late the game. The guy has like 30 albums, is known for playing back-yard parties instead of theaters and selling stock in his music catalog for next to nothing. There’s also this (for the Tiny Desk crowd).
Jackyl owned a weird space in music in the 1990s. A lovechild of late ‘70s southern rock and ’80s hair metal, the band was playing to arena crowds during the rise of grunge. Led by a chainsaw wielding frontman named Jesse James Dupree, the band felt like the heir apparent to Lynyrd Skynyrd. Or Ted Nugent, maybe. Other bands have come along that maybe fill that spot better, but Jackyl did it first (question mark??). The band plays the Tower Theatre, April 6.
Vina Robles Amphitheater, which I am counting here as a “local” venue, has filled in its 2025 concert series. Rod Stewart, who plays the amphitheater June 15, has been announced for awhile, but we now have confirmation for Leon Bridges (June 4), Joe Bonamassa (Aug. 1), the Indigo Girls with Melissa Ethridge (Aug. 7) and Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin (May 29), Chris Issak (May 23) and Los Tucanes de Tijuana (May 2). There’s also the Happy Together tour, which I mention only to wonder if Gary Puckett and the Union Gap is allowed to “Young Girl,” anymore. You can see the amphitheater’s full lineup here.
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. I’m in the studio by my lonesome tonight with new music from Kikki, Big Elk and more. Follow my other writing at The Fresno Bee. If you have anything you think I need to be looking at or listening to, feel free to let me know: jtehee@gmail.com