Last week, Off-Beat Music Society announced the first wave of their lineup for this year’s edition of Off-Beat Music Festival and it’s already promising to be another incredible two days of music and music discovery. From the announcement alone several familiar names stood out like of Montreal, RJD2 and Sonny and His Rhinestone Sunsets. Digging deeper into the initial lineup announcement you’ll find lots of local representation as well with Spencer Kilpatrick & the Sand Gators, The Happy Trails, Nightbrain and Anabelle & the Desert Scrubs. It’s this combination of local and mainstream indie talent that I respect and adore tremendously. The location in Reno’s Brewery District on 4th Street is the perfect location, paired with the SXSW-like venue hopping where every performance feels close and intimate.
I usually stay away from music festivals but that’s not to say I’ve never been to some. I enjoyed several years of Treasure Island Music Festival in San Francisco before the promoter Another Planet closed it down, I’m assuming to increase their budget and artist pool for their larger project, Outside Lands. I went to the first few years of that festival as well before it blew up in popularity and attendance swelled. I was able to make it out to the Henry Miller Library located in Big Sur along the California coast for two editions of Woodsist Festival as well as SXSW in 2014. There are other festivals I would still like to check out: Austin Psych Fest, Pickathon, Desert Daze, and Treefort Festival. I’ll pass on Coachella, Lollapalooza and Glastonbury.
At the start of 2025, I noticed some bands I liked had toured through Reno over the past few years (Wand, Meatbodies, Ty Segall and The Soft Kill) and it got me thinking that maybe something was going on in Reno that I wasn’t aware of. The last show I attended was in 2016 when King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard played The Independent in San Francisco and going about a decade without live music was starting to eat at me. I started to seek out live shows and settled with bands I was familiar with. I checked out Allah-Las and STRFKR perform at The Hangar in Lake Tahoe over the summer, flew to Los Angeles to see Little Brother’s farewell tour in September, and bought tickets to see Drab Majesty perform at The Great American Music Hall in SF during spooky season followed by Mint Field at The Holland Project to close out the year.
The fire had been lit and my addiction to live sound couldn’t be satiated. I needed more. I downloaded an app called Bands In Town and set Reno as my location. After going through all the featured venues, I noticed something called Off-Beat Music Festival on a, “we think you may like this” type listing for Brooks Nielsen of The Growlers. The app’s algorithm thought I would like to see Nielsen, but I was more interested in what Off-Beat was. Reno has a music festival? I closed the app and started searching right away. I found the website and was floored by what I saw. Indeed, Reno had a music festival and one that had been going on for ten years!
How did I miss this? It’s not surprising how I missed it in retrospect. I moved to Reno in 2020 right when the pandemic shut down the world. Plus, after the closures on my San Francisco music blog in 2013 and a podcast a few years later, I wasn’t actively pursuing new music. The times had changed where music blogs and websites I followed either stopped updating or got bought out by larger mainstream media conglomerates. Streaming had taken over and the algorithms were not feeding into my personal tastes. I was tuned out and sort of content being a music recluse with a handful of favorites as my soundtrack over the course of five years.
But back to Off-Beat. I scrolled through their entire history and was amazed by who they had booked since their inception in 2015. There were familiar Bay Area names like Shannon and the Clams, Lumerians, LSD and the Search for God, Howlin’ Rain, and Sunny & the Sunsets, in addition to several well-known indie bands in Blitzen Trapper, Holy Wave, Black Marble, Guantanamo Baywatch, Triptides, Surfer Blood, Levitation Room. The festival also made a point to give time slots to local talent as well with bands like Charity Kiss, Honey Plant, The Happy Trails, Faint Shape, Donkey Jaw, Bug Bath, Spitting Image and Blackstallion having all been booked. This festival was incredible! Over the years, almost every artist that I had come to know and love had played this event at some point. There were also tons of names that I did not know and that increased my curiosity in the festival even more. I decided then and there I was going to check it out and bought my ticket.
On a rainy Thursday evening, October 2nd, opening night came about at The Alpine with Rose City Band kicking things off. I was aware that Ripley Johnson had moved to Portland from San Francisco and formed a new band that was different from Wooden Shjips and Moon Duo and I was excited to check them out. This also marked the first time I ventured into the Brewery District and immediately fell in love with this area. Rose City Band played for a little over an hour and were fantastic. This was the perfect primer for what was ahead on Friday. After what felt like the longest day at work the following day, I cabbed over to 4th street a little early to scope out the venues and their locations. I noticed the street was now closed for several blocks which lent itself well for hopping between locations. I had my schedule ready on my phone and posted up at Lead Dog with beer in hand, ready for the music to begin.
