Future. Purple Reign Tour

Lollapalooza 25 Year Anniversary Lineup Announced

Celebrating 25 years as a world-renowned festival, Lollapalooza 25 Year Anniversary delivers an all-star lineup with Radiohead, Red Hot Chili Peppers, LCD Soundsystem, J. Cole, Lana Del Rey, Future, Ellie Goulding, Major Lazer and Disclosure topping the bill.  The diverse lineup also features performances from G-Eazy, Chris Stapleton, Leon Bridges, Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats, Miike Snow, Kurt Vile & The Violators and much more. To commemorate this milestone anniversary, Lollapalooza will bring four full days of music and over 170 performances to Chicago's beautiful Grant Park, July 28- 31.  View the full lineup and lineup-by-day here.

Legacy acts from the early days of Lollapalooza will be front and center with the return of Jane's Addiction, fronted by Lollapalooza creator and founder Perry Farrell ­- with a set full of surprises, as well as Red Hot Chili Peppers, who headlined the festival in 1991 and 1992 respectively.

"I've immersed myself in this experience for 25 years now, but it's in a constant state of evolution, living and breathing. As long as we always try to find the eye of the hurricane, the epicenter of the music that is truly connecting right now, I think we can go for another 25 years! And we'll do it by always making sure to keep it fresh. Four days this year, over 170 of the best bands, including acts from all over the world as the music community connects globally more than ever; the best sound, staging and lights. We promise the festival will always strive to be the 'lifeblood' of the music scene," says Perry Farrell.

This year's collection of fresh faces include ZHU, Aurora, Bryson Tiller, Oh Wonder and Låpsley as well as heavy-hitting female artists including HAIM, Grimes, Alessia Cara, Lindsey Stirling, Kehlani, Melanie Martinez, and a highly anticipated return from Halsey following last year's breakthrough performance.

Flosstradamus, Hardwell, Martin Garrix, Duke Dumont, GRiZ, Big Gigantic, Marshmello and more will bring the beats for Lollapalooza's beloved dance music fans.

4-Day General Admission Tickets sold out on March 22.  A limited number of 1-Day General Admission Tickets ($120) and 1-Day VIP Tickets ($650) will be available for purchase today,March 23 at 10am CT.  4-Day VIP Tickets ($2,200), 4-Day Platinum Tickets ($4,200) and Official Hotel Packages are also available now at here.

Lollapalooza welcomes music fans of all ages, including kids. Children 10-years-old and younger will be admitted free of charge with a ticket-holding adult.

Fans worldwide who can't make it to Grant Park can watch The Official 2016 Lollapalooza Live Broadcast exclusively on Red Bull TV, which is distributed digitally for free on the web, connected TV platforms, smartphones and tablets as well as Lollapalooza.com. A full schedule of performances will be announced this July on Lollapalooza.com.

Lollapalooza 2016 is generously sponsored by: Samsung, Red Bull Sound Select, Bud Light, Pepsi, Toyota, BMI, Tito's Handmade Vodka, Citi and Cupcake Vineyards.


[Album] Big Gigantic: "The Night Is Young"

Dominic Lalli and Jeremy Salken make up the eclectic electronic dance music duo Big Gigantic. The pair have made name for themselves over the better part of the last five years since entering the national scene on the back of their talented, yet still developing aesthetic of mixing Jazz and Electronic sensibilities coherently into a single production. Where the pair's debut project, Fire It Up comes with glitchy electronic hits and seemingly forced horn runs, their latest project is anything but. Polished over incessant touring schedules and packed festival lineups every year, Big Gigantic has evolved into one of the most entertaining live electronic acts in the world. Forget the smoke, light stick cannons and 3D renderings of acts like Excision, Datsik and the like; what sets Big Gigantic apart and allows them to live up to their name is the innate ability to be different through instrumentation.

