The summer festival season is great for catching legacy acts and buzzy bands enjoying their moment of critical acclaim, but festivals are just a small part of the yearly musical cycle. Much of the lifeblood of music takes place outside of festival—in clubs, bars, DIY venues and occasionally even the SAP Center. This fall, a number of this generation’s most exciting musicians come through the South Bay, most of whom are touring behind new albums. From Spanish punk to Barbie Dreams, this is the best live music happening in the South Bay this fall.

Wild Animals
Sept 5
Subrosa, Santa Cruz
This May, Spanish indie punks Wild Animals released their second album on SoCal label Lauren Records. Full of melodic bangers, The Hoax draws from a wellspring of tried-and-true ’90s influences like Superchunk, Dinosaur Jr. and Dillinger Four, as well as more current indie rock acts like Swearin’ and Katie Ellen. On their first-ever American tour, the Madrid band stops by Subrosa in Santa Cruz. On a good day the small anarchist bookstore and community space fits about 50 people, making it the perfect place to catch the kinetic punk band while they’re on top of their game.

Shakira
Sept 6
SAP Center, San Jose
In an age when Kellyanne Conway, Sean Spicer and Sarah Huckabee Sanders have all held positions of authority, it’s comforting to know that at least hips don’t lie. Shakira, she of throaty vocals and diminutive height, brings this eternal truth to the SAP Center this September in all its slinky glory. El Dorado, her 2017 album, may have been under-promoted in the mainstream, but it’s chock-full of classically Shakiran material like the dubby reggaeton of “Clandestino,” and the club-ready “Chatanje,” songs sure to get the crowd going in San Jose.

Tinashe
Sept 8
Pure Nightclub, Sunnyvale
With a voice somewhere between Aaliyah and Rihanna, Tinashe is a pop superstar in the making. She may not be a household name in America yet, but in plenty of places around the globe the former child star is already a major success, placing high on the charts with her trap-pop hit “No Drama” (featuring Offset) and club-ready sizzler “Me So Bad,” both of which are on this May’s Joyride. And with dance moves as good as her voice, club-goers at Pure are in for a great performance by an artist about to break.

Nothing & Culture Abuse
Sept 18
The Ritz
If heavy shoegaze is a thing (and based on the amount of bands making it, it is), Nothing is near the center of the movement. This month’s Dance on the Blacktop is the third album by the bad-dreamy Philadelphia post-hardcore band, one that continues their tradition of mixing swirling reverb with lyrics about the disgusting banality of bodily existence. Meanwhile, the Bay Area’s own Culture Abuse make impassioned pop played with the vitality of the punk bands they love, and are one of the best bands to emerge from the gentrified mess of modern San Francisco.

The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill Tour
Sept 20
Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View
It’s hard to imagine the last 20 years of music without the era-defining The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. Winning five Grammy awards the year it was released, the first solo album by the ex-Fugees singer laid the groundwork for pan-African American albums like Kamasi Washington’s The Epic and Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly, as well as the neo-soul movement of Amy Winehouse and the Dap-Kings. It’s a modern classic, and the reason why Ms. Hill remains one of the most respected and feared musicians on Earth.

Kneebody
Sept 21
Art Boutiki, San Jose
This one is not to miss. Kneebody is one of the best young jazz groups today. Last year’s Antihero is a record packed with incredible performances, weird compositional choices and, most importantly, great songs. All the songs are good. The groove on “Uprising” could kill a man. Kneebody is the kind of group that pays homage to the greats not by copying them, but by stretching the genre’s boundaries like they did. Getting this kind of talent in a room like Art Boutiki makes for one of the best shows of the fall.

Parquet Courts
Sept 28
The Ritz, San Jose
This year Parquet Courts released a song about collective action that’s named after a technique from the 1974 World Cup and ends with the lyric: “Fuck Tom Brady.” It’s good. The album opener for this year’s Wide Awaaaaake!, “Total Football” is pure nervous energy. Lyrically, it plays out like Marxist poetry, drawing a line that connect Hermann Hesse, the Beatles and the Black Panthers in a struggle against apathy. This is the first time New York band will play San Jose, a welcome sign for those anxious to see more relevant up-and-coming touring acts come through the city.

Childish Gambino
Oct 2
SAP Center, San Jose
Childish Gambino’s 2016 album Awaken, My Love! may have spawned the massive hit “Redbone,” but it proved to only be the beginning of a shift for the musician, one that culminated in his massive 2018 banger “This is America.” Like The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, Gambino’s (a.k.a. Donald Glover’s) recent works have made a conscious effort to fuse all elements of the African-American experience, creating something that is both pop and a cultural document. Not bad for a project that started with a Wu-Tang name generator.

