Hopscotch Music Festival is back Sept. 4-6 for its 15th go-round in downtown Raleigh.
The event once again presents a large, diverse, and daunting array of acts, with more than 100 artists representing a prismatic array of genres and subgenres, anchored as ever by a solid core of indie rock talent. And it again takes over two outdoor spaces in Moore Square and City Plaza while pushing late into the night at eight club spaces around the city.
Here are a few recommendations for acts you might see and themes you might tease out as you navigate the weekend.
They’re back!
Repeating acts, particularly on the bigger stages, used to be something Hopscotch avoided. As it raced to provide as many chances for discovery as possible into its choose-your-own-adventure schedule, having acts played again was a drag on the notion of exposing audiences to as many far-flung artists as possible.
But this year’s lineup features returning artists in prominent slots—allowing those who were there to bask in memories of 2010s Hopscotches, and those who weren’t a chance to catch them anew.
Earl Sweatshirt (10 p.m., Thursday, City Plaza) and Built to Spill (8:45 p.m., Thursday, Moore Square) close out main stages on the same night, the rapper’s casually deep bars continuing to grow in renown and the indie rock eternals continuing to bend and crunch with comforting earnestness.
Thunderous post-rock legends Godspeed You! Black Emperor (8:15 p.m., Friday, Moore Square) magically played through a storm in 2015. Hope for better weather this time—or maybe don’t.
Superchunk (6:45 p.m., Saturday, Moore Square), the band that built Durham’s Merge Records, also returns. See how their perennially punchy eruptions of pop-punk anxiety move now with drummer Laura King having replaced longtime band engine Jon Wurster.
Another returning local offers the chance to revel in changes, as Alexandra Sauser-Monnig’s Daughter of Swords (11 p.m., Thursday, Pour House) has shifted from delicate folk-pop to pop-rock that restlessly glitches and sparks.
profiles of 2025 hopscotch acts
For many years, metal was an essential mainstay at the festival, with titans such as Sunn O))), Sleep, and Godflesh playing headlining slots in the event’s bigger rooms. That tradition is happily back in action with a potent one-two punch.
Longstanding instro-metal champions Pelican (11:30 p.m., Saturday, Lincoln Theatre) bring riffs that continue to twist and rumble with righteous immensity on this year’s Flickering Resonance, while Windhand (12:30 a.m., Saturday, Lincoln Theatre) offers one of the most transfixing sounds in doom metal, as their sludgy, Sabbath-y smoldering melds with the operatic mysticism of singer Dorthia Cottrell.
Don’t skip the comedy
For a third year, Hopscotch has a comedy stage. And while it can be tempting to keep hopping from one musical moment to the next with so much on the docket this year, I recommend slowing down for some laughs—both as a palette cleanser and to indulge in the interesting offerings the festival brings through.
And this year definitely has the goods with boundary-averse funny man and musical improviser Reggie Watts (1 a.m., Thursday, Lincoln Theatre), gleefully acid-tongued stand-up Julia Desmond (12:30 a.m., Thursday, Lincoln Theatre) and Harrison & Wentz Presents: A Bewitching Night of Mystic Tropicalia (10:30 p.m., Thursday, Lincoln Theatre), a musical variety show that promises “an amalgam of Space Age Pop, Howdy Doody, The Gong Show, and Heaven’s Gate.”
more on this year’s hopscotch acts
Keep Hopscotch weird
In the last couple of years, as it has beefed up its lineup post-pandemic, Hopscotch has reclaimed some of the experimental frontiers that were once visible on its club stages. It’s one of the key strengths that makes the event feel like more than just another indie rock festival.
So get out there and enjoy the graceful but unnerving work of guitarist and composer William Tyler (1 a.m., Friday, Kings), the transfixing acoustic meditations of the Magic Tuber Stringband (12 a.m., Friday, Kings), the blur of avant pop and Afro-Brazilian inspirations that is Curiosidades de Bombrile (10:30 p.m., Friday, Neptunes), the upended post-rock grooves of Sinkane (11:30 p.m., Friday, Lincoln Theatre), the consuming musique concrète of Claire Rousay (11 p.m., Saturday, Nash Hall), and the intoxicating Peruvian-inspired rock of Chica Libre (12:30 a.m., Saturday, Kings), among others.
Legacies to toast
As ever, Hopscotch remains a place to celebrate the legacies of key musicians in the indie world, as the festival continues to anchor its lineups with exciting luminaries—some of which have already been mentioned in this guide’s top section.
A few more to stop by and raise a glass to are the Brian Eno-approved acoustic ambience of Laraaji (11:30 p.m., Thursday, Nash Hall), the beguiling and always enrapturing country soul of Swamp Dogg (12:30 a.m., Friday, Lincoln Theatre), and the unpredictable but consistently keen and erudite pop-rock of Sparks (9:30 p.m., Saturday, City Plaza).
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