Free “Retro-Future Revue” Concert Festival in Golden Gate Park

Submitted by the Event Organizer

On Saturday, May 25th, past and future will collide at the historic Golden Gate Park Bandshell! On the stage where iconic musicians like Jerry Garcia, Santana, and Jefferson Airplane entertained hundreds of thousands of San Franciscans in years past, something new is bubbling up. This free show will feature 4 Bay Area bands that mix classic sounds of country, Americana, and jazz with modern indie rock, electronica, and a distinctly San Francisco lyrical perspective. Expect neon cowboy hats, rocket launches, and a rootin’ tootin’ good time on the precipice of tomorrow.

Costumes are by no means required but definitely encouraged. For inspiration, think the Jetsons, Cowboy Bebop, or any vision of the future that includes a throwback to a previous era. Bring picnic blankets, drinks, snacks, kids, dogs, and the whole family. A splendid time is guaranteed for all!

Your musical entertainment will be:

Country Risque

America’s riskiest country band: classic honky-tonk, modern values. Country Risqué explores queer love and latter-day disillusionment in the language of classic tear-in-my-beer honky-tonk music. Formed by singer-songwriters Miles Gordon and Daniel Bromfield, Country Risqué currently features Richard Moog on guitar, Forest Reid on electric lap steel, Oscar Garcia on bass, and Tomas Georgiou on drums.

Often Easy

What happens when you take the downtrodden grit of American roots music and inject it with groove and funk until the need to dance becomes undeniable? Often Easy belts anthemic bops that invoke a fresh nostalgia for a time that may have never even been. What if the Stones had been listening to the Strokes? What if Vampire Weekend was fronted by Tom Waits? You’ll just have to come and find out!

Mitch Rocket

Free jazz and indie rock go to space together. Since June 2021, the Mitch Rocket band has been electrifying audiences around the Bay Area with a setlist that ranges from folk rock to ska to free jazz. Recently they have settled into a style they call “yacht grunge,” mixing the jazz chords and phasers of 1970’s yacht rock with the heavy textures of 1990’s alt rock to make a sound that is distinctly 2020’s. The band is currently preparing to record a complex yet danceable set of songs reflecting the influence of artists like Steely Dan and XTC as well as Smashing Pumpkins and Toad the Wet Sprocket.

Mare

Mare is an up and coming queer artist from San Francisco who creates futuristic music that takes cues from Japanese city pop, jazz, synth pop, and indie rock

The lunar maria (singular: mare) are large, dark, basaltic plains on Earth’s Moon, formed by ancient volcanic eruptions. They were dubbed maria, Latin for “seas”, by early astronomers who mistook them for actual seas.
Mare is the main project of Jess Konye seeking to encapsulate the beauty of the moon through lush electronic textures. Based currently in San Francisco, the synth-enthusiast enjoys work in a variety of genres from synthpop to classical music. 
”If you were to grab a friend and drive out to the most barren field you could find and just gaze at the moon, that would be the most ideal way to understand my songs”

See https://illuminate.org/event/retro-future-revue/ for more information

Disclaimer: Please double check event information with the event organizer as events can be canceled, details can change after they are added to our calendar, and errors do occur.