14 Bay Area concerts you shouldn’t miss this summer

This summer’s Bay Area concert lineup feels like someone hit shuffle on four decades of music history.

On any given week, fans can see a Beatle, a Nobel Prize-winning songwriter, a reggaeton superstar or one of indie rock’s great collectives.

Add in arena shows from Ariana Grande and AC/DC alongside club dates from Toro y Moi and King Woman, and the result is a season that feels both huge and strangely local at the same time.

The Grammy Award-winning musician is officially leaving the land of Oz and returning to the stage. Grande, who has spent the past few years filming and promoting Bay Area native Jon M. Chu’s on-screen adaptation of “Wicked,” is launching her first tour in six years with three nights at Oakland Arena on June 6 and June 9-10. While the trek is named after her 2024 album, “Eternal Sunshine,” some fans believe the pop singer may also preview new material from her forthcoming eighth studio album, “Petal,” due out July 31.

Four weeks shy of his 86th birthday, The Beatles drummer brings his act to the San Jose Civic on June 11. Hits alone from Starr’s years with the Liverpudlian group and his solo career, along with a tune or two from his new collaboration with T-Bone Burnett, “Long Long Road,” could fill the evening. But no show would be complete without classic contributions from an All-Star Band that includes, among others, Colin Hay (Men at Work), Hamish Stuart (Average White Band) and Steve Lukather (Toto).

Ten years after he last played the venue and exactly six years since the COVID-19 pandemic forced him to cancel two dates there, the legendary singer-songwriter returns to Berkeley’s Greek Theatre on June 13 and 14. He might even perform songs from the recent biopic “A Complete Unknown,” but don’t expect to recognize them if he does. Dylan likes to keep things fresh with new arrangements of old songs.

Lucinda Williams and Her Band and The John Doe Folk Trio open the shows.

With a 2023 Coachella set, a “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon” performance and a Met Gala appearance under his belt, singer, rapper and actor Diljit Dosanjh has already hit a pop culture trifecta. Dosanjh’s charismatic flair and visibility could do for Punjabi music what BTS did for K-pop or Bad Bunny did for Urbano Latino. His celebratory amalgam of bhangra, hip-hop and pop take over Chase Center on June 20-21. Expect to see Dosanjh transform from a diasporic music pioneer to a global mainstream superstar while not abandoning his language or identity.

Low-rise jeans, Juicy Couture tracksuits and Broken Social Scene — they’re all from Y2K, and they’re all in the midst of a comeback. The Canadian band, initially formed in 1999 by Brendan Canning and Kevin Drew, is a musical collective that sometimes performs with well over a dozen members onstage and includes a who’s who of Canadian indie rock icons, including Emily Haines of Metric and Leslie Feist of Feist. BSS released its sixth studio album, “Remember the Humans,” in May, after seven years, and is now set to bring its melancholic, dreamy yet noisy garage rock to the Masonic in San Francisco on its co-headlining All the Feelings Tour with Metric and Stars on June 21-22.

If ASAP Rocky had to pick a lane — rapper, actor, fashion icon, entrepreneur or Rihanna’s baby daddy — he’d probably say “all of them.” Yet despite multiple identities, including a role in the Golden Globe-winning “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You” and Spike Lee’s “Highest 2 Lowest” oppossite Oscar-winning actor Denzel Washington, he is best known as one of the most iconoclastic rappers of his generation. Money and fame haven’t changed the Harlem emcee except for his vision and tenacity. He’s coming to Chase Center on June 25 in support of his first new album in eight years, “Don’t Be Dumb.” Good advice.

Known for her soul-baring pop-rock music, Humberstone is fresh off the heels of her sophomore album, “Cruel World,” which was released April 10. The record brought a more mature and polished edge to the honest, sad-girl songs that she first gained popularity for and was widely praised by critics. The British singer-songwriter performed at Outside Lands in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park in 2023 and at BottleRock Music Festival in Napa the following year. Now, she’s returning to the Bay Area for a performance at the Fillmore in San Francisco on June 28 as part of her “Cruel World” tour.

