Bonnaroo 2024 Artist Spotlight: The Maine

Like we’ve been doing for many years now, we’re making it our mission to help you get acquainted with many of our favorite acts from Bonnaroo‘s 2024 lineup. After roaring back to life in 2022, after two years off due to Covid and weather, and feeling fully like its old self again with a great fest last summer, this year marks Bonnaroo’s 21st installment (and 23rd anniversary), boasting not only another great and varied lineup, but also a continuation of some of the big changes and improvements rolled out over the last couple of years, with more flexibility in ticketing and camping, a reimagined “Outeroo” campground area, new activations, and further new ways to Roo. Back once again in its usual June 13-16 timeframe, we’re counting down the days until another great weekend on the farm.

As we dig through the entire schedule, we’ll highlight a spread of performers spanning across genres and stages, big and small, new and old, to bring you some of the most interesting, lesser-known, and most highly-recommended among this year’s crop of artists. And as our time at ‘Roo approaches, we’ll also be bringing you some special features and full list-style daily lineup guides, to help you plan your weekend ahead of the fest. While these previews won’t span every artist, and might omit some more obvious must-see acts, we hope they’ll serve as a way to help you navigate Bonnaroo’s gargantuan lineup, and to make the most of your busy weekend at the fest!

Grab your tickets right here if you haven’t already, and read on for our Bonnaroo Artist Spotlight!

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Another tentative candidate to appear at this year’s Emo SuperJam, Tempe, Arizona’s The Maine formed in 2007, while still in their teens, arriving onto the scene as the scrappier pop punk and emo boom of the 2000s had entered its “neon wave” of late 2000s and early 2010s, with scene bands at the time adopting slicker, more pop rock and alt rock rooted production in reaction to the pop punk wave of as decade prior, with more mainstream ambitions, and that MySpace or Hot Topic look of the era with teased hair and (hence the nickname) tight-fitted neon attire. That’s not to say The Maine ever quite adhered that description, though their first two albums, 2008 breakout Can’t Stop Won’t Stop and 2010 major label foray Black & White, are undisputed classics of the era, and the bands they toured with at the time (and continue to today) and fests they played like Warped Tour were most definitely wholly pop punk and emo. Unlike many of their peers of that era, The Maine have managed to endure and stay creatively relevant over the last decade and a half by both not getting too saddled by musical trends, and also by becoming fiercely independent, starting their own label, artist collective, and management entity 8123, through which they’ve released every album independently since 2013 fourth LP Forever Halloween (recorded in Nashville with producer Brendan Benson), and also producing their own packaged tours, like the annual traveling Sad Summer Fest as well as larger, Arizona-set 8123 Fest. Though, as mentioned, they’ve consistently toured with pop punk and emo peers like Taking Back Sunday, All Time Low, Fall Out Boy, and Dashboard Confessional, The Maine have long been sonically distinct, evolving their sound through a prolific string of releases in the 2010s to explore more organic and visceral alt and indie rock, ’90s-infused pop rock, resonant and earnest emo, lush nostalgic indie pop, and, with last year’s ninth and most recent eponymous LP, The Maine, electronic-infused contemporary alt rock and pop a la The 1975. Fantastic live performers and also a band who’ve always shown immense gratitude for and accessibility towards their fans, The Maine have managed to retain a passionate following for their entire career, selling out practically all of their dozen or so Nashville appearances in just as many years. While not the first group who’d come to mind for a fest like Bonnaroo, the rockers feel like an inspired choice, and their main stage placement is a testament to how popular they’ve remained all this years!

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