Seven Years In, Redondo Beach Has Never Sounded Better
Written by Eric Budianto Thornton
Images Courtesy of BeachLife Festival | Photos by JP Cordero, Bobby Rivero, and Fabien Castro
There’s a stretch of coastline just south of LAX where the Pacific bends gently inward, the King Harbor pier juts out into the blue, and for one weekend in early May, the whole South Bay seems to come together with the smell of sea salt and the rumble of a kick drum. This was BeachLife Festival’s seventh year on the Redondo Beach waterfront, and as we predicted in last year’s coverage, we came back. Glad we did.
This year’s edition pulled the highest attendance in the festival’s history. More than 40,000 people made the trip down PCH, with both Friday and Saturday selling out completely. Three days, four stages, more than 40 artists across rock, indie, pop, jam, reggae, and punk — plus a culinary program that genuinely rivals what you’d find at the city’s better restaurants. By Sunday night, when James Taylor’s voice drifted out over the harbor and the last of the sold-out crowd swayed in the dimming light, it was clear why BeachLife isn’t really competing with anything else on the LA festival calendar. It’s its own thing.
For the uninitiated, the layout is something special. Four stages spread across a cleaned-up stretch of waterfront just north of Redondo’s sport-fishing pier, with the marina to your back, palms swaying overhead. The two main stages, the Fiji Airways HighTide and the Cove Soda LowTide, are positioned roughly across from each other so concertgoers can wander between sets without ever feeling crowded. Off to one side is the LA Chargers RipTide stage, and tucked into a more intimate corner is the SpeakEasy Stage presented by STōK Cold Brew Coffee, curated, as it has been since the start, by Pennywise frontman and BeachLife Brand Director Jim Lindberg. It’s where some of the festival’s best micro-moments happen: stripped-down acoustic sets that feel more like a friend’s backyard than a festival.
What sets BeachLife apart from anything else in Southern California is the food. Working with Executive Chef Chase Carlson and a roster of South Bay restaurants, the Captain’s Culinary Experience and the returning California Surf Club turn festival eating into something closer to a tasting menu — seared tuna, fresh oysters, halibut tacos that ruin every other festival taco.
DAY ONE — DURAN DURAN, AN ’80S TIDE, AND A BEACH FULL OF DANCING
Friday belonged to Duran Duran. When Simon Le Bon kicked into “Hungry Like the Wolf” and “Ordinary World,” with the harbor lights flickering on the water behind the stage, it was one of those moments that reminds you why people keep going to outdoor concerts at all. The set leaned heavily on the catalog, including the closer “Rio,” but the band slipped in newer material too, and they sounded tighter than they have any right to in their fifth decade.
“It felt like our team really hit its stride this year…and that’s the result of seven years of investing in people.”
— Sam Meyers, BeachLife Festival Director
https://www.tiktok.com/@jcasaglov/video/7635881488503885070
The bigger surprise was earlier in the evening. At about 7:30 p.m., just before Duran Duran’s set kicked off, The Chainsmokers took over the Cove Soda LowTide stage, the smaller of the two main stages, the one tucked closer to the lagoon, and somehow turned it into the most packed corner of the festival. Old, young, sunburned dads, Gen Z teens, parents with kids on shoulders, all of them dancing along the color-shifting LEDs and columns of CO₂ jets sweeping across the deck while Drew and Alex worked the controllers.
In the finale, they dropped the crowd favorite track, “Something Just Like This”, while telling everyone to get low before the drop, the typical dj move at shows. The whole hill went into a crouch before the drop when’ 20,000 people came up off the sand at the same time. It was the loudest singalong of the weekend.
DAY TWO — PUNK ENERGY AND A SURPRISE 27 YEARS IN THE MAKING
Saturday was a different animal. The wind picked up, the energy ratcheted up, and the lineup got delightfully louder. Joan Jett & The Blackhearts brought the early afternoon to a standstill with the holy trinity of “Bad Reputation,” “I Hate Myself For Loving You,” and “I Love Rock ‘n Roll.” Watching her hold an entire beach hostage with just a black T-shirt and a Gibson Melody Maker was one of the more humbling sets of the weekend. The crowd had self-segmented into pockets of leather-jacketed punks, sunburned dads, and Gen Z fans who clearly knew every word, and at least one fan with a foot-tall orange mohawk stalked the area like it was 1981 (and looked great doing it).
Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals followed with the kind of soulful, slide-guitar set that sounds tailor-made for a beach. Then came Slightly Stoopid, who treat BeachLife like a hometown gig .
