Let’s talk about Noise Pop 2026 in San Francisco, where a lively gaggle of badge-wearing music fans and industry folks zigzag across the city each night trying to see as many shows as humanly possible in a single week. Since its founding in 1993, Noise Pop has been one of the city’s most beloved independent music festivals, built around the small venues and a musically inclined spirit that define San Francisco’s culture. What started as a modest gathering of indie and underground bands has grown into a weeklong celebration that still feels intimate, with shows scattered across rooms like Bottom of the Hill, Swedish American Hall, and Great American Music Hall. This year’s lineup carried that tradition forward, featuring artists including Jeffrey Lewis, Stephen Malkmus, Rogue Wave, illuminati hotties, Black Marble, Sun Ra Arkestra, and many more. I had the pleasure of catching several of these sets as both a writer and photography guest, bouncing between venues and soaking in that unmistakable Noise Pop energy where the whole city briefly feels like one interconnected stage. Continue reading “Noise Pop 2026: A Reminiscing…”
Author: Tiffany Michelle Black
Show Review: Cat Power at The Fox Theater, 2/18/26
I found out about the show late. I had asked the magazine for a photo pass and was told Chan wasn’t allowing photography. No cameras in the audience. That was the boundary. Instead, they handed me a viewing ticket at the last minute, which felt generous and slightly strange. I’m usually moving around the pit thinking about light and angles. This time I took a seat. Front row balcony, the Fox opening up beneath me.
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SF Sketchfest Review: Wife Material with Sydney Kane at Eclectic Box, 1/25/26
Photos by Gabrielle f. Korein
Eclectic Box SF is the kind of small Mission venue where nothing is hidden, and everything lands a little harder, making it an ideal setting for Wife Material. The show arrived wrapped in an I Love Lucy-adjacent aesthetic, all bubblegum pink and tongue-in-cheek humor, but quickly revealed something far more anxious and intimate underneath. Kane entered in full Britney pink, with a headset mic, sorority curls pulled into a half-wedding updo, and towering six-inch square platform heels, immediately establishing both control and exposure. From the start, she blurred the line between performer and audience, pulling a small cluster of front-row participants into a scripted interaction that cracked the fourth wall and set the tone for the vulnerability to come. Behind her sat two nonchalant, middle-aged indie rock types on drums and keys, steady and almost indifferent, which only heightened the emotional contrast onstage.
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Show Review: Alex G at The Fox Theater – Oakland, 9/23 & 24
I was planning on taking my 15-year-old daughter to see Alex G. She’s the reason I got into him six years ago. She discovered him on YouTube, and over time she grew increasingly irritated by the hordes on TikTok who butchered his lyrics and turned his shows into screaming matches over mis heard refrains. Continue reading “Show Review: Alex G at The Fox Theater — Oakland, 9/23 & 24”
Show Review: Grandaddy at The Regency Ballroom, 9/16/25
The Regency Ballroom has a way of holding ghosts and sound in equal measure. Once a Scottish Rite temple built in 1909, its grand neoclassical bones and domed ceilings still hum with ritual energy. Now the devotion comes from a different kind of congregation. On this late September night, that congregation gathered for Grandaddy, a band whose bittersweet blend of analog warmth and cosmic melancholy has been quietly shaping indie rock for nearly three decades.
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Portola 2025: In Words and Pictures
Additional Reporting and Photos by Matthew Meyer and Dakin Hardwick
Portola has figured out how to live in the impossible: a perfect balance between a giant warehouse rave, an art-party fever dream, and a legacy showcase built around titans like The Chemical Brothers and LCD Soundsystem. The festival grounds themselves were half the trip, stages stretched across a working port, tucked between hulking cranes and an airplane-hangar-sized warehouse. One side of the grounds was dominated by a massive ship; the other opened out onto the Bay, where the breeze mercifully cut through the heat.
Scantily clad post-Burning Man pilgrims roamed like the playa had drifted into San Francisco, fur and neon armor still glowing. Unlike so many other festivals, Portola spared us the dreaded sound bleed; every stage claimed its own sonic territory without stepping on another’s toes. Continue reading “Portola 2025: In Words and Pictures”
Show Review: The Flaming Lips & Modest Mouse at The Greek Theater, UC Berkeley, 9/7/25
On September 7, 2025, the Greek Theatre in Berkeley hosted a remarkable double bill featuring Modest Mouse and The Flaming Lips -each band delivering at least a 75-minute set, separated by over 20 years from their breakout records. The evening carried the last heat of Indian summer, light winds hinting at fall as music fans filled the amphitheater. It was a night that underscored not only the legacy of both acts but also the profound evolution of their sound over the decades.
Show Review: Sunny Day Real Estate at The Catalyst, 9/10/25
The Catalyst in Santa Cruz is one of those venues where history hangs heavy in the rafters. It’s a place that has seen everything from Willie Nelson to punk chaos to indie legends, a club that is both small enough to feel intimate yet big enough to hold a restless crowd pressed shoulder to shoulder. Tucked downtown a few blocks from the ocean, the room itself is a rite of passage for anyone serious about live music in Northern California. On September 10, that stage belonged to Sunny Day Real Estate.
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Show Review: Ministry + My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult at The Warfield, 6/3/25
The industrial ‘90s buzz was still humming through my nervous system as I stepped into The Warfield on June 3rd. I was still lit from the Lords of Acid show at DNA Lounge just days prior, neon sweat, latex steam, and raunchy beats still echoing somewhere deep in my spine. Continue reading “Show Review: Ministry + My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult at The Warfield, 6/3/25”
Show Review: Lords of Acid + Little Miss Nasty at DNA Lounge, 5/27/25
On May 27, the DNA Lounge in San Francisco hosted a delightfully depraved evening where industrial sleaze met burlesque grit in all the best ways. Lords of Acid, those long-reigning Belgian electro-provocateurs, headlined with a full-throttle set of old-school rave filth, and Little Miss Nasty opened the night with a stage show that doubled as a flesh-forward fever dream.
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