Live from Brookside at the Rose Bowl, this weekend’s Cruel World music festival features some of the biggest names from the 1980s new wave and goth scenes, including honorary Angeleno Morrissey, English goth O.G.s Bauhaus and New York’s CBGB breakthrough stars Blondie, plus Devo, the Psychedelic Furs, the Violent Femmes, Australia’s Church and local legends 45 Grave and Christian Death.
Produced by Coachella promoter Goldenvoice, Cruel World time-travels back to that moment when synthesizers were supplanting guitars and rebel teens born into baby boomer hegemony were hungrily seeking new sounds, ideas and hairdos.
Today is sold out, but tickets remain for Sunday.
Times’ music reporters Randall Roberts and Suzy Exposito will be braving the heat and reporting live from the festival throughout today and tonight.