Conor Oberst
Oct 5
Cocoanut Grove Ballroom, Santa Cruz
It wasn’t so long ago that magazines were calling Conor Oberst the next Bob Dylan. Like Dylan, his voice is instantly recognizable, and like Dylan, he takes elements of folk music and weaves emotional journeys into their familiar chord progressions. After more than two decades in music, he’s been a part of indie rock, emo, punk, Americana and just about every diagonal that crosses and bisects them. With him in Santa Cruz is his backing band, the Mystic Valley Band, as well Phoebe Bridgers, a musician whose work is exciting people the way a young Conor Oberst once did.

Mac Miller & Thundercat
Oct 30
City National Civic, San Jose
Somehow, despite having his debut album hit No. 1 on the Billboard top 200s with no major distribution behind it, Mac Miller has remained something of an underdog. This year’s Swimmer is full of poolside pop that came just in time for the end of summer. But more importantly, Thundercat is opening the show. Thundercat, the low-end wizard who dresses like Ash Ketchum on acid, is one of the most unique voices in instrumental music today, playing bass in way that hardly sounds like an instrument at all. Don’t sleep on the chance to see either in a rare San Jose performance.  

Nicki Minaj & Future
Nov 16
SAP Center
It’s only been a couple of weeks since Nicki Minaj released Queen, but it’s already spawned thinkpieces about her witchy laugh, freestyles about fucking Stephen Colbert, and one weird piece from Forbes of all places claiming that the album is “hypocritical” (I guess fawning over billionaires’ yachts isn’t paying the bills). With her at the SAP Center is Future, the man whose “Mask Off” made flute the hottest instrument in hip-hop. Like Minaj, Future is saying he’ll have a new album out in time for the tour. Fingers crossed that the clarinet gets a prominent feature this time.

The concert schedule this fall is full of annual favorites, a few new surprises and Silicon Valley’s first large-scale mult-day technology conference and music festival.

VivaFest!
Aug 31 to Sep 28, Downtown San Jose; prices vary.
The 22nd annual celebration of mariachis and Mexican culture wraps up Sept. 28 with an evening of Latin alternative music from both sides of the border. Headliners Kinky leaped into international fame with their self-titled 2002 debut that jumbled funky electronica with guitar rock and traditional sounds from their native Monterrey, Mexico. Four albums later, they remain true to their name, joyously throwing kinks into the pop music machine. Filling out the bill is Carla Morrison, whose latest release, “DŽjenme Llorar (Let Me Cry),” was nominated for four Latin Grammys. Her dreamy and spare sonic landscapes that recall Mazzy Star and the Cowboy Junkies will seem immediately familiar to any indie fan. The L.A.-based sextet La Santa Cecilia spans traditional forms of Latin music—cumbia, bossa nova, tango—to produce music that is at turns haunting and rousing, and the Mexican-American collaborative Sistema Bomb gives a hip-hop remix to the traditional music of Veracruz. The month-long ÁVivaFest! will also present music and dance workshops, a film series, free outdoor music and other cultural events throughout downtown San Jose. (Richard Faulk)

Uproar Festival
Sep 11, Shoreline Amphitheatre; tickets start at $20.
Grunge veterans Alice in Chains and Lollapalooza founders Jane’s Addiction—can it really be 25 years since Nothing’s Shocking dropped?—headline the main stage at Uproar, which also features two other stages loaded with hard rock bands. Elsewhere, Toronto rocker Darko Jones channels David Lee Roth’s inner clown while serving up an eclectic set that cites everything from ’70s power pop to Scandinavian death metal. On the indie side of the genre, Beware of Darkness blasts Stooges-like freakouts, while traditionalists will enjoy the way Dead Daisies delivers straightforward, feel good rock & roll. But the true rock cognoscenti won’t want to miss second stage headliners Walking Papers. With ties both to grunge grandfathers Screaming Trees and Pearl Jam as well as Guns ‘N’ Roses, this Seattle outfit combines the swagger of Aerosmith with the brooding sounds and stories of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. (RF)

Rock The Bells
Sep 14-15, Shoreline Amphitheatre; tickets start at $65.50.
Hip-hop’s answer to Coachella celebrates its 10th anniversary at Shoreline Amphitheatre this year with two different lineups over two days and the festival’s most controversial move to date—virtual performances from deceased rappers Eazy E (N.W.A.) and Ol’ Dirty Bastard (Wu-Tang Clan) performing with their former crews. Other highlights include Too Short and E-40’s first Shoreline performance since 2004 (they were reportedly banned from the venue after a KMEL Summer Jam went sideways that year), A$AP Mob, Kid Cudi, Girl Talk, Juicy J, Deltron 3030, Trinidad James and many more. Check back for more details and interviews with the team behind the virtual performances in the Sep 11 issue of Metro. (Matt Crawford)

