What music are Bay Area venues playing? Concert data shows what’s popular

What’s playing at your favorite Bay Area music venue? Likely, some form of “indie” music.

The Chronicle analyzed more than 4,500 concerts that took place in the Bay Area since the start of 2020 to determine the common genres played at 27 popular music venues in San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley. The five most common genres were “indie pop,” “indie rock,” “pop,” “modern rock,” and “indie folk,” according to the music streamer Spotify’s classification system.

While the top spots went to familiar genres, things quickly got more interesting. The next five genres are much more specific, including microgenres like “electropop,” “art pop” and “stomp and holler.”

You might not know all of these genres. That’s OK, we didn’t know them all either. But they are easy to understand after you hear a few examples.

For instance, Charli XCX, who played two nights at Oakland’s Fox Theater in March 2022, is classified as “electropop” and “art pop” (artists can be listed under multiple genres). Those genres are exemplified by her popular songs “Beg For You” and “Hot In It.” “Stomp and holler” can be heard in the music of Wild Rivers, a trio that headlined a show at the Fillmore Auditorium in September, playing fan favorites like the folksy indie rock tune “Thinking ’Bout Love.”

The Chronicle obtained the concert data for this analysis by collecting information from concert discovery website Songkick. We then gathered Spotify genres for each of the more than 6,000 artists who played at the 27 venues we analyzed. Venues were chosen based on capacity (all were between 250 and 10,000), number of upcoming shows and the availability of data.

How does Spotify sort artists into genres? It’s a bit complicated. Spotify has nearly 6,000 genres and artists can belong to anywhere from 0 to 16 of them. According to Spotify, genres are created based on both how users group songs, like in playlists, and a mathematical analysis of a song’s components. In other words, if a lot of people listen to a set of the same songs or put them on the same playlist, that’s a genre. And if a computer thinks a set of songs sounds the same, that’s a genre too.

Geography also can connect artists to a genre. For instance, Still Woozy and Destroy Boys are categorized as “Oakland indie” because of their start in the East Bay. Other artists were categorized as “Oakland hip hop,” like rappers Too $hort and Luniz.

What microgenre is your favorite venue known for? Find out below.

Famous for its history as a rock venue under the ownership of promoter Bill Graham, the Fillmore is one of San Francisco’s oldest and most notable venues. It’s where Graham helped launch the careers of rock legends like Janis Joplin and the Grateful Dead. The venue also hosted historic rock events like Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ 20-show residency in 1997.

Rock is by no means gone from the Fillmore. Nearly 45% of artists identify with some genre of rock. But it’s also unusually likely to host artists who fall under the “country road” genre like ERNEST and Chris Lane.

Be sure to grab an apple on your way in. It’s a tradition Graham started that lives on to this day.

San Francisco’s Civic Auditorium was built for the Panama Pacific International Exposition to attract conventions to the city. Often now just called “the Bill Graham,” the venue has served as the temporary home for the San Francisco Opera and as an occasional home arena for the Golden State Warriors.

These days it’s the go-to place for raves. Nearly three times more artists whose primary genre was “EDM” played at the Bill Graham than artists who primarily belonged to the next most common genre, “dubstep.” The venue’s fifth-most-common genre, “pop dance,” didn’t show up among any other venues’ top 15 genres.

Put on your dancing shoes. You’ll probably need them.

Ever wanted to listen to music in a former mortuary? The Chapel, located in the Mission, shed its funeral services history to become a venue in 2012. Perhaps that explains why it’s the place for neo-psychedelia. The only genre more common than “neo-psychedelic” at The Chapel since 2020 was “indie folk.”

It’s also a popular venue for a variety of other folk microgenres. More “new Americana” and “stomp and holler” artists played at The Chapel than at any other venue.

The Chapel is also a place to find lesser known music, at least according to how much an artist’s songs are streamed on Spotify. Of the 27 venues we analyzed, we found that the average popularity of artists playing at The Chapel was lower than venues of similar size  like the New Parish and the Independent.

The UC Theatre was a cinema before being converted to a music venue in 2016. Tom Hanks cites the theater as one of the places that inspired his interest in movies.

Art house films aren’t so common for the UC Theatre anymore but for those interested in “pop-punk,” “emo” or “screamo,” it’s the venue for you. It booked the most “screamo” artists out of the venues we analyzed. It’s also where artists who have “graduated” from 924 Gilman, the venue where “punk” band Green Day got its start, go to play. Green Day played at the UC in October 2016, a couple of months after the venue first opened.

The UC Theatre was the only venue to play artists from the microgenres of “trancecore” and “Ukrainian pop.”

Oakland’s New Parish hosts more R&B and rap music acts than other venues in our data set. It had the most “alternative R&B” shows and was the only place that hosted multiple artists who fell under the microgenre “aesthetic rap” — like $NOT and Night Lovell.

