Make Music in Pasadena means the beginning of summer for me and that makes me very happy. The free music festival will be back on June 7th, with a just-announced line-up including Surfer Blood and Malaysian R&B artist Yuna, as well as many others.
It is the seventh year of the festival and I think I have attended most of them! However, it is really growing – 150 artists are on the bill this year – and I got more frustrated each time. The stages and acts are so spread out throughout Old Town Pasadena that it takes a lot of time to walk from one stage to another one. As a result, I won’t see much of these 150 acts! How could you see so many in a day anyway? I always end up seeing the most popular ones, because as everyone else, I stay with what I already know. And that’s a shame because shouldn’t I take advantage of a free festival to discover new bands? Anyway, I guess I will try to see Surfer Blood, the synth-pop duo Tennis, the dynamic Saint Motel this year, and I don’t want to miss Moses Sumney because I have already seen him twice and this guy is going to be huge in a few years or there is no justice in this world!
That’s a bit stupid because I have seen all of these bands already, just like The Record Company, and Run River North also in the line-up… It will depends on the schedule but may be I should also give a try to Andy Allo, Finish Ticket, Shelby Earl, The Second Howl, Wild Ones, Max and the Moon, Ted Z and the Wranglers, She, Her and I, Celeigh Chapman and Ester Rada. Organizers are saying that more acts will be announced in the coming days and a full list will appear on the Make Music Pasadena Website.
The festival is free, which explains why it is so crowded at night, but they are also encouraging to donate money starting at the modest price of $5. I have seen many street music festivals growing and collapsing over the years, look what happened to the Sunset Junction Fair and I wonder what happened to the Jubilee Music and Art Festivals? I haven’t heard anything about it this year. The FYF fest is a sure August deal but the location will change this year because the LA State Historic Park is going through some renovation. There are actually numerous music festivals around LA, mostly very big, coming up we have Ink’n’Iron in Long Beach and The Vans Warped Tour in Pomona in June, Echo Park Rising in August and we will also have Jay-Z’ s Made in America this year, plus small festivals are popping up all the time around the Echo/Echoplex/Bootleg… but this one-day Make Music in Pasadena is the real deal!