The evening started off with Floating Witch’s Head & Flaural. I then crossed the street over to Alpine to check out local’s Nightbrain before heading back to Lead Dog for Spirit Award. Things were off to a good start and only got better from there. I caught Sun Colony at Black Rabbit and Low Hums at Abby’s Highway 40 (where a birthday celebration for one of the organizers took place, with a delicious shot of Negroni to commemorate the evening). I ended the night back at The Alpine for Tropa Magica before heading home. I was hoping to catch Salt Lake’s Dad Bod but ran out of steam. I had discovered so many bands in that single day that my anticipation for Day 2 grew even more.
Heading back to 4th street Saturday afternoon, I noticed the area had changed a little bit. Venders were now set up in the middle of the street with a smaller stage located towards the beginning of the festival grounds. This portion of the day was made free and open to the public from 2-6pm and would feature three bands with Reno’s Ranger starting off the afternoon while the smells of delicious food wafted through the air. The festival felt a little more crowded, but it never felt suffocating. I was getting SXSW vibes as Saturday rolled along. The feeling was very similar to the experience I had over the three days spent in Austin photographing bands for a friend’s website. Eating amazing food while hopping from venue to venue to check out bands for hours on end.
I was back at Lead Dog for the debut performance of Packaging, which consisted of members from Spirit Award and Flaural. This would be significant as the band has blown up in the indie sphere since this performance. They had a live studio KEXP performance released earlier this year, and the first run of their vinyl is all completely sold out. Getting to see their first ever live show and hear these songs before the world was something special to me. I bounced around venues catching snippets of sets before heading back to Black Rabbit for The Blank Tapes. I’d been a huge fan of their work but never had a chance to see them live.
After about 30 minutes of the The Blank Tapes, I was back at The Alpine for the soulful sounds of Reno’s The Sextones. I went over to The Depot whose stage was set up in their gorgeous barrel room to scratch my cumbia itch with Combo Tezeta. I finished the night back at Lead Dog for Annie Taylor, all the way from Switzerland. I decided to call it a night after this as I again ran out of steam and sadly, had to pass on Death Valley Girls. Overall, this was an amazing weekend, and I had plenty of new music to check out over the next few months. This ended up being the most fun I had had in recent memory.
As with any music festival, there are bound to be bands that will have conflicting time slots and this was very true at Off-Beat. Not a criticism in any way but just the nature of these types of festivals. This was the point where my knowledge of Reno bands wasn’t where it is today. Looking back at the schedule I realized now that I had missed out on some great local talent. I probably should have seen Rigorous Proof on the main stage to start Thursday or catch some of the Blackstallion set before seeing Sun Colony, or maybe Spitting Image before I got my cumbia fix on Saturday. Tradeoffs and compromises but I feel it reflects the quality of the festival.
Reno has an incredible music scene and Off-Beat Music Society plays a huge part. The festival inspired me to further explore Reno music as I had no idea how expansive and amazing the scene truly was. In a way, the festival inspired me to get back into music blogging and show photography. More importantly though, Off-Beat Music Festival plays a large part in making Reno a music hub and pushing the Reno music narrative. They have brought in artists from across the US and abroad for the last 10 years and have been very supportive of the local musicians.
Tickets for the 2026 edition of Off-Beat Music Festival can be found here. The festival is scheduled for October 2nd and 3rd.
Off-Beat Music Society also puts on a free, all-ages summer music concert series titled Off The Rails. Information on this event can be found here.
My hope is that Reno’s music scene can push forward with the momentum it currently has. This biggest little city is strategically located between Oregon, California, Utah, Idaho and Arizona and the perfect stop in between the usual routes touring bands follow. I would love to see more bands start to come through and play here. Reno has the infrastructure in place with many different spots to see a show. There are house venues like Greenhouse, community art spaces like The Holland Project, mid-size venues like Cypress and The Alpine and massive, mainstream arenas in GSR. Whatever your musical taste, Reno has it.
Leave a Reply