See Moir Music: November 2025
Shows, DJ sets, and other music and local events for the SF bay area, plus some more thoughts about music...
It’s a big month, let’s get into it...
Quick recap
This month was more adventurous than usual because I went to 3 entire shows, two of which while I was on vacation in Berlin and all of which with lovely friends!
Parcels at Max-Schmeling-Halle had an uneven set which led to uneven energy, but the venue was interesting and it's always fun to go to a regular concert that ends at regular person hours.
Immersion Eleven: Kiasmos DJ set by Janus Rasmussen (live a/v) at Studio1111 was incredible on many levels — the headliner came on at 9 and was done by 10:30, we took the bus to and from the club (my favorite activity), and the visuals and set were entrancing throughout. More like this please!! On the dancefloor I overheard someone tell their friend: "this is like a healthy reminder that electronic music can be good that isn’t techno… and Berlin forgets that”
Rilo Kiley and Waxahatchee at the Greek Theatre was good, although Waxahatchee didn't seem to quite know what to do with the size of the Greek and were almost too chill to be engaging live. Best for listening to on the couch imo. It was great to see Rilo Kiley and be reminded of how many of their songs I love! They didn't play Always, which I was sad but not surprised by.
What's next for me?
So far I'm planning to check out bullet tooth at a secret underground location, Silva Bumpa at Audio, and MPH at 1015 Folsom. I might cave and add DJ Heartstring to that list too but I'm more likely to make a game time decision there. In December I'm planning to go to the O'Flynn and Banksia show at Audio, but nothing else yet!
Other shows going on
What I'm not going to, but might if I had unlimited energy... bold shows are ones that I am planning on or otherwise heavily recommend...
November
Saturday, November 1 — The Faint and Hercules and Love Affair at the Regency Ballroom
Saturday, November 1 — Thunder Jackson at Brick & Mortar Music Hall
Saturday, November 1 — DJ ADHD at Monarch (discount tix)
Saturday, November 1 & Sunday, November 2 — Bakermat, WHOMADEWHO, Aluna, Parra for Cuva, Starfari, Spencer Brown, ELIF, Qrion and more at The Midway
Wednesday, November 5 — Dijon at the Masonic
Wednesday, November 5 — Nas with Symphony at The Theater at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium
Thursday, November 6 — Dijon at the Fox Theater
Friday, November 7 — Helena Hauff and more at Public Works for As You Like It's 15 year anniversary
Friday, November 7 — DJ Heartstring at Club Six
Saturday, November 8 — DJ Fuckoff & X-Coast at Public Works
Saturday, November 8 — Head Automatica at the Independent
Saturday, November 8 — bullet tooth at a secret underground location
Not familiar? Listen to George's Groove, or the collab with Y U QT, Technique.
Sunday, November 9 — David Harness (day party) at Audio
Thursday, November 13 — Cut Copy at the Regency Ballroom
Thursday, November 13 — Rochelle Jordan at the Independent
Friday, November 14 — Kryptogram at Audio
Saturday, November 15 — Booka Shade (Live) at the Great Northern
Saturday, November 15 — Chris Lake at Bill Graham
Sunday, November 16 — Klangkarussell at Hotel Via rooftop
Tuesday, November 18 — Burna Boy at Oakland Arena
Tuesday, November 18 — David Byrne at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium
Tuesday, November 18 — Grizzly Bear at the Warfield
Wednesday, November 19 — Grizzly Bear at Fox Theater
Friday, November 21 — Jack's Mannequin at the Warfield (MFEO tour)
Friday, November 21 — Mark Knight at Audio
Friday, November 21 — Yotto at Gold Bar Hangar (on Alameda Island)
Saturday, November 22 — Disco Lines at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium
Saturday, November 22 — Silva Bumpa at Audio
Not familiar? Listen to When I'm With You.
Saturday, November 22 — Sam Alfred at Monarch
Not familiar? Listen to Feel the Friction.
Saturday, November 22 — Nero (DJ set) at Public Works
Wednesday, November 26 — Of Monsters and Men at Fox Theater
Friday, November 28 & Saturday, November 29 — Sara Landry at Palace of the Fine Arts
Friday, November 28 — MPH at 1015 Folsom
Not familiar? Listen to Spend the Night.
Saturday, November 29 — TEED (DJ set) at Public Works
Saturday, November 29 — Nils Hoffman at the Regency Ballroom
Sunday, November 30 — Jens Lekman at the Independent
December
Thursday, December 4 — pluko at Brick and Mortar Music Hall
Friday, December 5 — Motion City Soundtrack and Say Anything at the Warfield
Saturday, December 6 — IN PARALLEL at Monarch
I've listened to this DJ set of theirs many times at work this week, so seems like it'd be a fun set.
Saturday, December 6 — Pattie Gonia at The Warfield
Friday, December 12 — Patrick Topping at Audio
Friday, December 19 — Amtrac DJ set at Audio
Friday, December 19 — FISHER with Chris Lorenzo, Partyboi69, and more at Moscone Center
I mean, is this the most novelty venue of all novelty venues?!
Friday, December 19 — Plain White T's at August Hal
Saturday, December 20 — FISHER and others at Moscone Center
Saturday, December 20 — O'Flynn and Banksia at Audio
Excited for this show. If you're not familiar, Swiss Sensation is his latest banger and Sunspear is my most-listened-to track of his.
Friday, December 26 — San Holo at the Midway
Tuesday, December 30 — Four Tet and Skrillex at Pier 80 Warehouse
NYE
Lineups are up and out for NYE and boy howdy is it stacked this year... all of these are recommended so far!
Wednesday, December 31 — TOKiMONSTA, Sam Binga, and more at Public Works
Wednesday, December 31 — Swedish House Mafia at Pier 80 Warehouse (presale link)
Wednesday, December 31 — Four Tet at 1015 Folsom (already sold out)
Thursday, January 1 — It's a New Day / Breakfast of Champions at the Great Northern featuring Pangaea, Robin S (live), Claude Von Stroke, and many more names that I do not recognize.
I hear there's going to be a squish stage this time, look out for that lineup for sure...
Next year…
Thursday, January 8 — RJD2 at Rickshaw Stop for Popscene
Like 20 dates in February I'm not listing them all I'm sorry — Sam Smith at the Castro
Friday, February 13 — Atmosphere at the Fox Theater
Thursday, February 19th – Sunday, March 1st 2026 — Noise Pop Festival, featuring:
Friday, February 20 — The Pains of Being Pure at Heart at Rickshaw Stop
Saturday, February 27 — Clipping. at the UC Theatre
Saturday, February 27 & Sunday, February 28 — Tortoise at Great American Music Hall
Thursday, March 5 — Franc Moody at the Regency Ballroom
Thursday, March 12 — Miguel at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium
Thursday, April 16 & Friday, April 17 — The Format at the Castro
Tuesday, May 5 — Chet Faker at The Warfield
Other SF events
Some recurring events in the city to check out:
Inner Sunset Flea Market on second Sundays
If book talks, history walks, music-making classes, or public lectures are more your speed, here's what's going on this month and beyond:
Saturday, November 1 — Alex Werth with Liam O’Donoghue - On Loop: Black Sonic Politics in Oakland at Book Passage in the Ferry Building
Saturday, November 1 — Pistachio Wars at the Roxie Theater
Q&A with filmmakers Rowan Wernham & Yasha Levine (also the intrepid film subject), moderated by viral content creator, Josh! Journalist Yasha Levine follows a lead on a water sale between a farmer and a small desert town—and discovers a hidden side to California’s healthy snack industry.
Sunday, November 2 — Alex Madva on the book Somebody Should Do Something: How Anyone Can Help Create Social Change at Book Passage in the Ferry Building
Monday, November 3 — Sam Altman and Steve Kerr in conversation with Manny Yekutiel at Sydney Goldstein Theater
This just feels like the most Bay Area of lineups tbh. Like what.
Monday, November 3 & Wednesday, November 5 — Techno Blueprint: Making Techno Music with Ableton 12 at Gray Area
Wednesday, November 5 — Deep Fakes: A Critical Lexicon of Digital Museology at Gray Area
Wednesday, November 5 — Julia Ioffe: A Feminist History of Modern Russia at the Commonwealth Club
Thursday, November 6 — Music Videos: A "dance-fueled night of rhythm, style, and screen-shaking visuals" at SHACK15
Thursday, November 6 — Patricia Lockwood to celebrate the release of her latest novel, Will There Ever Be Another You with Rita Bullwinkel at Green Apple Books on the Park
Thursday, November 6 — Booksmith presents: Anna North with Esmé Weijun Wang / Bog Queen at the Booksmith
Friday, November 7 – Sunday, November 9 — 24th Annual San Francisco Electronic Music Festival at Gray Area
Saturday, November 8 & Sunday, November 9 — La Cocina SF Street Food Festival at China Basin Park
Saturday, November 8 & Sunday, November 9 — Micaya presents The 27th Annual San Francisco International Hip Hop DanceFest at Palace of Fine Arts
Monday, November 10 — Tim Wu: The Age of Extraction at the Commonwealth Club
I've followed his work for awhile so I caved and got a ticket to this…
Monday, November 10 — Annie Leibovitz / WOMEN at The Palace of Fine Arts
Wednesday, November 12 — Kate Crawford on Mapping Empires at the Long Now
I still have not read her book Atlas of AI but it haunts me from my bookshelf... I got a ticket to this!
