After giving way last fall for the Come and Take It Comedy Takeover, Houston Whatever Fest is back. The genre-hopping, five-stage festival will return to the venues and streets around Warehouse Live for its third installment April 1 and 2, with a lineup headlined by Cold War Kids, AWOLNATION, Roky Erickson, Ghostface Killah, Robert DeLong, Asher Roth, The Faint, American Football, Soul Rebels Brass Band, Big Freedia and Krayzie Bone.
Houston-based performers this year include Lyric Michelle; Frog Hair; Guilla & iLL Faded; Another Run; Secret Sands; We Were Wolves; The Cops; Dollie Barnes; Vodi; Giant Kitty; El Lago; Rose Ette; To Whom It May; a “HOU Next” hip-hop showcase featuring WhyJae, Rizzoo Rizzoo, T2 the Ghetto Hippie, Doeman, Soul of Sherif, Tim Woods and DJ Mr. Rogers; and a Roky Moon & BOLT! reunion.
Come and Take It notwithstanding, HWF is also notable as the first Houston festival to successfully combine music and standup comedy, and among this year’s scheduled funnymen and women are Hari Kondabolu, Michael Winslow (the “voices guy” from the Police Academy movies), Ali Saadiq, Sam Moril, Jo Firestone, Tim Dillon, Geoff Tate, Emma Arnold and many others.
The full 2017 HWF lineup is in the poster below. Tickets are on sale now at houstonwhateverfest.com.
This article appears in Jan 19-25, 2017.