The New Parish advertises itself as an intimate venue for national tours and the data shows that to be true. Even artists who play at larger San Francisco venues like the Regency Ballroom have played at the New Parish, like Billboard charter Giveon and Bay Area native Remi Wolf.

What about the other 22 venues? The chart below shows the top genres for each of the analyzed venues as well as the artists who played there.

It’s followed by our favorite insights from The Chronicle’s genre analysis of each of the remaining venues, in order of venue capacity.

The Greek Theatre is the longest-running outdoor amphitheater in the country. It’s held numerous historic speakers like the Dalai Lama and Theodore Roosevelt. With that history, it’s not surprising the artists who play here are primarily “pop” and “indie pop” artists. In fact, the shows were played, on average, by the most popular artists in our data set.

When it isn’t being used to hold the California Masons’ annual convention, the Masonic is a place to hear “pop” music. It is the only venue to have “dance pop” as one of its top five genres, different from the “pop dance” genre common at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium.

Though the Paramount is home to the East Bay Symphony and Oakland Ballet, the artists it brings are less classical and more hip hop. It’s hosted “hip hop” artists like East Bay natives Luniz and Too $hort.

Another cinema turned music venue, the Fox survived an arson fire and a 40-year event drought before becoming the venue it is today. One of the larger venues analyzed, the Fox’s most common genres were similar to the Bay Area in general, though it was the only venue to play “Celtic punk” bands like Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly.

The Warfield, formerly a vaudeville theater and movie house, was built in 1922. It brought the most “rap” artists to the Bay Area out of the venues analyzed.

The Regency Ballroom, which just last year was put up for sale, has been a part of San Francisco’s music scene only since the early 2000s. It’s the only venue to have played multiple artists falling under the “PluggnB” genre, a sound that combines the trap microgenre “plugg” with the melodies of R&B.

August Hall plays your typical indie array of artists. But it’s also been the one place to host more than one “Nigerian pop” act in the last three years. Five “Nigerian pop” artists have played since 2020.

When not being used as the background for tourists’ photos, the Palace of Fine Arts hosts the occasional show. Its most commonly played genre was “mellow gold,” a genre combining the sounds of folk rock and soft rock.

A fixture of South of Market’s nightlife, the DNA Lounge has hosted more “dubstep” artists than other venues analyzed. It was also the only place in the last three years to host “aggrotech,” “happy hardcore” and “spacewave” artists, among other microgenres.

Bimbo’s is one of San Francisco’s oldest nightclubs and the sound it brings in is reflective of that. If you feel like reliving the sounds of the 1980s, Bimbo’s had more “new wave pop” and “new romantic” artists perform since 2020 than any other venue.

You never know what you will get at Great American Music Hall. The venue, which was formerly a brothel and a jazz club, hosted artists classified as part of 480 distinct genres since 2020, the most of any venue in our dataset.

Cornerstone, which opened in 2017, is the only venue analyzed to consistently show reggae acts like “reggae rock” band Pepper.

Located in San Francisco’s North of the Panhandle, The Independent was the only venue to host multiple “British jazz” and “brass band” artists.

The third most common genre at Freight & Salvage, “lilith,” was not in the top 15 genres for any other venue. What is “lilith?” Think of any iteration of artists you would’ve found at Lilith Fair.

Housed in an Oakland Victorian, the Starline Social Club was the only venue to host multiple “doomgaze” and “folktronica” artists.

A former television studio, the Rickshaw Stop’s top genres are mainly variations of indie. For example, 17 “chamber psych” artists have played at the venue, including Yard Act and Automatic.

This venue is known for having live music every night, seven nights a week. It’s hosted the most artists who identify with Bay Area genres like “Oakland hip hop” or “Bay Area indie.”

Yoshi’s, a jazz club and Japanese restaurant in the East Bay, was the only venue analyzed that consistently brought “smooth jazz” to the Bay Area. Eleven smooth jazz artists played at Yoshi’s, and not a single artist classified as part of this genre showed up at any of the other 26 venues.

Best known for being an early home to Green Day, 924 Gilman is the place to see microgenres of punk music from “modern ska punk” to “5th wave emo.”

The Monarch is a good place to see acts classified under obscure genres. Four of the top five genres played at the Monarch were not in the top 15 of any other venue analyzed. They included house microgenres like “deep house,” “float house,” “dark techno” and “deep disco house.”

Café du Nord has a rich history from its time as a speakeasy to its run as a rock club that hosted Love’s last show with front man Arthur Lee. Today, a range of indie and R&B artists are the main headliners at the venue.

​​Brick & Mortar Music Hall is one of the only independent music venues left in San Francisco. It hosted the most “underground hip hop” artists of the venues analyzed.