The first time seeing Lalli induce a drop with his saxophone, accented by Salken on drums live is an almost truly out of body experience. The Night Is Young very well may be the duo's best offering to date. Building on production lines established on the last project, Nocturnal, it is a full step up from where they were a year ago at this time. On "Blue Dream" you can hear pieces of "Rise and Shine", but with a distinctly different play on notes that takes it to a different place sonically. Sounds are tighter, the horns and electronic hits feel in tune with one another. If their debut project was electronic with a sprinkle of Jazz, this latest offering is a more equal split of tendencies. Adding Cherub on the first single off the project, aptly titled "The Night is Young" is the perfect collaboration for the pair and one that I am personally glad is out in the world. The project was released both as a free download via their website and on iTunes and Lalli and Salken announced a nationwide tour (Tickets) in tune with the project's release. Check it all out below.

(Check the Kanye sample on "Clvdbvrst")

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Paper Diamond Announces Tour with Trap Mix

Paper Diamond has big plans for the new year. Today, the Colorado-based DJ announced a 32-stop tour alongside the release of his 22 minute Trap mix, intended to get the party started before the tour even begins. A mainstay in the EDM world for a minute now, Paper Diamond entered the larger lexicon of listener's consciousness last year with the release of his EP, Paragon and continues to gain steam after a successful summer that saw him on several festival stages across the country including North Coast, Bonaroo and TomorrowWorld, as well as opening for Zeds Dead. PD will close out a successful 2013 campaign opening for Big Gigantic as they take their annual Chicago New Year's Eve show east to New York City. Always a party, and never repetitive, Paper Diamond puts on one hell of a party, check out the tour dates and accompanying mix here below for a slight preview.
[iframe id="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/121073065" mode="normal" align="center"]

12-28-2013 Dallas, TX Buy tickets

12-31-2013 New York, NY Buy tickets

01-23-2014 Birmingham, AL Buy tickets

01-24-2014 Knoxville, TN Buy tickets

01-25-2014 Nashville, TN Buy tickets

01-28-2014 Carrboro, NC Buy tickets

 

01-30-2014 Asheville, NC Buy tickets

01-31-2014 Athens, GA Buy tickets

02-01-2014 Atlanta, GA Buy tickets

02-05-2014 Charlottesville, VA Buy tickets

02-06-2014 Philadelphia, PA Buy tickets

02-08-2014 Boston, MA Buy tickets

02-12-2014 Washington, DC Buy tickets

02-13-2014 Syracuse, NY Buy tickets

02-14-2014 So Burlington, VT Buy tickets

02-15-2014 Portland, ME Buy tickets

02-16-2014 Northampton, MA

02-18-2014 Pittsburgh, PA Buy tickets

02-19-2014 Columbus, OH Buy tickets

02-20-2014 Cleveland, OH Buy tickets

02-21-2014 Detroit, MI Buy tickets

02-22-2014 Grand Rapids, MI Buy tickets

02-23-2014 Urbana, IL Buy tickets

02-26-2014 Milwaukee, WI Buy tickets

02-27-2014 Madison, WI Buy tickets

02-28-2014 Chicago, IL Buy tickets

03-01-2014 Minneapolis, MN Buy tickets

03-02-2014 Omaha, NE Buy tickets

03-05-2014 St. Louis, MO Buy tickets

03-06-2014 Lawrence, KS Buy tickets

03-07-2014 Tulsa, OK Buy tickets

03-08-2014 Fayetteville, AR Buy tickets


Mad Decent Block Party: Q&A with Big Gigantic

The Mad Decent team has been steadily criss-crossing the country with an also-steadily changing group of performers. As the summer begins hitting the homestretch, Mad Decent heads to Texas for an all ages performance at the Whitewater Music Ampitheater before the festival series heads off to the west coast for a pair of final dates in Los Angeles and San Diego. The New Braunfels stop includes headlining sets by Major Lazer, Bauuer, Dillon Francis and Flosstradamus, as well as Big Gigantic who we were able to catch up with before they hit the Lone Star state for a brief Q + A. Check out the interview below with drummer Jeremy Salken and head here for tickets if you'll be in the area this weekend.

Jake: Last time I talked to you two, you were preparing for New Year's Eve in Chicago. How have things been since?

Jeremy: Wow that was a long time ago! Now we’re prepping for this tour and New Years in NEW YORK!! Things have been freaking incredible.  We literally just finished up our summer festival season and it couldn’t have gone better.  We didn’t play as many festivals as last year but we headlined a few which was a huge step up for us! Cant wait to be back in Southern TX though! Things tend to get a little crazier down there!

