Outside Lands had a lot of pop in 2024.
Although the genre has long been present, this year’s music festival focused on mainstream pop.
It opened on Friday with Renee Rapp, the actress who plays Regina George so wonderfully in this year’s film adaptation of “Mean Girls” and is currently establishing a compelling solo career as a pop artist. The festival was scheduled to close on Sunday with a performance by Chappell Roan, the singer of “Good Luck, Babe!” who is the most talked-about act of the entire three-day program.
And in between, fans were able to experience up-and-coming young pop star Sabrina Carpenter in an entertaining headliner set on the festival’s biggest stage – Lands End – on Saturday.
“Outside Lands, will you scream for me?” asked Carpenter.
We certainly would, and we did so virtually non-stop throughout Carpenter’s roughly 90-minute set. The dance-pop star – who rose to fame in 2016 with her work in the Disney Channel remake of “Adventures in Babysitting” and the popular series “Girl Meets World” – drew a large, enthusiastic crowd to see her perform music from her five (soon to be six) album catalog.
It was her first time headlining a festival and she smashed all records (Golden Gate) on her debut. Together with a backing band and a dance troupe, she put on a dizzying pop spectacle that showcased Carpenter’s talent as a singer and her enormous star status in equal measure.
And that star status is set to grow even further when she releases her sixth album, “Short n’ Sweet,” which I fully expect will debut at No. 1 on the pop charts when it’s released on August 23rd.
She gave a taste of the album by playing three numbers, two of which (“Please Please Please” and “Espresso”) fans already knew and loved, and another (“Slim Pickins”) had all the makings of another hit for the 25-year-old Pennsylvania native. All three numbers were very well received by the large crowd.
“Bay Area, it’s so crazy to be here with you guys,” she said. “There are so many of you.”
One of the highlights of her performance was when she invited Grammy winner Kacey Musgraves on stage and the two extremely talented women sang a lively version of the chart hit “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’” by Nancy Sinatra.
(Musgraves returns to NorCal next month for two shows — Sept. 23 at the Golden 1 Center in Sacramento and Sept. 24 at the Chase Center in San Francisco — in support of this year’s album, “Deeper Well.”)
All in all, Carpenter made a great use of an opportunity that should have gone to someone else, but Tyler, the Creator — who was originally scheduled to headline Day 2 on the Lands End stage — pulled out for unknown reasons. (He also canceled his appearance at Lollapalooza last weekend in Chicago.)
So Outside Lands organizers challenged Carpenter to take on the challenge, and she accepted. Plus, it was a great way to warm up for her upcoming concert tour, which kicks off in late September and is expected to further establish Carpenter among the top pop stars of 2024.
Sabrina Carpenter setlist, based on our notes and information from setlist.fm:
1. “Fast Times”
2. “Read your mind”
3. “Evil”
4. “Already over”
5. “Tornado warnings”
6. “Opposite”
7. “Interlude”
8. “I bet you want to”
9. “Paris”
10. “Feather”
11. “These boots are made for walking”
12. “Please, please, please”
13. “Slim Pickins”
14. “Because I liked a boy”
Encore:
15. “Nonsense”
16. “Espresso”
Originally published:
