The Big Week: Five Nights That Own the East Bay, Aug 10–16
Clear your calendar and check your bank balance, because the week ahead is the densest stretch of live music the East Bay has served all summer. From a sold-out blues legend to a Greek Theatre soul homecoming, here's your guide to the run of August 10 through 16.
It opens with a doubleheader on Monday, August 10. Down in Jack London Square, Yoshi's hosts the Robert Cray Band — and it's already sold out, so if you don't have a ticket, admire it from the sidewalk. Meanwhile at the Fox Theater, roots-rock institution Little Feat takes the golden-god stage, an 8 p.m. curtain in one of the most beautiful rooms in California. Two Grammy-caliber legacy acts, one night, a mile apart.
Midweek belongs to Berkeley. On Wednesday, August 12, the Greek Theatre at Cal opens its gates for the Tedeschi Trucks Band with Lukas Nelson — a slide-guitar-and-soul summit under the open sky, doors at 6. There is no better venue in Northern California to watch the sun drop behind a jam than the Greek's stone bowl, and this is the kind of bill it was built for.
Then the weekend detonates. Saturday, August 15 brings Thee Sacred Souls back to the Greek Theatre, the retro-soul trio's throwback sound filling the amphitheater at 7 p.m. a night with real homecoming energy for a Southern California band the Bay adopted years ago (tickets were going scarce at last check). Yoshi's runs its own marathon soul week in parallel, with J. Holiday on August 15 capping a run that includes Peabo Bryson and Bay Area rap royalty Rappin' 4-Tay.
And the week closes where big weeks should — under a proscenium. On Sunday, August 16, indie-pop favorites Passion Pit bring their synth-drenched catalog to the Fox Theater, 7:30 p.m., a euphoric last note before the East Bay exhales into late summer.
Five headline nights, four historic rooms, one very good week to live in The Town. A few notes for the road: the Cray show is gone, so don't count on the door; the Greek is an uphill walk from campus, so give yourself time and bring a layer for when the fog rolls over the hills; and if you can only pick one, make it the room you've never been inside. Then go home and rest. You've earned it.
Sources: Fox Theater — Bandsintown; Yoshi's Calendar — Songkick; Greek Theatre — Concertfix; Greek Theatre Calendar