Considering that the weather outside isn’t exactly frightful during the winter months in SoCal, our concert calendar manages to keep our social lives plenty warm in between all the extra meals and family gatherings scheduled to descend upon us in the coming days.
It’s in that spirit of giving that we offer a brisk yet bountiful list of ways to spend your time in the company of fellow fans, all basking in the gift of live music this holiday season. Cobbling together a slate that bears a gift of a little something for everyone — from the metalhead, to the pop princess to the avant-jazzer. Here’s our guide to 10 must-see concerts to enjoy from post-Thanksgiving through the top of 2025.
Dawn Richard + Spencer Zahn / Zebulon / Dec. 2
Richard deserves a clean break from any Diddy news in her life. She’s a hell of a modernist R&B singer in any setting, but even better with adventurous pianist and composer Zahn in tow. “Quiet in a World Full of Noise,” their latest collaboration in a fruitful string of them, is a tender, vulnerable meditation on grief and deserves its own flowers. — August Brown
TV on the Radio / El Rey Theatre / Dec. 4, 5 & 7
Twenty years after the release of its acclaimed “Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes,” this adventurous New York art-rock crew has reunited to play its first gigs since 2019. TV on the Radio’s 2004 debut mapped the bewildering psychic landscape of a post-9/11 America, so it’s fitting that the band chose this moment of exuberance and fear to make its return. At the El Rey, you’ll see singer Tunde Adebimpe, guitarist Kyp Malone and drummer Jaleel Bunton onstage; Dave Sitek, the band’s guitarist and studio mastermind, opted to sit these shows out. — Mikael Wood
KIIS-FM Jingle Ball / Intuit Dome / Dec. 6
For the acts on the bill — all of them eager to hear their songs on the radio into the new year — this annual all-star holiday concert is a way to kiss the powerful programming rings at KIIS (and its corporate parent, iHeartMedia). For fans in the audience, it’s efficient one-stop shopping for what’s happening on today’s Top 40, including SZA’s wonderfully digressive R&B, Benson Boone’s earnest nice-guy balladry, Tate McRae’s neo-Britney dance-pop and Shaboozey’s post-hip-hop country music. Also due to perform are Meghan Trainor, Kane Brown, Madison Beer, T-Pain, NCT Dream … and Paris Hilton. Some things never change. — M.W.
Metallica / YouTube Theater / Dec. 13
Between two SoFi Stadium dates and a headlining appearance at Indio’s Power Trip festival, Metallica hasn’t exactly been hard to see in Southern California over the last year and a half. But here’s a rare opportunity to catch the veteran metal band in the kind of small(-ish) room it hasn’t played regularly in decades. The occasion for Metallica’s visit to Inglewood’s 6,000-capacity YouTube Theater is the group’s biannual Helping Hands benefit concert, which aims to raise money to fight hunger and to support technical education. Jimmy Kimmel will host the evening, and expect additional acts to be announced. — M.W.
Billie Eilish / Kia Forum / Dec. 15, 16, 17, 20 & 21
On the road for the first time without her brother and producer, Finneas, as a permanent part of her live band, the 22-year-old pop superstar stops at the Forum for five shows in support of “Hit Me Hard and Soft,” which just became the siblings’ third straight album to be nominated for album of the year at the Grammy Awards. (Nobody else has done that with their first three LPs.) Before the tour, Finneas said he’d join his sister onstage occasionally when his schedule permits; here he’ll serve as Eilish’s opening act on Dec. 21. — M.W.
Jeff Parker ETA IVtet / Zebulon / Dec. 16-17
The guitar genius was the beating heart of the late, great Highland Park jazz club ETA, whose residencies spun off a number of compelling combos like the experimental group SML. Fans of his IVtet — a small cadre of jazz and session heroes who are among the city’s best improvisers — will be thrilled to see the combo back in action in person and on record with “The Way Out of Easy,” a refined slate of free-flowing jams. — A.B.
Besame Mucho festival / Dodger Stadium / Dec. 21
Shakira recently postponed a 2024 arena tour to 2025 so she could meet fan demand by upgrading some dates to stadiums. But the Colombian pop icon — whose latest album, “Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran,” chronicles her messy breakup with Spanish soccer star Gerard Piqué — is still on the books to headline the third Besame Mucho festival at Dodger Stadium, where she’ll be joined by Enrique Iglesias, Pitbull, Los Tigres del Norte and Banda MS for an expansive overview of Latin music spread across multiple stages. Among the dozens of other acts on the bill: Ivy Queen, Juanes, Café Tacuba, Caifanes, Los Tucanes de Tijuana and Carlos Vives, the last of whom was just named person of the year at the Latin Grammys. — M.W.
X / The Observatory / Dec. 27
What on earth is Los Angeles going to do without X? The standard bearers of SoCal’s punk scene for more than five decades promised they’d hang it up with “Smoke & Fiction,” a compelling valediction of an LP released this year. Who knows how many gigs they have left in the tank? While you should see them any chance you get, this Christmas show should be an especially meaningful one. — A.B.
Latin Mafia / Hollywood Palladium / Jan. 22
The Mexico-based De La Rosa brothers won a new artist nod at the Latin Grammys for their debut album, “Todos Los Días Todo El Día,” which deftly straddles urbano, trap, R&B, EDM and indie. They’ve already played Coachella and Camp Flog Gnaw. What’s next? A recent listening party in Mexico City that drew the 18,000 fans suggests they’re about to get much bigger stateside. — A.B.
Jamie xx / The Shrine / Jan. 23
You’re not going to have a better night on a dance floor than whenever Jamie xx is on deck. The producer and erstwhile member of the xx beat his own high standards with this year’s “In Waves,” a joyful and heartfelt insistence on the redemptive power of the club. Whatever other dark stuff is happening in late January in the United States, know that you can still go hear “Baddy on the Floor” with a roomful of jubilant friends. — A.B.