Swingin’ Utters
Sep 20, the Blank Club, $13.
San Francisco punk rockers the Swingin’ Utters are finally back with a new album. The band hits the road with the Dropkick Murphys this fall in support of Poorly Formed, finishing Sep 20 with a headlining gig at the Blank Club without the Murphys. The new album ventures into post-punk and garage rock territory, though the usual Swinging Utters’ punk sound with Irish-folk subtleties remains intact. (Stephen Layton)

Bassnectar
Sep 21, Event Center at San Jose State University, $35
Fans of the DJ and producer dub themselves “Bassheads” and it’ll come as no surprise that they like bass. Lorin Ashton, the San Jose native behind Bassnectar, is more than happy to provide. He’s grown from working local parties and Burning Man to become a leader in America’s still-growing EDM scene. Side one of his most recent Immersive Music mixtape contains a remix of Nina Simone’s “Feeling Good,” alongside a remix of obscure Portland prog/folk/metal band Agalloch. His original material blends genres as well, with anything from dubstep and glitch to Ashton’s first love, heavy metal. Side Two of Immersive Music is set to drop in mid-September right before the tour starts, but fans can always expect a trickle of tracks from the prolific producer. (SL)

C2SV Festival
Sep 26-29, downtown San Jose; tickets start at $55
With new venues and restaurants already starting a renaissance for nightlife offerings in downtown San Jose, the C2SV Festival continues forward momentum with four nights of music at 12 venues during one long weekend. Topped by a headlining performance from Iggy and the Stooges at St. James Park, the lineup features San Francisco fuzz rock favorites Thee Oh Sees, modern funk producer and Stones Throw affiliate Dam-Funk, Silicon Valley electro-rockers the Limousines, revolutionary hip-hop from the Coup, LA hardcore vets Off!, alt-rock pioneers the Lemonheads and more than 50 other acts. A tech conference accompanies the festival, with dozens of Silicon Valley CEOs and business leaders at San Jose McEnery Convention Center and a keynote speech from Stooges guitarists James Williamson. (Metro is a sponsor of C2SV)

Conor Oberst
Oct 3, Mountain Winery, $37.50-$47.50
It’s been difficult to keep track of former Bright Eyes frontman Conor Oberst this summer. In between touring with his newly reunited punk band the Desaparecidos and a couple of shows with his Mystic Valley band, Oberst will be playing some solo shows in California and Nevada, including San Francisco’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass. For his solo appearance at the Mountain Winery in October, the warbly singer will play material from Bright Eyes, Mystic Valley Band and the folk supergroup Monsters of Folk. Oberst’s Saddle Creek label reissued six out-of-print Bright Eyes records last year, and I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning was recently certified gold. Maybe a Bright Eyes reunion should be added to his burgeoning docket as well. (SL)

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass
Oct 4-6, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco; Free
The final lineup announcement is still pending, but lineup leaks from Hardly Strictly Bluegrass organizers look promising this year with Santa Cruz trio the Devil Makes Three, Allah-Las, Conor Oberst, Nicki Bluhm & the Gramblers among the younger acts on the bill, with HSB vets Boz Scaggs, Chris Isaak, Robert Earl Keen, Bonnie Raitt, Patty Griffin and Natalie Maines rounding out the lineup. With six stages over three days, this free festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park draws more than 500,000 people. (MC)

Paramore
Oct 18, SAP Center, $39.50-$49.50
Paramore will headline the newly renamed SAP Center on Oct 18, supported by Hellogoodbye and Metric. The alt-rock band released its first full-length album in four years in April, debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard charts. It is the first album recorded without co-founding members Josh and Zac Farro, guitarist and drummer respectively, who left the band at the end of 2010 with a scathing blog post accusing Paramore of being a “manufactured product of a major label.” Maybe after seven years someone finally decided to break it to them. Paramore has also recently announced a four day cruise/music festival slated to set sail next March, after completion of their international “Self-Titled” tour. The band will be performing on the high seas alongside dozens of other acts including Tegan & Sara. (SL)

Treasure Island Music Festival
Oct 19-20, Treasure Island, $85 and up
An armada of bands, 26 strong, rallies in the middle of San Francisco Bay for this weekend-long festival. Setting the tenor for day one is the twitchy, cerebral, but irresistibly danceable Atoms for Peace. This unlikely super-group pairing of Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea is supported by trip-hop pioneer Tricky, whose recent release False Idols is a return to his ’90s peak. Relative youngsters Phantogram fit right in with their menacing and seductive beats, while Little Dragon deliver New Wave neo-soul by way of Sweden. L.A.’s Poolside brings a welcome burst of sunshine with their signature “daytime disco” sounds while Diplo’s Major Lazer plugs in his dancehall sound system. Original loser Beck ushers in day two, featuring the many faces of indie pop, from the trickstery Animal Collective to the smooth rusticity of Lord Huron and the plangent garage rock of Palm Violets. James Blake’s dubstep infused singer-songwriter ballads may be the perfect recipe to soothe a Sunday morning hangover. (RF)