But the moment everyone was talking about Saturday night was The Offspring. Midway through “Pretty Fly (For A White Guy),” the band brought out a special guest: Guy Cohen, the original “white guy” from the 1998 music video, stepping back onto a stage 27 years later in front of a crowd that lost its mind. He still has the moves. He still has the hat. The fact that BeachLife managed to land that surprise says everything about how this festival approaches nostalgia. They don’t just book the songs. They book the moments.
@offspring BeachLife Festival, you were out of your f*cking mind 🙌🙏 #theoffspring #prettyfly #musicfest #musicfestival #ontour
DAY THREE — THE GROOVES AND THE GREATS
Despite having a delayed start due to a police investigation caused by a reported swatting incident, by Sunday, the festival had settled into a beautifully hungover rhythm. Daytime kicked off with a daytime disco set from Poolside, while the energetic indie-pop run from Peach Pit that pulled a much bigger crowd than expected at three in the afternoon.
My Morning Jacket was the set that, more than any other, came closest to defining what this festival actually is. Jim James led the band through a sprawling, jam-oriented run that blurred from “Off The Record” into the kind of cosmic guitar workout fans came for. The lights bled green and blue across the marina, the Sunday-night air had that specific California chill that hits around 8 p.m. on the coast, and the whole thing felt suspended in time.
Sheryl Crow kept the singalongs going with hits like “All I Wanna Do,” “Soak Up the Sun,” “If It Makes You Happy”. She somehow made a 35,000-person beach feel intimate. And then the lights came down for James Taylor.
@melissa_redford #sherylcrow #concerts #beachlifefestival #singing #guitar @BeachLife Festival
He’s 78 now. The voice has loosened slightly at the edges. But watching him close out a beach festival with “Fire and Rain” and “You’ve Got a Friend,” backed by his All-Star Band, was the kind of generationally graceful moment that almost no other festival on this calendar could pull off.
BEYOND THE STAGES
The thing about BeachLife is that even when there’s no band on, there’s something to do. Tucked between the stages, the festival rolled out a full slate of side experiences that turned the venue into something more like a beach-themed playground.
There’s a live karaoke booth that became the unlikely cult favorite of the weekend, where every brave soul who took the mic got blasted with a CO₂ cannon at the chorus drop. The line stayed twenty deep all three days. A few feet away, the Punk Rock & Paintbrushes popup gallery showcased original artwork from rock musicians-turned-visual-artists including, reportedly, a piece from Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea, whose visual art has been quietly making the festival circuit. The gallery was paired with a silent auction of artist memorabilia, signed guitars, lyric sheets, and one-of-one pieces, with proceeds going to BeachLife’s nonprofit partners.
Add in a Skechers activation, the returning California Surf Club VIP experience with cocktails and gourmet bites, the marquee-lit “Cool Way” pathway that turned into the festival’s most Instagrammed photo backdrop after dark, and brand experiences from Fiji Airways, Cove Soda, Hendrick’s Gin, and Tito’s, and you’ve got a festival that actually rewards wandering.
A GIVING TIDE
What’s easy to miss in the headliner-level coverage is that BeachLife is also one of the more philanthropy-minded festivals in the country. This year alone, between the silent auction, the Evening By the Sea gala, and a community Battle of the Bands, the festival helped its partners raise more than $150,000 for local and national nonprofits, including the Surfrider Foundation, Heal the Bay, the Wyland Foundation, and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Since launching in 2019, BeachLife’s giving total has crossed $900,000.
“Giving back to the community has been at the heart of BeachLife Festival since the very beginning.”
Rob Lissner, BeachLife Co-Founder
That’s the kind of number that doesn’t usually fit into a festival recap, but it should. The seven years co-founders Allen Sanford and Rob Lissner have spent building this thing and has been quietly underwritten by a commitment to the community that hosts them. The South Bay shows up for BeachLife because BeachLife shows up for the South Bay. In just seven years, BeachLife has gone from scrappy local experiment to one of the most distinct music festivals on the West Coast.
Last year’s recap closed with a promise: whatever the lineup looks like in 2026, we’ll be there. This year’s recap closes the same way. BeachLife Festival 2027 is already on the calendar for April 30 – May 2. If the past three days are any indication, that wave is going to be even bigger.
See you on the sand!
BeachLife Festival 2027 returns to Redondo Beach April 30 – May 2, 2027. For the most up-to-date info, lineup announcements, and tickets, visit beachlifefestival.com, or follow on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
