Father John Misty, King Tuff @ Palace Theatre—Father John Misty could feel like a holdover from the more irony-soaked trenches of Obama-era indie sleaze. (History is proving unkind to that epoch of Pitchforkian artists, generally speaking.) But Joshua Tillman happens to be a great singer-songwriter, so aging gracefully hasn’t been an issue. While his 2022 LP, Chloë and the Next 20th Century, featured uneven yet compelling adventures in jazz, his latest, 2024’s Mahashmashana, bowled listeners over with Tillman’s S-tier, Loki-like lyrics riding an avalanche of adventurous arrangements. Critics heralded it not just as a return to form, but, simply, one of the best offerings in the Father John Misty discography. (Local connection: Alan Sparhawk of Low contributed guitars to the massive-sounding single “Screamland.”) In a rare 2025 interview, Tillman distilled his project down with the trenchant humor that bubbles throughout his songs: “My whole thing is a therapist’s nightmare. It’s this Bergman-esque psychodrama where this Father John Misty construct really has it out for this Josh Tillman guy who keeps writing increasingly more humiliating songs,” he told WNXP. “I must be convinced that there’s some kind of truth. We’ll see when the body of work is finished. We will see what was achieved.”—Jay Boller

The Jon Brumm Musical Experience, Swan Lyons, Tree @ Pilllar Forum

International Reggae All Stars @ Rice Park

Institutional Green, Edith Head @ Schooner Tavern

Anvil, Midnite Hellion @ 7th St Entry

Synastry @ Terminal Bar

The Flying T @ 331 Club

IKON_HVVY, Ariesfriebomb, & hurtquake @ Underground Music

Twin Cities Flamenco Collective @ Volstead’s

Paul Bergen @ White Squirrel

Attack Dog, Planer, Pyrrhic Victories, TV for Dogs @ 331 Club

Harold’s House Party on KFAI with Pop Wagner’s Honky Tonk Ranch @ 331 Club

Cole Diamond’s Whiskey Wednesdays @ White Squirrel

Thursday, July 9

High Voltage @ Abi's

Piss With Style, Tumble Down Dick @ Acadia

North Star Nerdlesque Festival @ Amsterdam

Cole Diamond @ Animales

Chris Castino, Joe Dunn @ Aster Cafe

Dream Crease, Nthnl, Sunpearl, Sunflower @ Berlin

Fabio do Nascimento with Muku @ Cedar Cultural Center

Dancing Queen: Tribute to Disco @ Crooners

BZ3 Organ Trio (Album Release) @ Dakota

Alec Collins, Fiddle and Flannels, Timmy Magdall @ Day Block Brewing

Polem @ Driftwood Char Bar

Robert Wilkinson @ Dubliner Pub

Leslie Rich and the Rocket Soul Choir @ Dubliner Pub

LGBTQ+ Twin Cities Latin Dance @ Eagles 34

Karaoke With On Call Entertainment @ Eagles 34

Riff Rangers @ Eagles 34

Benjamin Tod & Lost Dog Street Band, Leon Majcen @ First Avenue

Craig Finn and Patterson Hood @ Fitzgerald Theater—Two perfectly matched songwriters in an ideally intimate setting. Probably the most impressive moment of Finn’s quite impressive new set, Always Been, comes on the closing song, “Shamrock,” which notes the shift from SA to Speedway to show the passage of time—and the guy hasn’t even lived here in decades. Now that’s an eye for detail. If the strugglers on Hold Steady albums always hold out a hope for salvation that’s reflected in the sweep of the music, Finn’s solo albums center on quieter vignettes about similar down-and-outers set to the sympathetic accompaniment of a back-up band inspired by ’70s singer-songwriter rock. Like Finn, Hood is best known for his band output (the Drive-By Truckers) and works solo in a subtler, more miniature scale. His most recent album, 2025’s Exploding Trees & Airplane Screams, begins with a beauty queen dead in a hurricane and climaxes with the promised flight disaster. Lyrics like “Lithium and tranquilizers/Lithium and tranquilizers” and “I was sad before I’s born” establish a mood that not even Katie Crutchfield’s harmonies on one track or Wednesday’s clamor on another can lighten much. I mean, the one where Pat hooks up with Lydia Loveless while spinning Tattoo You is even more of a bummer than the one about suicide.—Keith Harris