Wednesday, November 12 — Malala Yousafzai with Ayesha Curry / Finding My Way at The Palace of Fine Arts
Wednesday, November 12 — Elyse Myers and her new book That's a Great Question, I'd Love to Tell You! at Sydney Goldstein Theater
Thursday, November 13 — Brian Barth for the release of his book, Front Street: Resistance and Rebirth in the Tent Cities of Techlandia, with Nuala Bishari and members of Wood Street Commons at Green Apple Books on the Park
Saturday, November 15 — Freeway Plan Routes: Never Built, a Western Freeway Walk and Talk with Shaping SF
Sunday, November 16 — Come See Me In The Good Light at the Roxie Theater
Come See Me In The Good Light is a poignant and unexpectedly funny love story about poets Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley facing an incurable cancer diagnosis with joy, wit and an unshakable partnership. Through laughter and unwavering love, they transform pain into purpose, and mortality into a moving celebration of resilience.
Monday, November 17 — Padma Lakshmi in conversation with W. Kamau Bell at Sydney Goldstein Theater for City Arts and Lectures
Tuesday, November 18 & Thursday, November 20 — Weirding AI: Fine-Tuning for Poets & Artists at Gray Area
Tuesday, November 18 — The Moth Storyslam: Manners at Public Works
Friday, November 21 — Mindy Seu: A Sexual History of the Internet: Participatory Lecture Performance + Book Launch at Gray Area
Saturday, November 22 — Market Street During and After WWII walking tour by Shaping SF
Saturday, November 22 — Stephanie Burt on her new book Taylor's Version: The Poetic and Musical Genius of Taylor Swift at Book Passage at the Ferry Building
Music lately
You can always follow me on Bandcamp to see what I've bought lately...
I was listening to the Format's discography as I wrote part of this because of their newly announced tour. Listening back it's clear that their music is such a product of the times, but they were one of my favorite bands in high school. I still remember listening to the CD for their album Dog Problems (which I had checked out from the library and promptly ripped to the family computer, then burned to my own CD copy) on repeat so many times that my sister threatened to stop doing homework in the same room as me unless I turned it off. Sorry, T.
Something about their music really hit a groove in my head, the unabashed sing-it-loud vocals and the earnestness of the lyrics. When I was reflecting on my favorite music from 2024, I realized that a lot of the music had similar patterns of soaring vocals over a dropped-out wall of sound that had built up to that moment (really, like a lot of the tracks).
Aside from listening to a lot of The Format, I've been really enjoying HAAi's new album HUMANiSE — no domineering singles but instead a series of great tracks that flow together so well. Eagerly awaiting Tourist's new album, and enjoying this Double Take EP by Glockta which did indeed cause me to do an auditory double take as I was crushing through my BandCamp email recommendations. Check out Ricochet!
Other notes
I'm about halfway through Mood Machine and wishing I started it months ago when it came out (I preordered it)... reading a library e-book despite owning the hard copy because I find it easier to highlight nonfiction in that case, but definitely at risk of exceeding the 10% highlight export limit 👀
Having a lot of thoughts about music, like what it means to keep track of my favorite songs, and how the quantification of music listening (that I do with Last.fm and that Spotify somewhat fetishizes with Spotify Wrapped) can lead to a false equivocation of "most listens" with "best song" or "most important music". Or perhaps how capitalism has alienated us from our labor and AI exists to alienate us from our culture. Or what different discovery filters exist to make a song "locally popular" to me, given that I'm largely buying and listening to my own music. Or what it means when "perfect fit content" is moving beyond "standard muzak" and becoming (perhaps) even more present background music in various locations, which is in contrast to the personal resonance that I've felt with "background music". Like when I worked at Old Navy in high school and college and the store soundtrack is a big reason I got into Tokyo Police Club and why I can't listen to Fergie's Glamorous ever again, or when I was traveling in Copenhagen and discovered a Joe & the Juice (before they opened all sorts of US locations) because it had free wi-fi, but stayed because the music was incredible. Spotify might be fixated on commoditizing "lean-back music" but I'm fixated on the moments where "lean-back music" made me lean forward.
Anyway, more to come there when I finish the book, and just another month until my annual Spotify Wrapped breakdown post. I've also been considering a reflection on where AI-generated music is now, given that it's been 3 years since I wrote "Will we see prompt-based music generation?" and the answer is more firmly "yes, here it is" now. Let me know what you're curious about there, if anything! Haven't started digging in...
One last thought about music discovery struck me while I was wandering through the office and heard my coworker mention he was listening to a playlist of 90s trance — a playlist created by Armada Music (the record label) on Spotify. I mentioned that I'd heard of the label because of Bandcamp, but he'd never heard of Bandcamp. Reminds me how sometimes you can spend a lot of time inhabiting an ecosystem of sites and they are ultra familiar and known to you, but totally undiscovered by other people. Sometimes the internet can seem really small.
Oh yeah, I also gave a lightning talk about how music metadata gets made (and what it's used for) a few months ago, and finally published the slides and extra notes: Music metadata: What it is and why it matters.