BeachLife Festival 2024 Begs You to Chill the Hell Out: Review + Photos

Paolo Ragusa
·7 min read
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The post BeachLife Festival 2024 Begs You to Chill the Hell Out: Review + Photos appeared first on Consequence.

Over the weekend I found myself back in my hometown at Redondo Beach, California’s BeachLife Festival, a place where no one uttered the words “Kendrick” or “Drake” or “Beef.”

No, at BeachLife Festival, it’s all about chillin’ the hell out, man. Like Napa Valley’s Bottlerock and Long Beach’s Smoking Grooves, they’ve put the festival’s overall vibe in the title itself. You go to BeachLife to watch Sugar Ray and Steel Pulse while literally digging your toes into the sand; later on you see headliner Incubus open a song with the words “I dig my toes into the sand.” It’s a party, sure, but a muted one — you can’t mosh in flip-flops, after all.

Now in its fifth year, BeachLife has definitely leveled up since their inaugural 2019 lineup. What started as a Boomer-adjacent nostalgia fest (with a small sprinkling of Gen-X offerings) has aimed younger and younger every year; now, there’s still plenty for beach-dwelling retirees (ZZ Top, Sting, DEVO), but it’s mostly for Gen-X and older Millennial Angelenos who grew up on KROQ and have a soft spot for reggae, ska, folk, and other strands of rock’n’roll.

While the last two years of BeachLife featured a larger pivot to modern radio rock, the 2024 lineup was way more focused on great indie acts from 10 years ago: Fleet Foxes, Local Natives, Courtney Barnett, Surfer Blood, City & Colour, and Santigold were just some of the names gracing the poster this year, amidst SoCal mainstays like Pepper, the Dirty Heads, the Expendables, and the late Taylor Hawkins’ hard rock cover band, Chevy Metal.

Let’s get the unfortunate bits out of the way — just before 5:30pm on Sunday, when Fleet Foxes were minutes away from taking the stage and ZZ Top were literally in the middle of playing “La Grange,” organizers announced that the high winds were getting dangerous, and we were told to evacuate. They mentioned that it would just be for an hour and we’d then be allowed to come back in, but after an hour and 15 minutes, the festival canceled the rest of the day.

Before that, Sunday had been the most “curated” day of the festival, all things considered — with My Morning Jacket and Trey Anastasio’s band topping the bill, BeachLife was full of jam band devotees. Add in performances from the aforementioned Fleet Foxes and ZZ Top, plus terrific sets from Courtney Barnett, Margo Price, St. Paul and the Broken Bones, Sugar Ray, and Atlas Genius, it was set to be a perfect day of indie rock and its various offshoots.

So, it was definitely a bummer to see the festival cut short. That being said, we were lucky to even be able to go on Sunday at all — those attending Las Vegas’ Lovers & Friends festival saw their event cancelled due to high winds before it could even start on Saturday. Sometimes, the weather’s gonna weather, and even if you think that these temporary stages should be more sturdy and durable, hearing the festival organizer announce “It’s getting dangerous, I can’t have the stage falling on y’all” is enough cause to throw in the (beach) towel for the day.

At least Margo Price and Courtney Barnett (who played a scorching set as a trio alongside Warpaint’s Stella Mozgawa and Zach Dawes) killed it. They were the real headliners of the day. Meanwhile, Friday and Saturday still had plenty to offer. Friday, in particular, was the AARP day with Sting closing out the night and Seal taking the stage at sunset before him. Both of those guys look incredible for being 72 and 61 years old, respectively. Especially Sting, who wore the tiniest little t-shirt and performed like his bass was glued to his body.

Sure, the keys were lowered for him to hit some of those high notes, but it kind of doesn’t matter anymore; the more interesting thing was examining the musical evolution between The Police and Sting’s solo work, and really reassessing some of the latter. “Fields of Gold,” what a snooze. In fact, most of the songs that he busted out from his very successful ’93 album Ten Summoners Tales were dry lulls. “Desert Rose,” on the other hand… I’m sure people really hated that when it came out, but it absolutely holds up (I said what I said). Seal, meanwhile, sounds as radiant as he did in 1991. The only problem with his set was he performed a whole 20-minute climactic stretch from within the crowd, who stood vacantly as Seal tried to conjure some energy from the audience.

In fact, the lack of crowd energy was an unwavering feature at this festival. For some concert and festival attendees, a more reserved crowd indicates a lack of passion; for others, they may find the atmosphere to be safer and more controlled. I wouldn’t go so far as saying the crowd lacked passion — the sing-a-longs during Sting and Incubus definitely suggested some catharsis. But the energy levels never rose higher than those two sets, which, depending on how you like to do your festivals, is something to consider for next year.

Across three stages and a myriad of stimuli, here are some more stray thoughts on BeachLife 2024:

— Incubus headlined Saturday night with their newly re-recorded Morning View album set to drop this Friday, and those songs really lifted off — especially their downright hypnotic closer, “Aqueous Transmission.” They have quite the catalogue even beyond Morning View, and are luckily bringing those songs on tour this year (get Incubus tickets here).

— It was a weekend of covers, that’s for sure. So many bands busted out renditions — Incubus did Bowie, The Beatles, and Portishead, Seal covered a Prefab Sprout song, and DEVO played their own weird DEVO version of “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” The king of all cover bands, though, was Chevy Metal, who took the stage with Taylor Hawkins’ son, Shane Hawkins, on the drum kit. The band, overall, was fine — but I think anyone who saw their set can attest that Shane Hawkins was an absolute machine behind the drum set, and the apple does not far fall from the tree.

— In addition to the old, there was plenty of new this year. Local Natives took the stage on Saturday to play their first show after releasing their new album, But I’ll Wait For You, giving “April” a live debut. It was a particularly emotional show, as the band just announced that founding member Kelcey Ayer will be leaving the group after their forthcoming tour — so for this writer and Local Natives superfan, I literally couldn’t hold back the tears. Meanwhile, former Consequence CoSign Jordana treated fans to some new tunes, and they sounded terrific.

— You literally cannot keep Sugar Ray from playing this festival — they play every year, and while some bands are resistant to being pigeonholed into nostalgia bookings, Mark McGrath and co. have embraced it through and through. “Do you guys remember the ’90s?” McGrath asked the crowd in between songs amidst what actually felt like his standup routine. At least they’re self-aware!

— This festival was relatively well-run and featured a nice vibe, but like every event these days, it is not immune to inflation. The prices for food and drink were exorbitant, but that’s simply the norm. However, I do applaud BeachLife for attempting to give GA-purchasing fans a good baseline experience; these days, with festivals losing money and driving up prices, it’s very easy for organizers to focus on getting as many VIP and high-end tickets sold, prioritizing the upscale experiences and leaving the average GA music fans with nothing but a $16 beer and an open field. While VIP attendees got their own dedicated viewing areas, it felt like BeachLife were smart to keep the balance between the upscale and offerings for everyone.

BeachLife 2024 Photo Gallery:

BeachLife Festival 2024 Begs You to Chill the Hell Out: Review + Photos
Paolo Ragusa

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