First Out, Stranger, Foxby, Social Pariah, Milwaukee Deep @ Flying V

Vinyl Night @ Gambit Brewing

Snapz Live Band Open Mic @ Green Room

Singing Into Wilderness: A Benefit for the Boundary Waters @ Hook and Ladder

Hot Club Mania @ Hopkins Downtown Park

Jed Harrelson @ Icehouse

Victorio and the Bridges @ Lake Harriet Bandshell

Jada Brown @ Landmark Center

Acoustic Thursdays @ Mainstreet Bar

Ashley Dubose, Mae Simpson @ Mears Park

Blue Ox Trio @ Metronome Brewery

DJ Diane Miller @ Mia

Mudsteppers @ Midway Saloon

Bend in the River Big Band @ Minnehaha Bandstand

Rooms on Fire @ Minnesota Music Cafe

Mommy Log Balls, Hurtquake, Special Guest @ Pilllar Forum

Edie Rae Band, Box 10 @ Schooner Tavern

Daphne Jane, Harlow, Lana Leone, Jojo Ventus Ninja @ 7th St Entry

Thomas Sticha @ 318 Cafe

Nathan Walker, the Makeouts, Dowser @ 331 Club

Felicity, Loki’s Folly @ Underground Music

Rocky Lee, GeekedGang @ Underground Music

Bessie Snow @ Volstead’s

Ben Stoeck & Macahila Hinnenkamp @ White Squirrel

Gradience, Heed the Warning, Buzz Box @ White Squirrel

Timisarocker, Dave’s Manual, SigTones, YES WE ARE @ Zhora Darling

Friday, July 10

DJ Boom/Peewee Dread @ Acadia

Jeff Ray & the Stakes @ Animales

Death Cab for Cutie, Jay Som @ Armory—Similar to non-local band the Hold Steady, Death Cab for Cutie continue to churn out middle-late-career albums that have no business being so good. With their latest, June’s I Built You a Tower, the Pacific Northwest indie heavyweights went literally indie, releasing the harder-rocking LP on Anti- instead of their longtime major label, Atlantic. It’s a divorce record, it’s a meditation-on-aging record, it’s Death Cab, now three records removed from the departure of multi-instrumentalist/producer Chris Walla, continuing to successfully experiment ever-so-slightly with their tried ‘n’ true sound. “You compartmentalize all these memories in these buildings so they’re not out in the street, yelling at you 24/7,” frontman Ben Gibbard tells The Line of Best Fit, explaining the new release’s titular metaphor and theme.—Jay Boller

Curtis Wayne Hunt with Morlie Hunt @ Aster Cafe

Eav Present Grauchi Live @ Bazement

Jordan Christianson @ Berlin

Room3 @ Berlin

Tarik Thornton @ Berlin

Jimmi & the Band of Souls @ Blues Saloon

Some Shitty Cover Band, DJ D-Mil @ Boardwalk

Soul Shack @ Bunker’s

Paper Beast @ Can Can Wonderland

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah @ Cedar Cultural Center

Malamiko, Willem Dafoe Fan Club, Plumstar @ Cloudland

Monroe Crossing @ Crooners

Tom Hunter @ Crooners

Erin & Jay Perform Carole King and James Taylor @ Crooners

Nur-D @ Dakota

Heliocene (Single Release), Ray Gun Youth, Damn Phibian @ Day Block Brewing

Sylvia May & the Maydays @ Driftwood Char Bar

Eli Gardiner @ Dual Citizen

Irish Music Session @ Dubliner Pub

Mac and Cheese @ Dubliner Pub

Steve Clarke & the Working Stiffs @ Eagles 34

Cain & Co., Record Prophets @ Eagles 34

The Reckoning Crew, Lillies @ 50th & France

Girl So in Love–An Olivia Rodrigo Night @ Fine Line

Trader Joe's vs. Aldi Rave @ First Avenue

Bottle Rocket, Seraphim, Valerie, Espie @ Flying V

MN Salsa Fiesta @ Granada

Anna Houston, Ally Meier, Pageant Dress @ Green Room

Minnesota Country Club Festival @ Harriet Island

MPLS Funk Fest @ Hook and Ladder

Zacc Harris (Album Release) + Erik Koskinen @ Icehouse—An improvisor with a keen appreciation of melody, local jazz guitarist Harris's 2017 album American Reverie took in both "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" and Wilco’s “Jesus Etc.” Its new companion piece, American Reckoning, is an even more pointed historical survey, starting with “Amazing Grace” and closing with two Dylan numbers: "I Shall Be Released" and "Masters of War." Other highlights including a sprightly “House of the Rising Sun" and a noisy “Darlin’ Cory.”—Keith Harris

3-D @ Jazz Central

The Belfast Cowboys @ Lake Harriet Bandshell

Trace Adkins, Exile @ Ledge Amphitheater

Badklaat, Ossien @ The Loft

DJ Shannon Blowtorch @ Lush

Spencer Becker Guitar Band (Album Release) @ Metronome Brewery

Ditch Pigeon @ Minnehaha Bandstand

Keyez Williams @ Minnesota Music Cafe

Luke Bakken @ Padraigs

The Silverteens (EP Release), Faith Boblett, d’Lakes @ Parkway Theater

Hunny Bear, Chroma, Knife Emoji @ Pilllar Forum

Jiggs Lee Invasion @ Schooner Tavern

Detroit @ 7th St Entry—The '90s "fleshrockers" return to celebrate the re-release of their 1996 debut full-length, Hugo's Ball. What does that even mean? You'll have to show up to find out.—Keith Harris

Raymnd @ 318 Cafe

Dashed, Far Far Away, Peony Park, Short Timer @ Terminal Bar

Mississippi Mosaic @ 331 Club

SKÁLD with Áit Ait @ Turf Club

Gauze, Chemical-X, Hairless Twin, & Popsicklestick! @ Underground Music

Blood Royale @ Uptown VFW

Art N' Pils @ Utepils Brewing—No way around it: Art and pills just go hand in hand. Oh, uh—excuse me, that’s art and pils. Sorry about that. The event formerly known as Artepils returns to Utepils this weekend with local artists, live music, and lots of beer. This year’s featured artist is St. Paul’s Michael Iver Jacobsen, and art vendors include Mystic Healing Stones, Wander Want, Two Birds Tie Dye, and Fi Diaz. On the music side? We’ve got Mr. Rogers and the Make Believe Friends headlining Friday night, the Orange Goodness and Shotgun Ragtime band on Saturday’s lineup, and on Sunday, She's Green celebrate the release of their new EP, Swallowtail.—Em Cassel

Parisota Hot Club @ Volstead’s

Mac Hoffman & Peter Lochner @ White Squirrel

Headlight, Owen Trelstad & The Occasionals, Fortunate Suns @ White Squirrel

High Speed Snowshoes, Conzemius, Nice and Blue, & Terravision @ Zhora Darling

Saturday, July 11

Hill of Crosses, Make Me Sick, Sweet Land @ Acadia

Odds of an Afterthought @ Amsterdam

Second Hand Dan @ Aster Cafe

Saturday Night Live; Playaz Club @ Bazemnt

Antrio @ Berlin

One Time Out @ Berlin

DJ Maracuya @ Berlin

DJ Skriblz @ Boardwalk

Belfast Cowboys @ Bunker’s

Bomja: Golden Hours 002 @ Cabooze

The Music of Abba @ Can Can Wonderland

Dan Israel & Steve Brantseg @ Carbone’s

Skewed @ Caydence Records & Coffee

Horse Lords, Sidi Ould Ahmed Zeydan @ Cedar Cultural Center—The jittery Baltimore experimentalists are back, and they’re no longer purely instrumental, as Nina Guo and Evelyn Saylor now contribute abstract vocal sounds to the mix. Adding a bass clarinetist and a trombonist on top of that may be the avant-garde equivalent of tossing a juggler a couple extra chainsaws, but I’m happy to report after several listens to Demand to Be Taken To Heaven Alive! that no one has been seriously harmed by this expansion. Opening is Sidi ould Ahmed Zeydan, the Eau Claire-based master of Mauritanian classical music, which he has adapted from traditional lute to microtonally fretted electric guitar.—Keith Harris

Fret Rattles, Vacant, the Cobra Jets @ Cloudland

Jennifer Marie @ Crooners

The Dust of Suns Ensemble @ Crooners

The Music of the Beach Boys @ Crooners

Steeling Dan @ Crooners

Sounds of Blackness feat. Jamecia Bennett @ Dakota

Ambient Toad, Ell, Xlcr, Deep Fortune, Lubird @ Day Block Brewing

Manual Transmission @ Driftwood Char Bar

Release the Craicen @ Dubliner Pub

Doug Collins and the Receptionists, Paul Bergens @ Dusty’s

Rupert Angeleyes, Spaceport, More Milk @ Eagles 34

Spastic Bombastic @ Eagles 34

Cowboy Mouth @ Fine Line

The Bouncing Souls, the Suicide Machines, Death By Stereo, the Drowns @ First Avenue

Velvet Ghoul @ Flying V

The Boot R&B, the Dirty Pretty, Hot Press @ Gambit Brewing

DJ ENL X Mwah @ Gidi

Candlelight Concert: A Tribute to Adele @ Granada

Candlelight Concert: ’90s Hip Hop With Strings @ Granada

Kpop Takeover @ Green Room

Afrobeats to the World @ Green Room

Minnesota Country Club Festival @ Harriet Island

W.T.F. Fest 2 @ Hook and Ladder—The fest's name stands for “women, trans, femmes,” all of which can be found in the bands on this excellent local bill: Scrunchies, Snakeworld, Mary Jam, Spit Takes, Doll Chaser, Momzilla, Critterthing, Ghosting Merit, and ET.—Keith Harris

Sacred Advisory @ Icehouse

Jeff Rosenstock, Good Luck, Anita Velveeta @ Indeed Brewing

Brandon Wozniak Trio @ Jazz Central

Minneapolis Pops @ Lake Harriet Bandshell

Dirty Monkey, Chozen, Noetka @ The Loft

Derailleur, Access Otherwise @ Memory Lanes

Bob Frey & the Adaptors @ Metronome Brewery

MN Salsa Fiesta @ Mill City Museum

Funktion Junction @ Minnesota Music Cafe

Brunch Karaoke @ Mortimers

Dirty Heads and 311 @ Mystic Lake Amphitheater

'90s Corridos Tour @ Myth Live