John Waters’s summertime punk-rock hoedown Mosswood Meltdown will return for a 17th year, this time with ageless wonder Iggy Pop topping Saturday’s bill, riot grrls Bikini Kill headlining Sunday, and the Dead Milkmen in the mix too.
It’s only mid-January, and half of us still have our Christmas trees up, but Bay Area concert promoters would like you to be already busting your budget on summer festival tickets for shows that aren’t for another six months, thank you very much. On Tuesday of this week, the wine country music festival BottleRock announced its 2026 lineup for Memorial Day weekend music festival, and general admission tickets went on sale yesterday. And also already on sale are tickets for late July’s John Waters two-day mosh pit spectacular Mosswood Meltdown.
So Mosswood Meltdown 2026 tickets are already on sale, and we have a full line-up just announced. KRON4 reports that this year’s Mosswood Meltdown features 78-year-old ageless punk Iggy Pop as the Saturday night (July 18) headliner, 1990s riot grrl sensation Bikini Kill headlining Sunday (July 18), and other Sunday performers including Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein’s Ramones cover band The Return of Jackie & Judy, and snotty 80s pop-punk powerhouse the Dead Milkmen.
For those of you under 50 years old, Saturday’s bill also includes Otoboke Beaver, Scowl, the Spits, the Dirtbombs, The Fadeaways, and Primitive Ring, while Sunday also features Frankie & The Witch Fingers, Frightwig, and Las Nubes.
And it was announced earlier this week that Stockton-based indie rock heroes Pavement will play the Friday, July 17 pre-party show. That show is also at Mosswood Park, but requires a separate ticket.
Those tickets, by the way, are $179 General Admission for both days, $129 for just Saturday, and $89 for just Sunday. Yes there are higher-priced VIP tickets if that's your thing, and the Pavement pre-party tickets are $99.
Just like last year, this year’s Mosswood Meltdown is no longer on July 4 weekend, and is instead on the third weekend of July. So it seems like that calendar change is going to be permanent for this festival going forward.
Image: BEUNINGEN, NETHERLANDS - JULY 5: Iggy Pop performs live on stage at Down the Rabbit Hole festival on July 5, 2025 in Beuningen, Netherlands. (Photo by Paul Bergen/Redferns)