Ca7riel & Paco Amoroso are an Argentine duo who gained broader attention in 2024 when their “Tiny Desk Concert” went viral, racking up more than 52 million views to date. They mix hip-hop, pop, Latin beats, trap and electronic dance music, among other genres, and put just as much intentionality into their eccentric fashion and visual representation. That effort can be seen in videos of their recent high-profile collaborations, which include the pop-rock song “Hasta Jesús Tuvo un Mal Día” (“Even Jesus Has a Bad Day”) with Sting, the dance track “Blow My Mind” with Robyn and the single “Goo Goo Ga Ga” with Jack Black. Catch them on their world tour at the Masonic on July 11.

It has been five years since King Woman, the shoegaze-doom metal band fronted by Kristina Esfandiari, released “Celestial Blues,” and the doom metal band is celebrating the anniversary with a summer U.S. tour followed by Europe and U.K. dates in the fall. 

“A lot of the record is about my descent into hell,” Esfandiari said of the album in an interview with Little Punk People in 2021.

Raised in a Sacramento-area Christian cultlike community, Esfandiari, who removed herself from the environment by moving to the Bay Area in her early 20s, continues to process her experience musically. Feel the feels with the band at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco on July 15.

If there’s one element central to Chaz Bear’s music, it’s his Bay Area pride. The South Carolina-born musician, best known as Toro y Moi, has lived in the East Bay for years and constantly reminds his fans of that, whether through music videos or lyrics that show love to BART. This summer, the indie-pop artist is readying for yet another performance in the region this summer, when he performs at the soon-to-close San Francisco rock venue Bottom of the Hill on July 29.

If you’re due for a shingles vaccination, Aug. 5 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara is probably circled on your calendar. For 50 years, Sydney’s AC/DC has brought hard-rock thunder from down under by utilizing the three R’s: riffs, rawness and rebellion. Since the ’70s, the group known to its fans as “Acka-Dacka” has pounded FM car stereos with a steady, trebly combo of electrified blues and rock ’n’ roll damnation. AC/DC anthems like “T.N.T.” and “You Shook Me All Night Long” are still in heavy rotation at sports arenas and high school reunions. English vocalist Brian Johnson, who replaced original singer Bon Scott in the early ’80s, remains the band’s frontman, while lead guitarist Angus Young is a duck-walking, finger-flipping dervish who launched a million air guitars.

At 86, jazz legend Herbie Hancock is making multiple Bay Area stops this summer, bringing one of the most influential careers in modern music back to local stages. The keyboard innovator performs Aug. 16 at UC Davis’ Mondavi Center before heading to San Francisco’s Davies Symphony Hall on Aug. 17. Expect a set list that stretches from acoustic jazz to funk, fusion and electronic experimentation, drawing from classics like “Chameleon,” “Cantaloupe Island” and “Rockit.”

One of the headliners who benefited from a post-Coachella glow-up was Colombian singer and dancer Karol G. Her rave-cave performance was a blitz of Latin styles, sexy choreography, electronic dance music and her signature reggaeton pop. The event whetted the appetite for her summer tour, which pulls into Levi’s Stadium on Aug. 21. Given the current political climate, there’s never been a better time for Karol G to advocate for unity, resilience and a strong spirit.

For those wondering how or why R&B stalwarts Usher and Chris Brown command a three-night stand at Levi’s Stadium in late August/early September, the numbers don’t lie. Both have decades of certified bangers and are coming off two successful tours — plus, for Usher, a Super Bowl halftime performance and Las Vegas residency. Factor in the choirboy-bad boy paradigm and the slingshot popularity of their 2000s and 2010s hits at local R&B brunch functions (“U Don’t Have to Call,” “Burn,” “Run It,” “Look at Me Now”), the three days at Levi’s may not be long enough.