Coachella makes its way to San Diego venues

April 10, 2018 5:15 PM PT

Once again hundreds of bands are currently making their way to Indio for the back-to-back weekends of Coachella madness. And once again, San Diego will reap the benefits of so many musicians converging only a few hours drive from its county lines.

While festival headliners Beyoncé, Eminem, and The Weeknd won’t be making any local stops around Coachella’s consecutive weekends, plenty of the other performers will.

And not just those tiny little names in fine print at the bottom of the annual festival poster, either (although those acts have proven to be some of the best).

This year, San Diego will host more than 20 Coachella acts in eight local venues — and that’s just the ones that have been announced to the public.

So whether you didn’t get a wristband or just prefer your shows with a few hundred thousand less people, there is plenty of Coachella side-action to be had in the next two weeks.

THE BEST

Civic Theatre

4.12 & 17: David Byrne

Talking Heads founder and creative polymath David Byrne is a legend. In addition to being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Byrne has won a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Golden Globe. He’s founded a record label, written books, and both directed and scored films. The visual artist and multi-instrumentalist has made collaborative albums with Brian Eno and St. Vincent, and even played himself on an episode of The Simpsons.

In March, he released his 11th studio album, American Utopia. Byrne’s first solo album in 14 years debuted at no.1 on the US Top Current Album Chart and No.3 on the Billboard 200, both firsts for the Scottish-American musician.

American Utopia is also part of a larger multimedia project called Reasons to Be Cheerful (including a stand-alone website and ongoing lecture tour), which aims to bring positives to light amid the onslaught of daily negatives.

Although the record is definitely a reflection of that, Byrne’s frenetic energy, off-kilter delivery, and general unpredictability never let things stray too far from the quirky troubadour’s perfect strangeness.

The new album makes an awesome addition to this Renaissance man’s massively unique catalog and these two San Diego shows should not be missed.