San Francisco Bay Area premier independent music festival Noise Pop has made strides to make its 31st year move, sound, and look like the world we all live in. That kind of butts-in-seat calculus grows a festival alongside the culture.
Following last month’s initial lineup announcement—Snail Mail, Cherry Glazerr, Kendra Morris— Noise Pop has now expanded its musical assemblage with jazz-adjacent artists such as Louis Cole and Genevieve Artadi performing at August Hall on February 28, and the skin-and-bones punk of Chicago’s DEHD at Great American Music Hall on February 29.
The festival will be partnering up again this year with SFJAZZ to bring The Seshen and Melanie Charles for an open dance floor performance March 2 and 3 in the Joe Henderson Lab. Jacques Greene goes B2B with Nosaj Thing at Gray Area for electronic music fulfillment.
Noise Pop looks to make its 2024 debut with intimate concerts starting from the likes of The Mountain Goats and Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter at the ever-harmonious Grace Cathedral.
‘Tis the gourmet, to-go assortment of buzz and bedlam that festival lovers have come to expect, which has local and international talent mashin’ about SF and Oakland’s spectral venues for over a week.
Butts in seats, indeed.
2024’s gigs will also include indie darling headliner and singer-songwriter Snail Mail at Great American Music Hall, lo-fi garage rocker Cherry Glazerr at August Hall, all-encompassing retro soul lyricist Kendra Morris at Bottom of The Hill, and the rising Peruvian-born and Berlin-based house music producer Sofia Kourtesis bumping that bass at 1015 Folsom.
As we await the full lineup and event schedule to drop next month, here are some acts from the second phase you should check on.
LOUIS COLE, FEBRUARY 28
When it comes to the Brainfeeder empire, I don’t care which side of the fence you’re on. Founded by none other than Steven Ellison, aka Flying Lotus, DJ and filmmaker extraordinaire and late jazz pianist Alice Coltrane’s grandnephew—this label can be many things, but subtle is not in the mortar.
Take a look at the lineup and you’ll see Thundercat, Kamasi Washington, Georgia Anne Muldrow—pretty much the front line of progressive jazz, and some other stuff going on right now. Under those heavyweights, Brainfeeder constantly signs new artists exploring the jazz-related space, but that feel the need to add some different accents to the patina.
Fresh off his recent Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Jazz album, Louis Cole has been riding and pushing his insane musicianship performance videos on YouTube for a decade, growing a dedicated fanbase who absorb and expect both his craft and off-the-wall style.
Drums, bass, keys—and he has a monk-like attitude to practice and perfecting his art. Quincy Jones co-signed this dude. Get it?
Thundercat describes him as “one of Los Angeles’s greatest musicians,” and I’ve caught Thundercat performing “I Love Louis Cole.” Peep into his deep-crate video catalog and you’ll understand why he has the world’s most recognized bass player singing his praises.
GENEVIEVE ARTADI, FEBRUARY 28
Songwriting partner of Cole’s, Genevieve Artadi will be performing with him at Noise Pop. This self-described “creative tornado” is cut from the same all-in-’til-we-fall-in cloth, and has written and collaborated with Thundercat as well. Jazz may be the main subject of Artadi’s concentration, but the artist is just as multi-genre-studied as Brainfeeder.
That label has the players, for sure!
THE SESHEN, MARCH 2
When you see this Bay Area band live, it’s the crowd that lets you know, even before they hit the stage, that you are in for a sweaty, dance-y, post-punky electronic music show accentuated by Afrobeats. It’s a trip, and it’s one you want to take. Time and time again, they synthesize electronic music, R&B, and indie-pop into a cohesive prospect. Led by the powerful vocals of Lalin St. Juste, this Bay Area-based sextet is known for presenting polar opposites side by side, creating a low-end foundation where the melody just echoes from on top.
You may just have to see them at the Noise Pop and SFJAZZ event, on an open dance floor no less, to understand.
DEHD, FEBRUARY 29
Ambassadors of Chicago’s progressively high-yielding DIY scene, punk band DEHD stand and waver on the precipice of the new and nostalgic. From their debut Water, a chaotically freaky rumination high off the fumes of a shock record, they used the factual romantic break-up from Jason Balla and Emily Kempf as an opportunity to explore sensations of thanks for being granted the opportunity to feel. Trippy, right?
Naah. That’s punk, Son.
Their third record Flower of Devotion, a timely expression of return after an extended pause, played nicely as a soundtrack running underneath the tenderhearted flick I Used To Go Here with Gillian Jacobs, shot in Carbondale, Illinois, five hours south of Dehd’s hometown city of Chicago.
They continually use what’s in proximity to deliver elevated art.
You can go to the Noise Pop site for the full line-up announcement and to purchase tickets. They go on sale on Fri/15.
