Jasmine Cain books a home-for-Christmas night at Bigs Bar

The Sturgis-born rocker brings her "I'll Be Home For Christmas" tour to Sioux Falls on Friday, Dec. 18, and tickets start at $10.

Jasmine Cain built her career on the road, a lot of it in front of motorcycle-rally crowds. This December she's calling her run the "I'll Be Home For Christmas" tour, and for a South Dakota native, a Sioux Falls stop fits the name.

Cain announced the date last week: Friday, Dec. 18, at Bigs Bar, 3110 W. 12th St. The show starts at 8 p.m., and tickets run $10 to $50 through Eventbrite. Bigs holds about 300, so it's a room where the person playing bass is also the person singing straight at you, which with Cain is exactly the point.

If you don't know her, start with the nickname. Easyriders magazine called her the "Pixie with an Axe," and the axe is a bass guitar: Cain is a singer and bass player who fronts her own band and plays it hard. Her own biography says she's from Sturgis, made her mark in Nashville starting in 2003, and has since put out eight studio albums, the latest being Attitude is Everything in March 2024. Along the way she's picked up a shelf of independent-music awards, including Female Artist of the Year from the JPF Awards and four Female Rock Vocalist wins from the MCMA.

The person playing bass is also the person singing straight at you.

Her sound sits in hard rock, the loud, riff-first kind that works in a bar with the volume up. Some people have reached for a "modern-day Janis Joplin" comparison to describe her voice, and whether or not you buy that, it tells you she isn't a quiet singer. Live, the bass playing is a big part of the show; it isn't something she hands off to a sideman.

Bigs Bar is a natural fit. The bar books live music every week. A pre-Christmas Friday there, with a hometown-state rocker on stage and a ten-dollar floor, is the kind of night that sells out word-of-mouth rather than through ads.

So circle it: Friday, Dec. 18, 8 p.m., Bigs Bar. Bring your work friends after the holiday party, or your family when they're back in town. Cain is coming home for Christmas, and Sioux Falls gets to be part of it.

Sources: Eventbrite — Jasmine Cain at Bigs Bar Live, Fri Dec 18 (eventbrite.com); Bigs Bar — Live Music in Sioux Falls SD (bigsbar.com); Bigs Bar — Current Events (bigsbar.com); Jasmine Cain — Official Website (jasminecain.com); Jasmine Cain — Biography (jasminecain.com); On the road with Jasmine Cain — Bigs Bar Sioux Falls, SD (YouTube) (youtube.com); Jasmine Cain - GHS Strings (ghsstrings.com)