Jake: What's the experience playing Mad Decent Block Party so far?

Jeremy: We’ve done 2 so far and they’ve been great!! Its an earlier show and the music literally never stops.  It goes hard from start to finish and is always insanely entertaining!

Jake: Where is the direction of the music headed/plans for a new album?

Jeremy: The music is constantly growing and evolving.  We were hoping to drop the new album this fall but are pushing things back to the beginning of 2014 to really get it where we want it to be.  Dom has been working endlessly night and day writing, producing and working on putting this masterpiece together.  He has the vision of what he wants it to be and you just cant rush that kind of thing.  As much as we wanted to put it out as soon as possible, it’ll be better to take a little more time with it and get it perfect (or as close to perfect as he can get).  We’re dropping a few tracks here and there for kids to check out to hold everyone over until 2014!

Jake: You two have been touring incessantly for a couple years now, any burnout? Going strong?

Jeremy: Stronger than ever!! The more we do it the more we figure out about how we want to do it.  We used to just hit the road endlessly and tour tour tour. Now we kind of do it in chunks and take little breaks in between to recooperate.  I think that’s one of the tricks to keeping it fresh!

Jake: Plans for the rest of 2013?

Jeremy: We’ve had a mellow summer so we’re hitting the West Coast for 2 weeks now, then we have a break before ROWDYTOWN at Red Rocks!! That’s like our hometown throwdown.  It’s the most beautiful venue we’ve been to and just such an epic place to play and have all our friends and fam come rage with us!  We have a break after that then we do a month long tour of the rest of the country in October!  November/December is pretty much open to finish album stuff then Mayan Holidaze w/ the homies and 2 Nights in NYC for New Years! Then we get a short break and things start right back up again! I Guess we don’t take off as much time as I thought! Haha, good thing we LOVE playing music!

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[RH Photos] North Coast Music Festival 2013 Day 2

Photography by Geoff Henao

Day Two of North Coast Music Festival in Union Park went off much smoother than the 2013 debut a day earlier. With the sun finally shining down and the heat pounding festival-goers, things got off to a fast start. Chicago's own Porn and Chicken got things going with their 2:30 set at the Last Stand Stage, picking up where frat-dance kings Milk n' Cookies warmed up the stage earlier.

After floating through the following sets and checking out a truly inspired set from Conspirator, I found myself torn between the silky smooth tones of Aloe Blacc, the rough-edged hip hop of Flatbush Zombies and the endearing DJ sounds of Thibault. I ended up making the rounds to each briefly, unfortunately missing most of Flatbush due to simply not being able to navigate the festival properly. Between Bondax, Gramatik, Future Rock and the smattering of EDM/Dance acts on the Tent Stage, the Saturday afternoon air was soon completely inundated with the glitchy sound of digital music. Being a big fan of both Gramatik and Bondax, it was disappointing that organizers pushed so many similar acts together and brought about memories of monotonous EDM festivals of earlier months.

Emerging from the dense electronic jungle, Nas took the North Stage to close it out for the day. The New York MC showed precisely why he is one of the most decorated hip-hop acts in the history of the genre, filling his hour-long set with tracks from his entire discography. Dipping back to Illmatic for timeless hit ("The World is Yours", "Life's a Bitch", "Memory Lane") and peppering more recent work from several albums (God's Son, Stillmatic, Life is Good), Nasir Jones put on a show that won't soon be forgotten at North Coast.

EDM made it's way back to the stage in two forms to close out Saturday, with Big Gigantic and Afrojack bringing up the rear as the day's headliners. Jeremy Salken and Dominic Lalli continued their string of impressive Chicago shows by performing their instrumental take on the genre that includes live drums and saxophone, drawing one of the biggest crowds of the weekend. A meet and greet organized through Thissongissick.com kept the pair standing stage-side for hours. For his part, Afrojack held things down, giving fans a grittier dance experience from the other side of the festival grounds and closing out what was easily the biggest day at North Coast for anyone trying to dance.